THE SEPARATION OF CHURCH AND STATE: OLD WINE IN A NEW WINSKIN VIA A CRITIQUE OF THE ROLE OF CHRISTIANITY IN THE POST-CHRISENDOM ERA

Much has been written about the danger posed to America by the Radical Religious-Right. However, many of those who see this danger believe that what has happened in America since the rise of the Radical Religious-Right is nothing more than a blip on the history of American religion and politics. They believe that with the revelation of ineptness and corruption of the Bush administration, future presidents cannot be as destructive to America and the world as is Mr. Bush. They also believe that when Mr. Bush leaves office, the Radical Religious-Right will leave with him. None of these assumptions could be farther from the truth.

It is estimated there are approximately 100 million people who designate themselves as “conservative Christians” in America today. That means that one out of every three people in America is an Evangelical, Fundamentalist,  conservative Roman Catholic, or biblical inerrant believing Christian who believes God has ordained them to make their faith beliefs the law of the land. Thus, the danger they pose to America will remain with us for generations to come.

This is because the Radical Religious-Right sees itself as God’s instrument to “take back America for God;” that is, a Christian God they have created according to their own faith beliefs. For the Radical Religious-Right this is not politics; although that is the method they use to achieve their goal. To the Radical Religious-Right they are waging a cataclysmic battle between good and evil; a battle between those who fear God and the godless secular humanists of America for America’ soul.

It must be understood that to achieve this goal they will do anything possible without regard to what is legal, ethical, or moral as was demonstrated time and again during the presidential elections of 2000 and 2004. It is also demonstrated by Mr. Bush’s “Faith Based Initiative Programs” that have funneled countless millions of dollars in violation of the constitutional separation between church and state to religious organizations. These faith based organizations are dedicated to “Abstinence Only Before Marriage” programs in public schools that have been proven by study after study not to work and to faith based women’s health centers that are virulently against contraception and abortion that deny women the full range of gynecological and family planning health care they need.

How did Christianity in America create a militant Radical Religious-Right and what must Christianity do to heal itself form this unchristian malignancy? The flaw in the response of the Radical Religious-Right to what it perceives as attacks against itself is that it does not accept that Christianity’s historic role as the dominant shaper and judge of Western society and governance is over. Neither 21st century post-Christendom society nor governments will accord Christianity preferential treatment simply because of religious claims of entitlement. Nor, should Christianity continue to believe it should receive preferential treatment.

Simply because conservative Christians hold that certain beliefs and values are ordained by God does not mean that others do, they have a right to impose such beliefs and values as the law of the land on unbelievers, they should be immune from criticism when they attempt to do so, or that Christianity itself should be immune from criticism solely because conservative Christians believe Christianity is too sacred to be criticized.

Why? The reason is the difference between how a society that is a child of the Enlightenment perceives the relationship between expressions of faith, authority of religious bodies, government, and the rights and liberties of individuals juxtaposed with those societies that are theocracies such as Muslim nations where there is little if any distinction between the dictates of the Koran, government, and the denial of individual rights and liberties that conflict with the teaching of the Koran.

Why is this distinction so important? We need only remember the Danish Jyllands-Posten Muhammad cartoons controversy of September 30, 2005 that led to international riots in Muslim countries and the deaths of many people. We need only to remember the response of Muslim nations to Pope Benedict XVI's address at the University of Regenburg on September 2, 2006 in which he quoted from scholarship historical elements of Islam and the Prophet Mohammad regarding jihad, Muslim Holy War, by the 14th century Byzanitne emperor Manuel Paleologos II.

The bottom line is that if Christianity wants to be taken as credible, which in fact is the only way it can constructively influence society, it first must recognize and accept that Western Europe, Canada, and to a lesser degree the United States, Central, and South American nations are no longer "Christian nations." They are and are becoming more so "Enlightenment nations" that have entered the 21st century post-Christendom era.

If Christianity wishes to remain viable in the everyday lives of people, it too must enter the 21st century post-Christendom era. It must give up its presumption of entitlement. It must give up its dogmatically held belief that its faith beliefs regarding moral behavior are the only ones that are valid or come from God. In a multi-ethnic, multi-cultural, politically dualistic world, to hold to such beliefs results in marginalization which when carried to its ultimate extreme ends in extinction.

