Separation of Church and State: A shield for faith

by Macie Capote

By Macie Capote
Clarion Herald

Many individuals use the term “separation of church and state” to keep religion out of politics.
In reality, when our country was founded, the term was intended to protect the church from the immorality of the government, not to remove religious expression from public view. Furthermore, anyone who seeks to keep religion, or at least Judeo-Christian morals, out of government is urging the country to entirely reconstruct what makes it so great: its founding by Christians.

The concept of “separation of church and state” originates from Roger Williams, a theologian who founded the Rhode Island colony. In his most famous work, “The Bloudy Tenent of Persecution,” Williams states, “God requireth not an uniformity of Religion to be inacted and inforced in any civill state. … True civility and Christianity may both flourish in a state or Kingdome, notwithstanding the permission of divers and contrary consciences, either of Jew or Gentile.”

Thomas Jefferson, the third U.S. president and founding father, furthered this idea in a letter to the Danbury Baptist Association in 1802: “Believing with you that religion is a matter which lies solely between Man & his God, that he owes account to none other for his faith or his worship, that the legitimate powers of government reach actions only, & not opinions, I contemplate with sovereign reverence that act of the whole American people which declared that their legislature should ‘make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof,’ thus building a wall of separation between Church & State.”

Jefferson explicitly quotes a section of the First Amendment in his letter. However, legal scholar and senior researcher on this matter, Daniel Dreisbach, believes that the metaphor Jefferson used has “misconceptualized” the principles of the First Amendment.

Dreisbach states: “... the very nature of a wall further reconceptualizes First Amendment principles. A wall is a bilateral barrier that inhibits the activities of both the civil state and religion, unlike the First Amendment, which imposes restrictions on civil government only. The First Amendment, with all its guarantees, was entirely a check or restraint on civil government, specifically Congress.”

As Christians, one of our fundamental beliefs is that God gives everyone free will – we choose whether or not to follow God. This respect for choice is reflected in our nation’s founding principles. Many, if not all, of our founding fathers, were influenced by Christian beliefs, and that is why they did not establish a national, forced religion because faith in God is a personal decision.

Dreisbach urges that we should care about this metaphor today “because the wall is all too often used to separate religion from public life, thereby promoting a religion that is essentially private and a state that is strictly secular. This would have alarmed the founders because they viewed religion, to paraphrase George Washington’s words, as an indispensable support for social order and political prosperity.”

Our country’s laws are so clearly rooted in the belief that all humans are created in the image of God, a belief to which we as Christians hold strongly. The Constitution was designed to protect humanity and uphold the dignity of every person. The Pew Research Center notes that while the U.S. Constitution doesn’t explicitly mention Jesus, every state’s constitution mentions God at least once as a source of authority and moral guidance.

In today’s society, Christ-followers are increasingly being criticized for holding fast to their views, and there has been an attempt to eliminate every hint of Christianity from our government, although our beliefs are inextricably linked to the ideals of our country.

But, Jesus teaches in John 15:18-25 that we should not be surprised if the world hates us because the world hated him first. And in Matthew 22:21, Jesus instructs his followers to “Render therefore unto Caesar the things which are Caesar’s; and unto God the things that are God’s.”
Jesus calls us to love our enemies, treat everyone with respect and support our country, even when it appears that our faith is being tested.

As election season approaches, let us remember the true meaning of “separation of the church and state.” Never was it meant to wipe faith from the government, but to protect religion from being corrupted.

We must stay informed, pray for our leaders and vote according to what we stand for. By doing so, we may honor the founding fathers’ objectives as well as the principles that have helped shape our country.

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