Comments Which Conservatives Block From Their Blogs For January 25, 2017

Jan 17

To R. Scott Clark and his blogpost that opposes a state church. This appeared in the Heidelblog.

I fully agree that there should be no state church and that God's people are the elect from every nation who believe in Jesus Christ. But we would be fooling ourselves if we believed that there is no Christian meddling or privilege in the state outside of some kind of theocracy or Christendom.  That is because Christian control over and privilege in the state exists on a continuum where control over and privilege can still exist outside of a state church. I call one form of Christian control over and privilege in the state Christian Paternalism where there is a  broader mix of laws based on secular values and Christian values. Indeed, the controversy over same-sex marriage (SSM) brought this to light as many of my fellow religiously conservative Christians tried to draw a line in the sand justifying their opposition to SSM on natural law or on what is best for human flourishing. The problem with those justifications was that we see homosexuality in 1,500 species in nature on the one hand and the flourishing argument  allowed for law to be based on what is the best case scenario while ignoring what is an acceptable scenario.  Of course there were those who used the what is happening to the property values because of who is moving into the neighborhood argument.

In the end, opposition to SSM ignored the religious rights of those whose religion allowed for homosexuality whose view of natural law includes what is observed in nature. So though the previous state prohibition against SSM was not Christendom, it was due to Church control over the state and thus there existed a privileged place for Christians in society in determining certain laws. Here we should note that the opposition to SSM is just one example of an attempt to establish Christian Paternalism over our society.

BTW, it is ironic that Clark should be citing Calvin here because of how the religious persecution that existed in Geneva under his influence resulted in heretics and witches being put to death for religious reasons. And we certainly could not bring Luther in as an example either seeing how he called on German society and princes to punish the Jews for their unbelief lest they be complicit in that unbelief.

The concern for the freedom of the Church and the definition of who God's people are expressed in the article above are very sound and they serve as good reasons to reject not just Christendom and state churches, but Christian Paternalism as well. But in addition, we should note another reason why we should reject state churches and any form of Christian Paternalism.  That reason has to do with determining how we should share society with unbelievers. If we don't share society with unbelievers as equals, then we need to take into account the blowback to our Christian witness. That any form of Christian control over society can result in people not wanting to hear the Gospel not because of the content of the Gospel but because of the offense some unbelievers have taken to having their lives governed by Christian control over society.

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To Justin Taylor and his blogpost republishing Martin Luther King Jr.’s letter from a Birmingham jail. This appeared in the Gospel Coalition website.

Just as racism was not King’s only core concern, neither is the letter from a Birmingham jail the only document one should read when remembering King. Two other documents that are as equally important are his speech against the Vietnam War (see http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article2564.htm ) and his last speech given in support of the striking garbage collectors in Memphis (see http://www.americanrhetoric.com/speeches/mlkivebeentothemountaintop.htm ).
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Jan 20

To R. Scott Clark and his blogpost quote of Romans 13, a passage that tells us to both obey the civil authorities and to love one’s neighbors. This appeared in Heidelblog.

Martin Luther King Jr had to ask the inconvenient question of what happens when loving one's neighbor comes into conflict with following unjust laws? Another question before us is how should one implement Romans 13 in a vastly different historical context than what existed in the First Century.

It seems that when celebrating the American Revolution, citations of Romans 13 are not in sight. But when regarding a government that is controlled by the political party that is most favored by religiously conservative Christians and their leaders, we quote Romans 13 implying how it should be carried out.

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Jan 24

To Matt Carter and his talk  on how his church started to practice “social justice” by how it learned how to help the vulnerable in his city. This appeared in the Gospel Coalition website.

On one hand, Carter is talking about very admirable actions taken by his church and those actions are done in humility. Other churches should pay attention to what Carter's church is doing.

