LoL, you seem super intent on not getting the point. Constantine outlawing pagan worship and crucifixion doesn’t make him a priest, but it also doesn’t make him a representative of a modern democracy, either.
So from this comparison, are we to believe that there are no modern democracies that outlaw assisted suicide?
Japan, for instance, is not a modern democracy? Or perhaps they are somehow infested with Christian demagoguery, despite
the Christian population of that country being only about 1%?
This means you, as a Christian, should be turning to religious leaders for your spiritual practice, not to politicians to enact it.
To be fairer to Ignatius' argument, it is not traditional to Christianity that we separate the two. Some of the earliest apologies we have for Christianity, such as the apology of Aristides (2nd century AD), were delivered directly to the emperor or before the senate. This tradition continued on later with debates occurring in Constantinople, for instance, or when the Melkite bishop Theodore Abu Qurrah went to Armenia to stump for Chalcedonianism in the court of Ashot Msaker (the Armenian prince of the time, during Arab/Rashidun-ruled Armenia, 9th century).
Of course. You can throw your vote away however you want. That said, it means if people elect somebody who wants to legislate Islamic beliefs or Pagan beliefs, you have no business complaining as they’re just following the dynamic of leadership you advocated for.
That does not follow at all. We in the Coptic Orthodox Church, for instance, have never relied on the benevolence of government in order to practice our faith, but we nevertheless recognize that it's good to have when we can get it! That's one of the reasons why we still pray to this day "for the king of this land" (in quotes, because it's part of the liturgical text itself). Should we
not be doing that, just because since the 7th century Islam has come to Egypt, and eventually held sway there numerically by the turn of the first millennium?
This is the fundamental difference between the modern western secularist and the traditional Christian, it seems. The traditional Christian wants pious leadership because it is what is best for the Church, and it is ultimately best for all mankind when the Church is strongly present in the land. It seems that the modern western secularist looks at the presence of all these non-Christian minorities (or majorities, as the case may be) and says "What about them? You wouldn't want them ruling over you with
their religious law, so why should you rule over them with yours?", not recognizing that there is a world of difference between the Christian approach to such matters and that of others.
To put it another way, we do not fast so as to have a pretext to punish those who do not do so, but because it's what we are called to do personally and collectively, as members of the Church. In great distinction to how it is in many Islamic societies, it is not the rule that we carry out collective punishments against any who do not follow our rules, as our scriptures say instead "What business do I have judging those who are outside?" (meaning outside of the Church; this is in St. Paul's first epistle to the Corinthians)
