Secularization of Religion in In the Beauty of the Lilies

摘要

With the change of social structure, especially the appearance of consumer society, the Protestant ethics and religious spirit of industriousness and continence gradually disintegrates. The collapse of the institutional religion and the transformation of conventional Christian belief is a chronic disease of American society and is also the basic reason which creates predicament for the souls of ordinary Americans. The characters in Updike’s novel Lilies attempt to seek one sort of balance between the sacred world and the secular life.