Comment on 'Vocation', previous post...

The comment-feed gremlins said that my comment on Byrthnoth's post was too long. I've never had that happen before. Huh.

In any case, I don't really feel like being any more concise, so I'm pasting it here:

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I guess the answers to your questions would largely hinge on whether it is the vocation of any Christian--regardless of his station, be it teacher, politician, or garbageman--to "build Christendom." And that is why I can't get off this sticky widget: what Dickens is Christendom?!?!

Perhaps that whole debacle calls for its own post; I have a feeling it does and will be generating one once I collect my thoughts. For now, though, I'll give my quick takes, which I will try to keep relevant to Byrthnoth's post as well.

I agree with Byrthnoth: there is no purely civil libertarian argument against gay "marriage." For perhaps the best treatment of this issue, and one which examines it in the context of a much more widespread collapse of Western sexual ethics, read Christopher Oleson's piece "Phony Matrimony" in Touchstone magazine

I suppose the simplest argument against gay marriage when you're talking about building Christendom, regardless of how you define it, is that Christendom must be peopled! And, well...that demographic just ain't puttin' out. In all seriousness, though, I don't know if there's an argument to be made against civil unions for gays in our contemporary legal context. Natural law theory is dead. I mean, it shouldn't be. I'm sad that it is. But unless its corpus gets reanimated somehow, it's not much of a peg to hang anything on in the federal courts. Whether we (Christians) ought to try to find ways to "make them stop, Mommy!" is another question, the answer to which, I think must be "only through legal means." And if that can't be done, we accept what the magistrates say...unless they start telling us to engage in homosexual acts. See, that's a positive injunction to sin which we are bound to disobey.

I'm being cheeky and hyperbolic, but I'm also trying to illustrate a completely serious point. I mentioned this earlier in my comment on Brian's post on the Belgic Confession. Maybe we'd like to have more prohibitions in place, more specific curbs on man's sinfulness, in the civil government. There are means of bringing that about. James seems to think that the ballot measure isn't one of them. Maybe he's right. I haven't given it much thought. Regardless, absent a dramatic sea-change in government, however (like the US becoming a benevolent dictatorship overnight), we are bound to follow the laws. Likewise we are prohibited by God from engaging in vigilantism. It is not sinful to suffer the sinfulness of others (e.g., "Turn the other cheek"), unless it is your office, your vocation, to bind and to loose, to wield the keys whereby forgiveness is proclaimed or withheld. Unless you're a pastor of the Church, this isn't you. As Christian laymen we are constrained on a daily basis to tolerate the wickedness of the world and its denizens. Yes, tolerate them. Put up with them. Otherwise you're in an uncomfortable position of being compelled by conscience to disobey any government which is not completely legitimate, whose laws do not mandate perfect holiness. The problem is that no such government exists or can exist. You'd be honor bound to live as a rebel all your life. But you would be, sadly, "a rebel without a clue," in the immortal words of the philosopher Petty. Governments are flawed institutions administered by human beings; there is not a one of them whose founding is not steeped in blood. They're all illegitimate in one way or another. But they're still authoritative. The fact remains, though, that we would not need them were we not fallen. We would not need the negative which they have been given to wield--the administration of violence, the sword. It's been said that we'd still need traffic lights, stop signs and the like, but I don't think there would be cars in an unfallen world. Well, maybe there'd still be BMWs.

...but I digress.

I'm not sure what annoys me more: the fact that homosexuals are allowed to "marry," or that all the rubes from the Christian Coalition et al are out there on the steps of the nation's courthouses protesting in a high dudgeon like they own the place, incredulous that this could have happened in God's Country!

Why are they/we so surprised? Why are they protesting at a courthouse? This is a human problem at base, not a political one. I'm not saying that there are no political steps which must be taken as well, but they're already being taken -- at the ballot box. And for now, marriage amendments (which I am uneasy about to say the least) are passing by the slimmest of margins, and gay "marriage" is still illegal in most states. But that's not making anyone less gay, remember? So vote against them if they come up in your state. But if and when they pass, you are duty-bound to obey the law, and tolerate civil marriages between gays. You can move to a different state, or retreat to the country. But you have to honor the law--again, unless the terms of a particular law are telling you that YOU, sir, must marry a man, in which case, sure, protest. Disobey.

Not only is it a bad idea to build Christendom, I'm not sure we have the right to build it. But then there's that bugaboo again: WHAT IS THIS CHRISTENDOM THAT WE SHOULD/SHOULD NOT BUILD?? Suffice it to say that I remain dubious about the possibility of a political alliance of Christian states, dubious, even, of the notion of a "Christian state," as I've said before.

Thoughts? Byrthnoth, yours especially...

Vocation

Avoiding Huffiness, as per Mark's sage advice, and as we've already discussed the (not quite ivory tower) "you can't change the world, brighten the corner you're in" thesis, perhaps we could talk about what it means to be a teacher at a Christian School rather than a School, and, at the other end of the spectrum, what it means t be a Christian politician rather than a non-christian (atheist or pagan or whatever) politician. Its been said on this message board that there is nothing decidedly Christian about morality, something which maybe this will bleed into.

In some important ways, it does matter whether or not one's elected officials are Christians or atheists, and in some ways it matter if they are Christian or Muslim, for example. Not always, but sometimes.

An example: it makes no political sense that gay marriage should be an issue. From a civil rights stand point, there really is no reason to disallow two fellows to shack up with the same benefits as a guy and a gal; however, Christianity has a distinctive teaching on homosexuality (shared, as far as I know, by Islam and possibly borrowed from Christianity) which prohibits it. Now, from a civil standpoint, as a man operating and voting according to the constitution and legal traditions of our country, there's no reason for me to vote against gay marriage on a state constitutional ballot proposal. In fact, I might vote against it, say, because I disagree with ballot proposals as a means by which to change state constitutions.

However (yes, starting with a post-positive!), as a Christian, this should bother me. Not so much because I think anyone will become "less gay" or "more gay" by my vote, or even because I think the Bible has outlines on the civil laws of the country in that regard (we must be prudent in governing I suppose). Married couples are more eligible to adopt children from adoption agencies and to receive government adoption assistance, and adopting a chid means raising a child and instilling that child with values and morals. "Raise up a child in a certain way and he will not depart from it." From the standpoint of human rights, it makes sense to allow to men to marry. When looking at it from the tradition of Judeo-Christian morality, (without claiming to be any holier than those two fellows mind you), one has the imperative to take legal steps, like voting for that proposal perhaps, against handing children over to them when such steps are within one's vocation to do so.