On the other hand, Carter is missing a foundational part of social justice that was practiced by both the OT prophets and the Apostle James. According to model of though Carter's employing, they also preached 'against the city.' In other words they cited others, especially those with wealth and power, for their sins of oppression against the vulnerable. Without this part of social justice, then one of Vladimir Lenin's criticisms of Christianity rings true. That criticism was that Christianity provided a cheap form of grace for those with wealth and power who were oppressing the vulnerable. It was cheap because those who oppressed only had to add to their repertoire acts of kindness and charity toward those they were exploiting. They were not required to change from exploiting others. In a sense, it is as if Lenin viewed those acts of charity without repenting from exploiting others as indulgences (see https://www.marxists.org/archive/lenin/works/1905/dec/03.htm ).

In The Crisis Of Democracy the complaint was made that the Church had failed to fulfill its role as an institution of indoctrination during the 1960s. How was the Church to function as such an institution? It, along with educational institutions, the military, and the family, was to teach its people how to fit into society and respect the authority those elites from both the public and private sectors. However, we should note that the 1960s saw a great rebellion against injustice. Instances of injustice were seen in the immoral war in Vietnam as well as the Jim Crow society we had constructed. It could also been in the inequitable treatment of women. If the Church had fulfilled its role of indoctrinating the young rather than failing in that role, then those injustices would have been accepted rather than challenged.

Again, what Carter speaks about churches coming alongside of those who were there to help the vulnerable in the city is very admirable and should be highly valued. Other churches would do well to imitate what his church has done. But social justice isn't putting bandaids on wounds, it consists of challenging those institutions and those with wealth and power to repent from exploiting and oppressing others. Instead of talking about the Church and Social Justice, Carter would have been better to talk about the Church and the Social Gospel of which helping others is an indispensable part. But we should note that Social Justice is the calling of institutions and those with wealth and power to repent from harming others (see http://flamingfundamentalist.blogspot.com/2013/05/is-social-gospel-biblical-enough-for.html ).
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To Pat Buchanan and his blogpost commending Trump’s ‘America First’ inaugural address. This appeared in the Imaginative Conservative blog.

'America First!' without any mention of moral obligations to those in and out of America gives an eerie reminder of what was promised in Germany in the early 1930s. And for all nations to take this our nation first attitude without reference to any universal moral standards by which nations would restrain their behavior can serve as an invitation to a giant king-of-the-hill battle where the rule of force by the strongest nations reigns.

Certainly America has tried two basic approaches in responding to the world around it. It has tried isolationism, such as just prior to WW I, and imperialism. And both have failed. While isolationism inevitably draws us into conflicts because other nations are vying for more wealth and power, imperialism has proved to be neither feasible nor moral.

There is another approach. It was an approach that was promised by the creation of the UN but never carried out because the most powerful nations would have nothing to do with being restrained. And the worst culprit at refusing international restraint is the US because it was seeking an 'America First' foreign policy through the creation of empire. The UN offered a hope for alternate ways at resolving conflicts because it allowed for some measure of democracy to be used in forming resolutions. However, the existence of the Security Council ensured that only the weaker nations that were not supported by the most powerful would be subject to international law. And as for as long as we practice either isolationism or imperialism, we continue in rejecting  international law from controlling our actions and we head for the cliff of self-destruction.

Today's Silent Majority Are Yesterday's White Moderates

In his Letter From A Birmingham Jail, Martin Luther King Jr  identified the White moderate, rather than the White bigot, as providing the greatest deterrent to freedom for Blacks. Here, we need to stop and think about his claim before we describe who the White moderate is. We need to stop and think lest when we read the description of this moderate, we would exclude ourselves from fitting today's version. 

We could described White moderates of the 1950s and 60s as those who did not want their boat to be rocked by the activity or discontentment of others. And so they opposed civil disobedience and the direct actions practiced by King and his fellow activists. They were against King's actions for two reasons. First, one should not break the law. Second,  drastic action is not needed to stop inequality now because, as Christians know, equality will be given to Blacks in the world to come.

