Lesson 7: Woke Christianity and the State
Last week, I suggested we are in a cultural revolution in which people turn to name-calling and invoking God when rational arguments fail. One reason I decided to write on Woke Christianity is I’m surprised that more people are not in an uproar over the misuse of God in this conflict.
MAGA claims our nation is no longer united and prosperous because their group has lost power and privilege. They could supposedly provide these because they operate with traditional American and Christian values.
In this scenario, woke culture has brought bad times by abandoning those values. Woke Christianity is a large part of the problem because it participates in the critique of the past establishment. To be woke then is to be disloyal to the nation and the church.
It seems to me this is exactly the kind of situation our founders were trying to avoid. Confronted by all the denominations that emerged after the religious wars in Europe, they wanted to prohibit the establishment of any one of them. To do this they tried to separate church and state as much as possible. Now many forms of Christian nationalism are attempting to change this.
An examination of the many anti-woke groups finds they almost all identify themselves as Christian efforts to impose their version of the faith on America. It is troubling enough that this comes close to establishing Christianity as the nation’s religion. It goes further by aligning one kind of Christianity with one kind of nationalism.
Maintaining separation benefits religion as much as the nation. It enables support of the government when it is deserved but still retains the independence needed for a prophetic role.
One danger in unquestionably joining any establishment’s efforts to preserve its power and privilege is the possibility of compromising the truth. You see that in the present situation when unconditional loyalty becomes the overriding value. Celebrity-based politics and American exceptionalism have no place for repentance. Prophecy is silenced and creative change is resisted.
We do well to remember the prophets and Jesus were executed as God’s enemies by the religious establishments in their times.
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