The jeremiad became a rhetorical vehicle to demand innovative social change rather than a call for the community to repent of well-worn and familiar sins. The tight connection between jeremiad and national covenant was loosened, but it was not entirely eliminated. In fact, the reconstructed jeremiad presented its call for social change as clearly demanded by faithfulness to the nation’s deepest values. Needless to say, those opposed to the proposed change did not understand the values of the national covenant in the same way. The nation’s periodic culture wars have reflected and reinforced each side’s configuration of its opponents as inimical to the nation’s basic commitments.
Cathleen Kaveny, Prophecy Without Contempt: Religious Discourse in the Public Square, 225.