Refute? Support? Buy me lunch?

James Davison Hunter in Christianity Today

Thank you, Joy, for posting snippets of that excellent feature piece in Christianity Today. The interview with James Davison Hunter is indeed excellent, and quite germane to our discussion. I would highly recommend it to all who are participating in this forum, or merely following it.

Here are some choice tidbits from the interview:

"Culture is far more profound at the level of imagination than at the level of argument. Deep structures of culture are found in the frameworks of our imagination, frameworks of meaning and moral order that are embedded in the very words we use. There's a difference between the weather and the climate. Contemporary politics is like the weather, changing day to day or week to week. But culture, in its most enduring qualities, isn't about the weather at all. It's about the climate. Changes in the climate of culture involve convoluted, contested, and contingent dynamics."

"[T]he title of my book [To Change the World] is ironic, because I'm trying to disabuse people of changing the world. We cannot control history—God alone is its author. We're accountable for our actions as individual believers and as a body of believers. The nature of that accountability is clear from Scripture, theology, and history. The point is not to change the world but to serve faithfully in our relationships, tasks, and spheres of social influence."

"The rhetoric of world changing originates from a profound angst that the world is changing for the worse, and that we must act urgently. There's a sense of panic that things are falling apart. If we don't respond now, we'll lose the things we cherish the most. What animates this talk is a desperation to hold on to something when the world no longer makes sense....It may be that the amount of rhetoric is inversely related to our actual ability or capacity to change the world. Most American Christians believe America owes its greatness to Christianity, which is now being uprooted. Uprootedness brings sadness and nostalgia. The problem here is not just the historical question—was America ever a Christian nation?—but the theological question, should America be a Christian nation? If you don't believe that America was ever or should ever be a Christian nation, you will evaluate cultural changes from a different vantage point. Some changes might be destructive, but you will not feel obliged to save America or to save the West. That's not the burden of faithful presence in the world."

"The state is the sole legitimate source of coercion and violence. When Christians turn to law, public policy, and politics as the last resort, they have essentially given up on a desire to persuade their opponents. They want the patronage of the state and its coercive power to rule the day. What makes this problematic, in my view, is that the dominant public witness of the church is political, rooted in narratives of injury and discourses of negation. The sense of deprivation among Christians leads to an ethic of revenge, or what Nietzsche called ressentiment. In different ways and to different degrees, the prevailing political theologies in American society today—the Christian Right, the Christian Left, and even the neo-Anabaptists—partake in that ressentiment and consequent will to power. And here's the tragic irony: Whenever Christian churches and organizations partake in the will to power, they partake in the very thing they decry in society."

"Christians need to abandon talk about 'redeeming the culture,' 'advancing the kingdom,' and 'changing the world.' Such talk carries too much weight, implying conquest and domination. If there is a possibility for human flourishing in our world, it does not begin when we win the culture wars but when God's word of love becomes flesh in us, reaching every sphere of social life. When faithful presence existed in church history, it manifested itself in the creation of hospitals and the flourishing of art, the best scholarship, the most profound and world-changing kind of service and care—again, not only for the household of faith but for everyone. Faithful presence isn't new; it's just something we need to recover."

From the Belgic Confession, article 36, still in use in the Reformed Church in America:

"And the government's task is not limited to caring for and watching over the public domain
but extends also to upholding the sacred ministry, with a view to removing and destroying
all idolatry and false worship of the Antichrist; to promoting the kingdom of Jesus Christ; and
to furthering the preaching of the gospel everywhere; to the end that God may be honored
and served by everyone, as required in God's Word."

Proposition: this assignment of tasks is appropriate to the biblical nature of government.
Thoughts?

Near the start of the 20th century, an official meeting of the Christian Reformed Church claimed grounds from Scripture and revised this paragraph to a footnote. However, I haven't researched enough to find what actual Scripture they cited.

The Church and Culture

Thesis: We cannot separate cult (the Church) from culture; obversely, neither can we conflate the Church and the State.

Byrthnoth, I see where you're going with this. I'm not sure I agree, and not sure if I disagree, but I think I know where you're going.

You're talking about that "Republic of Letters" that we talked about in IDS 300 with Dr. Birzer. You're describing a culture which understands and appreciates the Christian influence in Western Culture, whether or not it confesses Christ as Lord. That way Matthew Arnold, Joseph Wood Krutch, Jakob Burkhardt and other modern noble pagans could come play in our sandbox.

I agree with you when you say that this a good thing. A lesser good, obviously, than that which the Church administers. It is, in fact, the good which we all hope to attain in some part through studying the liberal arts -- the good of Christian culture, whose watering streams are knowledge and virtue. Yup, I'm going to call out Aristotle on this one and say that the servile is higher than the liberal. Jesus Christ, the foot-washing King, beats the Magnanimous Man six ways before Sunday, and on Sunday...man he REALLY beats him on Sunday...but I digress.

It seems to me that Christian culture, churchly culture, is an epiphenomena of the Church. A vigorous, thriving Church which confesses Christ and defends pure doctrine produces in and through its members the artifacts of culture that we know and love so well, that we pine for: beautiful architecture, stirring literature, honest politics, humane commerce. Who does not desire to live in a place where these things exist in abundance?

As much as this is true, mark well a truth of the human condition (I said it) that makes these cultural goods nothing more than withering grass and fading flowers. And I say this as one who likes flowers and grass just as much as the next guy. But, people...original sin. Byrthnoth, there's a section in the Apology you might want to review. The Church of Christ is comprised of men who are at once saints and sinners, and Her works are not always those befitting the bride of a righteous King. In the Old Testament, God tells Hosea to marry a prostitute in order to say, in effect, "see how YOU like it!" Because that's what He did. Christ wed himself to prostitute, forgiving her sins, which were as scarlet, making them white as snow. Yet like the woman whom He tells "go and sin no more," we, the Church, go, and sin more. As I have said before, the Church is an unfaithful bride. Yet Christ's love abounds, and His forgiveness abounds all the more. This is mystery which no philosophy can penetrate.

