Evangelical responsibility extends to politics

As Glenn Youngkin ran his successful campaign last year as the Republican candidate for governor of Virginia, several critics highlighted his religious ties. Simply put, Youngkin supported orthodox breakaways from the Episcopal Church as it embraced grievous heresy and sin. As that denomination further supplanted Biblical faith with universalism and sexual immorality, several northern Virginia congregations cut off ties, citing the institution’s abandonment of Christianity altogether.

Youngkin has generously supported Holy Trinity Church in McLean, Va., a conservative congregation that has no official ties to any Anglican body. Whereas in the past, generous donors to any church would have been seen as upstanding citizens, nowadays such religiosity—when it leans conservative on moral issues—can be a major political liability. Apparently, marching in pride parades and supporting drag queen story hours is fine, but material support for orthodox Christianity sets a bad example for the children. More specifically, there is a popular notion that ardent, traditional Christians should not be in a position of significant political power, and, if they are, they had better not act upon their religiously derived principles, especially where morality is concerned.

Surprisingly, this contention comes from both inside and outside the church. Elite secularists and even some prominent religious voices bewail the presence of politically engaged Christianity, especially when it opposes the wider agenda, values, and conduct of the global managerial class. Granted, many political candidates aren’t religious and have to put on a show to attract conservative voters. Other well-meaning (or power-hungry) politicians have done a poor job in working out how their faith should inform and guide their conduct and policies. This results in cringeworthy instances of moral blindness, obvious religious ignorance, and embarrassing scandals. And, it should be noted, such instances occur on both the right and the left sides of the aisle.

Plenty of liberal leaders claim a religious identity for themselves, even though the Democratic Party’s embrace of abortion on demand and sexual license has stretched many religious identities to the breaking point. Only those who have minimal religious beliefs, such as adherents of mainline Protestantism or Reform Judaism, experience little tension in this regard.

A good many of today’s self-described evangelicals, however, seem uneasy about any exercise of political authority by fellow evangelicals. They see political power as inherently corrupting and worldly, and its exercise by Christians as a compromised testimony before the watching world. A whole intellectual class exists to remind evangelicals they ought to decouple their theology from their politics or to stop making an idol of politics. They become queasy at the thought of laws and policies that punish, fine, and even imprison people for various offenses.

This tendency is not rooted in historic Protestantism. The Radical Reformation rejected the post-Constantinian Christian tradition at the very root (radix), including many centuries of political theology. Initially, this manifested in violent revolts and cultlike utopian projects until the influence of pacifists like Menno Simons and Jakob Ammann became dominant. The Radical tradition was revived somewhat by influential Neo-Anabaptist theologians like John Howard Yoder. In this view, one of the great tragedies of history was the conversion of Constantine the Great and the ensuing legalization and establishment of Christianity. Before then, Christianity was pure because it was politically powerless. Since then, the church has sullied herself with involvement in politics.

Now, most people aren’t consistent thinkers, so many embarrassed evangelicals don’t renounce politics altogether. They intuitively realize that political authority is necessary and not inherently sinful. They simply don’t have the stomach for fulfilling such oaths of office themselves or seeing the same fulfilled and wielded by fellow Biblical Christians because it will end up being “mean” and lacking in “winsomeness.”

This argument produces a convenient evangelical paralysis that is exploited by secularist politicians, lobbying groups, and institutions. If Christians cannot take office and govern according to their first principles, unbelievers are quite ready to do so.

This is a recipe for continued political defeat combined with unseemly moral preening. If we believe society should commit itself to certain laws and not others, that means using the means to bring about those needed laws—in the right way, with the right motive, toward the right ends. There is a difference between pursuing power for power’s sake and pursuing a political office that holds the power to craft policy that benefits everyone in society.

Powerful forces for evil benefit from a politically disengaged Christianity. Christians hold vital convictions on sex, the sanctity of life, marriage, justice for the innocent, and the exploitation of the poor. Labor on Sunday, the sale and distribution of addictive substances, a deeply corroded public education apparatus, gambling, payday loans, pornography, no-fault divorce laws, financial irresponsibility, and predatory financial practices bring in immense profits or provide tools for subjugating a free populace. And they are threatened by evangelicals wielding political authority.

It is one thing to have political influence taken away. It is another to forfeit that influence on our own.