"Unwell in a New Way"

I just finished The Contemplative Pastor by Eugene Peterson (the guy who wrote The Message). He's become one of my favorite writers of late. This wasn't my favorite book of his, but it was good. I should have blogged on more, but time didn't permit.

Anyhow, there's a great chapter on sin as a theological notion - humans aren't close to God and don't serve Him. But Peterson correctly notes that we're able to distance ourselves from the concept of sin. We need to localize our sin to our lives, to our times. This book was written in 1989 and he says the sin of his day was "episodes of adolescence." That is, people worship youth culture and that adults are still functioning with their emotions, traumas, and difficulties like adolescents. That, I guess, is how people in 1989 were "unwell" (sinners) "in a new way."

One of the issues for this adolescent perspective is the "absence of historical sense." Every problem is dealt with from scratch, there's little learning from history. Learning too often comes from experience rather than trusting history or obeying God. Adam and Eve opted for experience over obedience.

I feel that way sometimes and I don't think this challenge of "adolescence" is out of date - even almost twenty years later. What do you think? How are we "unwell in a new way" in our day and age?