How important, then, is it that we have a nice monolithic Christian culture in which to dabble? Not as important as it is to take every thought captive to Christ, that in all things He might have the supremacy; to consider all things loss for His sake. The world is fallen, and the line through good and evil runs through every human heart. You want culture? Again, you will never find it separate from the Church. The Church is culture. The family is culture. These are the seats of religious life -- not the state; not the market. The latter are the seats of secular life. Never expect them to exhibit the consistency of character which even the Bride of Christ cannot attain to by her own merits.

The problem here is not that we don't have Christian culture. The problem is that we -- the participants of this conversation included -- seem to be begging the question of "How should we change the world?" and then having a discussion over ways and means, with the general assumption in place that of course we can and should. As if that's what our good works are supposed to do. No, your good works will probably not change the world. But they may serve your neighbor.

Christendome is and is not the Church catholic

The idea that Christendom is the universal church of Christ is a very good one, and I hope the one that we all first thought of as an appropriate definition. That the Church makes up the people of God is, I think, something we can all agree on.

There is that business of culture, though. I think that we use "the church" to mean Christ's bride, but that Christendom implies a (here's for you roomie) lower, less important, vastly important cultural order. When one looks at Oxford's dreamy spires, one looks at Christendom. When one looks at two or more people gathered together to pray in name of the Triune God, one sees the Church. One is cultural, the other something more.

I'm not trying to make anyone upset, so here's a better illustration, borrowed from Rowan Williams' introduction to a new book series put out by Baylor University Press entitled 'The Making of the Christian Imagination.' His book, the only to be published so far, is on Dostoevsky. Anyway, the Archbishop points out that there is a particular culture of Christianity which is somewhat opaque to outsiders. Here's his example:

We often say that Graham Green and Waugh are 'Catholic' or 'Christian' authors. What we mean, in regards to most of their books (The Power and the Glory is a good example) is that the themes being dealt with will seem particularly, well, non-existent to a non-christian audience, or at least to an audience which has no understanding of the way Catholic ordinations work. One need not be Christian to understand Graham Green's novel, but one must be well versed in Christianity to understand it, much less appreciate and by moved by it.

We also call Flannery O'Conner a "Christian" or "Catholic" author. What we mean here is different. Where one must be culturally sensitive to Christianity to appreciate Graham Green's "The Power and the Glory," one need not be Christian at all to like O'Conner's short stories. But, if one is a Christian, her novel appears to be about the absence of Grace, where it will appear to be about nihilism to an outsider (for an example, try reading "A Good Man is Hard to Find.").

So, we have this thing called "the Church" which we could very well and rightly call Christendom. But, for the sake of conversational shorthand, we could also call "Christendom" the cultural body that can properly read and appreciate O'Conner, Cather, Eliot, and (maybe) Dostoevsky. These two bodies are not necessary one and the same. Melville, for instance, could be considered part of the cultural body known as Christendom as he works within an anthropology that he most definitely inherited from his New England puritan ancestry (his novels being able to be read alongside, say, Hawthorne but NOT Emerson), whereas, as far as we know, he did not participate in the body known as Christ's Church, the primary definition of Christendom.

So, the first Christendom we mentioned and all (I hope) thought of, we could define as the Church catholic, the other we could define as a mental and epistemological framework that knows why there are pelicans all over that old building with the "t" on top but thinks its still kind've odd that you'd eat your god.

I'm not trying to make less of the Church by trying to say that there is a Christian Culture apart from it. Byron and Emerson both have poems that most certainly come out of a Christian mental and cultural framework (biblical narrative, eucharistic imagery, etc) which can only be understood if one has an understanding of Christianity, but they certainly do not represent the work of Christ's church.

Just looking for the proper shorthand I guess...

Interjection: Broadening the Conversation

My friend, Eric, whom I mentioned in my first post, stopped by today and, in the course of conversation suggested I look up an author/professor/Christian thinker named James Davison Hunter. Hunter's most recent book, To Change The World, deals with this blog's very subject. I thought it instructive to post a few excerpts from an interview with him in Christianity Today.

To Change the World comprises three essays. The first examines the common view of "culture as ideas," espoused by thinkers like Chuck Colson, and the corrective view of "culture as artifacts," as recently argued by Andy Crouch in Culture Making. Both views, argues Hunter, are characterized by idealism, individualism, and pietism.

Hunter develops an alternative view of culture, one that assigns roles not only to ideas and artifacts but also to "elites, networks, technology, and new institutions." American Christians—mainline Protestant, Catholic, and evangelical—will not and cannot change the world through evangelism, political action, and social reform because of the working theory that undergirds their strategies. This theory says that "the essence of culture is found in the hearts and minds of individuals—in what are typically called 'values.' " According to Hunter, social science and history prove that many popular ideas, such as "transformed people transform cultures" (Colson) and "in one generation, you change the whole culture" (James Dobson), are "deeply flawed."

Read more on Christianity Today and Hunter's personal website. Oh, can't resist one more teaser:

Hunter critiques the political theologies of the Christian Right, Christian Left, and neo-Anabaptists, showing that unlikely bedfellows—James Dobson, Jim Wallis, and Stanley Hauerwas—are all "functional Nietzscheans" insofar as their resentment fuels a will to power, which perpetuates rather than heals "the dark nihilisms of the modern age."

Church = Christendom

It seems to me that if we do a bit of fast and loose parsing, the word "Christendom" most nearly means "Christ-domain," or "a domain unto/for/of/with respect to/regarding/according to/[insert preposition which associates an earthly domain and Christ] Christ." Wikipedia (heh heh) backs me up on this: "Kingdom of God" is often used interchangeably with "Christendom." The Wikipedia gods used the passive voice to make it more difficult to discern who uses the terms interchangeably, or when, but Vox Populi, Vox Dei Wikipedia and all that...

Also, I found this gem of a definition:

"Christendom, or the Christian world, has several meanings. In a cultural sense it refers to the worldwide community of Christians, adherents of Christianity. This community numbers in the billions of people of the world population, and is spread across many differentiations and ethnic groups connected only by faith in Christ and observance of the Bible. In a historical or geopolitical sense the term usually refers collectively to Christian majority countries or countries in which Christianity dominates or was a territorial phenomenon."

