The title is a very controversial and diverse topic. The Separation of Church and State. This blog is going to specifically deal with my perspective and I fully acknowledge that I may not be able to cover other nuances of this subject so please bear with me patiently and kindly.
Overall, I think there should be a separation between the state and any religious institution. I don’t think that our culture, civilization and or country is falling to pieces because there’s not enough church in our government. The first reason is that using your religious affiliation at all to signal being wholesome and trustworthy has allowed people to pass as being good and/or ok individuals without actually having to do the hard work that goes with the name. The second is that I think having religion in issues of state puts into question the intentions and genuineness of everyone who claims a title of religious affiliation of those who run for public office. The third reason is that even if we were to put more church into the state, it creates an issue of which religion. The fourth is that placing religion and state together, we create a system in which people are forced into the dominant religion not by any genuine feeling or conversion, but because of matters of convenience, power and/or safety. The fifth reason is that religion becomes an identity not of heartfelt feelings of wanting to be closer to God, but like a Sports fan identity. The sixth reason is that people use lack of sufficient religion as a reason for unrelated problems.
It’s just signaling kinship and connection without doing the work
As a famous writer once said, ”A Rose, by any other name, would smell as sweet.” Or in other more unfortunate cases, a crook by any other name, is still a crook, just better hidden. Having a politician, especially in a government where it boils down to a popularity contest espouse a religious affiliation in public is more about signaling than trying to build a meaningful relationship with God. I believe that use of religious rituals, language and other sacraments in things that involve gaining or maintaining political power is suspect. Jesus himself warns us to not pray in public to be seen(Matt 6:5), or to broadcast our good deeds (Matt 6:1–4). Jesus says that those who trumpet their righteousness in public do so only to gain honor by others. Jesus says to keep your good deeds a secret and to pray in private. Religion should be a personal relationship with God. Involvement with community should only be for the advancement of understanding and relationship with God through connectedness of others on the personal and private level, not on a policy one. When we allow people to announce their religious affiliation, people tend to immediately feel more comfortable with those individuals just by mere verbal affiliation. We should judge people not by what they say, but what they do. Your actions speak louder than words. The alternative is to allow people a sense of kinship and trust without earning that right. How many Christian and other religious leaders espoused the “right” religious titles and creeds, yet they not only failed to live out the lives that Jesus and others taught, they committed acts of violence, rape and corruption that hurt people? How many religious leaders raped innocent children? How many Christians and Muslims in positions of leadership siphoned off funds meant for good causes? How many religious leaders were not upfront with how much of a cut they would take from donations to religious institutions and now own their own jets and mansions? Allowing people who are vying for political power to use religious affiliations in public forums enables people to unlock an undeserved sense of kinship and trust with an audience that should really be earned through consistent actions. We should not let our titles inform us of who we should vote for, but what we should be doing and looking for in others.
You’re not doing it to build a relationship with God. It’s about power.
The second reason why the Church should be separated from State is that it puts into question the genuineness of the person announcing their religious affiliation. Why would anyone announce it in a public forum or on national television? Why would anyone say it in front of a crowd? Unless its with the knowledge that your are going to be booed off that stage, or that you know you would gain nothing from that announcement, your intentions are put into question. A politician, or a leader that requires the backing of people will do everything to create a cohesive and amped up body of individuals in order to enact policies. And while this could be used for good, it is too powerful a tool to use at all and too corruptible. Some of my readers may ask, “what about those who announce their affiliations as acts of bravery and to signal to other isolated individuals that others like them exist?” My first question to that reader would be, is this person talking about LGBTQ people coming out in public? Or being Muslim in the United States? If your audience either cheers you on or doesn't care at all and you suffer no loss of power, you have a privilege you’re not acknowledging. If you are not booed off that stage or make no impact, negative or positive at all, it means you’re in the majority. Announcing you are Christian to a wide audience is basically “preaching to the choir.” Even if you were to have chosen a venue where your crowd is specifically anti-Christian, the reality is that that is rare and you still have the majority of the country backing you. We must remember that whenever Jesus performed miracles, if he did it in a crowd it was only because that was where the unexpected opportunity came up and it was asked of him. But when he had a choice to have it seen or not by the world, he told the people he helped to speak nothing of his involvement. If you are laying claim to the majority religion as your affiliation to an audience, your intentions are put into question on whether you do so for God or for you.
If we do mix religion and politics, which religion?
The third issue with not keeping Church and State separate is the issue of which religion to use if we do go with putting them more together. I personally would not want American Christianity to be officially incorporated into the state because it has a very strong tendency to be awful to non-hetero, cis gendered people. It has a tendency not to consider science as a valid source of information, at least where it doesn’t suit the overarching narrative of their religion. It tends to blame victims of rape and ignore and oftentimes actively squash accusations of rape committed by their own church leaders. I am an American and my opinion is valid, and I would choose to not have American Christianity as the state religion. I bet many of my readers didn’t take my type of opinion into account when thinking of mixing the two institutions. American Christians often forget the fact that their religion is not riddled with corruption itself, but sees it as perfect. But why not Buddhism? Or Zoroastrianism? Or Islam? They equally have their issues and matters of corruption on par with American Christianity. Why not them? The State shouldn't be used as a tool for Religious institutions. It should be a moderator, a tool of the people to ensure that no one religion dominates another so that we actually have a choice to fully engage with religion in a genuine, intentional act of exploration.
