The past is malleable and flexible, changing as our recollection interprets and re-explains what has happened.

There is a continuum of values between the churches and the general community. What distinguishes the handling of these values in the churches is mainly the heavier dosage of religious vocabulary involved

In all advanced industrial societies, education has become the single most important vehicle of upward mobility.

He who sups with the devil had better have a long spoon. The devilry of modernity has its own magic: The [believer] who sups with it will find his spoon getting shorter and shorter--until that last supper in which he is left alone at the table, with no spoon at all and with an empty plate. The devil, one may guess, will by then have gone away to more interesting company.

If you say simply that pressures toward democracy are created by the market, I would say yes

The past is malleable and flexible, changing as our recollection interprets and re-explains what has happened.

Even if one is interested only in one's own society, which is one's prerogative, one can understand that society much better by comparing it with others.