Friday, June 06, 2008
Christianity and Society
Out of London, reported in the London Telegraph, yes, LONDON -- ENGLAND, the western world, comes a story of persecution of Christians by Muslims.
One of the reasons we separate church and state in this nation (as opposed to the UK, where the Anglican church is an official, established religion) is to give the church the freedom to stand up strongly and not be subject to the whims of public will as is mandated for a representative government. Established religion must, of necessity, take on some governmental function, which can demand compromise of its religious function and moral underpinnings. (Consider many of the recent pronouncements by the Archbishop of Canterbury.)
Religion in our nation has the freedom to be religion, and only religion, and to not have to compromise because of government function.
Next time you think the church needs to make law, you might want to think about that - what is the cost?
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Canon Michael Ainsworth, a priest and colleague of mine just a couple of miles from my rectory in the City of London, was recently attacked in his churchyard by three youths. Michael suffered two black eyes, cuts and bruises. He was taken into hospital and his wife Janina, also a priest, said: "It's obvious that the attack on Michael does contain a religious element." It certainly is obvious: his attackers shouted, "You f------ priest!" as they beat him up.The author, also an Anglican cleric, goes on to decry, as leading to this sort of disaster, the liberalization of the Church of England. In some ways the thing is a rant, the author sounding like the Brit equivalent of a televangelist with a talk radio bent, but his essential point, that if the church sacrifices its moral authority, through conformity with a liberalizing society, it sacrifices its role as moral agent in that society, is one well taken.
[...]
Well, it's clear that the yobs who attacked Michael were Muslims. To their credit, the local Muslim leaders have tacitly admitted this by publicly deploring the crime.
One of the reasons we separate church and state in this nation (as opposed to the UK, where the Anglican church is an official, established religion) is to give the church the freedom to stand up strongly and not be subject to the whims of public will as is mandated for a representative government. Established religion must, of necessity, take on some governmental function, which can demand compromise of its religious function and moral underpinnings. (Consider many of the recent pronouncements by the Archbishop of Canterbury.)
Religion in our nation has the freedom to be religion, and only religion, and to not have to compromise because of government function.
Next time you think the church needs to make law, you might want to think about that - what is the cost?
Technorati Tags:church, state, freedom, separation
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