You know, Matthew, you could have saved us a lot of needless kerfuffle if you had just consulted the almighty Wiki to begin with!

Seriously though, are we dissatisfied with an identification of Christendom with the one holy, catholic and apostolic Church of the ages, wherever She may be?

If so, then why?

If the Church herself is Christendom enough (a big 'if', mind you), then what exactly does she lack? Does she have a mission other than the Great Commission that she is neglecting? If she has a commission to build an earthly kingdom, whence cometh it?

James, could you post that bit from Dostoevsky's The Idiot where he pillories Rome for taking the otherworldly Kingdom of Christ and trying to make it an earthly kingdom?

1 Samuel contra Christendom

The people of God (in the Old Testament, Israel; in the New, the remnant of Israel [believing Jews] and those elect in Christ from all nations [believing Gentiles] who together comprise the Church) have a long history of being dissatisfied with the portion appointed them by their Lord and King. We have a long history of desiring to be like other nations. The temptations of temporality have always existed: we'd like a king and a kingdom, please; we'd like to make a scene, make a splash. A little territory would be nice. Some legroom. A little power, a little prestige. A little pomp. Some fanfare. We'll settle here and get comfortable.

Resist the temptation.

* * *

"Now it came to pass when Samuel was old that he made his sons judges over Israel. The name of his firstborn was Joel, and the name of his second, Abijah; they were judges in Beersheba. But his sons did not walk in his ways; they turned aside after dishonest gain, took bribes, and perverted justice.

“Then all the elders of Israel gathered together and came to Samuel at Ramah, and said to him, 'Look, you are old, and your sons do not walk in your ways. Now make us a king to judge us like all the nations.'

"But the thing displeased Samuel when they said, 'Give us a king to judge us.' So Samuel prayed to the LORD. And the LORD said to Samuel, 'Heed the voice of the people in all that they say to you; for they have not rejected you, but they have rejected Me, that I should not reign over them. According to all the works which they have done since the day that I brought them up out of Egypt, even to this day—with which they have forsaken Me and served other gods—so they are doing to you also. Now therefore, heed their voice. However, you shall solemnly forewarn them, and show them the behavior of the king who will reign over them.'

"So Samuel told all the words of the LORD to the people who asked him for a king. And he said, 'This will be the behavior of the king who will reign over you: He will take your sons and appoint them for his own chariots and to be his horsemen, and some will run before his chariots. He will appoint captains over his thousands and captains over his fifties, will set some to plow his ground and reap his harvest, and some to make his weapons of war and equipment for his chariots. He will take your daughters to be perfumers, cooks, and bakers. And he will take the best of your fields, your vineyards, and your olive groves, and give them to his servants. He will take a tenth of your grain and your vintage, and give it to his officers and servants. And he will take your male servants, your female servants, your finest young men, and your donkeys, and put them to his work. He will take a tenth of your sheep. And you will be his servants. And you will cry out in that day because of your king whom you have chosen for yourselves, and the LORD will not hear you in that day.'

"Nevertheless the people refused to obey the voice of Samuel; and they said, “No, but we will have a king over us, that we also may be like all the nations, and that our king may judge us and go out before us and fight our battles.”

"And Samuel heard all the words of the people, and he repeated them in the hearing of the LORD. So the LORD said to Samuel, 'Heed their voice, and make them a king.'"

"And Samuel said to the men of Israel, “Every man go to his city.”

1 Samuel 8

Too much history...

...says this history major. I'll be the first curmudgeon to say (and who knows? perhaps the first to think) that the historical meandering seems to be moving us into the dithyrambic. I'm not sure what the antidote to that might be, but I'm going to try to come up with one. I apologize in advance if I, too, end up with little more than a dithyramb.

What is the unique office of the Church of Christ? What makes Christianity unique? Nothing less and nothing more (not that there need or could be more) than the scandal presented by the Cross of Christ, Christ the incarnate Lord, crucified, risen and ascended, "foolishness to Greeks and a stumbling block to Jews." Atonement. The great cosmic paradox. This is the Gospel.

This, then – the Gospel – is the unique purview of the Church, of Christianity. It is distinct from every other religion, every other philosophy under the sun. It is so much more than “living in harmony with the Divine Order.” We are, each one of us, born in disharmony with that Divine Order, out of tune with the Music of the Spheres. We can’t follow the Law. We need the Gospel, or we will all perish. Without the God who justifies sinners in His flesh, we are lost.

What of the Law, then?

Well, the Law tells us how we ought to live while simultaneously showing us how we are not living. The law condemns and kills the old Adam in us. And there are so many ways in which the Law comes to us, not just Holy Writ: all of Nature testifies to this Law. The wise men and scholars of every age – Platonic, Aristotelian, Stoic, Cynic, Cartesian, Newtonian, etc. etc. – have born witness to it. C.S. Lewis called it “the Tao,” attesting its culturally transcendent nature. It is written on man’s heart. As Lewis wrote in the Abolition of Man, there is not really any such thing as a Christian morality (we can challenge this if we want to, but I use it here as a heuristic tool): there is morality, and there is immorality; the Law which is written on the hearts of even the most recalcitrant and unregenerate man has gone out to all the earth from before the foundations of the word so that men are without excuse! One need not be a Christian to know that one's sins are damnable; that is why it is just that the heathen are damned. With that said, we Christians do not go to Church simply to hear the Law; we go for the Gospel, which is Christ Jesus, the power of God for salvation to all who believe. This is something that the Law cannot do, "for by the works of the Law shall no flesh be justified in His sight." No, we go to the assembly of believers on the Lord's Day to receive the gracious and life-giving Word of God, in the preaching of the forgiveness of sins by pastors and in the distribution of the same in the Eucharist. This is the unique office of the Church of Christ. This is her charge until Christ, her Bridegroom and her Lord, comes again. And the gates of Hell shall not prevail against her, for she is Christ's Body, and His Body has already endured the flames once and for all, and risen triumphant. She waits the consummation of this victory, which is Hers by faith – already, but not yet. Kingdoms rise and fall; empires wax and wane. The grass withers and the flowers fall, sed Verbum Dei manet in aeturnum.

