A Look at Romans 13:1-7, Must Christians ‘Obey’ the Government? Part 1 #christianityandpolitics

Vice-President Mike Pence’s speech at the Southern Baptist Convention, thankfully, sparked a debate over whether he should be welcomed or disinvited.  Pence’s defenders predictably quote Romans 13:1 as their argument for welcoming a political speech at the convention.

In Romans 13 the apostle Paul says:  “let everyone submit to the governing authorities.”  So, that means Pence needs to be given the time normally allotted for group prayer in order to deliver a partisan, political speech?

In light of this current debate, I thought I’d post a few serialized excerpts from my book, I Pledge Allegiance, that looks carefully at what Paul actually says in Romans 13:1-7.  The complete excerpt is from pages 56-62.  Here goes:

“Paul had specific concerns in mind as he wrote his letter to the Roman church and describing a comprehensive political theology of church-state relations was not one of them. Recalling the church’s precarious standing with the local government in a time of tax revolt is far more illuminating of Paul’s argument in this chapter. The early church lived within an authoritarian state. There was no expectation that the average person could exert any meaningful influence in bringing about broad-based, systemic social or political change. Neither Paul nor his readers had any conception of participatory democracy. Modern strategies for popular political and social transformation through civil disobedience and nonviolent resistance were inconceivable at the time. Naturally, this does not mean that Paul was devoid of political opinions or that he might not write something of universal political significance for the church, regardless of its particular location in time and space, but it does mean that properly understanding Romans 13:1–7 requires that we keep the actual historical situation foremost in our mind.

Observing God’s Order

“Several details in Romans 13 need elaboration for Paul’s ethical instruction to become clear for the modern reader. The chapter’s opening sentences twice affirm that government authority is put in place by God (v. 1). God has established a hierarchy of civil authority to regulate the otherwise strong tendency toward unruliness in human society. Anyone who rebels against this ordering of authority, therefore, is rebelling against God’s design (v. 2). Two details of Paul’s vocabulary clarify his point.

“First, Paul describes civil authority as part of the way God “orders” the world. This idea of God’s ordering, organizing, appointing or arranging is central to the passage, with several derivatives of the verbal root “to order” appearing five times in three verses (vv. 1 [twice], 2 [twice], 5 [once]). It is clearly Paul’s key concept. God “establishes/orders/institutes governing authorities” (v. 1) not by bringing any particular leader to power—though he may at times also do that—but by providentially creating structures of governing authority that exercise responsibilities delegated by God. When Paul says that “there is no authority except that which God has established” (v. 1), he is not claiming that divine providence places all rulers in their specific positions of power. He is saying that the various stations of authority that make up civil government are put in place by God’s providential ordering of human society.

“Understanding Paul’s use of “ordering” vocabulary helps to answer long- standing questions about Christian obedience to tyrannical rulers. The problematic logic, based on Romans 13, usually goes like this: If every governing authority is put in place by God, so that disobeying the authority is the equivalent of disobeying God, then even a man like Adolf Hitler must have been put in place by God, and disobeying even Hitler becomes the equivalent of disobeying God. This was, in fact, the logic used by many German Christians who swore allegiance to Hitler, the “divinely appointed” Führer.

“Though some additional arguments will be advanced below for addressing the question of obeying Hitler, Paul’s emphasis on ordering rather than personnel makes it clear that God establishes positions of authority, positions that are occupied at different times by different leaders of greater or lesser ability, wisdom, and moral fiber. Paul does not make God responsible for ordaining every leader who ever fills an office. Christians are obligated to respect the role of government per se in their lives, but that is a far cry from being obligated to obey, much less enthusiastically endorse, every wretched leader braying for national allegiance to his every foolish decision.

Subordination vs. Obedience

“A second—equally important—matter of vocabulary arises once we notice that Paul does not command believers always “to obey” the governing authorities (Rom.13:1). Translations that render Romans 13:1 along the lines of “obey the government” (Living Bible, Contemporary English Version, Good News Translation, Worldwide English) seriously misrepresent Paul’s words. Instead of commanding obedience, Paul tells the church “to be subject/to submit” to the way God has “ordered” governing authority. If Paul had intended for the church always to obey the government, he could have used the common word hupokouō (obey) to make his point. But he doesn’t do that; instead, Paul stays with the “order” word group and directs believers to be “subordinate (vv. 1, 5) to the authorities that “have been ordered” by God. In effect, he is reiterating the need for believers to cooperate with God’s design in ordering human society.

“Following the logic of verse 3 is crucial for understanding the full significance of Paul’s refusal to tell the church that they must always obey the government. Notice that Paul’s description of civil authority is utterly idealistic, in so far as he assumes that the church can always count on the government to faithfully enforce God’s expectations. “Rulers are not a terror to those who do what is right but to those who do wrong. If you don’t want to be afraid of the one in authority, do what is right and the authority will praise you” (my translation). Had Paul intended to deliver a lesson on Christian obedience, he missed a perfect opportunity to do so. Notice that he does not say, “Shed your fear of authority by doing what you are told; be obedient.” Instead, Paul counsels the church to free itself from any fear of authority by always “doing what is right.”

“At least two assumptions are at work in this statement. First, Paul’s argument assumes that government authorities will never be corrupt. Their judgments will always faithfully reflect God’s judgments concerning what is good and bad, right and wrong, just and unjust. But we all know better. The claim that “rulers are not a terror to those who do what is right but to those who do wrong” is not always true, and Paul knew it. The civil rights demonstrators who walked across the bridge in Selma, Alabama, with Dr. Martin Luther King in 1965 were excoriated by the state’s governor, condemned by the local sheriff, and beaten with clubs by the local police. It is no secret to us or to Paul that rulers can easily reward those who do wrong and become a terror to those who do what is right, but Paul is describing the ideal, the way things are supposed to be, for the sake of his argument.

“Paul’s second assumption is that when government functions as it should, citizens never need to be afraid about doing what is right because “the right” is always what governing authorities will want from their citizens. Those who do what is right can be confident in their Christian obedience because they are simultaneously being submissive to authority, as God requires. In an ideal world, a believer’s act of submission will be synonymous with obedience because the perfect, incorruptible government will never ask its citizens to disobey God.

“Unpacking these assumptions at the root of Paul’s idealization of earthly authority also exposes the prick hidden in his argument. Paul knows that the Roman government does not measure up to this ideal. He cannot possibly in- struct the Roman church always to obey a government that made public sacrifice

Roman Christians were thrown to the lions for refusing to obey the law

to the Roman pantheon a civic responsibility; but he can tell them always to do what is right. When Christians act on what they know is right and those actions coincide with the government’s expectations, Paul’s argument predicts the happy outcome—“do what is right and the authorities will praise you.” But when doing what is right puts the believer on a collision course with government expectations, Paul’s instructions take on even greater significance: “Still do what is right.”