Does this mean the end of Christianity as a contributing member of society? Of course not! However, Christianity must accept there is a New World Order and that it is but one member, coequal to all of the other members, of society. The fact that Christianity must accept is that it no longer will be accepted as the dictator of societal norms, ethics, and morality.

This is the challenge to Christianity in the 21^st century. Can it make the transition from dictator to coequal member? To be honest it is a tremendous challenge to voluntarily give up belief of entitlement, privilege, power, prestige, and status. That is why so many nations around the world that have a history of dictatorship find it impossible to make the transition to democracy without falling into a prolonged period of civil war.

Yet, this is exactly what Jesus taught. He did not create a hierarchal ekklesia. He did not teach that his followers should have a sense of entitlement. He did not teach that the faith beliefs he taught should be made the law of the land.

What he taught was that his followers were to be the servants of the poor and oppressed. They were to give of themselves without thought of personal or institutional reward. He taught the law of love: love of God first and love one’s neighbor as oneself as coequal. Most importantly, he taught the interior dwelling of the Holy Spirit and belief in him as the way to the Father.

He certainly did not teach that his followers should enter the political arena, as has the Radical Religious-Right, to make his teachings the law of the land. In fact, he taught just the opposite: "Those things that are of Caesar belong to Caesar and those things that are of God belong to God." If anyone thinks Jesus was speaking only about paying taxes they do not understand his teaching methodology which was to teach a universal ethical or moral truth by using a specific example. In this case, Jesus taught that there is a natural division between the realm of God and the realm of human politics and governance and that the distinction between these two realms should be a wall of separation between his teachings, the interior spiritual development of the heart that leads to salvation, and the politics and governance of the secular state.

Christianity should not feel threatened that we have entered the era of 21^st century post-Christendom. Rather, it should be elated that the era of 21^st century post-Christendom calls the faith and the faithful back to its and their roots. It calls for Christianity to be as was Jesus in the Temple when he told his parents he was, "about my Father's business." What he meant by this was not that his Father's business was conducted in the political arena of governments but rather in the interior awakening of the Holy Spirit in individual human hearts. Thus for Jesus, conducting business in the political arena is the lost way; the way of the Pagan and the Pharisee, while conducting business in the interior of the human heart is his way and the way to salvation.

The reason the Radical Religious-Right finds itself under attack is that when it seeks self-aggrandizement in the political arena, when it claims that it is the only truth and way to salvation as does the Roman Catholic Church by stating, “the full means of salvation are to be found only within the Roman Catholic Church” and Evangelicals by stating, “only those who are ‘born again’ are saved,” and then seeks to impose its faith beliefs as the law of the land, it has violated the sanctity of the principle Jesus taught of the separation between the things of Caesar and the things of God.

How did Christianity reach this sad state of affairs that is an affront to God, humanity, and the state? Christianity was decriminalized in 311 by Galerius, who was the first emperor to issue an edict of toleration for all religious creeds, including Christianity. However, Christianity’s “Golden Age” was from the Apostolic Age to Constantine’s Edict of Milan in 313.

The Edict of Milan was a letter that proclaimed religious toleration in the Roman Empire. The letter was issued in 313, shortly after the conclusion of the Diocletian Persecution. The Edict, in the form of a joint letter to be circulated among the governors of the East, declared that the Empire would be neutral with regard to religious worship, officially removing all obstacles to the practice of Christianity and other religions. It declared unequivocally that the co-authors of the regulations wanted no action taken against the non-Christian cults.

Consequently, the Edict of Milan went beyond the first edict of 311 because it was a decisive step from hostile neutrality to friendly neutrality and protection that prepared the way for the legal recognition of Christianity as the religion of the empire.

How can we say that Christianity’s “Golden Age” was the Apostolic Age through the persecutions as opposed to it beginning with the Edict of Milan? We can because it is in the transition from persecuted religion to religion of the empire that Christianity began to lose its way. Coming out of the catacombs into the daylight, from being persecuted to being protected, was the beginning of Christianity’s growing sense of entitlement. This sense of entitlement began as a tiny trickle that grew into a bubbling brook that transformed itself into a rushing river and finally into an ocean that overwhelmed entire societies of people as the crest of what became known as the Holy Roman Empire. As such Christianity used its sense of entitlement to impose itself as the absolute dictator of all aspects of both religious and secular life. It ruthlessly persecuted and crushed any political or belief system other than its own just as Imperial Rome had persecuted and tried to crush it.