The state does not exist for such a blessed vocation, for such a blessed end; still, this is not to say that its vocation is profane. It is, however, secular. Mundane. I no more care that the leaders of state who pilot the bodies politic of the world are Christian than I do that my plumber is a Christian. And that's fine! If a man is a Christian and a statesman, then thanks be to God! He may therefore have a more sedate perspective on the limited nature of his office and be more circumspect on that account; that would be a blessing, indeed. But that would in no way change the nature of his office, which Holy Writ speaks of in the following fashion:

"Let every person be subject to the governing authorities. For there is no authority except from God, and those that exist have been instituted by God. ²Therefore whoever resists the authorities resists what God has appointed, and those who resist will incur judgment. ³For rulers are not a terror to good conduct, but to bad. Would you have no fear of the one who is in authority? Then do what is good, and you will receive his approval, ⁴for he is God’s servant for your good. But if you do wrong, be afraid, for he does not bear the sword in vain. For he is the servant of God, an avenger who carries out God’s wrath on the wrongdoer. ⁵Therefore one must be in subjection, not only to avoid God’s wrath but also for the sake of conscience. ⁶For because of this you also pay taxes, for the authorities are ministers of God, attending to this very thing. ⁷ Pay to all what is owed to them: taxes to whom taxes are owed, revenue to whom revenue is owed, respect to whom respect is owed, honor to whom honor is owed" (St. Paul's Epistle to the Romans, 13.1-7).

The state can, through negative prohibition and positive injunction, move men to moral action, perhaps even at times create a penumbra of moral culture. But this cultivated thing is not the Church; an amalgam of moral men is not the church. Two or three gathered together in His name (Father, Son and + Holy Ghost) are more the Church (indeed, truly are the Church), than an alliance of Christian states, an alliance of do-gooders. What is to be gained from such a thing? What more needs to be gained? If this is what we mean by Christendom, then so be it. It will, however, be a sad misnomer, for none of us will be saved by our morality. None of us will be saved by our own righteousness. We are all saved by the righteousness of Christ, who being in His very nature God, did not consider equality with God something to be grasped, but made himself nothing, emptied himself, taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men (cf. St. Paul's Epistle to the Philippians). Christ became sin for us, and won for us forgiveness, gave to the whole world his righteousness. He gave us Himself, for He is righteousness. Christ is the Gospel.

I deny, then, the possibility of a Christian state. I deny the possibility of applying the adjective Christian to anything, really, be it corporate or singular, that is not the Church of Christ. (The Christian per se is not singular, not individual, but is a member of the Church, i.e., a person. For a fuller explication of this concept, see “Personhood and Being,” by John Zizioulas in his larger work, Being as Communion: Studies in Personhood and the Church.) Things can be Christian insofar as they are incorporated into the Body of Christ; the family, then, can be a Christian family insofar as its members are also adopted into the family of God. But the Gospel is the distinguishing mark of the Church, still and all – not the Law. This is not to say that the Law is not also preached in the Church; indeed, only in the Church is the Law preached in its fullness. But the Church never stops at the Law; no, it points to the sinner condemned by the law to his proxy and surety, the crucified Lord of Calvary. Apart from the work of the Holy Spirit, though, who works through the Word, this message is pure folly. In the mundane realm of politics, for example. The Gospel doesn’t “spend.” It doesn’t makes sense. Morality does! The Law, to a certain degree, does. But the Gospel? Forgiveness of sins? Not at all.

All this talk of Christendom has me thinking of the account of the Transfiguration of Our Lord in the Gospels of St. Matthew (ch. 17) and St. Luke (ch. 9). Peter, James and John accompany Jesus to the top of the mountain and are granted a foretaste of the beatific vision in a theophany. Moses and Elijah join them, and talk with Christ (what about? No one knows!) Peter, overcome as any would be in his situation, desperately tries to make the moment last forever; his words are apposite to our discussion:

“’Lord, it is good for us to be here; if You wish, let us make here three tabernacles: one for You, one for Moses, and one for Elijah.’”

Peter wants to make a more permanent dwelling there on the mountain. He wants the “mountaintop experience” to continue. So he proposes to build tabernacles, wherein Christ and the patriarchs might dwell. But poor Peter—great among the apostles if only on account of his great folly, the penitence he models, and the great forgiveness he receives—did not yet know that “the Most High does not dwell in temples made with hands” (cf. Acts of the Apostles 7.48); he seeks to build Christendom there on the mountain. But before he is even done with his proposal, the very voice of God the Father knocks them flat!

“While he was still speaking, behold, a bright cloud overshadowed them; and suddenly a voice came out of the cloud, saying, ‘This is My beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased. Hear Him!’”

This reads almost as a rebuke to Peter: the Incarnate Word and the words which He preaches are sufficient for you! Do not desire anything more! Yes, the ecstatic experience atop the mountain is a free and spontaneous blessing; who, like Ransom on Perelandra, would not want to taste the fruit again? But life is not lived on the mountaintop. It is lived in the Valley of the Shadow of Seath, which we traverse as pilgrims. We have no Abiding City in this Valley, yet traverse it we must. That is why the disciples go back down. It has not been granted to them to stay. They must live by faith, not by sight. On top of the mountain, they did indeed say “it is good to dwell here.” But such was not within their power.

“[T]here is a preliminary taste of this fulfillment that occurs within history,” Mr. Taylor wrote in the first post, “when Christians of good faith and character live together in peace and justice. You might have felt yourself close to heaven in the home of a beautiful family, or in communal worship during a Sunday service.” Yes, I think we all have. But it was an unexpected blessing, and the blessing was not the feeling, but rather the reality. The objective truth of God’s grace may not always evoke the same feeling. We may not always feel like we’re on the set of the Fellowship of the Ring, replete with a soundtrack and lembas. But it is Truth, for God’s Word is Truth. And the blessing is not because we good Christians are living together in peace and justice in our meager tabernacles. The blessing is that Christ is among us when we gather together in His Name (Father, Son and + Holy Ghost) to hear His Word and receive His Sacraments. The Church is Christendom enough for me. In it God’s kingdom comes every moment, at right angles to this earthly plane, farther up, farther in. It’s always now, already, but not yet. We don’t need a five point plan to make it happen. No political schema will make it more what it already is. The Church lacks nothing, for she is bedecked in the robes of Christ’s righteousness. Even though she has been an unfaithful bride, Christ the Bridegroom is ever faithful, daily and richly forgiving her of her many sins, her covetousness, even her murders and adulteries, which have been many. All of these He has assumed as His own:

“In Him you were also circumcised with the circumcision made without hands, by putting off the body of the sins of the flesh, by the circumcision of Christ, ¹² buried with Him in baptism, in which you also were raised with Him through faith in the working of God, who raised Him from the dead. ¹³ And you, being dead in your trespasses and the uncircumcision of your flesh, He has made alive together with Him, having forgiven you all trespasses, ¹⁴ having wiped out the handwriting of requirements that was against us, which was contrary to us. And He has taken it out of the way, having nailed it to the cross. ¹⁵ Having disarmed principalities and powers, He made a public spectacle of them, triumphing over them in it” (St. Paul’s Epistle to the Colossians 2.11-15).