“God’s own perfect government awaits the coming age, when Christ is seated on his earthly throne. As long as Jesus’s disciples live in this world, however, they must anticipate times when the governing authorities will not praise them for doing what they believe is right in the sight of God. So Paul diplomatically commends the Roman government as much as he is able to in his description of the ideal, but he also assiduously avoids giving the church advice that could eventually lead it to compromise with the ungodly designs of a government that is out of step with God’s vision of truth and justice.

“Christians are not commanded always to obey their government or its laws. The church is told to be submissive and always do what is right. Obedience is one way of showing submission to authority, but submission and obedience are not synonymous. In some circumstances the submission God requires will work itself out as disobedience to governing authority. When a government expects believers to do things that the latter believe are wrong, things that will compromise their relationship with Christ, things that will violate their kingdom citizenship, then godly adherence to what is right demands conscientious disobedience against the government. At that point, faithful disciples remain submissive to misguided governmental authority, not by compromising their Christian conscience, but by freely submitting themselves to whatever punishment the authorities threaten to impose for disobedience. Living out the values of the kingdom of God always comes first for the followers of Jesus.”

Venezuela is on the American Empire’s Chopping Block

Yesterday’s post addressed the wholesale propaganda war being waged against consumers of US news.  The purpose of this particular campaign is several fold:

First, the ultimate political goal is to force Venezuela back into the international fold of global capitalism (sometimes called neoliberalism), thereby reopening its doors to American corporate interests (especially our oil companies);

Second, to persuade the American people that economic sanctions and even military action against Venezuela is entirely justified, should we decide to act in those ways. (Note – the US has already imposed severe economic sanctions against Venezuela which are helping to cripple the nation’s economy and its supply of consumer goods).

Third, propaganda – which is the standard diet dished out to every American who depends on the major corporate news outlets – serves as the information artillery barrage used to soften up the American battlefield of public opinion long before our government unleashes the military on “the enemy.”

Making the general public believe that, once again, the US has been “forced” into using our military as “the last resort” in “fighting for democracy, freedom and human rights” in another part of the world, keeps the public subdued, pliable and supportive of The Empire’s latest acts of international barbarism.

In addition to yesterday’s information, here are several more video reports from journalists working in Venezuela that help to fill out this picture.

First, reports from Abby Martin’s The Empire Files: She walks the streets of Venezuela, goes shopping in the stores, reads the newspapers, attends demonstrations, interviews people on both sides of the confrontations, including average people and their political leaders.

I think Martin is one of the most important journalists working today.  Granted, her personal interviews can be needlessly profane, but from all I have seen, her journalism is excellent.  Check out:

Why Socialism Keeps Winning in Venezuela (24 minutes)

Venezuela’s Constituent Assembly: Dictatorship or Democracy? (26 minutes)

Abby Martin Fact-Checks “No Free Press in Venezuela” Claim (3:39 minutes)

Inside Venezuela’s Markets: Propaganda vs. Reality (22 minutes)

Abby Martin Meets the Venezuelan Opposition (26 minutes)

For another thorough analysis of the Venezuela issues, here is Michael Prysner’s excellent response to John Oliver’s recent segment on Venezuela during his HBO comedy show. Granted, it is 45 minutes long, but you don’t have to watch it all at once.  Prysner takes the time to debunk, point by point, all of Oliver’s thoughtless repetitions of the mainstream media’s statements on Venezuela.  You can easily follow up on Prysner’s work online.

You can also find similar analysis from others by searching sites like the Real News Network, teleSUR English, RT News, and RT America.

Here are some of my thoughts on becoming a well-informed, thoughtful news consumer.

In order to find this type of journalism – that is, REAL journalism, something that the corporate media abandoned many years ago because their top executives decided that it did not make enough money – we must turn to independent, genuinely investigative journalism.  Most of these folks nowadays work for online publications and video outlets (check out youtube).

I give greater attention to journalists who report from the ground inside the relevant country, especially those who speak the language (for instance, Abby Martin’s reports from Venezuela; she is fluent in Spanish) and interview their subjects on their own or at least use a translator by their side.

The kinds of journalists I am talking about are people like Max Blumenthal, Dan Cohen, Glenn Greenwald, Abby Martin, Michael Prysner, Amy Goodman, Jeremy Scahill, Iona Craig, Eva Bartlett and others too numerous to list.  You can find them if you begin to look.

Another good source for alternative perspectives appears in outlets backed by foreign governments.  I watch and read them as much as I do US news.

Places like RT (Russia Television), Al Jazeera (coming from Qatar) and teleSUR (financed by the governments of Venezuela, Cuba, Nicaragua, Uruguay and Bolivia).  Yes, these broadcasts will certainly have their own biases, but all US media are biased, as well. They certainly are no more biased, and in many, many instances they are much less biased, than any of our American news corporations.

Furthermore, foreign news stations typically offer a different perspective on the world’s problems.  It is good and necessary to break out of the American bubble.  We need to stop looking at ourselves in the mirror and learn how other people from around the world view us.

For instance, did you know that when the people of the world are asked which nation poses the greatest threat to world peace, the United States (not Iran, Russia, China or North Korea) tops the list (here and here)?

Finally, no one can say that they are well-informed until they look at all sides of an issue.

If I don’t know what the other side is saying or thinking – not from my perspective but from their perspective – if I haven’t engaged the evidence used in their arguments; if I don’t understand how they are refuting my arguments, then I simply don’t know what I am talking about.

We need to listen to alternative voices, perspectives and analyses.  Things that not nearly enough Americans do.  And, I am afraid, that American Christians tend to be among the worst at gathering a diversity of perspectives from which to learn.  (OK, I have to say this:  Please, TURN OFF THE CHRISTIAN RADIO AND TV NEWS BROADCASTS.  MOST OF IT IS PURE PROPAGANDA AND LIES.  SUCH BLINDNESS ONLY SERVES TO KEEP THE CHURCH IGNORANT, OFFENSIVE AND PLIABLE TO AMERICAN CORPORATE & IMPERIAL INTERESTS).

Our Creator gave us minds for thinking not strings for pulling.

Hands Off Venezuela, America! You’re a Big, Fat, Bully Nation!

I have been meaning to write about Venezuela and the distorted coverage of its internal affairs that we have been receiving in this country for some time now.  Well, I better do it now, before the US sends our troops to help complete the overthrow of another democratically elected, South American government, and the US press extolls the virtues of yet another one of our “humanitarian interventions.”  (That was sarcasm, in case you missed it).

Crowds of voters during the 2012 elections

Western news coverage of Venezuelan politics, whether by print, radio or television, not only in the US but in Britain and Western Europe, offers a perfect example of how corporate media dishes out pure propaganda to its consumers.

This includes everyone.  I have yet to find a single exception to this rule in the case of Venezuela, whether it’s Fox, ABC, NCB, CBS, CNN, MSNBC, you name it.  They are all the same.

