The Church and the world

As I try to work out how my faith relates to the world, one question constantly reoccurs to me. That is how far faith is a personal matter, and how far it is a public one. I don't mean whether I should keep it to myself or go around shouting it from the rooftops- the answer to that is simple. I can't keep it to myself, and I don't want to, and I don't think I should. Although I don't think shouting from the rooftops is going to do much good- especially if it's me doing it- my faith affects other people from the way I talk, and live, and act, so I cannot keep it purely to myself.

What I often ask is how far I (and/ or the church) am justified in imposing my view of right and wrong on the whole of society, whose views of what is or isn't wrong may be significantly different. Just because I believe that x is wrong, does that give me the right to try to force people who do not share my beliefs not to do it? In a democracy, the majority decide (at least in theory) what is or is not illegal. Why, if the church is a minority in society, as it sadly is, should we expect the rest of society to do what we say?

That's not to say that the church should conform to society's norms and standards of what is acceptable. Far from it. The church, in its early days, was not connected to the state in any way. They did not expect governments to do as they requested. Quite the opposite- they were the ones who were often outside the law, and prepared to defy society's behavioural norms to obey God. For example, Paul in his letters has plenty to say warning the Christians in Corinth not to get dragged into the demeaning sexual practices which were associated with pagan idols.

Reformer and theologian Martin Luther recognised that even in a 'Christian country' not everyone could be ruled in the same way, and developed his 'Doctrine of the two kingdoms' to explain what the relationship between church and state should be, in his opinion. Without going into too much detail (much of which I can't remember offhand) he recognised that some people would obey God's laws through choice, while others, who do not, cannot be coerced into doing so against their free choice. While I would probably disagree with Luther in some points, I think there's a lot of truth in that. Of course, if everyone agreed to follow God's laws (always supposing they could agree on what that meant!) the world would be a better place. But being realistic, that's not going to happen anytime soon.

Another point, and one which the church- often with some justice- is accused of, is of presenting what is merely culture or tradition as an article of faith. For example, the debate around women's leadership in the church has a lot to do with this, and debates over how the biblical passages referring to it are to be interpreted in the light of the culture they were originally written in and to are sadly not likely to go away any time soon.

That's not to say I don't think that leaders of the faith community, such as the archbishops of Canterbury and York shouldn't speak out, (see here) or that the church shouldn't express it's views of what's going on in the country. That's part of our duty to be salt and light to and in the world. We can state what is right and wrong. But can we expect those who don't believe to follow the same standards of behaviour as we do if they don't believe they are right? I'm not sure we can.