- Church, Government, and Society: The Early Church
- From the Early Church to Christendom
- From Christendom to the Modern Church
- Where Should the Church Go From Here?
The End of Christendom
For many centuries, from the late Roman Empire, through the Middle Ages, and into the Modern period, the political, social, and ecclesial status quo in Western civilization was that of Christendom. All of society was (supposedly) Christian. “Christian” governments used coercion and violence to force everyone to be part of the visible Church (except Jews, who were usually begrudgingly tolerated) and to punish those regarded as heretics. The Church was an institution serving a religious function for all of society.
The prelude to the end of Christendom was the Protestant Reformation. The Protestant Reformation of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries ended the authority of the Catholic Church as a single institution over all of Western Europe. The Church schisms it produced resulted in a number of different churches that were politically established by different governments over different areas. In addition, it gave rise to various nonconformist sects such as the Anabaptists, which challenged the legitimacy of these established state churches.
This growing diversity of churches eventually led to increased tolerance of religious diversity in many parts of Europe. And this eventually provided space for people to call into question the authority and legitimacy of the Church altogether. Meanwhile, a growing number of Christians began to question whether using coercion and violence to force people to be part of the visible Church and to punish heretics was really consistent with the teachings of the New Testament. Together, these two developments eventually led to the political disestablishment of Christianity in Western civilization.
The political disestablishment of Christianity was a gradual and complex process that took place differently in different parts of Western civilization. The United States of America, uniquely, never had an established state church (though some of the preexisting colonies that formed it did). Some European countries still technically have established state churches, though de facto they ceased to function as state churches forced upon the population long ago. Some Eastern European countries had their established state churches suddenly attacked and disestablished by Communist revolutions in the early twentieth century. But however it happened, by the mid twentieth century, Christianity was no longer imposed by government coercion on society anywhere in Western civilization. Christendom had ended.
Following this political disestablishment of Christianity came the social/cultural disestablishment of Christianity. Because of the inertia of centuries of Christendom, many Western societies maintained a kind of cultural Christendom for a time even after the political end of Christendom. Christianity remained culturally dominant and social norms kept it in some ways de facto established in society. But eventually, even this cultural Christendom faded in Europe, which is now essentially post-Christian. This process has taken longer in the United States, in spite of (or perhaps because of?) the fact that the U.S. never had an established state church, but we can now see this process reaching its conclusion. The United States is becoming post-Christian, with Christianity no longer dominant in government, society, and culture. Christendom has essentially ended in Western civilization, and only vestiges of it remain.
The Modern Church’s Decline
With the end of Christendom, Christians lost access to their ability to dominate, control, and Christianize society using the political power structures of this world. They had to accept the guarantee of religious freedom made by modern secular nation states. As a result, modern Christians have come to accept the idea that the claims of the Christian Gospel are personal “religious” beliefs that are therefore nonpolitical. While Christians in the Middle Ages took for granted that the Christian belief that Jesus is Lord of all was a political claim that therefore should be imposed on society by political force, modern Christians have redefined the Christian belief that Jesus is Lord of all as a religious claim that exists in a distinct sphere from the political sphere. Thus, from the perspective of most modern Christians, the political power structures of this world have an independent legitimacy, and our Christian faith can, at best, merely help us to operate these worldly political power structures in a more ethical manner.
The problem with all this is that the New Testament is very clear that the Christian Gospel is political in nature, that Jesus literally is Lord and King, and that the whole point of Christianity is to establish God’s Kingdom here on earth. All Christians up until the modern period understood this. While Christians during Christendom were in error in thinking that God’s Kingdom can be established by using the violent, coercive methods of the kingdoms of this world, modern Christians are guilty of an equally egregious error in depoliticizing the Gospel. While it is of course a good thing that modern Christians are no longer using violence and coercion to force people into the visible Church and to persecute heretics, modern Christians have not fixed the fundamental problems with the relationship between Church, government, and society that started beginning in the fourth century. They have only created new problems.
When modern Christians believe it is wrong to kill for the sake of the Gospel, but perfectly acceptable to kill for the sake of secular nation states, they are being wildly inconsistent. When modern Christians believe it is right to use the violent, coercive power of secular governments to redistribute wealth to the poor and to persecute racists, but wrong to use the violent, coercive power of secular governments to force people to get baptized and to persecute heretics, they are being wildly inconsistent. From a genuine, biblical Christian perspective, evangelism, worship, and teaching true doctrine are not merely “religious” issues; they are just as much ethical issues as caring for the poor and racial justice. If it is acceptable for Christians to use the violent, coercive power of worldly governments to accomplish good things in the world, then it must be acceptable for Christians to use it for the sake of the Church, as Christians did during the Middle Ages. At least Christians during the Middle Ages were consistent. At least they cared enough about the Gospel and the Church to be willing to use coercion and violence for their sake. When modern Christians are perfectly willing to use coercion and violence, but not for the sake of the Gospel and the Church, this suggests that their true priorities lie elsewhere than the Gospel of Jesus Christ.
The modern Church thus is not any more faithful than the Church of Christendom when it comes to the relationship between Church, government, and society. The early Church actually sought to visibly embody the reality of God’s Kingdom in itself as a radically countercultural, disciplined, political community that rejected all methods inconsistent with the nature of Jesus’s Kingdom. To a large extent, they were faithful. The Church of Christendom attempted to embody God’s Kingdom in all of society by illegitimately using the methods of the kingdoms of this world to forcibly make all of society Christian. But with the end of Christendom, the modern Church has not returned to the vision of the Church taught in the New Testament and embodied by the early Church. Instead, modern Christianity has essentially become disembodied.
The modern Church has retained the function it had during Christendom of being a religious institution serving people’s religious needs. But with the end of Christendom, the Church can no longer serve this function for all of society, but only for a minority who, for one reason or another, feel some value in its religious practices and rituals. It thus seeks to win converts to Christianity by seeking to convince people that the Christian message can bring personal meaning and/or happiness to their lives. This evangelistic message is a far cry from the New Testament’s Good News that Jesus is Lord, that through Him God has defeated all the powers of evil, and that God calls all people everywhere to submit to His Lordship. And this picture of the Church is a far cry from the New Testament’s vision of the Church as a political community, a holy nation, a disciplined community of disciples that seek to visibly embody the reality of God’s Kingdom and God’s New Creation.
Most modern Christians believe that the Church sinned by seizing political power in the fourth century, but that, with the end of Christendom, this problem has been fixed. This is a serious misreading of Church history. The end of Christendom was a positive development in some ways, but it is a serious error to think that the modern Church is more faithful than the Church of Christendom. We are equally unfaithful, just in different ways. The fundamental turn towards serious unfaithfulness that the Church made in the fourth century has in no way been rectified.
The only path to genuine faithfulness for the modern Church is to submit to what the New Testament actually says about the nature of the Gospel and the Church, and to look to the early Church as an example of what it looks like to live that out. This will be radical, difficult, and in some ways painful, but this is what we must do if we want to be genuinely faithful.