Shouldn't all Evangelicals want Christian Nationalism?

[Ignatius the Kiwi]

Not true. The entire point of a democratic government "Of the people" and "By the people" is to protect everyone's rights and interests. The thing is, you're never going to get everyone to agree what the best way is to do that, so you come together and do it as best you can - with everyone having representation in the best way possible.

Which renders it largely impossible for Christians to thrive since the interests of non-Christian groups may take precedence. Consider the secular introduction of an acceptance of Homosexuality, divorce or usury for instance. We have seen how Christians in the service of other's interests have neglected their own and Christian standards fall by the wayside. Christians do not have to agree that a society where everyone is 'equal' is best, especially when it undermines their own political and social interests.

Will that model be perfect? Most certainly not - but I would argue that its a better approach to governing than having separate religious sects / philosophical groups battling for power in a "my way or the highway" approach. That sounds more like a middle-eastern or communist country than western democracy. Moreover - does that striving and desire for absolute power line up with the loving and respectful attitude toward one's neighbor which is clearly communicated in the Bible, and which was modeled by Christ? I think not.

Love for one's neighbor did not involve letting them do whatever they wanted. For instance, we are seeing the reemergence in society of Polyamory and Polygamy. Do you believe Christians, if they want to maintain your vision of society, where everyone is equal and all interests are respected can stop such a practice from being legally recognized? No, we cannot. Or what about trans ideology or any number of social values hostile to our faith?

You will find Christianity continuing to decline, especially as Christian spaces are infiltrated and non-Christian values are tolerated and that toleration is considered more valuable than Christianity itself.

 

[MarkSB]

Which renders it largely impossible for Christians to thrive since the interests of non-Christian groups may take precedence. Consider the secular introduction of an acceptance of Homosexuality, divorce or usury for instance. We have seen how Christians in the service of other's interests have neglected their own and Christian standards fall by the wayside. Christians do not have to agree that a society where everyone is 'equal' is best, especially when it undermines their own political and social interests.

Love for one's neighbor did not involve letting them do whatever they wanted. For instance, we are seeing the reemergence in society of Polyamory and Polygamy. Do you believe Christians, if they want to maintain your vision of society, where everyone is equal and all interests are respected can stop such a practice from being legally recognized? No, we cannot. Or what about trans ideology or any number of social values hostile to our faith?

You will find Christianity continuing to decline, especially as Christian spaces are infiltrated and non-Christian values are tolerated and that toleration is considered more valuable than Christianity itself.

So - there are a lot of things to address in this post, and unfortunately I don't have time for all of them. All I will say is that by my estimation, your argument seems to be centered around the need to control society as a whole - and you seem to think that is a necessity in order to prevent worldly values from infiltrating the church. I just simply don't see that as being true. Moreover, you're just never going to be able to control people to that degree - and certainly not peacefully. And do you really think that executing that kind of control over your neighbor is something that is of God?

If your goal is to separate yourself from all these "social ills" you have listed, there are certainly groups who have done that without trying to overthrow the government (the Amish are the first who come to mind). Unless you're trying to outright control people outside the church, I fail to see why a government takeover is necessary.

EDIT: And your last comment is another strawman. I never said that loving others is letting them do whatever they wanted. But it certainly isn't executing the kind of control which you seem to be proposing, either.

 

[Ignatius the Kiwi]

So - there are a lot of things to address in this post, and unfortunately I don't have time for all of them. All I will say is that by my estimation, your argument seems to be centered around the need to control society as a whole - and you seem to think that is a necessity in order to prevent worldly values from infiltrating the church. I just simply don't see that as being true. Moreover, you're just never going to be able to control people to that degree - and certainly not peacefully. And do you really think that executing that kind of control over your neighbor is something that is of God?

It isn't that control of a society is necessary, but if you surrender institutions of power that has add on effects and the Church as it stands today is not strong enough to actually resist them. We like to appeal to the Christians under Rome as the example but so much of what the early Christians did would be considered horrendous by our modern standards, in how they excluded, made a clear distinction between who was part of the Church and who wasn't and in how they were prepared to resist Roman authority. Most American Christians could not dream of resisting America the way the early Christians resisted Rome and as a result said Christianity will die out. Which might not be a bad thing, as stronger Christians emerge whom are willing to challenge the current status quo.

If your goal is to separate yourself from all these "social ills" you have listed, there are certainly groups who have done that without trying to overthrow the government (the Amish are the first who come to mind). Unless you're trying to outright control people outside the church, I fail to see why a government takeover is necessary.