Venezuelan president Nicolas Maduro

Everyone is touting the same line: Nicolas Maduro is a dictator.  He has killed Venezuelan democracy.  The people are oppressed. There is no freedom of speech or of the press. The entire nation is starving due to government mismanagement. And on and on…

Sound familiar?

For a legible version see http://lati-negros.tumblr.com/post/31490408699/56-us-military-interventions-in-latin-america

Anyone who knows anything about the long, bloody history of American intervention in South American, however, will already be suspicious of such uniform, lock-step reporting.  Especially when few if any of this “reports” are coming from (a) journalists who speak Spanish (b) doing investigative journalism (c) on the ground in Venezuela (d) by speaking to a broad spectrum of actual Venezuelans still living in Venezuela.  (For information on US-sponsored coups in South America see this, this, this, this and this).

From what I can discover, the reality in Venezuela today is exactly the opposite of what our news media is telling us.  They have democratic elections. In fact, Jimmy Carter’s election monitoring organization observed Venezuela’s national elections in 2012 and concluded that The election process in Venezuela is the best in the world.”  (For further discussion, see this article on “Why the US Demonizes Venezuela’s Elections” by Mark Weisbrot, another guy I pay attention to.  Another great source of information is Venezuelanalysis.com, where you can find “Facts About Venezuela’s Presidential Elections and the Voting Process”).

WW 2 propaganda poster

I mention all of this, not only to highlight another clear example of the way our government and corporate controlled media try to propagandize us all, but also because propaganda often paves the way for military intervention and war.

Remember that President Trump has already threatened using “the military option” on Venezuela if Maduro won reelection (also here).

So, why does the US government hate the Maduro government in Venezuela?

First, Venezuela has one of the largest oil reserves in the world and is a significant source for US imports.

Second, the Venezuelan people have chosen to elect a socialist government, which is a convenient way for the US to resurrect the Cold War bogie man of creeping communism sucking at American’s underbelly.  There are several problems however:

  • If America is the great defender of democracy around the world, what business is it of ours to interfere in country’s that democratically choose a socialist government?
  • Venezuela has not threatened to invade any neighboring countries. The US is the only nation threatening to invade another in order to overthrow its (democratically elected) government.

Third, beginning with Hugo Chavez and continuing with Maduro (but not as aggressively) the Venezuelan government has worked at nationalizing its industries, including its oil production.  This has been good news for the general population, but not such welcome news for the CEOs of the major oil companies operating in Venezuela.

Whenever more money flows into the pockets of the local people, ensuring that less money will flow out of the country and into the pockets of foreign oil conglomerates, the corporate executives always call Washington, D.C. and demand some of that ole’ time “regime change.”

Mohammed Mosaddegh, Prime Minister of Iran

Don’t forget that in 1953 the CIA and the British overthrew the democratically elected government of Mohammed Mosaddegh in Iran (and had him executed) after he decided to nationalize Iran’s oil industry, depriving British Petroleum of its windfall profits at Iranian expense.  There IS a clear precedent for all this.

So, in preparation, the government propaganda machine has been rolling for some time now, preparing us for the possibility of another illegal military/CIA intervention overseas.  If/when it happens it will be described as another chapter in the noble saga of America’s sacrificial “defense of freedom around the world.”  (Wave flags and play patriotic music, with predictably mind-numbing effects, here).

US orchestrated coup in Chile, 1973

In fact, it will be one more bloody intervention in another nation’s affairs where innocent human beings will be murdered by the thousands simply because US business interests are lusting after more and more money.

This government overthrow will then be followed by the imposition of a conservative, right-wing government, perhaps even a military dictatorship, as has happened so many times before.  The multinational corporations with return. The resource extraction will be denationalized and reprivatized so that the majority of the benefits will go back overseas to Western companies, and the local people are once again deprived of what is rightfully theirs.

THIS IS WHY CHRISTIANS, and by this, I mean the entire Christian church in this country, NEED TO CARE ABOUT THE NEWS AND POLITICS!

Because we want to obey Jesus’ teaching that “we do to others as we would want them to do to us.”

Because we want to “love our neighbors as ourselves.”

The US military kills people all around the world in our name, using weapons created with our tax dollars, pursuing policies supposedly for our benefit, sacrificing the lives of our children and the children of many others, all in the name of “American values.”

I am firmly convinced that nobody who genuinely knows and loves Jesus Christ; no one who understands Jesus’ values and the manner of living he taught and modeled for his disciples, can possibly be at peace with our country’s interventionist policies around the world.

We must object, speak up, write letters, call our representatives and insist that we stop meddling in Venezuelan internal affairs.

No US military or CIA in Venezuela!

(This post originally included a section on finding reliable news sources for this type of information and discussion.  I have decided to make that a separate post to follow shortly.)

The Meaning of Holiness, Part 3B:  Sinners in the Hands of a Forgiving God

We have come to the end of our brief investigation into the Biblical definition of holiness.  We discovered that it is, first of all, a theological term describing God’s nature (here).  Then it becomes a redemptive term describing the results of God’s saving grace (here and here).  Finally, it is a sanctifying term characterizing the ethical goal of a life in relationship with God (here).

But here is where a problem arises.

Any reflective, self-aware believer will quickly recognize that the Lord’s command “to be holy as I am holy” sets an impossible standard, even for the most scrupulously attentive disciple. The distance separating vision from reality could not possibly be greater.  Who in their right mind would ever claim that they are living such a morally pure existence that they are as qualitatively distinct from the world around them as the eternal, Creator God is distinct from his temporal Creation?

The Old Testament addressed this issue straight on.  It was the rationale behind God’s instructions for animal sacrifice.  Leviticus 17:11 says,

“For the life of a creature is in the blood, and I have given it to you to make atonement for yourselves on the altar; it is the blood that makes atonement for one’s life.”

A sacrifice of atonement covered or expunged the guilt created by one’s failure perfectly to obey.

God’s people were expected sincerely to do their best in obeying the law of the covenant.  But knowing full well that no one could keep the law perfectly, God provided a variety of sacrifices (not only animal but vegetable sacrifices such as first-fruit offerings) in order “to cover over” – to make atonement – for the people’s failings.

Offering these proscribed sacrifices, as they were instructed, was also a part of what it meant for Israel to be a holy people.  So, every Israelite was to take God’s word seriously.  Obey the law as fully as possible. Not taking it lightly.  Which included making regular sacrifice as a confession of one’s failings, recognizing the need for God’s forgiveness.

This is the Old Testament prescription for “being holy as Yahweh is holy.”

When we get to the New Testament, both the law and the sacrifices of the Sinai covenant have been fulfilled, completed, realized and thus brought to their conclusion in Jesus of Nazareth. (Obviously, there is a lot to be discussed here, but that is for another post or two or three).

