Civic totalists attempt to subordinate the nation, family, religion and individuals beneath their ideology. In defiant response, the Church, as it defends its own freedom of worship and witness, must also stand for the liberties of others.70 Laura Alexander acknowledges that the ‘purpose of the state is to promote human well-being by providing order, protection, and the material and social goods that allow people to live reasonably stable lives and pursue good and meaningful ends’, but she adds the important caveat that the state is not itself an ultimate end to be pursued, or an ultimate
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