My point isn't even that taking over the government is necessary, rather it's that Christians should not think themselves unworthy of power and exercising it for their own benefit. The Amish I'd say are perhaps one of the better examples of a movement out there, a Christian community that is growing and hates the world. They are prepared to sacrifice reliance on modernity and that is to their credit.

 

[o_mlly]

Let's assume this to be true. Does said failure mean a world where Christianity did not dominate would have been more worth it?

How exactly would you practically make the US a Christian theocracy? What human acts would you proscribe as immoral and what acts would you prescribe as moral?

Do you think history would not repeat itself, eg., Treaty of Augsburg (1555) or the Treaty of Westphalia (1648) ...

	Treaty of Augsburg	Peace of Westphalia
Date	1555	1648
Main Conflict	Catholics vs. Lutherans	Thirty Years' War
Key Participants	Charles V, Holy Roman Empire	Holy Roman Empire, France, Sweden
Religious Provisions	Lutheranism or Catholicism	Tolerance to Calvinists
Political Impact	Cuius regio, eius religio	Sovereignty of German princes

... or the persecution of Anabaptists in Europe (1525 - 1535)?

Estimates of those who died directly or indirectly as a result of the internecine wars exceeds 9 million. Do you think those lives made the effort that failed to unitize politics and religion are reasonable?

 

[o_mlly]

So your opinion is that religion causes wars that separating religion utterly from power was intended to prevent war?

Both are matters of fact.

 

[o_mlly]

You are also of the opinion that if we tolerate a Christian law imposed on society we must tolerate Islamic law imposed on society?

We must be prepared to do so if we abandon the First Amendment.

 

[o_mlly]

Alright, prevent religious wars but not prevent secular wars? Are secular wars inherently better? That is, do you prefer WW1 and WW2 and the American crusades for Democracy over the 30 years war and actual Catholic Crusades? Why should I privledge secular warfare and it's legitimacy over religious warfare?

Prevent all wars. Wars of aggression are always evil.

 

[o_mlly]

Why should a Christian community tolerate it's own values being supplanted with another's? That doesn't make sense.

Which Christian community would rule? Some Christain communities see divorce and remarriage as acceptable, some see artificial contraception as moral, some see abortions as moral, some see same-sex marriage as moral, etc.

 

[o_mlly]

Does a non-Christian society eliminate concupiscence?

No.

Has the west become better or worse in your estimation as we have become less Christian?

Less.

 

[Ignatius the Kiwi]

How exactly would you practically make the US a Christian theocracy? What human acts would you proscribe as immoral and what acts would you prescribe as moral?

Do you think history would not repeat itself, eg., Treaty of Augsburg (1555) or the Treaty of Westphalia (1648) ...

	Treaty of Augsburg	Peace of Westphalia
Date	1555	1648
Main Conflict	Catholics vs. Lutherans	Thirty Years' War
Key Participants	Charles V, Holy Roman Empire	Holy Roman Empire, France, Sweden
Religious Provisions	Lutheranism or Catholicism	Tolerance to Calvinists
Political Impact	Cuius regio, eius religio	Sovereignty of German princes

... or the persecution of Anabaptists in Europe (1525 - 1535)?

Estimates of those who died directly or indirectly as a result of the internecine wars exceeds 9 million. Do you think those lives made the effort that failed to unitize politics and religion are reasonable?

It's not my intention to make the USA a Theocracy. A Christian lead government need not be a Theocratic regime, only a minority of past Christian governments were Theocracies to begin with. Do I believe war would not happen under a Christian regime? No, but it is clear to me that abolishing religion from power did not stop war. Rather it only changed the reason why we fight for wars. You as a secularist seem to want to lambast Christians for the wars of religion, yet WW1 and WW2 and all the wars that America has fought throughout it's existence have caused far more death and suffering as a result. Are you in any place to condemn Christians as an American secularist when your country dropped a nuke on Japan?

War may be inevitable because that is an aspect of human nature. There's a great article by Joseph De Maistre who catalogued all the major wars which happened throughout history up and until his time and instead of aspiring to a world without peace he simply conceded the brutal reality of warfare that it is innate to human nature. Separating religion utterly from power has not resulted in anything different, rather I'd say we've seen the scale of warfare increased as states disregarded the old prerogatives that the Church and Monarchies held together. Democracy lead to the Levee on Mass as the entirety of the people were viewed as participants of the war and this in turn lead to the Total warfare we saw in the Modern era where civilians are indistinguishable from Military men. The Idea of withholding war for sacred reasons is absurd to the modern mind.

