Feelings of guilt can be a good thing ...

Especially if you're guilty.  In Charles Lewis's column, he lays the blame on secularism for the trend away from personal responsibility, concluding:

... being forced to face one’s own sins can produce guilt, as it should. The point is to feel the pain of those wrongs, make it right with God and move on. It is the reason it is called the Day of Atonement and not the Day of Whining.

... freedom comes from an obedience to greater truths. It demands attention to the details of life. It asks that life not be a blur of excuses but freely exercised choices. And then it asks you to be an adult and take responsibility for all that you do.

Good points, but laying the blame on secularism doesn't quite do it for me.  It's too broad a brush.  The decline of personal responsibility and rise of whining can be more precisely attributed to neo-liberalism which has for decades been promoting bleeding heart social policy, criminal justice, education (eg. the cult of self- esteem), and on .. and on ....  A good case in point is documented in another excellent NP article this week - the remarkable recovery of New York City from decades of decline under liberal policies.  NYC was saved by secular conservatism.

The entire NP series on the death of personal responsibility is well worth the read.