[annalex]

You can even restrict it to the past 40 years. But the radical individualism was set in motion by the Reformation, it just took a while to get the ball really rolling.

[redgolum]

Maybe. Though the “spinning off of restraints” has also been traced back to the Black Death years.

Though that has been also been cited as a cause of the Reformation.

[Cronos]

You can even restrict it to the past 40 years. But the radical individualism was set in motion by the Reformation, it just took a while to get the ball really rolling.

As a Catholic, i'd like to agree with you, but the fact is that church attendance has dropped since the second world war -- since that event. The next generation after that was the Baby boomers

and THEY, single-handedly, made the West godless. I suspect it was because they saw the effects of WWII and the carnage, yet didn't have the discipline and the perseverence their parents had. A greedy generation (with many notable exceptions of course, but I talk in generalities here)