I'm not saying Christianity in power would be perfect, but I fail to see how modernity is better than the past. Rather we are far more inhumane and less honourable and fight for reasons far more petty.

 

[Ignatius the Kiwi]

Both are matters of fact.

If religion is the cause of war, why did WW1 and WW2 happen? Why did America launch multiple crusades for Democracy in the Middle east?

 

[Akita Suggagaki]

Which Christian community would rule? Some Christain communities see divorce and remarriage as acceptable, some see artificial contraception as moral, some see abortions as moral, some see same-sex marriage as moral, etc.

Yes, which Christian values do we go with? What are we talking about?

Why do so few care to articulate them?

Biblical Values

We might hear a lot of talk about Biblical Values and how we should govern our lives and country by them. But seldom do we actually try to identify them and reflect on them. And then the biggest challenge is praxis. How do we live them our in our daily lives...

www.christianforums.com

 

[Ignatius the Kiwi]

We must be prepared to do so if we abandon the First Amendment.

Or we could live according to different principles than American secular ones. We do not have to submit to Islam if we don't want to and can in fact resist them as Christians in the past did.

 

[Ignatius the Kiwi]

Prevent all wars. Wars of aggression are always evil.

Naive and magical thinking. You'll never stop all wars, it's part of human nature and the nature of power itself. You cannot prevent all wars, you cannot prevent people seeking power. Americans more than anyone understand this, since they have launched countless wars in order to secure their own power right from the outset of their existence.

 

[Ignatius the Kiwi]

Which Christian community would rule? Some Christain communities see divorce and remarriage as acceptable, some see artificial contraception as moral, some see abortions as moral, some see same-sex marriage as moral, etc.

Well said communities you are talking about aren't really Christian so we can dismiss them. Episcopalians need not concern themselves with the affairs of the faithful. But you seem to think only one community has to rule instead of there being a broad coalition of Christians who agree on certain precepts and can work together in the face of a greater threat. I see less of this inter-Christian competition amongst Christians who are politically activated and who want an alternative to the current system. They are prepared to live in peace with Protestants, Orthodox and Catholics as we come together and agree on a common direction for society. It need not be utterly comprehensive either since we're talking about political coalitions.

Let's put it this way, I'd rather work with a Fundamentalist on the matter of social values and politics than I would work with a secular Atheist. Because our interests align.

 

[RDKirk]

Naive and magical thinking. You'll never stop all wars, it's part of human nature and the nature of power itself. You cannot prevent all wars, you cannot prevent people seeking power. Americans more than anyone understand this, since they have launched countless wars in order to secure their own power right from the outset of their existence.

We can't stop all wars, but we can stop wars that put Christians in the crosshairs of other Christians.

When the Church is entangled with government, that's what you get...every time.

If war must be, we can let war be for pagans.

 

[o_mlly]

It's not my intention to make the USA a Theocracy. A Christian lead government need not be a Theocratic regime, only a minority of past Christian governments were Theocracies to begin with.

Confusing. Are you not proposing a Christocracy of sorts?

 

[o_mlly]

Do I believe war would not happen under a Christian regime? No, but it is clear to me that abolishing religion from power did not stop war.

Separating church and state stopped religious wars.

 

[Ignatius the Kiwi]

We can't stop all wars, but we can stop wars that put Christians in the crosshairs of other Christians.

Well, no you can't, unless you secure the power to launch wars to begin with. WW1 and WW2 put millions of Christian men at war with each other for petty reasons of Nationalism, Democracy, Fascism and Communism. Modern democracies are not shy of drafting their boys to fight their wars and it's one of the most ghoulish elements of society.

When the Church is entangled with government, that's what you get...every time.

Actually no, It was the French revolution that introduced the levee on masse for explicitly secular and state reasons. It is in modern regimes, where the state can print infinite money to keep the gears of war going and demand total surrender from the enemy that makes modern wars so destructive. At least in medieval times there was the Church as an authority to act as arbitrator between Lords. Now modern nations don't talk, they don't negotiate or terms.

If war must be, we can let war be for pagans.

Except it will be fought with Christian bodies because Christians have decided they cannot control it. If the USA was to go to war with Russia, it will draft Christian men of fighting age to die for it.

 

[o_mlly]

You as a secularist seem to want to lambast Christians for the wars of religion ... Are you in any place to condemn Christians as an American secularist when your country dropped a nuke on Japan?

? I've been a practicing Catholic all my life. If I question you on the practicalities of another "Christendom" kindly just answer my interrogative rather than trying to insult me.