Jesus’ life fulfilled the Old Testament law of the covenant (Matthew 5:17-20, compare 24:35), while his death became the ultimate, atoning sacrifice (Matthew 26:27-28, compare Exodus 24:8; Mark 10:45).  This is both the consistent teaching of the New Testament and the historic theology of orthodox Christianity. Thus, by fulfilling the old covenant Jesus inaugurated the new covenant.

Jesus Teaching a Crowd by Rembrandt

Nevertheless, there is a curious stream of continuity flowing from the old into the new:  namely, the seeming impossibility of fully obeying Jesus’ requirements for his disciples.

Here is only a brief sampling:

If you even speak badly of someone, you are guilty of murder.

If you lust after another person, you are guilty of adultery.

If someone hits you on the right cheek, let him hit the other one too. Never seek revenge or go to court.

Love your enemies and pray that your heavenly Father will bless them.

Give to anyone who asks and be so generous that you can’t keep track of where your giving goes (Matthew 5:21 – 6:4).

If you do not hate your immediate family and even your own life (in comparison to your devotion to me), you cannot be my disciple (Luke 14:26-27).

If you do not give up everything you have, you cannot be my disciple (Luke 14:33).

The apparent impossibility of living out Jesus’ instructions is the reason several Christian traditions have devised different ways of avoiding the literal intent of Jesus’ words.

Some suggest that Jesus intended there to be two different types of disciples.  One, like priests and nuns, who will obey his teaching literally.  And another, sometimes called laypeople, who are free to adhere to a lesser standard.

Others find creative ways to reinterpret Jesus’ words so that they don’t actually intend what they appear to say.  I criticize this way of dealing with Jesus’ hard sayings in my book, I Pledge Allegiance (pages 38-39).  I believe that we must take Jesus at his word.

It’s true that Jesus’ teaching is rigorous. It’s also true that no one, not even monks and nuns who take vows of poverty, can follow Jesus’ teachings perfectly.  We can see this in the gospels themselves as the devoted disciples who live with him every day are periodically rebuked and corrected for their failures and misunderstandings.

If you want to read a fine discussion of this dynamic, I recommend taking a look at Richard Burridge’s book, Imitating Jesus: An Inclusive Approach to New Testament Ethics (Eerdmans, 2007).  Burridge provides a thorough look at the many ways in which the theme “impossible expectations – failing disciples” plays out in the gospel storyline. The apparent tension is harmonized by taking Jesus’ words and his actions together.

Jesus’ words are hard, but his behavior is merciful.  He asks for the impossible and then extends compassion with forgiveness.  Burridge notes:

“His [Jesus’] demanding ethical teaching was delivered in the context of keeping company with outsiders and sinners, those who had ethical difficulties, yet he seems to have accepted them, ate and lived with them – which leaves us with the challenge of how imitating him requires New Testament ethics to be done within an inclusive community.” (page 179 and throughout)

Jesus Eating with Sinners by Caravaggio

Jesus’ resurrected life is the gift that keeps on giving.

He still requires that we follow him; that we obey his impossible words, conform to his perfect life, and imitate The One beyond imitation.

And when we fail, which will happen frequently, our perfectly holy Lord Jesus will be there every time to pick us up, to forgive us, brush us off and provide the encouragement we need to give it another try.

That’s what it means for a true disciple to be holy as the one and only Son of God is holy.

Being an Individual Rather Than a Member of “The Herd,” with Sǿren #Kierkegaard

Kierkegaard is often criticized for being too individualistic and not having sufficient appreciation for the importance of community.  I disagree.

Kierkegaard’s book, A Literary Review, discusses a contemporary novel, Two Ages.  Without getting into the details of the book’s historical background, Kierkegaard uses his book review as an opportunity to unmask what he sees as the social dangers of mass movements.  Kierkegaard refers to such movements as “the herd.”

The herd finds its power in a “leveling” process; that is, in its insistence on uniformity, keeping everyone scripted, on message, thinking, saying and doing only that which is approved by the herd.

The herd’s efforts at leveling always work to destroy individualism.  And, I would agree with Kierkegaard in saying that an especially powerful place for leveling is the Christian Church.

In contrast, Kierkegaard defends the vital importance of courageous individuals who will stand up for what they believe is right and act accordingly, especially when driven by Christian conviction.

The principled individual is more important than the largest, unprincipled herd, for herds are controlled by the whims and fancies of “abstractions” like the press and popular opinion.

Therefore, the principled individual does not hesitate to act, to do what is right, all alone, if necessary.

The principled individual’s greatest enemy arises from within, appearing in the form of “reflection.

Reflection, in this context, involves overthinking a situation so that “due consideration” stalls the impetus to action.  Instead of standing up for what it right, the “reflective” person remains seated because taking a stand might prove irrational before knowing all the facts, all the possible consequences, exploring all the alternatives, etc., etc., etc.

Kierkegaard’s social critique is as relevant today as in his own day. I believe that it is especially urgent advice for anyone in the American church, particularly in so-called evangelical churches, who wants to follow Jesus faithfully:

“The idolized positive principle of sociality in our time is the consuming, demoralizing principle, which in the thralldom of reflection transforms even virtues into vitia splendida [i.e. glittering vices].  And to what can this be due other than to a disregard for the singling out of the religious individual before God in the responsibility of eternity?  When terror begins here, one seeks comfort in company, and reflection then captures the individual for life…

 “Stopping it [i.e. the leveling process] is possible only if, individually singled out, the individual achieves the fearlessness of religiousness…

 “…only he [sic] becomes an essential human being in the full-bodied sense of equality…for if the individual is unwilling to learn to be satisfied with himself in the essentiality of religiousness, before God rather than ruling over the world; unwilling to be satisfied with ruling over himself…if he is unwilling to learn to be inspired by this as the noblest he should achieve because it expresses equality before God and equality with all men, then he will not escape reflection…”

The Meaning of Holiness, Part 3 #religion #theology

In part 1 of this series covering the Biblical concept of holiness, I (hopefully) explained how understanding holiness begins by understanding the unique nature and character of God.  Holiness is fundamentally a theological category.  God is essentially holy as the One who is Wholly Other, incomparable, the one and only God.

Part 2 then explained the resulting relational dimension of holiness. People and places may become holy when God comes into contact with them. Ancient Israel is called a holy nation because God enters into a covenant relationship with them and only them.

Now, in part 3, the stage is set for understanding the ethical dimension of holiness.  Behavioral holiness, being set apart, being different, is the most common, popular definition of holiness.  And behavior is certainly an important component of holiness, but notice how much Biblical groundwork has been required for us to construct the necessary framework for understanding this ethical dimension properly.

We are finally in a position to grasp the apparent strangeness of a text like Leviticus 20:7:

“Consecrate yourselves and be holy, because I am the Yahweh your God.  Keep my decrees and follow them. I am Yahweh, who makes you holy.”