Isn’t that enough? What we think we are going to achieve or accomplish with “Christendom”? Another tower of Babel, and a worse one that at, for it will be self-righteous one.

A Vague Disconcertion

First of all, I really like the conception of this discussion (hats off to you, Matthew). I have had a vague notion for some time that something approaching this issue is central to the future movement of the Church--the Religious Right movement (and particularly the pro-life aspect thereof) set us on this path decades ago. Of course, that is just in America--I'm hardly qualified or versed in recent cultural history to speak about the West in general or the world, for that matter.

Still, as I read recent posts, I find a strong push from several voices towards moving the discussion into the realm of the individual and the family. If this tendency among us were for the purposes of illustration or simplification I'd hardly object, but what I hear is a strong leaning towards a kind of libertarian familial isolationism... and against that, I have to... well... interject that it makes me uncomfortable.

Certainly, I don't plan on entering politics personally--rather, I want to do more or less what my parents did: raise a family in its own culture not entirely divorced from, but certainly not overly credulous of, that which surrounds it. But is this really what the Church as a whole is being called toward? Is it the heart, somehow, of Christianity? Is it a symptom of decay and decadence? Is it purely a cultural preference that we hyper-individualistic Americans latch onto with a vengeance, scenes and half scenes of Little House on the Prairie flashing momently through our brains?

And for all of that, what do we say to those Christians who do enter politics? 'Play by the rules, but kind of try to change things to fit Christian values a little bit, but not too much because we don't want to seem like we're melding Church and State?' No. When it comes down to it, I don't really know where I stand on this issue, but I don't think either extreme is going to work. To turn the Church into the State corrupts inevitably; but to remove the Church from the State will serve only to turn the latter into a very twisted reflection of the former.

We can escape politics personally, if we choose, because we live in a Democracy that functions reasonably well with only a small minority of people really getting involved--actually, widespread apathy seems to be one of the pillars that holds up the system--but just because it's not our problem to deal with, or because we have been called into service in another area of the polis where our politics and our religion don't seem to run into one another, does not mean that discussing the ideal, or most practical, or most stable form of the chimera which is religious AND political life is wrong or wrongheaded. I know precisely how cheesy this sounds, but honestly if all Christians withdrew in that way, we'd have some weird inversion of the tale where Belaraphon slays only the lion portion of the monster by filling Pegasus' belly with molten lead... then walks up and offers himself as a mid-afternoon snack.

For all that, the extremes are respectable if you are willing to accept the consequences of their actuality... but perhaps that's another discussion for another time. I'll just say that I would be sorry to see this vital discussion morph away from what seems to me a very important issue: how on God's mostly blue Earth do we, as Christians, deal with politics?

Defining This Down

I'd like to surface a bit from Matthew's ancient plumbing for a breath of air about this whole idea. Back in high school and college debate, I thought topicality (a discussion of the topic as topic rather than of the topic itself) a rather annoying argumentative procedure. Out here in real life, however, I've learned that parsing and understanding terms are essential to communication and thought. Whatever is happening on this blog first needs some topicality.

Why? Because I see things similarly to Trent, in many ways, and think that, if Matthew or history or other commenters consider "Christendom" some unified church-state edifice, I'm completely outta here. I'm pretty sure that the American Revolution clarified how evil and mucked-up life is under state-sponsored religion, or religion-sanctioned states (see also: Islam, the Catholic Church right before and during the Reformation, the Spanish Inquisition, the early church's grab for power under Constantine). Not only that, in a post-American Revolution world, it seems absurd to spend time arguing about some earthly Christian State that will a) never exist and b) seriously screw religion AND politics if it does.

Which is why I'm really not sure why Matthew went through all that weird Augustinian support for killing heretics and such, because if such things are germane to this discussion, again, this is not a discussion I care to have. So perhaps he should explain that link briefly.

My opening statement: So if that's what I want this NOT to be about, what do I think a good and useful definition or opening for discussing "Christendom"?

I am very concerned that discussants avoid the attractive ideas of bringing "the Kingdom of Heaven to earth" so we can have "heaven on earth," et cetera. My evangelical background encouraged such nonsense profusely. Why is it bad? Because, ultimately, this world will perish. Adam and Eve, and now all of us, have sealed its fate. We can't redeem the earth, our communities, our schools, ourselves, anything. Thinking otherwise has us foolishly considering ourselves, literally, our own christs. Which, of course, is blasphemy, and why Trent is also right that we can't avoid talking theology here, because at this core issue different theologies will disagree; however, ultimately it seems we're about to discuss how humans can respond or participate in responding to our utter depravity. My own theology says that Jesus himself orchestrates and creates the redemption necessary to "fix" utter depravity; and any good that happens on earth results from his work.

Again, I'll take a step back here from all that danger (an area which would also reveal my hopeless lack of deep theological understanding) and propose an area safer to tread. And I think my thoughtful friend, Eric, opens that avenue for discussion brilliantly over on his personal blog just this morning.

It was recently pointed out to me by a professional mentor. He said, "When we die and stand before the throne of God to offer an account of our time on earth, there is only one answer that is sufficient, and it isn't, "well, you see LORD, I'm the product of the environment in which I was raised...'" When all is said and done, each of us is accountable for who we chose to be. Did we entrust our whole selves to God, relying on His grace made possible through Jesus, or not?

If that's true, but it is also the case that we are in large measure influenced by the environments in which we our raised, then it seems the crucial question is, "How do we create communities that encourage individuals towards relationship with Christ?"

