Our predicament now [is] very similar to the conditions of nonconforming Christians in England during the reign of Charles I in the early seventeenth century. The State then and now has felt that all areas of life ought to be under its control.
“Charles I and the U.S. federal government have both taxed heavily. The purpose of taxes is partly to gain funds, but taxation is a form of revolution in the modern age. Taxation is also used to control behavior. In order for churches and religious institutions to maintain their rightful tax exemptions, they must follow the guidelines laid down by the government.
“This was also true in the days of Charles I. Only those belonging to the State church had ‘liberty.’ To belong to the State church meant, especially for ministers, that they had to approve of certain doctrines and practices in Church and State. The alternative was to be cast out, to become a nonconformist, and to be persecuted.
“Some Christians, not willing to compromise, were driven to the point of leaving their native England. They came to America in search of religious freedom. Christians have now gone full circle. The conditions of the England of Charles I have found their way across the ocean to the land which sheltered those English religious outcasts, the United States of America. . . .
“There is, however, a difference. The Puritans of the seventeenth century were seeking to control a State church with their perspective. The embattled Christians of twentieth-century America seek to avoid controls on themselves and others: they want freedom for Christ’s kingdom from the power of the State. Some centuries before the Puritans, John Wycliffe had begun a movement to place the Bible in the hands of the people. The survivors of his movement, the Lollards, merged with the Puritans. Step by step, the Christian society in the United States moved from the old-established-Church pattern to an emphasis on the separation of Church and State (not Christianity and the State) and a grass-roots faith; conversion, not State controls. . . .
“America is an unfinished story. As a result, it is sometimes a confused and stormy one. The fact remains that the United States, which began as a new experiment in civil order, continues to be such. The issues are now sharply drawn, more so than in 1776, between a top-down civil government and Church and a grass-roots faith which reorders Church and State from below.”
From James T. Draper and Forrest E. Watson, If the Foundations Be Destroyed (Nashville: Oliver Nelson Books: 1984), pp. 165, 166.
|
TOP LEVEL
Past Issues
Printer-friendly page
Send this page to a friend