Society Without God: What the Least Religious Nations Can Tell Us about Contentment

The Scandinavian societies have been a byword for secularism as much as for social democracy for at least fifty years. When in 1960 President Eisenhower made a public reference to “a fairly friendly European country” where suicides, drunkenness, and lack of ambition seemed to have been the product of socialistic policies, he caused something of a diplomatic incident with Sweden. He might just as well have added secularism, sexual license, and neutralism to the charge sheet as Swedish welfarism was at the time just as much associated by religious conservatives with these deviations from virtue. At a time of the widespread resurgence of religion across the world Scandinavia and some other parts of northern Europe continue to stand out against the trend and represent as much laggards in this respect as they were once celebrated or condemned as pioneers of some brave new world. Zuckerman's book looks at Denmark and Sweden which he calls “probably the least religious countries in the world, and possibly in the history of the world” (p. 2). His conclusion, per contra Eisenhower then and the New Christian Right now, is to find them, despite their secularity, or maybe even because of it, to be remarkably healthy, prosperous, and contented societies.