Comments Which Conservatives Block From Their Blogs For June 2, 2021

 June 1

To R. Scott Clark and his blogpost quoting from an article written by Keith Mathison that talks about how the Church's desire for political power, as in the days of the Roman Church in the Middle Ages, will be one of the factors that contribute to its death. This appeared in Heidelblog.

Link to article cited in Clark's article

https://www.keithmathison.org/post/the-shared-priority-of-american-evangelicalism-and-the-medieval-papacy

The question here is whether the Church, including the evangelical part of the Protestant branch, can speak prophetically to the state without lusting for power. For while the above post and article cited makes the traditional conservative mistake by viewing the Church's interaction with the state solely in the light of the past, we need to also consider the present. The present includes a significant laundry list of politically facilitated oppressions some of which are still promoted by Evangelicals including those who are providing the criticisms of evangelicalism described above.  One only needs to ask if homosexuality and same-sex marriage should be legally allowed to show that point.

We should also note that it isn't just liberals who, as described above, teach that cultural standards should replace the scriptures, conservatives do that too. Only conservatives know that the appearance of doing so raises red flags. And so instead of teaching people that we should replace what is taught in the scriptures with cultural values, they teach that their favorite sacred cow cultural values are also taught in the scriptures. Some of those cultural values include patriotism, conservative political ideology,  and capitalism. 

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To Russell Kirk and his article, possibly written in 1973, about the need for order and how the American order, though not perfect, has brought freedom and justice to people. This appeared in the Imaginative Conservative blog.

The more unjust the order, the greater risk of challenges to that order which can cause unjust changes in current order or a new order to  become more unjust. The latter happened in Russia following the October 1917 Revolution. The former seems to be happening in Israel with its Occupation of Palestinian territories. Now Israel faces a choice between military defeat and moral suicide. It seems to be vying for the latter. 

The perception of the justness of America's order often depends on whether or not one is privileged. One can quote Tocqueville to one is blue in the face, but he spoke as a member of the privileged from Europe. Thus he failed to see America's atrocities for what they were. Those who suffered the atrocities of the American order have seen things differently, and perhaps more realistically, than Tocqueville did.

We have a choice when facing the corruption of the current but weakening American order. Either we can insist on maintaining the current order because order is better than anarchy, or we can look to change the current order to become just--note that I didn't say more just. Those who are privileged, are looking for affirmation when they view the current American order. Their insecurity is evident when they either describe the merits of the current order or when minimize its atrocities. But because they have prospered by way of oppression, nagging self-doubts caused by guilt cause them to gloss over reality.

So the question is whether we will have the courage to face a real picture of the moral failures of the American order. We've already seen, through examples, what  our options will be if our courage fails.

How Should The Church Identify Politically

 The important question of how Christians should identify politically was given some good input by a Christianity Today article by David Robertson (click here for a short bio).

I could review the whole article (click here for the article) but that would take away from a very important point that Robertson makes about the Church's political identity. I will use a quote from his article to show his point but will vary from his views as to why the quote is important. That quote is made in the following quote:

I thought of that title when I read the various competing propaganda from the Evangelicals for Trump/Biden groups. If these groups are representative of American Christianity, then the Church has already been defeated. Why is that the case? Is it wrong for individual Christian leaders to support a political party or candidate? Of course not. We too are citizens. But we are also citizens of another kingdom and when we start confusing the two – claiming, or creating the perception, that the good news of Jesus means he is endorsing one or other of the candidates - then a line has been crossed.

 
The point of the quote is to warn against conflating our faith with a particular political ideology or party. In other words, we can't identify the Church and the Gospel with any particular political party or movement. To see Robertson's reasons why we shouldn't do that, you need to read his article, which is well written and makes some very good points.

There are two reasons why we cannot confuse what our faith says with our political leanings. First, if we conflate the faith with our political views, we will find that our understanding of the Faith will be more determined by our political views than by the Scriptures. This is a point that Robertson makes while citing the views of Francis Schaeffer. Another way to put it is to say that if we confuse our faith with our political views, what we think the Gospel is will become a servant of our political views. And that is where the Gospel a spiral of change that can end up separating us from the Gospel itself as our understanding of it continually changes and is determined by our political views.

However, I believe that our political views as Christians are more important to us and the Church than Robertson gives credit for. Why? It is because I believe that politics should be considered a subject in practical theology where there is enough ambiguity in the Scriptures to give some general guidance but not enough details for the Gospel to be identified with a given political ideology.

But once we master not letting our political views control what the Scriptures say, what else is there to say? What we should note is that if we conflate the Gospel with a given political ideology, party, or teachings of any individual politicians, we have prevented the Church or a given individual Christian from speaking prophetically to that ideology, party or individual. For if we equate a given political ideology, party, or words of a given politician then that ideology, party, or individual can assume the role of speaking prophetically to God's Word than vice versa. And in fact, that is what we see in the world today with people dictating to the Gospel regarding what the Scriptures can and cannot say.

We should note that the Scriptures come from God while our ideologies and political parties are the creation of people. And that point should be nonnegotiable for all Christians. However, we should note because of our sins and faults, occasionally the outside world can correct some of how we Christians interpret the Scriptures. They can do that not because any of our political ideologies are superior to the Scriptures, but because we can be prone to misunderstand the Scriptures for a number of personal reasons.

Politics is important for Christians especially if we should treat it as a subject in the field of practical theology, which I think we should. But the source for what we know about the Gospel comes from God, through the Scriptures, rather than from man because of whatever insights we might come to realize.