What’s the deal?  If the Israelites became holy when God brought them into the covenant (i.e. I am Yahweh who makes you holy), then why do they need a warning about making themselves holy (i.e. consecrate yourselves and be holy)?  Are they already holy or not?

How can these two seemingly contradictory statements stand side-by-side in the same sentence?

“You are holy, so you must become holy.”  “Make yourselves holy because you are holy.”

It sounds contradictory…UNLESS you understand the multiple levels of meaning connoted by this word – holy/holiness.

Because our holy God is distinctive and unique (part 1), when he brings others into relationship with himself (part 2), he requires that they, too, become distinctive and unique like him (part 3).  So, Yahweh commands the Israelites:

 “Consecrate yourselves and be holy, because I am Yahweh your God.  Keep my decrees and follow them.”

This is a repeated refrain throughout the Old Testament, especially in the book of Leviticus, sometimes called the book of holiness.  Here is a short list of further examples:

“I am Yahweh your God; consecrate yourselves and be holy because I am holy.” (Leviticus 11:44)

“I am Yahweh who brought you up out of Egypt to be your God; therefore, be holy because I am holy.” (Leviticus 11:45)

“Be holy because I, Yahweh your God, am holy.” (Leviticus 19:2)

God emphatically presents himself as the model of holiness.  For the Old Testament, the process of making oneself holy, of consecrating oneself, entailed obedience to the Torah, that is, the code of behavior given to Moses for members of the Sinai Covenant.

The Torah included a wide variety of elements that we would see as both cultic/ritual (e.g. what kinds of clothes to wear) and ethical (e.g. do not steal), although no self-respecting Israelite would have considered making a division between ritual and ethics.  As far as Moses, Aaron and every other Israelite were concerned, it was all ethics.

God’s people were expected to live unique, distinctive lives because their God was/is a unique, distinctive Person.  They were to be set apart just as the eternal Creator is set apart from his temporal creation.  And a central component of God’s holiness is his unique, divine character distinguished by personality traits like justice, righteousness, faithfulness, mercy, compassion, patience and love, etc.

Yes, God emphatically presents himself as the model of holiness, but God’s people cannot make themselves Wholly Other. (Please, don’t try.  It gets really creepy.)  But we can obey God’s call to emulate his character, to live among others in the same way that he chooses to live with us.

Thus, for God’s people to display his character, to make ourselves holy as God is holy, means that we too must live lives of justice, righteousness, faithfulness, mercy, compassion, patience and love – “being perfect as our heavenly Father is perfect” (Matthew 5:48).

So, holiness does eventually become a matter of ethics.

In a world characterized by injustice, unrighteousness, faithlessness, lack of mercy, absence of compassion, impatience and hatred, reflecting the holiness of God’s character will set God’s people apart as a unique community; a stark contrast to the status quo around us.  At least, that is the goal.

I believe that understanding this 3-step unfolding of holiness is crucial to a proper, Biblical Christian ethics.  By rooting our view of holiness positively in God and who God is, we are better able to cultivate a positive, rather than a negative, approach to godly behavior.

Typically, when conversations about holiness begin (rather than conclude, as I do here) with ethics we end up thinking negatively.  Becoming holy is a matter of what we don’t do.  “I don’t drink, and I don’t chew, and I don’t go with girls who do!” as the old saying goes.  Being different from the world around us becomes a primarily negative concern focused on prohibitions; a matter of not associating, not doing, not participating, not sharing in the concerns or behaviors of those around us.

Certainly, abstaining from evil is important if holiness is to mean anything.  But making these sorts of prohibitions the entry point into holiness is wrong Biblically and theologically.  It, therefore, leads to any number of wrong-headed, practical mistakes.  (Perhaps, most significantly, it has a horrible tendency to blind God’s people to the continued reality of God’s Image in every human being, no matter their misbehavior.  But this is an important issue for another day.)

For our purposes in this post, I will only mention one practical mistake:  a prohibitive view of holiness invariably teaches us to view life principally in terms of what we don’t do, who we aren’t.  That is, we are not like them.

That is grossly backwards and upside-down.  Holiness is intended positively to express who we areWe are God’s people!  And so, we are like our God in the sorts of things we do, in how we love others, show mercy, remain faithful, always being compassionate and patient.

Thus, holy behavior is rooted in our identity as sinners saved by God’s grace.  Only in a derivative sense is holiness concerned with not being like others.  Holiness is first and foremost concerned with being like Jesus, our Lord and Savior in the flesh.

Naturally, anyone who truly wants to live like Jesus will find any number of abhorrent thoughts, feelings and actions to avoid, but that is only the shadow-side of holy living.  The substance of a holy life is not determined by the shadows but by the beautiful light of God’s own presence and by heeding the Spirit’s call to “fix our eyes on Jesus” (Hebrews 12:2; see 3:1).

With our lives fixed on following Jesus, we avoid the shadows without even trying because we will be too busy living out the grace, mercy, righteousness, faithfulness, love and compassion of our crucified Lord.

See the difference?

OK, there has to be a 5th installment.  Next time: The Meaning of Holiness, Part 3B, “Sinners in the Hands of a Forgiving God”

A Review of James K. A. Smith’s book, Awaiting the King: Reforming Public Theology

NOTE: Jamie Smith is a friend of mine.  We were colleagues at Calvin College for many years.  He is also the fellow who gave me the nudge to write my book, I Pledge Allegiance: A Believer’s Guide to Kingdom Citizenship in 21st Century America.

Awaiting the King: Reforming Public Theology is the final volume in Jamie’s Cultural Liturgies trilogy, an ambitious and masterful project that takes its cue from St. Augustine, especially his work in the City of God.  The previous two volumes in this series are Desiring the Kingdom and Imagining the Kingdom, all published by Baker.

Jamie’s goal, I believe, is to call and equip Christians for a life that is created, directed and consummated by the love of God (both objectively and subjectively).  Thus, Jamie puts Augustine’s central insight at the heart of his analysis: We are what we love.  For the church, then, the love of God, our religious affections, becomes the gravitational center properly (re)ordering the Christian’s approach to all other areas of life, especially public life.

This seemingly simple thesis is unpacked throughout the Cultural Liturgies series by dissecting the many ways in which modern society, whether in politics, education, entertainment, media, advertising or what have you, attempts to shape each of us through its own powerful, repetitious, and typically implicit, liturgies of personal formation (or should we call it deformation?).

Such secular liturgies are conducted through the many public rites and rituals in which we all participate every day, whether it be filing our income taxes by April 15, standing (or kneeling) for the National Anthem in a football stadium, or shopping for the newest version of some must-have electronic gadgetry released just before Christmas.  Every person’s participation in these daily collective activities, all conceived, orchestrated and implemented by anonymous power-brokers unknown to the average person, engages us in a beggar’s banquet of cultural liturgies.

Here is one of Jamie’s more important points.  Liturgical performance, whether religious or secular, is powerfully formative.  Human beings are not simply what we think, ala Descartes, “I think, therefore I am.”  We are also, perhaps even more importantly, formed by the things we do.  And our culture shapes the majority of our activities in day-to-day life.

