Comments on: Aliens in a strange land

By: Bror Erickson

Bror Erickson — Thu, 21 May 2009 00:34:23 +0000

Peter,
There are two ditches equally perilous on both sides of the narrow path which is Christ, the way the truth and the life. Yes Christians can be tempted to decadence. However, take a walk through Pompeii to see the level of decadence within which the early Christian church grew and flourished!
The other side of the path, and I think this is the most shameful sin of the church today, is to lose sight all together of the gospel and fall into legalism. For some reason people, and most shamefully, Christians confuse Christianity with moralism. It is bad enough when this happens in the church. It is down right horrid that we allow it to spill out of our sanctuaries, and terrorize the world with this moralism. The government has accomplished all it can hope to when it maintains a modicum of peace among the people, punishes wrongdoers, and rewards good citizens. It is not the job of the government to make everyone conform to Christian principles. And the Church should not want Christianity to be confused with this either.
If saving souls is the main thing, then we must be very careful that the gospel we have been entrusted with is not confused with law. Engaging the world with the gospel, is different than trying to pass anti sodomy laws, or making it difficult for a citizen to get a drink, or taxing them for their cigarettes. Yet, today that is the perception of the church, a bunch of “do-gooders” who really aren’t doing anything “good” at all, but are worried their neighbor might have some fun. Seriously, the world associates us with nothing but law anymore, and that is a huge shame. The only time we are in the public eye it seems is when we are trying to ostracize another segment of society with yet another law, all in the name of Christ!
We have to learn to do better. of course me sitting here arguing with you probably isn’t doing better.

By: Peter Leavitt

Peter Leavitt — Thu, 21 May 2009 00:09:09 +0000

Okay, Bror, I’ll read Secular Society.

I agree with you that the fundamental issue lies with saving souls, though my understanding is that Augustine and Luther were far from confining themselves narrowly to the City of God.

The reality is that the liberals/barbarians have taken over the cultural heights; their fondest wish is for religious folk to keep their religion private. Meanwhile decadence abounds and has a ferocious influence on everyone in our society including religious people.

By: tODD

tODD — Wed, 20 May 2009 23:49:44 +0000

Peter (@14), can you see the irony here? On one thread, you berate us Protestants (but not including yourself; you have an out for “family reasons”, I guess) for not being ecumenically minded, as we insist on our (Biblically derived) litmus tests.

And yet here you are lambasting “liberal Christians” for not passing your own collection of litmus tests. How divisive of you! Why can you not overlook these differences with your fellow Christians and seek unity with them?

It would appear that you consider “cultural issues” more important than the presence of false doctrine among those groups you deem “serious” — up to and including Jews and Mormons! I mean, at least liberal Christians have the potential of having the Gospel. And yet you praise those who have no gospel at all! What a curious stance.

“The secular barbarians love it when do-gooding Christians confine themselves to charitable causes.” Yes, well, that’s a false choice, isn’t it? Bror said nothing about “confining” ourselves merely to such things. Clearly Bror isn’t afraid to preach the full Law as well. But that’s not the question. The question isn’t “do we give up preaching the Law”, but rather, “Do we enact our beliefs as laws for those who do not share our faith?”, and, subsequently, “If so, what does that tell unbelievers about Christianity?”

But rather than chasing down the “let’s enact laws to make them know what we believe” path, I’d like to submit that we should not love with words or tongue but with actions and in truth, and live such good lives among the pagans that, though they accuse us of doing wrong, they may see our good deeds and glorify God on the day he visits us. Just my opinion, though.

Your wiggling in re: “Paul’s situation” being “rather different” hardly convinces. Your argument seems to be one of: We (that is, at least nominal Christians) used to be in charge here, thus we should pretend we still are, or demand to be put back in charge, no matter how things have changed.

By: Bror Erickson

Bror Erickson — Wed, 20 May 2009 23:49:29 +0000

Peter,
You found me out, I’m a liberal.
Actually, a look at history will show that often it was the liberal churches who got involved in all the “serious issues” in a political way. They had no gospel, just politics, “the progressive gospel.” In fact, liberals and fundamentalists often have that in common. Once they lose the gospel, all they have left is politics (law). Kissing cousins.
And when I said we would do better to engage society with soup kitchens than with passing laws, I was more making a comment on the futility of the approach you want to take than I was on the merits of soup kitchens.
Now, one might argue that actually our day has a lot more in common with Paul’s day in the early church than it has with Luther and Fredrick the Wise’s day. And quite frankly I prefer it.
However, Luther set a very wise precedent for us Lutherans and was not willing to compromise in doctrine in order to align with others in the world politic. I think of Marburg, and the desire of Philip of Hesse to have a pan protestant league. Some things are just to important. The Gospel is one of them.
Can’t save anyone by passing a law. Can’t sanctify society by passing a law. The law has its uses, but it also has its limits, and they ought to be heeded. Luther knew this well, read “On Secular Authority.”

By: Peter Leavitt

Peter Leavitt — Wed, 20 May 2009 23:13:07 +0000

Bror, soup kitchens et al are fine, though that is really the favored approach of liberal Christians who avoid the serious cultural issues including those of homosexual marriage, abortion, and stem-cell research, to say nothing of the squelching serious religious voices in the public square. The secular barbarians love it when do-gooding Christians confine themselves to charitable causes.

Paul’s situation in ancient Rome and elsewhere during the very early days of Christianity was rather different than today in the West that has a strong tradition of Christendom being a major cultural and political influence. Again, think of Luther working with Frederick the Wise in Saxony and the Evangelical Wilberforce who ended slavery in Britain.

