I think you're truly correct, and I have been saying something very similar in here and elsewhere for some time now....
The late 1970's and the 1980's were abominable times for "real" Christianity. You had these fundamentalist wackadoodles on TV with crazy snow-white hair running around in seersucker suits Benny Hinn style grabbing people by the head shouting "receeeeeeeeeive the Holy Uh-Spirituhhhhhhh and beyuuuuh saayyyyyyyyvuddduhhhhhhh" as they grab an old lady in the head and knock her over on the stage. She gets up supposedly healed and dances the Macarena. Then the same seersucker evangelist begs people to hand over as much $$$$$$ as they can to his psycho ministry.
We hear
"ARE YOU SAVED!?"
"You must support the State of Israel if you want salvation!"
"Have you accepted Jesus Christ as your personal Lord and Savior? Then you're in!!!"
"Come up and receive the anointinggggggg"
"hell, fire, brimstone, hell, flames, burning, hot coals, lake of fire, burning, sizzling, hot, burrrrrrn!"
You hear nary a word from these loons about helping the orphans or the widows, nothing about stopping abortion or giving back to the community. You hear nothing about God's genuine love or His victory over death. It's all about the Cross and a snapshot moment of accepting a savior, and essentially that's it. It was a time of empty and silly promises, greed, bloviating, and prosperity gospel nonsense.
In high school, all the "saved" kids I knew were super hypocrites and most were on drugs. That's why I turned to Buddhism and Eastern mysticism as a teenager. On my SAT test, when asked religion, I put "Buddhist." My mom was less than happy about that. But at the time, I saw Christianity as a bunch of morally bankrupt idiots who hid behind the robe of Jesus just being "saved" and conducting business as usual. With Buddhism I saw meditation, charity, calm, quiet stillness, prayer, incense, peace, fasting, the "Middle Way" between the extremes, and a leader in Siddhartha Gautama who advocated a very sane and coherent placidity to life.
Little did I know that, sans the emptying of one's "self" and the idea of Nirvana and other stuff, Orthodoxy was what I was seeking----a coherent leader (Christ Jesus), incense, meditation, quiet calm, seeking after peace, fasting, the middle way, charity, love.....
Many Americans saw the TV evangelist maniacs as genuine Christianity. I know I did in a way. Now the chickens have come home to roost and that whole Generation X I belong to plus the Baby Boomers are fast into atheism, cynicism, abortion, euthanasia, legalized dope, socialism and surrender, gimmee my free stuff, the LGBT lie, and every other thing they see as the antithesis of the 1980's TV evangelical hallelujah squad.
I always tell people, "Imagine what America would've been like had it been founded on Holy Orthodoxy!" I wonder if we'd have had a 1960's hippie movement or the drug culture we have or the rampant perversion, LGBT sickness, abortion baby-killing machinery so beloved, and so much cynicism. Orthodoxy shows a Jesus triumphant, victor over victim, a dragon-slaying hero. It shows us a loving God not a vengeful blood-thirsty legal figure. It shows us hope, joy, and ultimately that beautiful paschal resurrection. Our Church is so holistic, sane, rational yet mysterious, so focused on finding peace and sharing it with others. We have so many good clergy (2 of them in this forum!) and so many good parishioners. There is so much that is beautiful and sane in Orthodoxy. I still say it's unacceptable what a "best kept secret" we are. That needs to stop.
The sad world we're in comes from sin, but also false representations and dumb theology from people who were clueless....
When one reads things like this it becomes clearer and clearer that some of the "pro-choice" movement's loudest voices are people who grew up in fundamentalist evangelical households where they were force fed scripture verses and condemned for any action that was perceived to be in opposition of this movement. When they finally got old enough to escape this world, they ran as far away from it as possible, and into a new world that completely contradicted every social norm and spiritual belief of their old world.
I see this time and again when you read pieces from left wing authors. They write about growing up as a "Christian" and feeling choked and stifled by their upbringing. They then project these feelings about Christianity onto everybody - Catholics, Orthodox, Lutherans, Methodists etc.
The thing is, Orthodoxy is way different from Evangelical Protestantism. Sure, it is a morally conservative religion, but it is not oppressive in ways like the author describes her experience of Christianity to be. Orthodox Christians are taught to love human life and treasure it through our sacraments, through our connection with the saints, through the liturgy which unites us and brings us together. We see in each other real people struggling on the path to salvation, just like us. Our mission is to pray for each other and provide aid to the fallen. Our mission is not to thump bibles over people's heads while reverencing Ronald Reagan with our free hand. We work towards God.
And what of people who have had an abortion? Or who have sexual relationships outside of marriage, or with people of the same sex? We do not condemn them and say, "the bible says that you are damned to hell." We pray for them and acknowledge that we are all fallen. We offer confession as a way for these people to heal, and offer a hand of friendship when they ask for it. That's quite a difference.
As more and more people feel oppressed and spiritually devoid in their traditions, we need to open our door for them so that they do not fall away from God and end up wielding a sword against him. We still need to remain true to the faith that we inherited, but we need to demonstrate the Christian virtue of love in our actions, so that through our witness people might choose to lay down their weapons and join us on the path to salvation.