Thus, Jamie asks us to consider the question: as we participate in these frequent cultural liturgies, what kind of formation is happening to us?  Are we being turned into more agreeable consumers, more patriotic inductees, more subservient government supporters?  And how does this cultural formation process cohere with the Christian’s (presumed) conformity to the person of Jesus Christ?

Jamie correctly insists that every follower of Jesus must remain vigilant in assessing how these competing cultural liturgies are working implicitly, subliminally, to subvert and to replace our love of God with cultural alternatives – love of country, love of new consumer products, love of entertainment, love of sexuality, love of partisan politics, love of warfare, etc.  These alternative liturgies are constantly competing for our attention/ participation, and they will change us if we are not very, very careful.

The Church, however, is called to become an alternative society – in the world but not of it, as the old saying goes – where the love of God binds its members to liturgies of Christian worship that are conforming us more and more to the likeness of Christ. Thus, regular (trans)formation through rites and rituals of Christian worship – scripture reading, prayer, biblical teaching, confession, repentance, admonition, praise and adoration – is essential if the church hopes to stand strong as the alternative community that God calls us to be.

My brief synopsis can hardly do justice to Jamie’s more expansive analysis of the church’s role in society and the work of public theology.  I heartily recommend that you take the time to read Awaiting the King for yourself.  There is much to consider, even though I do not agree with all of Jamie’s analysis or proposed solutions.

However, I will offer a few of my thoughts on Jamie’s final, most practical chapter entitled, “Contested Liturgies: Our ‘Godfather’ Problem.”

I suspect that many of Jamie’s readers have been asking themselves (and him) about the effectiveness of his proposal, e.g. we best counteract the deforming power of secular liturgies by participating in liturgies of Christian worship.  Has Jamie overlooked the elephant in the room?  Namely, if Christian worship is the antidote to cultural conformity, then how do we explain the many examples, too numerous to count, of church-going people who behave no differently than non-church-goers who don’t know Jesus Christ from a hole in the ground?  Worse yet, how about those faithful church-goers who live criminal lifestyles or do horrible things?  People like Francis Ford Coppola’s “Godfather” who would never think of skipping out on mass yet remains untouched by the gospel of God’s grace.

Of course, a full accounting of this problem would require a treatise on the Holy Spirit, conversion, sanctification, spirituality and “the imitation of Christ,” all well beyond the scope of this one book.

However, Jamie has not ignored the elephant completely, and he illustrates the problem by exploring two case studies:  (1) the history of western colonialism and the slave trade, as well as (2) the church’s contribution to the horrific “liturgies of violence” executed in the Rwandan genocide.

Jamie offers three essential ingredients to any healthy church life intending to help people conform primarily to Christ and only secondarily, in non- compromising ways, to culture.

First, Christianity “is a teaching faith” (175). A “failure of catechesis contributes to a failure of formation” (205).  So, the Body of Christ requires continuous, Biblical education.

Second, every local pastor must become an ethnographer and a political theologian.  That is, someone who can (a) interpret the competing cultural liturgies working to reshape and deform God’s people, and then (b) can prescribe the Biblical evaluation and divinely preferred alternatives that equip disciples to “cultivate their heavenly citizenship” here and now. Breaking Christianity’s bondage to nationalism and capitalism will be essential to this task as congregations grow in God-honoring worship (174).

Third, worship will never become purely instrumental.  “To show up to worship is tantamount to an admission of failure” (207).  I like that sentence. Authentic worship liturgies are always theocentric. We adore our Creator and our Savior, first and foremost, because they deserve our honor, praise and service.  The fact that we are also transformed through our worship is only gravy.  Awesome gravy, but gravy all the same.

By in large, I agree wholeheartedly with Jamie’s diagnosis of where and how the liturgical/discipleship rubber must meet the cultural road.  I would prefer, however, that Jamie’s first two points were elaborated more specifically with a laser-beam focus on Jesus as our Paradigm.  This, after all, is the consistent New Testament answer to these questions of competing liturgies:  follow Jesus, keep your eyes on Jesus, imitate Jesus, imitate me insofar as I imitate Jesus.  This is why the eternal Son became the historical Nazarene.

Detailing the necessity of this task, of being Jesus-focused, is the reason I wrote my new book, I Pledge Allegiance: A Believer’s Guide to Kingdom Citizenship in 21st Century America (Eerdmans, 2018).  I dedicate a chapter each to the dangerous cultural liturgies of nationalism and capitalism, for instance.

Granted, Jamie does elaborate his observation that Christianity is a teaching faith by noting the importance of “imitatio Christi.”  He also employs the model of Jesus-as-mulatto developed by Brian Bantum in Redeeming Mulatto: A Theology of Race and Christian Hybridity (Baylor 2010).  In my view, however, this is a serious misstep on Jamie’s part, but I don’t have space here to elaborate my disagreements with Bantum’s mulatto Christology.

It is simply more Biblical, faithful and practically translatable to imitate and to obey the Jesus of the Gospels, to teach what he taught, to model our lives after his, to learn to read our surrounding cultural, political liturgies as Jesus read his, and to embrace suffering for righteousness sake as the measuring rod for our conformity to his image.

Is there a sufficient number of well-equipped ethnographer-political-theologian pastors available in North America to lead God’s people adequately in this task of liturgical discernment and appropriation?  No, not by a long shot.  And I doubt there ever will be.

Many radio preachers think they are fulfilling this role, but generally they are playing in a multi-million dollar kiddie pool while God’s people are drowning in a turbulent sea of militaristic, nationalistic, capitalistic whirl pools.

But then I remember Jesus’ parable of the sower (Mark 4:1-20) and his (apparent) expectation that only a minority of those who make a start at faith will see it through to the end.  I recall Jesus’ description of his “narrow gate” and “restricted road” which only “a few” will ever find (Mathew 7:13-14).  I think of John’s stories of the large crowds of “disciples” who abandoned Jesus because his teaching was “too hard” for them (John 6:66).

Perhaps, when the time is right, God’s people will find just as many faithful, Jesus-following, ethnographer-political-theologian pastors as they need, because the number of faithful, Jesus-following, liturgically-discerning and deformity-resisting lovers of Jesus is fewer than we imagine.

Sorry, I Don’t Need Government Sanction for My Prayer Life

The loss of special privilege is not persecution.

Let me say it again: The loss of special privilege is not persecution.

Furthermore, the loss of religious privilege is neither religious persecution nor an infringement of religious liberty.  Rather, it is an honoring of the American ideal that no religion will receive special government patronage.

Unfortunately, this failure of basic logic is a major source for confusion and poor political posturing among the conservative block of America Christianity.

It also is symptomatic of the way in which too many Christian leaders hunger for dominance over our public life, believe that they know what’s best for everyone, and don’t really trust the Holy Spirit’s ability to hold his own on a level playing field.