I'm again a little worried theologically about humans deciding they're the influencing factor in helping people do good or enter communion with Christ, but definitely agree that, as a Christian, I am responsible to act like one, and as God's grace allows me to grow in it will as a matter of course increase the, let's say, "saltiness" of my behavior. Eric goes on to give several examples. Here's one short enough to quote:

Dr. Morse spoke about the behavior-altering effects of her "mom stare." You know, that look that freezes a child in their steps, non-verbally communicating "STOP IT and BE-HAVE." Why is this such an effective tactic? The mom look forces children to cognitively process the reality that their behavior is not matching the expectations they understand their parents have of them. Over time, this process indwells in children the same expectation of themselves that their parents started with! Simply put, we learn self-governance from being governed by others.

This is bite-size "Christendom," perhaps, that I can wholly endorse. I am primarily responsible for me, not for "saving the world" or "taking this city for Christ" (reference to Frank Peretti's brilliant The Visitation). Those things are Jesus' job. But he's let me have authority over myself, and my little home, and my little job, and how I manage them and my relationships. So if we view ourselves as mere bricks in the walls and pavement of a Christendom God himself is building, cool. That seems healthy. Not some large-scale political or any other movement or delirious attempt to conquer a world that, but for Christ, had already defeated us long ago.

In other words, I think the best step towards "Christendom" is first learning to manage ourselves, and hold ourselves accountable to God and others. Apologize for cursing, and stop. Clean up that freakin' messy desk. Give an extra $10 in offering. Put the alarm across the room to break that lazy snooze-button indiscipline. Because little things grow; we can water, but God gives the increase.

Initial Thoughts

Christendom. A noble ideal. An illusion. I would argue that it has never existed, in spite of the fact that it can be pointed out quite clearly in history. I would argue that “Christendom” was so named by the powerful elite as a way to justify their own, often very un-Christian behavior, and to hide behind the power of the church. By centralizing the government under Christ they were, in essence, provided with a carte blanche. Who can argue against the mouth piece of God or Divine Right? I would argue that there was nothing more “holy” or “Christian” about the culture during any particular historical period than there is today. Christendom, as a political aspiration, is nothing more than a Utopian dream.

Christian Culture, however, is another matter altogether and one worthy of a great deal of discussion. If by “Christendom” you mean a culture which is composed of Christian people who put hands and feet to the gospel, thereby preserving the culture at large, then, certainly, there is hope for it’s establishment. I would argue that true “Christendom” in this sense has been in continuous existence since the time of Christ and is not defined by borders or political movements. It is not, I think, something to be planned from the top down as a governmental structure, but, rather, something that grows quite organically from the bottom up. The smallest unit of Christendom is the man himself. He who follows Christ, quietly, in his own mind and directs his own steps according to the principles of Scripture. This man then finds his mate and the two together form a family and endeavor to impart this same love for God and reverence for his ways into whichever children may find their way, by birth or providence, into their home. Each little family is, in essence, it’s own little state; it’s own political unit of Christendom. The influence of these little units of Christendom is not to be underestimated. God has, more than once, changed history through the channel of one family.

It seems to me, that if one is truly interested in impacting the world for Christ, in “re-establishing Christendom” on earth then the best and most useful course of action would be to take a wife and set about the messy business of birthing babies, raising men and concerning oneself with the foundation rather than the lofty heights. With a firm undergirding, the ramparts tend to take care of themselves.

I don’t know any of the lovely minds invited to participate here besides my friend Matthew. Perhaps I am the old lady of the group. Perhaps not. Either way, it seems to me that the idealism of the young often gets tempered by the beatings endured in the gales of “real life,” and that is a shame. Dreaming big dreams is how one changes the world. There is, however, danger, I think, in becoming overly cerebral in one’s discussions of how to go about changing the world and achieving a Utopian dream without the needed balance of boots on the ground. It is one thing to sit in smoking jackets and talk of Christendom, where it has gone and how to recapture it for the modern era; it is quite another to do the hard work of sanding the rough edges, overcoming the selfishness, cultivating the generosity, exercising hospitality, and the many other aspects of “one anothering” that the gospel admonishes us to and which define Christendom apart from the secular culture. Then there is the business of inspiring the children to take up the cause for the next generation, which sounds simple enough until those children arrive in person, unique souls on their own paths before the Holy God.

Matthew, you and I have sat long and late around campfires and tables with wine in hand and talked. I know your heart to be a true one and I LOVE that you’ve opened this discussion. Thank you, sincerely, for including me.

Christian Culture in the Neighbourhood

I like Trent's new name for St. Augustine's two kingdoms. The divide is between two cultures, the one Christian, the other worldly, both extending across silly little national boundaries, each challenging the imaginative world of the other. If we set aside, for a moment, wondering how the two should ultimately coexist, Christians meanwhile are neighbours to one-another, they go to church together, they argue, they read each-other's poetry, they drink together, and they have culture, a Christian culture that's not alienated from the earth, but lives within it, and makes it beautiful. And neighbourhoods come in many guises. What is the culture of your neighbourhood? What does it do beautifully? What problems do you run into? How do you face them?

~ The Canigiani Holy Family, c.1507, by Raphael

Response to the man of water

The limit I requested is a light burden, hence the ample exception, "except insofar as the doctrine and practices etc. etc. obtain to the main idea," intended to keep our rhetorical attention on the central issue, so that doctrinal disputes serve, rather than distract from, our understanding of Christendom. Since in your opening statement you tightly knit the doctrine you mention to the argument you make, I don't think we really disagree.