Forced conversions, fake faith
The fourth reason that the two institutions should be kept separate is that it forces people into the dominant religion and not by genuine feeling. We can take today’s state of affairs as an example. What happens when a person of a minority religion in the United States announces their affiliation? Or even when it is just suspected like in the case of former President Barack Obama? The reality of the United States is that it is, unofficially, a Christian nation. This is the reality because the majority of its citizens affiliate with Christianity on one level or another, the federal government officially celebrates and schedules around Christian holidays, issues of social policy lets Rightwing Christianity have a very large and threatening voice in the matter and, lets be honest, most Christians wouldn't allow into power people who are of other religions or who are on a list of “undesirables” (homosexuals and Tran people) according to their very oppressive beliefs without a fight. So what has the current situation taught us about what happens when a religion is allowed to dominate the state, or be a very powerful force in it? Minorities don’t get voted into power simply because of one aspect of their lives. It doesn’t matter if they’re qualified, experienced, or actually the right person for the job. Many American Christians would vote for a grossly unqualified candidate over a highly qualified non-Christian candidate. People generally vote for others who they see as part of their own group, the “us” people. Which means, in order to gain political power or any standing at all, one would have to convert to the majority religion. If there is a huge earthly advantage to converting or “signing up” and a very debilitating mundane disadvantage to not joining up, conversions would be a matter of just being born into it or a matter or convenience. Its easier to just say you’re part of the dominant religion. Its not a matter of actual conviction. The quality of faith becomes an issue because there was no real intention behind it. How many people have been damned because they were not allowed a true conversion experience? How many people have been damned because they were forced to abandon their actual religions that were theirs out of conviction? How many people converted to the dominant religion because it was just a means to keeping either themselves, or their families alive for fear of physical threat or loss of a means of earning a living? How can we even look at ourselves with any respect if we allow a state religion to gain numbers that way?
Faith by birth, not by conviction. Favorite sports team
If we allow religion to mix with government, it becomes just a mere identity of chance; one that is generally like a sports identity instead of one of conviction. First, for this paragraph, let us establish an assumption from the writing above: that the numbers of converts to the majority religion rise if there is both an incentive to gain power by doing so and/or incentive of avoiding loss of life and living. Once converted, their children and the generations after are born into a status quo that is reinforced by what converted the previous generation. So, what do I mean by chance? And what do I mean by a sports identity? By chance, I mean by birth. We are Christian, Muslim, Jew, Buddhist, or Zoroastrian just by birth and being raised into it. It is our default and we establish assumptions at an early age. Baptisms, Shahadas, and other conversion rituals become mere milestones in child rearing. Can we really say that faith from such a condition is good? Leo Tolstoy railed against such religious inclusion into the fold of cultural norms because church and religious norms were used, not as acts of convictions and true faith, but as status symbols and the thing “normal people’’ do when they grow up. Along with being a mere identity, it has the danger of being a sports identity. Many people adhere to their “favored” team not because they’re particularly better than others or that they espouse a training regimen or playing strategy that gives them a leg up; it is often because they were born and raised in an area that identified with that local team. No matter if their team’s opponents had better training, better plays, better coaches. They wouldn’t convert due to an irrational sense of loyalty to their team. In fact, when comparing their teams to rival ones, the flaws of their home team either seem to disappear or are mitigated due to an “unfair advantage of the enemy.” It is an irrational loyalty that flies against facts and self reflection that characterizes sports identity. And that is the danger we face with religion. We start to mitigate the flaws of our religion or not see it. We don’t join our religion because it was a choice, but a mere factor of birth and upbringing. We may not even participate in it at all but still have the audacity to bash other religions because “ours is better.” And that is not what religion should be. Mixing Religion with the state would only increase that bad behavior.
Panacea to all this world’s issues…Not
The final reason to not mix the Church with the State is that much of the push to blend them together is the idea that all the problems we are facing is because of lack of enough religion. It comes from the idea that “if your life is bad, just go to church.” Many people mistakenly believe that your life would be better if you just go to Church. This ignores the deeper issues that assail people’s lives. A cheating spouse cannot be solved by sitting in a pew listening to the pastor. An abusive parent cannot be made to stop beating their kids by showing up every Sunday. A person living in poverty and unable to make ends meet cannot solve that issue by taking communion regularly. While the Church and other religious institutions may have the tools and community that could be used to solve some of these issues on a local level, its necessary to identify which tools are actually needed for these problems. That is where people who use church as the Panacea-of-all-ills fail. They don’t take the time to figure out the root of the actual problem is and if the church is actually equipped or appropriate to handle it. And because people don’t take the time to look for the root cause of an issue, they blame the person’s “moral failings” for continued existence of the problem instead of negligence of proper diagnosing caused by a focus on the “one size fits all” mentality. When we use that one size fits all answer, we ignore studies of human nature and explanations as to why people do things. We ignore actual corruption going on in the government because we are so busy thinking that failure of government is because of lack of church. It is a lazy and harmful answer to our world’s and personal issues.
Combining the State and church would be undemocratic and create a disingenuous population of “faithful.” The temptation to think that religion would solve every problem is powerful, but ignores not only the pitfalls of misdiagnosing, but also the problems inherent in one’s own religion. People forget that, yes God may be perfect but the transmitters of God’s will were human, and the transmitters of those transmitters (later priests, imams, rabbis after Jesus, Moses and Muhammad) were human as well. We get our religions from generations of humans passing down knowledge over hundreds if not thousands of years. Its passed down until it gets to us. Humanity as a whole, including us, are prone to huge mistakes, baggage, and cognitive dissonance. We have areas in our psychology that are irrational and rotten. All of this gets mixed up with our good qualities; and that mixture sums up to who we are. We take who we are and interpret the religions given to us by other humans who are in the same boat. But we forget that and think our religion is perfect. That is why we cannot have religion and politics mix. Not on a policy level.