All of these political, spiritual, and logical shenanigans were on full-blown, gory display in the Rose Garden on Thursday when president Trump read his Proclamation on the National Day of Prayer and then signed his Executive Order on the Establishment of a White House Faith and Opportunity Initiative.

According to the Religious News Service, Trump’s executive order “aims to give faith groups a stronger voice within the federal government and serve as a watchdog for government overreach on religious liberty issues.” 

What’s wrong with that? Well, a number of things:

First, let’s recall that we have traveled this road several times before, and it has never turned out well.  Required reading for all of today’s faith-based enthusiasts should be David Kuo’s book, Tempting Faith: An Inside Story of Political Seduction.  Kuo was the Deputy Director of the Office of Faith-Based and Community Initiatives under President George W. Bush.  He offers a moving confession of political seduction and “a heartfelt plea for a Christian reexamination of political and spiritual priorities.”

Washington D. C. has not changed, and I very much doubt if anyone in the Rose Garden last Thursday either remembers David Kuo or has read his book of confessions.

Furthermore, the current crop of evangelical advisers — the “court evangelicals,” as Professor John Fea aptly labels them — appear even more eager than their predecessors (if that were possible) to sell their ever-lovin’ souls for that much coveted “access” to the devil’s own hallowed halls of power.

Get ready to watch history repeat itself and the Christian church be publicly shamed again and again.

Second, if you have read Trump’s Proclamation, or if you listened to his speech, I hope you noticed that it had as much to do with Jesus Christ, the gospel message, or the kingdom of God as a tea-teetotaler at an Irish wake.

There was absolutely nothing particularly Christian about any of the glad-handing, obsequious antics going on at that pompous affair.  A sure sign of things to come.

In fact, it was a full-out, no-holds-barred display of America’s false gospel of civil religion, pure and simple.  Followers of Jesus Christ have no business signing on to such spiritual quackery, much less “praising the Lord” and polluting the Body of Christ with its deceitful promises. (I unpack all of this anti-Christian messaging in my new book, I Pledge Allegiance: A Believer’s Guide to Kingdom Citizenship in 21st Century America).

Of course, I recognize that the best way to safeguard any religious expression in America is to protect all religious expression in America.  So such Executive Orders must be generic.  I enthusiastically applaud religious freedom for everyone — including those who choose not to believe — in our country.

But that is not my problem.  My objection is two-fold.

First, I believe that evangelical lament about religious persecution is a Trojan Horse being used to promote their agenda of evangelical superiority and control over  public policy (more on this in a future post).

Second, as a Christian, and an evangelical one at that, I believe that the public embrace — which is a public endorsement! — of civil religion is a form of idolatry.  It is a betrayal of the good news of Jesus Christ.

As an American, I applaud the reaffirmation of religious liberty for all religious groups in this country.

But, as a citizen of God’s kingdom, I have no interest in confirming others in the validity of their prayers to a deity other than the heavenly Father of our crucified, resurrected and ascended Lord Jesus.

THIS is what followers of Jesus Christ ought to care about most deeply!

Neither Trump’s Proclamation nor his Executive Order will provide a diddly-damn’s worth of influence towards advancing the kingdom of God in this world.

So why are “Christian” leaders applauding presidential edicts sanctioning policies and actions that could deceive the very people who may actually be  searching for the answers that only Jesus Christ can provide?

Power and privilege.  It is all about the acquisition of power and privilege.

Finally, we return to where I started — the disentangling of religious privilege and the perceived threat of religious persecution.

Christian radio and television have managed to brainwash many evangelicals into thinking that if Christianity is not sitting at the head of a government table, then their religious freedom will be violated.  (Read my earlier post on this subject).

For instance, take the long-standing debate about prayer in our public schools.  Evangelicals have long insisted that, unless there is a specific law sanctioning their prayers in public schools, then they are experiencing oppression at the hands of government.

We might call this the cry-baby approach to religious liberty in America.

I grew up in public schools, and no one ever stopped me from praying inside the building whenever I chose to. In fact, I have never needed a law specifically sanctioning my approach to personal spirituality anywhere in public. (My children also attended school in a nation with mandatory religious instruction.  I had to deprogram them after each indoctrination session).

But, then, religious freedom is not really the point of the prayer debate.

The real point is that evangelicals want a bigger piece of the public policy pie, which they will use to wield greater power over what is acceptable and unacceptable in public discourse.

President Donald Trump, surrounded my members of the clergy, signed the Executive Order on Promoting Free Speech and Religious Liberty, in the Rose Garden of the White House, On Thursday, May 4, 2017. (Photo by Cheriss May/NurPhoto via Getty Images)

I fear that this is the motivation behind a portion of Trump’s Executive Order which says its purpose is “to reduce…burdens on the exercise of religious convictions and legislative, regulatory, and other barriers to the full and active engagement of faith-based and community organizations in Government-funded or Government-conducted activities and programs.”

In other words, the point, in

CHICAGO, IL – JUNE 30: Sister Caroline attends a rally with other supporters of religious freedom to praise the Supreme Court’s decision in the Hobby Lobby, contraception coverage requirement case on June 30, 2014 in Chicago. (Photo by Scott Olson/Getty Images)

part, is to make it easier for future Hobbie Lobby-type companies to force their employees into abiding by the employer’s religious convictions.  In the case of Hobby Lobby, it was to deny female employees the sort of health care coverage that would pay for their choice of contraception, despite the fact that these employees are not necessarily Roman Catholic.

Folks, it is all about power and privilege.  Power and Privilege.

Other illustrations could be listed, but this one must suffice.  (I also suspect that this new Executive Order is another feature of the long-term Republican strategy to dismantle the New Deal by starving public programs like Social Security, Medicare, affordable public housing, and more.  But that argument must wait for another day).

Honestly, I felt a bit depressed last Thursday after watching men and women who should have known better, so-called Christian leaders accountable to the Church, scurrying around the Rose Garden like a gaggle of glad-handing geese gobbling up the stale crumbs of white bread thrown to them by the White House.

There is an old saying (that I just made up) which goes — when the monks come calling be sure to hide the wine.

Well, look out public policy!  The Religious Right is coming. And they ain’t necessarily working for you.

The Church Fights for a Seat at the Head of the Table, An Excerpt from “I Pledge Allegiance”

Jesus warns his followers that when they live as he lived and invite others to inhabit the kingdom of God as he did, they would experience opposition.  In the Sermon on the Mount, he encourages them by saying, “Blessed are you when people insult you, persecute you and falsely say all kinds of evil against you because of me.”

American Christianity has horribly twisted Jesus’ teaching.

White evangelicals regularly complain about the persecution they face because of their Christian faith.  This perception of anti-Christian hostility was a large piece of the cultural backdrop to last Thursday’s Rose Garden ceremony where president Trump issued a Proclamation on the National Day of Prayer and then signed his Executive Order on the Establishment of a White House Faith and Opportunity Initiative.

