Atwood’s book on Debt (Payback: Debt and the Shadow Side of Wealth) is brilliant. Although she infuriates me at times with her glib comments on Christian religion, most of her observations are right-on-the-mark. Here’s one of many:

The recent fundamentalist Christian Church—especially in the American South—has identified sinning largely with sins of the flesh—especially sexual sins—though excessive drinking and drug-taking feature in there as well. The Catholic Church has also been in the sex-as-sin business for quite a long time. Whatever the intent, the effect has been to divert attention from money sins to sexual ones.

She could have went further: in many ways Western Christianity has turned mammon into a demigod.