Jesus and the Powers: Christian Political Witness in an Age of Totalitarian Terror and Dysfunctional Democracies

by N.T. Wright

independent judiciary

hold them to the same standard as every other citizen.

judiciary is free of political interference and manipulation and is able to interpret the law without fear of reprisal.

only an independent judiciary is able to make sure that the law is applied ...

We hasten to add that women and sexual minorities generally fare better in liberal democracies than in any rival or alternative systems of government.

Refugees don’t flee from liberal democracies, but they do flee to them.

We need to choose truth over tribe.

Liberal democracy only works if we find a way of living with differences, dealing with diversity, tolerating others, not begrudgingly, but in a manner that respects people’s right to hold their opinion and pursue their social vision.

Unless we are going to bully people or break all dissent, we need to find a way of managing differences within our democratic diversity. It is here that we wish to commend a vision of political unity within social diversity by appeal to the concept of confident pluralism.

politics has instrumental rather than ultimate value. In other words, politics is a means, not an end.

political leader Tim Wilson writes: ‘A free society does not seek to homogenise belief or conscience but instead, affirms diversity and advocates for tolerance and mutual respect.’

We need confident pluralism, or something close to it, because liberal democracy creates a plurality of political perspectives. This plurality is messy and conflictual; it leads to confrontations and is not conducive to public unity, let alone social uniformity. The fact is that the consciences of some people will lead them to kneel for a national anthem, while others will proudly stand and place their hand on their heart.

The disparate and diverse beliefs that occupy the public square, parliaments, or even the food court plaza, mean that we need the practice of confident pluralism to enable us to respect differences rather than attempt to suppress or punish them.

Good government arises from the cultivation of debate, not ritual denunciations or intimidation.

Tolerance properly understood means ‘the refusal to use coercive state power to impose one’s views on others, and therefore a commitment to moral competition through recruitment and persuasion alone’.

which differences make a difference?

we can only regard democracy as the best way of constructing a human civilisation if we are prepared to wrestle with its historical failures and potential weaknesses.

‘The faith of the Christian is the last great hope of earth.’

we do not build the kingdom ourselves; we only build for it.

the world we live in now is at a moment of social and economic turmoil, with new imperial powers rising and democratic nations tearing themselves apart.

what is up for grabs is the place of Christians in the State and the type of state that Christians should support.

the advent of Christendom,

It was precisely the close relationship between the Church and European powers, extending into religious wars and making Christians complicit with colonial violence, which might make us sceptical of mixing Christianity and politics. Be that as it may, to build for the kingdom means building something on earth that anticipates the new creation.

Such witness and work does cross over into the political realm. Christian testimony must not shrink back from its theopolitical implications, even if it must be vigilant not to be seduced by the temptations of proximity to political power.

What else is not an option? Do a lot of Christians get into public positions of power and either shrink back from mixing Christianity and politics or succumb to integrating a certain orthodoxy of Christian belief into the way that things should be governed, the way that power should be wielded? The revolution of Christ and Christianity is that his followers don’t need to attain power for Christ’s sake. That is very much not the point, certainly short-term (lifetime-term) speaking.

custodians

Custodians and servants?

The problem is, unfortunately, that human authority is corrupted by the poisonous pursuit of power and contaminated by the human attachment to idols of every kind.

A seduction that is enabled and was perhaps even started by dark and evil forces of the heavenly realm.

In the end, God’s sovereignty, as well as human regency over nature, and even Israel’s priestly vocation in the world – all of that is telescoped into Jesus.

But we are to build for the kingdom, to prepare for it, to anticipate it, to turn our communities into signposts displaying it.

cross and kingdom go together.

submission to state authorities and at other times subversively resisting them.

it is the institution of government, and not every individual governor, which deserves our obedience.

Christian nationalism,

But liberal democracy and confident pluralism constitute a form of government and political philosophy that gives us the best opportunity to love God and to love our neighbour. It is a working arrangement to help us find unity even with our differences, to promote freedom and responsibility, and to pursue the things that make for peace and mutual encouragement.