The church leaders standing beside the president actually thought that he was doing something to relieve the Christian church of religious oppression in America.  Many of these people actually believe that Christians suffer more discrimination than black people in the USA.  White evangelicals are “more likely to see discrimination against themselves than against minority groups, [saying] oh, no, we’re the ones being persecuted(emphasis mine).

Such is the power of spiritual delusion, of suffering with the blindness of white privilege, of embracing the liturgies of American civil religion, and of investing more energy into protecting oneself than into actually living like Jesus.

This white evangelical pity-party might be laughable were it not so spiritually crippling.

 I confront this spider web of problems in the following excerpt from chapter 11 of my new book, I Pledge Allegiance: A Believer’s Guide to Kingdom Citizenship in 21st Century America. The chapter title, “Blessed Are Those Who Are Persecuted Because of Me,” is lifted from the Sermon on the Mount (Matthew 5:11).

“When it comes to the prospects of suffering for the gospel, the American church commits two mistakes that distort a proper understanding of its role in this world: first, Christians wish to occupy a privileged place in society; second,Christians want to live ‘triumphantly’ here and now, immediately possessing all the power and authority exhibited in Christ’s resurrection.

“The first error is most clearly seen in the so-called culture wars supposedly waged between what passes for a Christian worldview and secular humanism. What this obsession with spiritual warfare reveals, however, is not secularism’s efforts to extinguish Christianity, but the church’s assumption that Christianity has a right to unchallenged preeminence in the public square. This cultural conflict is not evidence of a cosmic struggle between light and darkness as the televangelists proclaim. Its roots are much more mundane and secular, for this so-called culture war is actually the last gasp of an antiquated confusion between church and state once referred to as Christendom, that is, the merging of Christianity with a nation’s social, political, and cultural life such that the church and its teachings dominate public affairs, confusing Christian discipleship
with state citizenship. The current cultural combat is not concerned with
a genuine defense of Christian faith, but is fomented by the church’s misplaced desire to assert social and political dominance over society at large. Personally,I cannot blame nonbelievers for resisting these efforts.

“How curious it is, then, to observe that neither Jesus nor Paul (or any of
the other New Testament writers, for that matter) ever expresses the least bit of concern about seeing the church assert control over the social, cultural, or political landscape in their own day and age. The apostle Paul was surrounded by an utterly pagan Greco-Roman society awash in idolatry, immorality, and bloodthirsty political maneuvering; yet he never so much as hints at the need for his communities to devise a strategy for taking over Rome’s politics, social customs, arts, or mores. In this respect, Paul was following his master, for as Christopher Bryan correctly notes, Jesus did not show any interest in changing, much less controlling, the temporal forms of political power in his day either. Instead, Jesus and Paul focused on creating a new, alternative community that would shine as a light to the world, showing the spiritually curious where they might discover the kingdom of God in the midst of this world’s corruption.

“In a pluralistic society such as America’s, why should Christian prayers,
holidays, and ceremonies be prioritized above those of other religions? Why
should displays of the Ten Commandments, crucifixes, and nativity scenes
receive pride of place on state lands and facilities without equal representation from Jewish, Muslim, Buddhist, or Hindu symbols? The honest answer is that there is no reason for Christian ceremonies or insignia to receive any state-sponsored preferential treatment. And being denied such prioritized benefits does not constitute discrimination, much less persecution. The fact that many Americans believe otherwise, and are willing to fight tooth and nail over small-minded concerns like manger scenes and Christian prayer in public schools, merely demonstrates how the American church is still trying to capitalize on the historical momentum generated by past centuries of Western Christendom, even as that momentum grinds to a halt. This explains the oddity of a country like the United States, which has never had an established state church and hence never officially participated in Christendom, nevertheless experiencing a culture war where Christian people assume that they are justified in imposing their religiously based moral code, spiritual sensibilities, and religious symbols on the rest of the nation.

“We should not be the least bit surprised when non-Christian people resist the church’s efforts to exercise such power over them. Unfortunately, when the predictable resistance appears, the church typically responds by crying “persecution,” “discrimination,” and “anti-Christian bias” when, in fact, prejudice and suppression are working the other way around. The church frequently behaves like the worst sort of petulant child, crying “foul!” when Christians are the ones kicking every other player in the shins…

“…In fact, the truth of the gospel and the upside-downness of Jesus’s kingdom values appear to have nothing at all to do with the high level of hostility many Americans feel toward the Christian faith. The monumental national and ecclesial tragedy crying out for recognition is that the Religious Right has managed to obscure the central message of the crucified, resurrected Jesus beneath a never-ending soundtrack of over-heated partisan rhetoric lamenting the dangers of “secular humanism” and “liberal politics.” They have pursued a no-holds-barred strategy to reach their partisan goals and have successfully accomplished what can only be described as a demonic victory. They have blacked out the good news of God’s kingdom from public perception like a hellish eclipse of the Son. Such betrayers of God’s kingdom have no business complaining about their bogus ‘persecution.’”

Practice in Christianity, with Sǿren Kierkegaard #kierkegaard

In my opinion, Sǿren Kierkegaard’s book Practice in Christianity is one of the best handbooks on Christian discipleship ever written.  Personally, I far prefer Kierkegaard over Bonhöffer’s Cost of Discipleship.

As I mentioned in my earlier post, Kierkegaard lived in Christendom. He knew very well what it meant for people to define their “Christianity” in terms of nationality and earthly citizenship.  Loyalty to one’s homeland, patriotism, military service, church attendance, mourning over the redemptive deaths of Danish soldiers, these were the liturgies and sacraments that defined a good Christian life in his world.

But Kierkegaard had the spiritual maturity and insight, not only to realize how corrupting the Christendom counterfeit could be, he also had the prophetic fortitude to loudly warn his compatriots of Christendom’s fiendish ability to snuff out authentic Christian witness.

For everyone who believes that society ought to be more hospitable and welcoming to Christianity, so that the church can enjoy greater privilege (and maintain its tax-exempt status); for all who imagine that the legislature and the courts can advance the kingdom of God, or that the rules of church discipline ought to be imposed on everyone in the public square, Kierkegaard observes:

 “As long as this world lasts and the Christian church in it, it is a militant church; yet it has the promise that the gates of hell shall not prevail against it.  But woe, woe to the Christian church when it will be victorious in this world, for then it is not the church that has been victorious but the world. Then the heterogeneity [the contrast] between Christianity and the world has vanished, the world has won, and Christianity has lost.”

The church militant is the body of Christ that understands this world is not home.  If we become too comfortable, we have forgotten our mission. Authentic discipleship always faces opposition.

Suffering with and for Jesus is the defining characteristic of genuine Christian living in this fallen world.  The true church, which is always the militant church, never forgets these things.