I’m all in favor of Christians working hard in the right-hand kingdom, though we ought not avoid our serious obligation in the left-hand one, even in our modern pluralistic set up.

By: Bror Erickson

Bror Erickson — Wed, 20 May 2009 21:41:39 +0000

I can commend the Catholics for standing on their convictions and upholding the sanctity of life. I sort of like people who can stand on conviction.
However, I don’t know that I at anytime want to be lumped together with Mormons, Muslims, and Jews. Nor do I think the passing of laws is the best example we can have for having a religious presence in the public square.
Homosexual activity was quite a common practice in the Roman Empire about the time of Paul. And though he preached against it and admonished Christians not to engage in it, he didn’t go around campaigning for laws against it.
Is that seriously the limits to our imagination as to how to engage society today? Is that really what we want the secular world to think of us, that we are no different than Muslims, Jews, or Mormons, that we don’t have any other message for the world than law? No wonder we are dying off and losing traction in society. What do us Christians hope to accomplish with this so called culture war? The 1950s? A “Leave it to Beaver” Society? You can have it.
I think we would do better to engage society with soup kitchens, food banks, orphanages and the like.

By: Peter Leavitt

Peter Leavitt — Wed, 20 May 2009 20:50:07 +0000

Bror, I’m not arguing for any sort of Constantinian, caesaropapism Christian rule; rather for a strenuous religious presence in the public square. A good example of this recently involved the conservative Catholics who opposed the abortionist, Obama’s invitation to the Notre Dame commencement. Another excellent example is the Evangelical, Catholic, and Mormon influence that defeated Proposition Eight in California.

Luther and Calvin in their day, while building strong churches on the basis of the Cross, were closely involved in cultural and political matters. While differing in some respects,they both understood that Christians should be closely involved in state as well as church matters. The Two Kingdoms are far from being mutually exclusive.

Orthodox Christians, Jews, Mormons, Muslims, et al need to make their voices loud and clear in the public square. We, also, need to take the gloves off in this very real cultural war.

By: Jim

Jim — Wed, 20 May 2009 20:41:20 +0000

Peter,

If you write off receiving the Word and the sacraments as “hunkering down and whining,” then we have a lot more to discuss than can take place in a blog’s comment section.

The question isn’t whether to affect culture and politics, it’s how to affect culture and politics. Your suggestion is that Christians need to do more of what they’ve been attempting to do since the 1970s (or even since the 1960s, after the school prayer decisions) — play power politics.

Yet the “culture” has been dramatically and radically transformed for the worse over that period. You suggest that the solution is “the same as we’ve been doing, except more of it.”

I’d instead suggest that the model of “power politics” is a deformed model.

IMHO, U.S. Christians depended on an ostensibly “Christianed” culture to do the work that their ecclesiologies ought to have been doing. So when the culture took a nosedive, it took a lot of churches as well, because we depended on culture for a generic type of quasi-Christian discipleship and were not used to understanding ourselves as communities centered around Word and sacrament.

“Cult” is the root of “culture.” If the Christian cult is not the center of this culture, then it is an idolatrous culture that the Christian must live in, but not be a part of.

The only way to revitalize culture is to revitalize the cult. And that always and only means Word and sacraments transforming lives.

By: Bror Erickson

Bror Erickson — Wed, 20 May 2009 20:15:38 +0000

Yes, Peter, I am a little confused along with Kerner as to who is recommending hunkering down inside of assorted Christian confines and give up influencing politics and culture, here.
Yet, I am also perplexed as to why you think Christian influence has to be by law? As long as the Church is here in this world it will influence as it has politics and culture. The Early church was very influential in politics and culture though, without having to resort to societal sanctification by legislation.
The unique gift the Church has is not specially ordained laws of God. God ordains all government, Christian or no. Remember Romans 13 was written in reference to a very pagan Caesar. Pagan governments are able to have perfectly acceptable laws to govern the public peace. What the church has is the gospel, the forgiveness of sins. Funny, early Christians used to be persecuted on account of that article of faith. Now we get heat for trying to make society conform to our norms of good social behavior. We lost something in the Constantininan era. I’d like to go back to the days when we were persecuted for believing in the forgiveness of sins. At least then you know that you are engaging society not with legislation, of which they have enough, but with the gospel, and that is true evangelization. When the church is influencing the culture with the gospel, then it is truly being the salt of the earth. The world has law enough if you ask me.

By: kerner

kerner — Wed, 20 May 2009 19:57:06 +0000

Hunkering down and whining in provincial denominations is the polar opposite of what is being recommended here. This goes back to Jesus command to be the “salt of the earth”. Salt, in food, is a small part of the mass, but it changes the flavor of the whole meal throughout. This is what is meant by going back to the basic building blocks of society, and preserving (as well as generating new) social institutions of our own to overcome the world.

Allying with other Christians to stand up in the public square? Sure, when it’s appropriate. Allying with non-Christians to make the culture better in a natural law sort of way? I think that’s appropriate too, as long as we don’t compromise our faith in the process. But I don’t know why you picked Jews as the favored non-Christians. Frankly, when the Californians shot down gay marriage last year, the Mormons were leading that charge. And I’ll bet you every conservative Muslim voted with conservative Christians on that point. When it comes right down to it, whoever wants to jump on the natural law bandwagon is welcome as far as I am concerned, when it comes to specific issues. But we can’t let the lines of the law and gospel get blurry for the sake of these “alliances”. That is a huge danger.