Is There a Lutheran Version of Catholic Guilt?

In church circles, we often use the term legalism. I may have mentioned it before. There are two extremes in Christian attitude and behavior -- Legalism and Licentiousness. You can probably guess what they're all about. In a Christian context, the latter means presuming upon God's grace, doing whatever you feel like because you know you can be forgiven. Legalism is the opposite -- always trying to be good, as if your salvation depended upon it (which is ironic, because it's your own sin that you're being saved from).

I fall way the hell on the legalistic side. In my case, it seems to be primarily a matter of temperament, of nature over nurture (though there have certainly been those who added to the problem). I'm naturally a religious person -- not one who easily believes (far from it), but one who is inclined to follow rules. At least on the surface, I'm good at being good, and I don't deal well with the consequences of my missteps.

When I lost my childhood faith in God at the age of 13, my response was to up the religion -- read the Bible before I go to sleep, make my parents drive me to church (a half-hour away at the time), and in every way try to be as close to perfect as possible. I knew I had been baptized Lutheran as a baby, so I started going to Lutheran churches. I took my first Communion. I went through Confirmation. And the whole time, I felt guilty for not believing. Right up into college, I was convinced that I could do better at everything if I just tried hard enough. I could have the perfect figure if I stopped eating potato chips. I could be the best trombone player in the world if I stopped watching TV and practiced instead. I could believe if I prayed harder. Of course, I was never able to work my way up to any of those things. (Faith did come, but not because I achieved it.)

Have you ever listened to Garrison Keillor's A Prarie Home Companion? He tells stories of the fictional Lake Woebegon, a town in Minnesota full of Lutheran Norwegian farmers. Whenever he talks about how uptight they are, I recognize myself. Example: The church members go on a little cruise down the river. The boat lists and some people fall overboard. The pastor feels obligated to be with them, so he jumps into the water. That whole weird, useless sense of obligation is me all over. I don't know if it's genetics or what, but somehow, when atoms smashed together to form the gloriously unstable chemistry experiment that is my brain, they created a legalism machine.

Don't go anywhere. There's more to this story, but things were getting long so I'm splitting it up.