If you're concerned with the etymology of the word 'culture', you might look at the extension of the root latin meaning of 'worship' to its modern roots: a husbanding, a cultivating of the land, eventually to be extended in the 16th century to the cultivation of language, and then to the cultivation of the intellect through education, and eventually to the end result of such education and customs as generalized across many persons. Out of the latin root, this genealogy of meaning drew that aspect of worship having to do with the knitting together of families and persons by a shared perception of a final good, the agreed-upon true virtue of the husbanded material. If the Christian church knows this final good best, still, a secular culture has a understanding of some good, even if it be a false one, and this knits it together and justifies the name 'culture'. Moreover, a secular culture, to the extent that it is not suicidal, has some grasp of the truth God makes available to man's natural reason. At its best, the hope of the secular culture, and thus the hope of politics (the etymology of which you would do well to consider) aspires to the possibilities of greatness, glory, and beauty in the souls of men. Hope belongs to politics; vastly less than the hope of Christian glory, but it still deserves to be called hope. St. Aquinas may have described all he wrote as seeming "like straw", but he had written the works all the same. St. Augustine writes of the city of man, in Book XV.4 of City of God, that "the things which this city desires cannot justly be said to be evil, for it is itself, in its own kind, better than all other human good." The danger, I know no-one here needs to be told, is in the injustice wrought by the overweening ambition of the powerful, because secular culture doesn't understand humility. And in the unavoidable mingling of the two kingdoms, since we are citizens of both, this is surely the first place the church may take up arms: to chastise the state for its injustices.

You call on the authority of Augustine, but I'll be the one taking him seriously. In the first letter in our possession (#100, A.D. 408) which is written to a Roman official during the Donatist controversy, he does just as I considered, petitioning the African Proconsul to exercise leniency towards convicted men. The city of Calama was rioting in reaction to recent measures signed by the Emperor Honorius against Pagans and Donatists, including fines, "a sharper goad of irritation," and confiscation of church property. Augustine, speaking as a pastor of souls, asks the Proconsul "to use milder methods of coercion, and to spare their lives."

But it was also around this time that he writes his first significant defence of state interference in church affairs, letter 93: "let the kings of the earth serve Christ by making laws for Him and for His cause," and also the ominous interpretation of Christ's words, "compel them to come in."

Earlier, in A.D. 397, he writes to a Donatist bishop who had voiced a complaint on behalf of his brethren about the original schism. Upon receiving the judgment of the Council of Arles in 314 that the confirmation of bishop Caecilian was valid, the Donatists had appealed to the emperor. When the emperor had supported the Catholic side, the Donatists refused to abide by his decision. The later Donatist bishop complained that an ecclesiastical dispute had been settled by a secular authority. Augustine responded, that "it was not meet that a bishop should be acquitted by trial before a proconsul: as if the bishop had himself procured this trial, and it had not been done by order of the Emperor, to whose care this matter, as one concerning which he was responsible to God, especially belonged."

Augustine's writings over the whole period (388-416) are characterized by concern for peaceful reintegration of the Donatist with the Roman church. He places great hope in pastoral dialogue, missionary work, and formal debate. But the Imperial rescripts increased in harshness, culminating in Council of Carthage in 411 (at which attendance was made compulsory by Imperial edict) at which the Donatists were proved to be in the wrong, and in an edict in 414 that attempted eliminate the schismatics, banning the writing of wills, punishing with total confiscation of property, lashes, and exile. When the Donatists were briefly tolerated between 409 and 411, they persecuted the Catholics; when the law turned against them, they turned increasingly to violent revolt. Many criminals and vagabonds seem to have joined it and wandered the countryside as outlaw thieves and vandals. After an Imperial crackdown of an unrelated rebellion by a Roman official in Africa, the Donatists seized the chance to falsely accuse an enemy of theirs, Marcellinus, a Christian and a friend of Augustine, saying that he had been involved in the conspiracy. Marcellinus was imprisoned by the special imperial judge, and then murdered while in jail.

By the end of this period, Augustine seems to have lost hope in the ability of moderation to persuade the Donatists to rejoin, and he begins to defend vigourously their prosecution by the state. But the manner he chooses is instructive. One might expect that Augustine would take the political line - that these men are ruining the social order. In fact, he takes the ecclesiastical line - that, for the good of their souls, these men must be converted. In letter 173 (A.D. 416) he writes to an imprisoned Donatist,

"How much more, then, is it fitting that you should be drawn forcibly away from a pernicious error, in which you are enemies to your own souls, and brought to acquaint yourselves with the truth, or to choose it when known, not only in order to your holding in a safe and advantageous way the honour belonging to your office, but also in order to preserve you from perishing miserably! "

In letter 185 (A.D. 416), a long letter to a Count Boniface, governor of the Diocese of Africa, explaining the whole history of the Donatist controversy, he writes,

"What sober minded person could say to Kings, 'Care not by whom the Church of your Lord is in your Kingdom restrained or oppressed; it is no business of yours who in your Kingdom is religious or sacrilegious'; since you cannot say to them, 'It is no business of yours who is chaste or who is unchaste in your Kingdom'? Why should adultery be punished and sacrilege permitted? Is it a lighter thing that a man should not keep faith with God than that a woman should be faithless to her husband?"

It would be unfair to Augustine to imply that he was a Torquemata supporting an Inquisition. On the contrary, his letters are characterized by moderation and pastoral concern for souls, including a strong sympathy for human weakness, and passion for evangelization. Nevertheless, these letters teach us that his chief purpose in dealing with the Donatist controversy was not to preserve the distinction between church and state, but rather to maintain the unity of the church; if the state had to be conscripted to achieve this unity as a last resort, he was willing to use it.

What was he doing then? Were the arguments of his letters an intellectual failure? Was he inconsistent with the thesis of the City of God? I am not familiar enough with that work, so I must ask someone else, perhaps you, Trent, to take up this burden. The letters must be explained away somehow, but I'm afraid I'm not up to the task.

On the subject of state churches: it wasn't just England that had one. Several others come to mind: the Lutheran princedoms, the Masssachusetts Bay Colony, effectively early-modern France. The Bride of Christ, rightly or wrongly, has not always longed for divorce. Sometimes it's frantically tied the knot with its own hands. During the pre-Reformation years, John Wyclif, William of Ockham, Pierre Dubois, and Marsilius of Padua, among others, all called for state authority over the ecclesiastical government, not to mention property. After the Western church had been stripped of its universal character, the threats posed to dissenters did not pass. Persecution merely specialized in a wider variety of heresies and perhaps, with the division of labour, became more efficient.

Augustine's letters: http://www.newadvent.org/fathers/1102.htm

Imperial edicts: http://www.fourthcentury.com/index.php/imperial-laws-chart-395

Historiography of Augustine's letters, published first in 1919, and republished in 2009: http://books.google.com/books?id=ZaEuAAAAYAAJ&dq=the+letters+of+st+augustine+sparrow-simpson