You Can’t Legislate
Pure Religion
The word “Religion” is used in conversations frequently and most often refers to organizations like churches that claim to represent God or spiritual issues.
Generally, religion is thought of as a good thing and it can be but we also know it has a bad side. According to the Global Center For Religious Research, as many as a third of all US adults have experienced religious trauma, and that’s just in the US.
Religious trauma is defined by Therapist.com as any religious experience that is stressful, degrading, dangerous, abusive or damaging.
It’s strange that those words should be associated with religion since the only Bible verse that comes close to defining the nature of religion paints a very different picture.
If any person thinks he is religious and does not bridle (control) his tongue but deceives his heart, this person’s religion is worthless. Pure religion that is undefiled before God the Father is this: to visit orphans and widows in their affliction, and to keep oneself unstained from the world. (James 1:26-27)
Many thoughts can be extracted from these two short verses but the most important point is religion done properly is helpful and encouraging. It solves problems and lends assistance.
It also means religion must be monitored at all times to make sure it’s staying on the right path.
The focus of this article is organized Christian religion and how we view it. I’m also focused particularly on the ways in which religion interferes with democracy. It goes without saying that there’s nothing in James or any other book that indicates religion should mimic political action groups.
First, A Clarification
“Religious” and “Christian” are NOT synonyms. Becoming a Christian is quite different to becoming a member of an organized religion. A person can be very involved in organized religion and not be Christian and the converse is true. They can be very Christian without being a “member.”
Christianity is personal. You believe in Jesus for salvation or not but it has nothing to do with religion. Organized religion cannot save anyone. If you’re not saved before, joining a religion won’t change that.
I became a Christian when I personally believed in Jesus individually and completely apart from church.
Salvation, unlike church, is not a communal experience. It’s each person deciding on their own to believe or not and that’s it.
Church is a completely different step.
In fact, it is possible to become a Christian and never join a church. Joining a church may seem like the natural next step and we definitely try to arrange it so both things happen consecutively but it doesn’t always work out that way.
Jesus died to save souls not build up organized religion and He’ll save anyone, anywhere, at any time, under any circumstance and keep them saved eternally whether they join a church or not.
Becoming a part of organized religion is predicated on belief in Jesus but it holds a very distant second place to your relationship with Jesus. Those two things don’t always happen simultaneously. I met Jesus on one day and became a member of a church on a different day quite a while later.
Being a Christian and being a member of an organized religious group are two different things.
Organized Religion Is Babelific
Now that that’s clear we need to see how religion can, in fact, endanger democracy.
You may recall the story in the Bible involving the Tower of Babel (Genesis 11:1-9). It describes an era in early human history when politics and religion converged.
It was the first major event following the flood of Genesis 8 and 9. Immediately after the flood, Noah’s family, numbering eight souls in all, were commanded to populate the earth and Genesis 10 records them doing just that.
Some believe that the “Tower” was not just one but many. It was a network of towers throughout Mesopotamia that represented the convergence of both political and religious ideologies. It was also a way of maintaining control.
The intent was to reach up to heaven. The project was aimed at spiritual achievement and was politically driven. At that time in history there was no politics without religion or religion without politics.
On the surface, it may seem like they were doing something good, reaching up to God. The problem is reaching out to God is personal. It can’t be done communally. Christian credibility cannot be conferred by the State.
What is not said specifically but is clearly understood by the nature of politics in that time period is that democracy wasn’t the operative political mechanism at play. Developing states were centered in one person (totalitarian). It is usually assumed that everyone was in on the plan but there’s nothing in history to suggest that possibility and there was one person mentioned who was described as power hungry, Nimrod.
For Babel, there was one plan, one idea, one goal and there was probably one person (Nimrod) at the top driving the whole thing. It was an extreme version of totalitarianism. Nimrod, a descendant of Noah, had no constraints, so he took charge and controlled everyone.
Democracy offers regulations that protect the individual and keep the overly aggressive, dominant types from taking over. But political philosophies weren’t so advanced in ancient history. Democracy is an enlightenment that came much later.
During the Babel period, the populace was in compliance, not because they agreed but because they had no choice. Having only one language facilitated this unhappy situation.
God intervened by confusing the situation with a diversity of languages. Linguistic diversity became an obstacle to the politics and religion of the hour. The inability to communicate freely allowed diverse ideas to emerge. It created friction and that fractured the unity.
We often think of unity as a good thing but it depends on the core issues around which that unity adheres. A unity that is not debated, that is driven by only one person or one group, is not real unity. Unity is best when the issues are widely and openly deliberated before coming to an agreement.
We call that process democracy. In Babel’s case, democracy was forced on the community by diversity, the very thing totalitarians dislike.
Religion coupled with human nature has never inclined toward a democratic approach. The mindset is “what we believe is right and you must believe it too!” No questions allowed, no discussion engaged.
