On Church and State

Having refused to join the myriad bloggers opining on recent Supreme Court decisions, I can’t help but notice a bit of fatalism on the part of some because of those decisions. In a few weeks my wife and I will have been married for 40 years. Two things about that reality stand out to me. One, we didn’t make it 40 years because the State of Florida gave us a license approving of our marriage; and two, nothing the Supreme Court said about marriage will change one thing about our marriage. 

We’ve stayed married for a number of reasons, among them the fact that we love each other despite ourselves;  and we gave our word to God, our families, and a whole bunch of friends who were at our wedding that we would stay married “until death do us part.” We were taught about those two values by our individual Christian families and by the two churches we grew up in as young people. We both had parents who apparently learned the same lessons. I can’t recall a single thing the states of Florida and South Carolina, or the federal government of the United States did or is doing to make that happen.

One of my “summer projects” has been to re-read Eric Metaxas’ wonderful biography of Dietrich Bonhoeffer titled Bonhoeffer: Pastor, Martyr, Prophet, Spy. I read it shortly after it was published and described it to several friends as “the most convicting book I’ve ever read, other than the Bible!” It deserves another reading. Actually, this time I’m listening via audible.com, and listening is, in some ways, even more powerful than reading.

In describing Hitler’s attempt to take over the German church, Metaxas describes Bonhoeffer’s refusal to succumb to the manipulation that Hitler and his minions used to convince some otherwise pretty bright people that the Christian gospel and Nazi heresy were compatible. How in the world could that possibly happen? Here’s what Metaxas says, “For many Germans, their national identity had become so melted together with whatever Lutheran Christian faith they had that it was impossible to see either clearly. After four hundred years of taking for granted that all Germans were Lutheran Christians, no one really knew what Christianity was anymore.” (page 174)

I think that is the very thing that has a nagging presence in my mind when I hear all the talk about the United States as a Christian nation, and especially the fatalism I hear about some decision made by the Supreme Court. Is it possible that our own assumptions about Christian-nation ideas mean that we are confused about what Christianity is all about?

I am fairly confident that there is a “civic Jesus” that many, if not most Americans like. The civic Jesus is one that we create, and it just depends on one’s cultural setting as to how this civic Jesus works. For some, the civic Jesus is, himself, in a mood of fatalism right now because of the Supreme Court’s decision. For others, the civic Jesus is euphoric that the Supreme Court finally got it right. For some, he is a Tea Party voting Republican; and for others, a far-too-the-left voting Democrat. In some contexts he is all about “follow me and be prosperous,” while for others he is only concerned about poverty.

This is what happens when we confuse national ideals and the Christian gospel. The biblical Jesus certainly wasn’t an anarchist who wanted to overthrow Rome, but I’ve yet to come across the gospel story where He seems overly distraught that the fruitfulness of His mission to renew and restore creation was somehow attached to whether or not the Roman government made Christian decisions. I think one could demonstrate that the Emperor’s view of human sexuality in general and marriage in particular would make the challenges of our culture and time appear to be tame.  But then He knew what the gospel was all about!

I’m not confused, by the way, about the blessing of having been born in the United States. Neither am I non-patriotic in the appropriate sense of that word – patriotic, not a nationalist. I always vote and I pay my taxes. I stand for the national anthem and am offended when bad etiquette means men don’t take their hats off. I’m also not confused about what Scripture says about marriage – it is one man and one woman committed to one another for life. 

I’ll stick with Paul on this one when he declared to believers living in the seat of power for the Roman Emperor, “For I am not ashamed of the gospel; it is the power of God unto salvation to everyone who has faith, to the Jew first and also to the Greek.” (Romans 1:16, NRSV) I can’t help but think about the fact that he wrote those words to believers who lived in the shadow of the Emperor himself, who tended to think he was “the power” of all powers.  Paul apparently believed that gospel, not government, was our hope.

It all makes me wonder what would happen if we who truly believe the gospel could set aside the civic Jesus and, with Paul determine that we too would “preach Christ, and Him crucified.”  And, getting back to the Bonhoeffer issue, it makes me wonder if sometimes we haven’t confused what it means to be an American and what it means to be a Christian to the point that “no one really knew what Christianity was anymore.”