King addressed both points in this letter. First, King understood the opposition of White moderates to direct action as a preference for a tension-free 'order' over justice. So White moderates favored compliance to the law because they had a higher regard for their own comfort than for what was right. And even though perhaps some White moderates could sympathize with  the plight that Black had to endure, correcting those injustices was not worth the disruption in the tranquility that came from an ordered society. For White moderates, personal peace, rather than justice, was king.

Likewise, King took apart the contention that direct action is unnecessary because equality would be the status quo in heaven. He merely pointed out that such thinking is the reason why those who work for evil are better stewards of their time and resources than those who work for good. And Christians who do nothing now because justice will be realized later need to take note of Kings's point here. Here King is observing that the rewards of doing evil seem to provide more inspiration for those who do wrong than God sending His Son to die for our sins does for Christians.

To summarize these two points in Christian terms we must say that those Christians who were not willing to do something to further justice on earth were not only failing to practice practice their faith, they were becoming the primary stumbling blocks to justice. Thus, they provided an even greater cause for injustices of the day than those who were actually doing wrong. And this point is not one that we can claim to be ignorant of. We are familiar enough with history to know that during WWII, allied troops forced German residents to tour Nazi death camps so they could see the evils that their inaction brought.

Who are today's White moderates? They are those who are not demanding that we change from today's economic class warfare, a warfare in which those who profit from today's economic apartheid are consolidating wealth for themselves and appropriating unjust suffering and hardships for the  rest--note here that today's battels revolve more around class than race. The Occupy Movement, which is actually an international movement, pointed out just some of the sins that those with wealth and power are committing in this current class warfare (click here). And though we helped further the economic apartheid by scapegoating the 1% rather than inviting them to join the rest of us, our accusations are being constantly confirmed by each day's headlines. And today's White moderates are those who prefer the serenity of today's status quo to the anxiety that comes with demanding change.

When we rose up, as seen in Occupy Wall Street and other encampments in 2011, there were so few of us that some of us subdivided the 99% into two groups: the 98% and those who occupied. Why the subdivision? It was because the absence of the 98% from the protests loomed as a greater threat to our work than the presence of police in riot gear. And it is because of this 98% that the message of the Occupy Movement has not borne more fruit than it has. For the current comfort seems to be far more important than justice to many if not all in the 98%. And the biggest shame here is on America's Conservative Church. For it has joined not only an idolatrous patriotism with the Christian faith, it has intimately embraced the conservative ideal of individualism as opposed to loving one's neighbor as Jesus described in the parable of the Good Samaritan.

To prove that the 98% has acted like the White moderates of King's day, one does not rest in the 98%'s their rejection of today's direct actions. Rather, proof can be seen in their steadfast refusal to practice in any legal action that challenges today's status quo. For they're turning their back on participating in legal protests, they are refusing to vote for third party candidates when it is obvious that the two major parties have been bought and paid for, and they abstain from spending any significant time in even reading about the injustices which the system they benefit from inflicts on others. Those actions are the least one can do to change our world. But, rather than letting the cries of the afflicted flame the fires of urgency, the 98% prefers to preserve their own place in the status quo. 

Certainly injustice has always been a part of human history but that is not the issue here. The issue is how do we respond to injustice. This issue becomes even more pertinent to those of us who are Christians because the God we claim to worship is heavily invested in pursuing justice. But unfortunately, our individualism redirects our focus from justice for others to what we personally hope to gain from our faith--that is we hope to be saved from wrath. Thus, those of us who are Christians cripple the credibility of the Gospel when we are content to be part of the 98% or the White moderates of King's day or the German citizens who tolerated their Nazi rulers by turning a blind eye and deaf ear to the plight and pleas of those who are suffering from injustice. 

So, again, the issue becomes how are we going to respond to the injustices suffered by others. Are we going to resist or we will become the biggest part of the problem?