“The Church’s wisdom has always pointed to the presence of original sin in social conditions and in the structure of society: Ignorance of the fact that man has a wounded nature inclined to evil gives rise to serious errors in the areas of education, politics, social actions and morals.” Pope Benedict XVI
It’s one thing for a man to believe he’s a Bighorn sheep. It’s another thing for that man to challenge an actual Bighorn sheep to a duel of the skulls.
This is how it always is with reality. Though illusions may be strong, reality has a way of making itself known in the long run. This is a comforting thought especially in a day when many believe our social and technological progress has enabled us to transcend the reality of cause and effect. They tell us that now boys can be girls, that men can marry men, that police can be defunded, and that the best truth is actually post-truth.
But just as Peter reminded his readers, just because consequences are forthcoming, it doesn't mean they're not coming. You can’t refuse to pay the piper and avoid a plague of rats. And judging by the size of the ones already coming up the pipes, this one’s going to be a doozy. The only reason the West is able to continue in it’s delusion of “better days ahead” is the delay factor between the cause and the effect. For all the failures of the boomer generation, we continue to reap the benefits of their religious assumptions, their lack of antipathy towards children, and their willingness to work thankless jobs for decades.
Did you catch that? The only reason for the relative stability we presently enjoy were the stable assumptions of our forebears. You can’t abandon kids, marriage, and transcendence and still have a flourishing society.
Ask Japan.
First Thing’s First
Since the 60s there has been a renewed a determination to erase all memory of Judeo-Christian values from the psyche of the West. We now operate under a reimagined Ministry of Truth, where longstanding assumptions regarding human nature are no longer deemed “acceptable” by the progressive magisterium. Reality must now fall in line behind the so-called triumph of the modern man and the baggage of his modern self.
All of this is devastating to flourishing human culture, of course. Whenever created man abandons the Creator’s reality, suffering follows. We see this most clearly in Genesis, where God clearly outlines the blessings of obedience and the consequences of disobedience. Obedience or disobedience has always been reality by the way; there has never been any other. When Adam and Eve attempted to create their own viable system of reality (one in which they could eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil), sin entered the world and ruin quickly followed.
This — the desire to escape God’s reality and manufacture our own — is the fundamental problem with the world. Not Co2 emissions, not systemic racism, not the patriarchy, not the Russians. It is us. We are the underlying cause of poverty, the sex trade, war, and broken families.
Romans 3:23 puts our condition succinctly: “For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God.” We are not simply bent and in need of minor repairs. We are as spiritually and morally dead as your average curbside Christmas tree. We are blind to the beauty of the Lord and offended by the light of his truth. This isn’t simply an opinion to consider, but a fact that thousands of years of human history will readily lend their “Amen” to.
We need to acknowledge this before we go any further. We don’t incline to truth, we don’t incline to love, we don’t incline to good. The monster isn’t out there somewhere beyond the city walls, but in each of us. If we deny this basic fact — if we get a variable wrong this early in the equation — we’re going to screw everything up.
Which is, in fact, what we’re in the middle of doing.
The Danger of an Unopposed State
There never was a government that was not composed of liars, malefactors and thieves. - Marcus Tullius Cicero
Perhaps not surprisingly, the expression of sin at an individual level (license to do what I want, when I want) is also the expression of sin at the state level. If we fail to account for sin at an individual level (i.e., ignoring the rule of law) there are individual and societal consequences. When we fail to account for sin at an institutional level (i.e., failing to maintain checks and balances), there are national consequences.
It was because of this awareness of sin that Canada’s founding fathers had the foresight to adopt Britain’s parliamentary system of government; one which assumes that fragmentation of state power is in the people’s best interest. These at least had enough Biblical literacy to know that, in Glen Sunshine’s words, “The state is more interested in self-aggrandizement and power than it is in promoting the good.”
Among other things, this meant the presence of an official opposition in government — a mechanism designed to set one party’s lust for power against the other’s. It may not be pretty but it’s also just about the only system that works. I want to repeat that just so we’re all clear. The rough-and-tumble of a parliamentary system isn't an obstacle or an incidental appendix to the democratic process — it IS the democratic process. If the government is working properly, it shouldn't whiz along like a well-oiled machine. When debate between ruling party and opposition regularly resolves in backslaps and genial smiles, we should all be worried. An “efficient” government is a citizen's worst nightmare.
