Om alle Oorlogen te beëindigen… een snelle gedachte over Kerk en Staat
Geschreven door Mark Van Steenwyk: 7 februari, 2007
Mijn recente posten over „kerk en staat zijn“ vrij heady geweest. Ik realiseer dat veel van mijn lezers opteren-uit soort van van de bespreking wegens dergelijke headiness hebben. Maar ik geloof ons theologisch begrip van de Kerk en hoe het op Staat betrekking heeft en de Maatschappij ongelooflijk belangrijk voor het onderscheiden van is hoe wij in ministerie in de lange afstand in dienst nemen. Ik zal onderaan deze heady weg voor een weinig verdergaan terwijl langer, zo met me draag. Ik zal proberen om ander materiaal van een „praktischere“ aard eveneens te posten.
Voor die van u die niet de tijd of de wens aan wade door mijn theologische behandeling van Romeinen 13 hebben gehad, wilde ik mijn hoofdpunt op een verschillende, misschien toegankelijkere manier maken:
Mijn punt wordt goed gemaakt door movie Om alle Oorlogen te beëindigen. In movie, worden de verenigde militairen gehouden in een Japans gevangeniskamp. Enkele gevangenen, die door hun Christelijke overtuigingen van brandstof worden voorzien, weigeren om tegen hun vijandelijke overweldigers te rebelleren. In plaats daarvan, draaien zij de andere wang, en tonen vergiffenis en liefde aan hun overweldigers. Dit is hoofdzakelijk hoe wij, als Christenen, aan elke overheid zouden moeten antwoorden.
Ja, weet ik… er een groot verschil tussen het voorleggen aan zijn eigen overheid en het voorleggen aan een „vijandelijke overheid.“ is Nochtans, als Christenen, bieden wij geen trouw aan één natie of een andere aan. Onze trouw is aan Christus en onze verhouding met de Staat (of het Amerika of Japan of Irak) is is één van geduldige liefde voor onze vijand. This is, I believe, the point made in Romans 13. Any thoughts or questions?
Later this week, I’m going to take a quick look at Rev. 13 and then I’ll offer several posts on practical implications.
for further reading . . .
- None Found
As someone who really enjoys your blog, but sometimes gets lost and feels really dumb because she doesn’t understand the heady lingo - I’m really glad for the more accessible conversation.
Rachel,
Thanks for the comment. It is hard for me to find a good balance. I struggle to write in an accessible way and “do” theology at the same time.
I live between two worlds (the world of the “practitioner” and the world of the “academic”). The gap is wide and it is difficult to speak to both church folks and academics at the same time. My motivation (and the reason I decided not to pursue an academic career) is to bring some deep theological thinking to life within the practices of the church. Often, theologians just write back and forth to one another with their secret language and hope that folks will pick up their ideas when they are at seminary…thus causing the theological equivalent to Reagan’s “trickle-down.” But that doesn’t really work. Instead, we need to make theology an in-house enterprise.
Submission to whatever gov’t we are under does not preclude our participation in the ways we are able to participate.
The issue is not whether we are to show love and forgiveness to those who abuse the power of state, but rather whether it is consistent with the mandate of the church to help administrate its regulative powers to establish an order closer to the ideal briefly sketched in Romans 13.
Thanks for the comment. I replied, but I think more important than your response would be for me to hold you to your promise.
I also think it would be authentically Christian to press for a system where third parties are allowed footholds as a complement to the house church model. The idea would not be to try and end the dominance of our political system by the main two parties, but to make them somewhat more dynamic and to allow third parties who have strong grass-roots support and are able to appeal to the center to affect policy better. This is authentically Christian because the focus is on effective political change the permits more people more voice in decision-making, rather than getting our people into power.
As you undoubtably would also know, such a system would also help prevent us from going to war and constrain the influence of the military-industrial complexes and other interests on our gov’t.
dlw
ps, Letters from Iwo Jima is well worth watching someday. I think it shows the rudiments of the victory of the Christian story over the story implicit in the Japanese belief system during WWII.
dlw
dlw…
I feel like we’ll keep butting heads on this stuff forever. We have different starting points and I’m not sure we can see eye to eye on this stuff. You think my position is extreme and unhelpful, but it is my position nonetheless. I’m not following it naively or out of frustration with the system. It is based upon my theological convictions.
To which promise are you referring in your third paragraph? About encouraging my politically minded friends to consider your proposal?
Yes, that was the promise.
I don’t think we need to butt heads endlessly on the matter.
The question is what wd it take to get you to change your mind on something theologically? I replied at length over at the Anti-Manichaeist and in the end proffered a minimalistic approach that you and Missio Dei could undertake and see whether it benefitted your ministry or not.
Its a little bit pushy, but its not personal. I probably need to be pushed the opposite direction to doing more community stuff. Right now, it’s hard to do that while living with my grandmother in Coon Rapids and going with my folks to church in Ham Lake. I hope to be in a different situation next year, after I finish seminary, but God knows what situation that will be…
dlw
One last response.
dlw