Church, State and Public Justice

Church, State and Public Justice: Five Views

Edited By: P.C.Kemeny

Authentic Books

Page 254

The book presents the viewpoint of five schools on how matters of Church, State and Public Justice should be dealt with. It has the position of the Catholics, Anabaptist, Principled Pluralist, Classical Separation perspective and Social Justice perspective. After each position is explained, the rest of the schools provide comments and thus readers are given good materials to evaluate the strengths and weaknesses of each school.

I picked up this book because I wanted some clarification, and I would say I was provided sufficient information. As a student of theology my interest has been primarily on political theology and eschatology. I am quite aware of the already-and-not-yet tension when it comes to the idea of the kingdom of God. My question was when I pray "thy kingdom come on earth as it is in heaven" how much do I let the aspect of 'already' come into play specially in the domain of political thought. When I read the Anabaptist position in the book, presented by the well-known theologian Ron Sider, I could very well identify myself with him at many point. I thought that used to be me! But even before I came to chapter 4 of Ron Sider, I would say I have found my answer through the writing of Clarke E. Cochran, who outlined the Catholic perspective. One commentator pointed out that Ron Sider's position has a weak concept of the State. I agree. At least for me my understanding of Church-State relationship was at some point fuzzy because I had a weak understanding of the theory of a State. After having read more on Moral and Political Philosophy, I began to wonder how Political Philosophy and Political Theology should relate to one another. And I found that the position outlined by the Catholic position provides the most robust and thought through framework on how a Christian church need to relate with the State. This does not mean that I agree with all the detail in the chapter. In fact Dr. Cochran himself says that not all the Catholics have a uniform position on the finer details. 

Dr. Cochran outlines that Catholic church has four features on how Church and State can relate with regard to matters of public justice: 

Cooperation: This refers to the way the church works together with the government on matters regarding fighting poverty, providing international relief etc. 

Challenge: This takes the form of challenging government policy through agitation, lobby etc.  For example, Catholic Americans  may challenge the policy of the US government to invade Iraq. 

Transcendence: This is about seeking to propagate one's religious belief. This sort of thing transcends the mission of the state, but is part and parcel of being a follower of Jesus Christ.

Competition: This is when Catholic run institution like College compete with government funded institution.

The book would be useful for any Christian student of ethics, political science or political theology. In fact, if people of other religious traditions wish to know the kind of thing that Christians believe, and how the beliefs are applied in political institutions this book may shed light.But non-Americans can skip Chapter 2 which basically is an interpretation of how the framers of US Constitution intended to maintain separation between state and the church.