Religion by nature is undemocratic.
Religion’s Diversity Is Prophylactic
While thinking through these ideas, it occurred to me that organized religion is like the Tower of Babel. Historically, churches have been very divided and it turns out that that is a good thing.
Like the confusion of languages at Babel, different perspectives on the Bible encourages the development of divergent ideas.
The belief that the Bible is the source of truth is sound. The idea that anyone group has an absolute handle on that truth is not just ignorant, it’s arrogant.
Here’s why we need to be a little less forceful when it comes to what we believe.
Generally, churches are organized and visible and influential. Church members avoid certain lifestyles, accept certain ideas and even vote for one person or another based on what the church teaches. That doesn’t mean the church is right. It only means the church holds sway. Members hear what is taught and follow suit.
The divisions that have existed between churches throughout history, however, makes us wonder. If God is true and the Bible is correct, why are there so many different opinions on what all that means.
Why do some churches baptize by emersion and others by sprinkling? Why do some churches baptize babies while others only baptize adults. Why do some churches believe baptism saves and others don’t? Why do some churches believe you can lose your salvation and others believe you’re secure no matter what? Why do some churches teach that only Jesus can save without human effort or merit and others require all sorts of activities to secure and keep salvation?
Why do some churches believe you can get saved only in this life while others believe you’ll have a chance later?
I could keep going. The list of conflicting ideas is endless.
But more curiously, why did God not stipulate the answers to such questions clearly in the text of the Bible? Is He trying to confuse? Is uncertainty His wish?
No, there’s no trickery here. The Bible is the source book. Jesus is the Savior. The community is a reference point but no community knows everything. Every genuinely sincere Christian is attempting to ascertain the truth and everyone is to some degree responsible. They can also be wrong.
God isn’t wrong. The Bible isn’t wrong but our understanding is limited. As Corinthians says, we’re looking through a glass darkly (1 Cor. 13:12). That applies to every person and every group. No one sees everything with absolute clarity, not even the Apostle Paul.
These differences between churches are friction points that keep us to some degree at a distance from one another. We can organize within local churches and churches develop into wider associations but the disagreements keep the divisions in place.
But what happens when all these local communities (and there are thousands if not tens of thousands) coalesce around a common idea? Even when these communities have highly competing, contradicting viewpoints on many doctrinal issues (like baptism and salvation), the common issues fuel the desire to control the whole population.
That is what is happening with ideas like abortion, same-sex marriage and sexual identity issues.
Religion Is Naturally Violent
Modern Christians have been referred to metaphorically as fighting fundamentalists. The tag is not without justification and the title is bolstered by emotional arguments like, “if you don’t stand for something, you’ll fall for everything!” that are often used in Christian discourse.
Separation is another issue. It isn’t just allowed, it’s taught with a scowl. Separate from anyone who disagrees on the common issues. That isn’t the point of separation but that is what is taught. Separating from sin personally is the aim. We are still to remain in contact with and humbly respectful to those who sin.
Evangelism a few hundred years ago was done by the sword. If a nation wasn’t Christian, their confession was secured with a knife at the throat. The Crusades are one example but do a bit of research and you find that blood thirst was prominently associated with church growth.
Things have changed in the modern era but only in terms of weaponry. The desire to impose organized religion’s ideas on everyone and the expression of hate for those who don’t comply is quite evident. Donald Trump’s diatribes are cheered by his followers loudly and many of them claim to be Christians. The more he hates, the more they like it and the more determined they are to vote for him.
Jesus, of course, said hating in this manner was the emotional equivalent of murder (Matt. 5:21-22) so in a sense, we’re still drawing blood.
Sadly, I’m talking about many people I’ve known and worked with over the years. As far as I know every one of my Christian associates voted for Trump in both 2016 and 2020. Hopefully, that will change in 2024.
Religion Overrides Democracy
In past centuries, organized religion was so tied to government you couldn’t tell the difference between the two and religion’s aggressive tendencies were unrestricted. Catholic abuses are well known so I won’t mention them here but John Calvin, a reformed protestant in the 1500’s, was also known for having anyone executed for questioning his theological ideas.
Not much difference between him and Catholics. Calvin separated from Catholicism and then acted like a Catholic.
Just to be clear, democracy was philosophically and practically non existent at the time. Rather than be kept at bay by the government, the church was the government.
All that changed with the Declaration of Independence. Democracy was established, the kind where church and state are separate, and we haven’t looked back.
Democracy has fostered some messy moments in the past and I’m sure there will be more but Democracy is forward moving. The church continues the effort to impose it’s ideas on the broader public (by taking control of the government) and is perilously close to doing so but the right to vote secured by democracy is still the silent bullet that makes the magic happen.
Religion Isn’t Biblical
Religious people love to claim their ideas are sound because they are biblical. They’ll even quote a verse or two to prove it. Since every divergent idea is promoted as biblical, what that really means is anybody’s guess.
