I'm no fan of fundamentalist evangelical theology, but I'm also not a Liberal Christian, either.
I suppose if painted into a corner of my own choosing, I'd self-identify as a "radical Christian" -- radical in the sense of getting at the root of the Christian faith.
I think Liberal Christians insist too much on the separation of church and state. I think that demand is self-defeating and naive. The distinction only makes sense when the church is powerful in its own right (this is what we call "Christian domianism"). That's why the separation of church and state exists: The state in the modern world has always attempted to insulate it from the church's political power.
Things are different now. Ours is a church of the largely middle-class which bears so much of the work to keep the state in possession of its own power for political and economic purposes. Protestantism (by which I probably should say "bourgeois religion") has withdrawn from its moral work in the modern world. It has silenced its social and economic demands for the whole of human life and its society.
Liberal Christianity colluded with the powers of the Enlightenment to produce the modern American experiment -- devoid of a religious voice outside the approved American civil religion. What this means, of course, is that we accepted the division of political from economic and believed that both had nothing to do with the private.
And by "private" we meant "individual".
This is, after all, the "Liberal" myth: The state can deal with politics and economics and the church can deal with saving the soul of the individual.
You really don't have to look far for all the ways in which that myth has turned deadly. The state cannot be depended upon to deal adequately with human, social problems. That's because the iron law of oligarchy remains: The state will always become a tool for fascist destruction and oppression. And that church which has abdicated its prophetic moral self is left to sustain the separation of power into "church and state". By keeping its distance, the Liberal Christianity loses both its courage and ability to call out the powers and principalities of this world.
Witness German Christians in the 30s.
And American Christians today.
I suppose if painted into a corner of my own choosing, I'd self-identify as a "radical Christian" -- radical in the sense of getting at the root of the Christian faith.
I think Liberal Christians insist too much on the separation of church and state. I think that demand is self-defeating and naive. The distinction only makes sense when the church is powerful in its own right (this is what we call "Christian domianism"). That's why the separation of church and state exists: The state in the modern world has always attempted to insulate it from the church's political power.
Things are different now. Ours is a church of the largely middle-class which bears so much of the work to keep the state in possession of its own power for political and economic purposes. Protestantism (by which I probably should say "bourgeois religion") has withdrawn from its moral work in the modern world. It has silenced its social and economic demands for the whole of human life and its society.
Liberal Christianity colluded with the powers of the Enlightenment to produce the modern American experiment -- devoid of a religious voice outside the approved American civil religion. What this means, of course, is that we accepted the division of political from economic and believed that both had nothing to do with the private.
And by "private" we meant "individual".
This is, after all, the "Liberal" myth: The state can deal with politics and economics and the church can deal with saving the soul of the individual.
You really don't have to look far for all the ways in which that myth has turned deadly. The state cannot be depended upon to deal adequately with human, social problems. That's because the iron law of oligarchy remains: The state will always become a tool for fascist destruction and oppression. And that church which has abdicated its prophetic moral self is left to sustain the separation of power into "church and state". By keeping its distance, the Liberal Christianity loses both its courage and ability to call out the powers and principalities of this world.
Witness German Christians in the 30s.
And American Christians today.
Interestingly, the right-wing evangelical
church ("Religious Right") showed no such reluctance, and through its
strategy of political engagement became a cultural force throughout the
decades of the 1970s-80s -- though it clearly fell off the other side of
the cliff from decades of exchanging truth and prophetic speech for
political power and cultural influence. The unholy alliance of
evangelicals (the "81%") with Trump is the manifestation of the
consequence of decades of bargaining with American principality and power.
I really don't give one whiff that the church engage in political power for the purpose of cultural or social influence. I care only that the church is free to speak -- as the Body of Christ in the world -- for justice, righteousness, and the peace of this good world.
Which means if there's one demon that needs exorcising in this American experiment, it's the demon of individualism.
Why can't I be a Liberal? Because I read Robert Bellah's Habits of the Heart in college (and noted its influence quite early on in a sarcastic column I wrote as a student). I can never be a Liberal Christian because I do not believe in modern Enlightenment individualism. When "deliver us from evil" is the prayer Liberals pray, I proceed to boldly petition, "Thy Kingdom come on earth as it is in heaven". (Both petitions belong together, truthfully, but I don't think Liberals think that.)
Liberal Christianity is bourgeois religion -- relatively well-to-do, they reject any prophetic call for the Kingdom to come and surpass what they perceive to be a great America already.
My theology will always be a liberation theology: I anticipate the liberation of God's activity in the world. Faith is not primarily my comfort in this life but my assurance that God will make God's home with people. Which has yet to fully be.
I suppose Liberal Christians will think this means I'm one of them. They want to embrace liberation theology, after all. But I have to think that all their calls for social justice fall on deaf ears so long as they're willing to embrace the state's power to accomplish the Kingdom's ends.
It didn't work out so well for the Emperor. But that's hardly a surprise. Jesus' Kingdom is not one of the world's kingdoms. Though they both demand obedience, you can only serve one.
Of that much Jesus has made us certain.