The other day, after worship, someone referenced an editorial in the fine, fine Providence Journal by Julia Steiny about the current state of education. I have only been able to read the article briefly (gasp), but my understanding is that schools have to spend so much time focusing on tests, science, math, and language arts (painting with words?) that teachers no longer have the time to teach citizenship and civic duties. The lack of such an education leads to a lessening of society, a dwindling of respect, and knowledge of political process among other things. Such a premise may or may not be true (I do think she has a point), but that is not the point of this posting.
If schools are no longer able to teach civic responsibility, etc., then I wondered if that is something churches should teach, or at least inform people about. There are some factions of Christianity that already embraces this idea whole-heartedly. These are the people who tell the members of the congregation how to vote and who to vote for, will sing “God Bless America” and say the pledge of allegiance during worship. The home-schooled children who are brought up to be active participants in the political system in order to co-opt the system in the name of Christian Fundamentalism. They teach a certain kind of civic responsibility.
I disagree with the content of the message my more conserative, fundimentalist brothers and sisters push, but am not sure I disagree with the method. Churches are to be formative communities, shaping the grammar and worldview of the individual. There is a specific language or jargon to being a Christian, and part of the role of the community is to teach and shape the individual in that language. If we do not have a shared language, then we will not have a shared faith; it would be completely personal and private.
If this is the case, then is it not the responsibility of the church community to shape and inform one’s role as a citizen? We may say that the government should take care of the least of society (or at least some may say this), but why? As Christians we can turn to the prophets, or the teachings of Jesus, or other parts of the Bible and claim that as an authoritative source of our claim. Nonbelievers may have other reasons, philosophical or otherwise, and that will shape the actions and beliefs of those individuals. We vote for the person who will work towards the society that we embrace as a Christian. That individual does not have to be a Christian, but hold to some of the same ends (I recognize this opens up another can of worms, but one thing at a time). We read the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution with a particular lens, while others will have a different lens.
The challenge is walking that fine line of allowing our faith to inform our civic duties and imposing our views as they are informed by our faith on others. This is a challenge of post-modernity, embracing the idea that there is not one proper or appropriate way to view things.
With all of that said, I believe that the church does have a responsibility to teach civics and civil responsibilities from a faith perspective. We need to be careful that we always understand that the government is a flawed system and will never match up to the Kingdom of God, but it is what we have now, and we are living with it. Or, to put it in other terms, it is a mad, mad world and we are all living in it.
3 comments:
Jonathan, I agree that the churches need to take responsibility for helping our children and young people understand what makes for good citizenship, and that our values as Christians influence how we behave as citizens.
I think it's equally important for the churches to teach all our members that there are others who are not Christian, who share many of our same values. We can even learn some things by the ways that people of other faiths (even, indeed, people of no faith perhaps) live out their values as citizens. Then perhaps we would all begin to listen better to each other and all be enriched.
Yes, Jonathan, I'm THAT Lois Ann -- currently at EBC.
Lois,
Horace Bushnell would be very happy with your sentiment. When it comes to teaching about other people who are not Christians I am not sure what approach to take. We cannot teach to a full extent what the others believe, or what their specific practices might be because we do not full know unless we are a part of that tradition/community. Yet we can teach HOW to be in relationships with others.
I think that is more what you are getting at. I agree that we most likely share values and can learn about ourselves through the other. Yet we need to relate to others holding onto our own identity but respecting and creating space for the other.
So perhaps we can teach a way for Christians to relate to non-Christians so that particular faiths are respected, and at the same time we wittness our faith in Jesus Christ (respectfully).
Thanks for the comment!
Jonathan, you do understand me correctly. We Christians can't explain other faiths entirely, we need to depend on followers of those faiths to explain. Since I've been at EBC I've been able to explain my Presbyterian flavor of belief to Baptists who in some cases have had rather strange views of Presbys. And I've also been -- on a limited basis -- been able to explain Baptist belief to my Presbyterian colleagues. But the latter certainly not as well as a Baptist could have. And we're all Christians!
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