What the Bible says is not what the Bible teaches and everyone believes that even if they haven’t clearly conceived it. Using toilets is a good example. Israel was told to dig holes for latrines but the teaching was sanitation and hygiene, not dig holes. We don’t dig holes today because toilets serve that purpose.
You can add shaving side burns, wearing cloths made from blended materials, along with several other common practices to the list of things the Bible says but doesn’t actually teach. Determining what is being taught is the outcome of the interpretive process.
Well, religion isn’t biblical. Yes, the word “religion” is in the Bible but religion as we know it and do it is not.
Churches are where religious institutions are housed but even that is a far cry from what is found in the Bible. The waste in government is easily matched if not outstripped by churches. Buildings are unused for the better part of each week and expensive to maintain.
Salaries are an issue too. Preaching may qualify as hard work but when it’s done only once or twice a week, you have to wonder. And it’s a bit of hoot for ministers to claim to be counselors since most have no formal training in counseling, despite the teachings of Jay E. Adams.
Democracy is more biblical than religion.
The US is Christian because it’s a democracy. Anything more than that is a religious state.
Religion Discourages An Interpretive Approach To The Bible
God, in His infinite wisdom, did two things to protect us from religious fascism.
He created the human ability to develop endless linguistic expressions (over 7K languages in the world). Languages may be similar but they are never static. New words and meanings are regularly being developed in each particular locale. Ideas can’t readily or easily be communicated from one group to another making it difficult to develop universal tangents or force those ideas on everyone.
Social Media and the almost universal use of English has changed that somewhat but you get the point. Language creates barriers between groups. It’s almost a forced democracy.
The second thing God did was He gave us the Bible.
The most significant characteristic of the Bible is the need for interpretation. You can’t take the naked text and impose it directly on human society. It isn’t a how to book. Reading the Bible must be accompanied with the question, “What does this mean?” “What are we being taught here?”
Why is that good? Because the interpretive process creates a natural democracy for belief. One person reads the Bible and thinks it is teaching one thing. Another person reads the same passage and thinks it is teaching a different thing. Resolution is only possible if they get together, debate the different ideas and come up with an acceptable version for both. And they may in the end agree to disagree – unheard of among fundamentalists.
That hasn’t happened. What I’ve just described is exactly what has produced the endless lists of denominations and even the variations within each denomination. Believers debate passages and when they can’t find the middle ground they separate and develop new denominations along with the endless variations on each.
Religion Has Replaced The Gospel
The Gospel you can preach and when you do souls are saved and hope is encouraged. Religion’s message, however, which is mostly political these days and anti-democratic, has replaced the Gospel. Because of that, people are misled by the real purpose of religion. Instead of encouraging kindness and generosity in society and support for all, it leaves a bad taste in the mouth.
We shouldn’t be surprised by this. Our forefathers, the Pilgrims, came to America to get away from what they perceived as a dominant (and at the time undemocratic) state. They, of course, weren’t very democratic either. They wanted things to be done their way and were not inclined toward the negotiation, deliberation process. They took their ball and went elsewhere.
That mindset seeded religious tradition in America and supplanted the Gospel. The public views churches not as centers where the Gospel is preached, outsiders are welcomed and hope is encouraged but as political friction points where trouble is constantly brewing.
It explains why so many harbor bad attitudes about the church.
Religion Opposes Democratic Change
Occasionally the thinking side wins and absolutists change. They become more rationally active and I would say that’s a good thing, even a godly thing. Change is the one thing humans can do that God cannot do.
God doesn’t change because He cannot change. Humans change because they can’t do otherwise.
We were made for change. We should pursue it intentionally, deliberately and daily.
Refusing to change or accusing those who do is an expression of arrogance. No one knows everything and reasoning coupled with learning helps change the perspective.
Arrogance should never characterize Christians.
Relligion Encroaches
You might not think much of it but right now seven of the nine Supreme Court Justices are Catholic. Six of them are practicing Catholics. The seventh is now Episcopalian.
The Heritage Foundation has produced game plans for the government once a Donald Trump type gets into office. Along with Heritage, there are many other smaller organizations adding their voice to the effort.
Focus On The Family, a quasi governmental institution attempts to sway the thinking of a broad swath of the population through their various public channels.
Many of these Christian groups are encouraging young people to pursue career paths that place them in power. Mike Johnson is one such example. There’s no end to these types infiltrating various offices and departments. They usually come across as combative and sycophantic, cardboard cut-outs for lack of a better term. They’re easy to identify.
It’s a coup. A religious coup but still a coup.
And there’s more. We shouldn’t be surprised. It’s always been the nature of religion to control. That won’t change. Couple that with a sinful nature and it becomes an irritant on the backside of Democracy.
THINK!AboutIt
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