The Dark Ages of Christian Tyranny were unchallenged until the Age of Reason ushered in by Rene Decartes declaration, Cogito, ergo sum "I think, therefore I am" or Dubito, ergo cogito, ergo sum "I doubt, therefore I think, therefore I am" which became the foundational element of Western philosophy. Cogito ergo sum is a translation of Descartes' original French statement, Je pense, donc je suis which occurs in his Discourse on Method (1637). Cogito, ergo sum fundamentally changed the relationship between humanity and God. Humanness is now no longer a gift of God but a rationally engendered expression of self. Consequently God, Christianity, and God’s representative on earth “The Church,” have no right to determine the limits of human thought or behavior. It is in Decartes cogito, ergo sum that we find the first challenge to Christianity’s presumption of entitlement that in the 21^st century has found full expression in 21^st century post-Christendom.

It is not surprising the Radical Religious-Right perceives itself unjustly under attack in this era of post-Christendom. However, it is in error when it does. It is in error because those aspects of historic Christian dictatorship in the political arena regarding individual ethical and moral behavior were never legitimate. It was not and is not legitimate because it is predicated on a sense of entitlement that is “extra-Christian;” that is, outside the teachings of Jesus the Christ. It is outside the teachings of Jesus because he did not speak one word regarding what the Chilean writer Rosario Guzman Bravo describes as the Radical Religious-Right’s obsession with  “moral values below the waist;” that is, contraception, abortion, and homosexuality. It is the attempt to impose its self-created beliefs regarding such issues as contraception, abortion, and homosexuality on society by making them the law of the land that has led to institutional Christianity being under attack; not Jesus’ teaching of salvation.

What is under attack is conservative Christianity’s transgression from the spiritual realm into the political arena. What is under attack is what Ian Henderson in his book, Power Without Glory calls conservative Christianity’s, “Transposition of political and national realities into an ecclesiastical key.” That is so important let me repeat it: “Transposition of political and national realities into an ecclesiastical key.”

While Christianity may perceive this attack as unjustified and an attempt to make it irrelevant, this is not the case. To claim that the attack is the consequence of the “evils” of an atheistic secularism, ethical and moral relativism, and rejection of biblical inerrancy and natural law is simply not true. Rather, it is the effect of humanity waking; an awakening that has been in process for 370 years codified by the Founding Father’s who made the separation of church and state central to the United States Constitution, to the fact that Christianity lost its way 1,700 years ago when it began its ascent as the state religion of the Western World and the consequent entitlement it claims as its own.

What role should Christianity play in the post-Christendom era?

It should play the role promulgated by Jesus known as “The Great Commission” found in Matthew 28:19-20a: “Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of he Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you.”

The role of Christianity is to teach the Gospel truth, the good news of Jesus the Christ found in John 2:1-2 that, “If any man sin, we have an Advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous; and he is the Propitiation for our sins.”

The role of Christianity is to teach in the words of John 3:16, “So God loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, to the end that all who believe in him should not parish, but have everlasting life.”

The role of Christianity is to teach the Summary of the Law as did Jesus in Matthew 22:36-40, “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart and with all they soul, and with all they mind. This is the first and great commandment. And the second is like unto it: Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself. On these two commandments hang all the Law and the Prophets.”

The role of Christianity is to baptize people into the Body of Christ and then sustain them by its holy sacraments.

This is what Jesus taught his followers. It has everything to do with the Kingdom of God and the means of personal salvation. It has nothing to do with politics, the political, or the state. It has nothing to do with denying the moral agency of non-believers or those who believe differently from exercising their informed conscience pursuant to their own understanding of ethical and moral behavior.

Salvation has everything to do with the interior of individual human hearts and nothing to do with Christianity trying to advance its faith beliefs in the political arena by making them the law of the land.

That is why the post-Christendom era calls Christianity back to its roots and the Great Commission given it by Jesus. When Christianity hears this call and accepts it; moreover, when it respects the separation of church and state, it will no longer find itself under attack.