As “the operative faith” of the American people,” the American Way of Life was a bona fide religion, Herberg argued, complete with “its rituals, its holidays and its liturgy, its saints and its sancta.” Herberg listed the doctrinal elements of the American Way—capitalist economics, individual responsibility, a facile idealism—and noted its incarnation in a host of objects, from the flag to indoor plumbing to Coca-Cola bottles, the enchanted tokens of postwar capitalism.