Believe it or not, there was a time where putting forward a controversial ethics bill would be met with fierce pushback by the opposition. Due to a secularization, however, the keen edge of biblical antithesis has worn down to the point where all parties now basically assume the same things. Few politicians now have any real convictions about — well, anything really. These days, the “opposition” would rather cross the floor to shake hands over a bill advocating adolescent mutilation.
Because Canadians have largely been spared the atrocity that is unchecked power, sadly many of us — including Christians — have become functional semi-Pelagians in our attitude towards the state. We have been too unconcerned by the homogenization of government. We have been too content to let a fragile system run it’s own course to oblivion and the detriment of its people. Again, this should not surprise us. Without a clear awareness of original sin, we should not expect the exercise of humane government.
We cannot ignore reality and expect everything to turn out okay.
Practical Application
So enough with the doom and gloom already. How should Christians respond to the present clown convention that is Canadian politics?
As this publication is a ministry of our church and not a partisan platform, it is not our intention to tell Christians who to vote for. It is our intention to equip the saints with biblical principles that will hopefully help them make God-honoring decisions in this, and every, area of their lives. Remember, the decision of who to vote for is no less “spiritual” than the decision of what church to attend. As we discussed last week, we need to leave the wasteland of pietistic categories and recover a robust Bible-centricity to all areas of life.
So, two practical applications here:
Invest in Actual Opposition
Genuine political opposition is a necessary attribute of democracy, tolerance, and trust in the ability of citizens to resolve differences by peaceful means. The existence of an opposition, without which politics ceases and administration takes over, is indispensable to the functioning of parliamentary political systems. - Gerald Schmitz, Political and Social Affairs Division, December 1988
I think we can all admit the current political scene in Canada is well on it’s way to receive the “Dog’s Breakfast of the Year” award. However, one practical takeaway for Christians is the importance of working towards an actual opposition party in parliament. It will likely take some intentional research to discover which parties, if any, could actually function in this capacity. At this point the rot is admittedly pretty well established.
Which leads to my next point, which is taking the time now to invest in institutions that are attempting to raise the next generation of principled opposition. Yes I happen to teach and be on the board of such an institution — and no, I don’t make a dime from endorsements. This isn’t even about a particular school, but about the importance of Christians everywhere recovering the importance of Christian education both at home and in formal learning environments. Things won’t change if Christians keep allowing a state-endorsed system to churn out more dysfunctional citizens.
Remember, this isn’t just about you, at your particular cultural moment. Don’t be like Hezekiah who checked out of his responsibilities early because he knew judgement would delay until after his death. Part of living wisely and faithfully is taking the long-game approach. What kind of government do you want your kids to inherit? Do you want to be the guy who just let the bike coast towards the cliff? Or do you want to be the one who did his darndest to jam a stick in the spokes before it careened over the edge.
Prayer and Preaching for Revival
There is no such thing as humane society outside the truth of Scripture; and no, acknowledging this basic fact doesn’t make you a theonomist. Only in the Bible do we find a universal basis for assigning dignity to all human life. Outside the Bible, this basis can only rise and fall with the ebb and flow of power’s ideological preferences. It is no accident that the Western world — a culture shaped by Bible principles — has enjoyed the success and overall flourishing that it has enjoyed. This is not a comment on the inherent quality of Western people, but on the inherent quality of their moorings.
If we really want to see real recovery in the days ahead, we must recommit ourselves to the exercise of real prayer and preaching in our churches. Ultimately we must determine to address all sin — both individual and institutional — through the Gospel of Jesus Christ. The kingdom of God didn’t arrive through political savvy but through blood and tears; in the tearing of a temple curtain and the sundering of stone. It began with God’s power, and it will continue the same way.
Though we have access to carnal weapons, and should know how to use them, they aren’t our best or brightest tools by far. This is because our fight isn’t ultimately against corrupt flesh and blood systems but against the principalities and powers that undergird them.
For this the arm of God must move; humbling hearts, strengthening arms, and raising the dead to life. In all this he can do more than we ask or anticipate.