Should Christians Impose their Worldview?

Christians today have a lot to say when it comes to politics. Many want to ban homosexual marriage, abortion, and birth control. Others believe that a woman should not be President. Throughout this election season I've seen conservative and liberal Christians duke it out in the media and on Facebook. I've been in some of those conversations. What I want to know is should I, as a Christian, impose my worldview on others so that they follow the same biblical rules and laws that I do?

When you first become a Christian, you acknowledge and accept Jesus as your savior who died to save you from your sins. You confess that you accept Jesus into your heart and depending on your denomination, you get baptized. That is the primary rule of Christianity. You accept, believe, and confess. Your sins put you at risk of hell, a place of fire and/or a place apart from God. Without Christ's sacrifice, you would have never been able to be in God's presence in Heaven. This is the primary, fundamental belief that all Christians hold.

Everything else is secondary. What do I mean by secondary? I mean all of the varying beliefs among Christians. There are hundreds of denominations of Christianity and within those, each member of every church holds varying beliefs, but they all hold the belief that Jesus came and died on the cross as a substitutional sacrifice. He died so that we would not die. In Him we have eternal life. I will refer to this as the Primary Rule.

That's it. Anyone who does not believe and accept Jesus Christ's sacrifice and the reason for it is not a Christian.

Any other beliefs are considered secondary in that they are important to the Christians who believe them, but are not agreed on by all Christians. For example, you may believe that you need to be baptized to be saved. You may believe it so much that you insist that all of your children and grandchildren be baptized for fear that they will not enter Heaven without doing so. To you, this is a primary issue. But to someone else, they may believe differently as demonstrated by many denominations of Protestants who believe that baptism isn't required for Salvation, but is part of the confession. They believe that you re-enact burial and resurrection with Jesus as an outward demonstration of your faith. Baptism is secondary because not all Christians agree that it is necessary for Salvation, but everyone agrees that you need to accept Jesus--the Primary Rule.

Without going into any secondary rules, should we enforce the Primary Rule? Should we force other Americans to accept Jesus as their Savior and confess that they believe in Him? What would such a country look like?

• In 381 A.D., The Roman Emperor Theodosius was the first to outlaw pagan sacrifices in The Codex Theodosianus¹. For not being a Catholic you would receive fines. For being caught using a temple or sacrificing, you would be punished by being be killed by the sword and all your property would go to the city. As a pagan, you were not allowed to make wills. Any pagan gatherings were hit with fines and the members cast out with the house going to the city. By the end of his reign, Theodosius paid informants for information regarding pagans who would then be killed and have their property confiscated².
• Under Justinian's rule from 527-565 A.D., non-Christians could not teach³ and everyone was forced to be baptized including Jews⁴. If you were not a Christian, you were not allowed to make accusations against Christians.
• From 771-779 A.D. Charlemagne campaigned against the Saxons in modern northern Germany. In the year 782, he infamously massacred 4,500 pagans who preferred to die rather than convert to Christianity.
• Iceland in the year 1000 A.D. had multiple missionaries who converted the local chiefs. In multiple cases, those who did not convert where killed⁵
• On November 27 1095, Pope Urban I declared a Holy War on the Turks⁶. When the crusaders arrived in Jerusalem, they massacred Muslims and Jews. Thousands of crusaders would die in battles for the next two centuries.
• From 1390-1406, Henry III of Castile and Leon pressured and persecuted Jews in Spain to convert to Christianity. Those who weren't baptized were killed
• In 1452, Pope Nicholas V gave permission to "attack, conquer, and subjugate Saracens, pagans and other enemies of Christ wherever they may be found." This authorized the African slave trade in which 2 million Africans died crossing the ocean and 12 million entered slavery in the Americas.
• In 1478 Pope Sixtus IV issued the decree that inquisitors should seek out and find anyone who was not a Christian. Anyone accused of not believing was burned at the stake. Over the next hundred years, thousands would be burned at the stake and some 300,000 expelled.
• In the years following Columbus' arrival to the New World, the Spanish Conquistadors would kill millions of inhabitants. Many were burned at the stake.

To impose your Christianity, you would need to make consequences. What would you do if your neighbor did not convert? Would you make them pay a fine? Jail them? Kill them?

The primary goal of Christianity is to accept Christ's sacrifice. This is the Primary Rule in Christianity. Does Christ want us to force America to submit whatever the cost? That was the thinking for hundreds of years and millions suffered the price. We like to point at countries like North Korea, Myanmar, Iran, and Saudi Arabia for their strict religious laws, but we fail to recognize our own past. In many ways our Christian forebears were just as strident in their pursuit to make others become like them.

I don't want to live in a country where I have to spy on my neighbors or see them killed for not believing like I do. I don't want to see them jailed either. If I am not willing to coerce others into believing like I do and following my religion's primary rule, how can I expect them to abide by and follow my secondary rules? I can't.

You may believe that abortion is wrong because it kills thousands of unborn children each year, but that is a secondary issue. Your point of view is at odds with other Christians and cannot be confirmed or denied beyond a shadow of a doubt. Nor can your view on birth control, divorce, homosexuality, pre-marital sex, keeping the Sabbath, taking the Lord's name in vain, blood transfusions, or the other myriad of secondary issues we Christians argue about. Yes, you can point to your verses or popular opinion, but that doesn't make it a primary issue.

I look at theocracies of non-Christian countries and I think, how backwards can you get? Read sometime about life in the Caliphate of ISIS and you'll realize how closely their religious laws reflect medieval laws. I wouldn't want to live in a country where I couldn't practice my beliefs, but that's exactly what we propose when try to force our beliefs onto others. 

I know not many Christians agree with C.S. Lewis' views on divorce, but I think he fundamentally understood the impracticality of coercing others into our Christian worldview:

"Before leaving the question of divorce, I should like to distinguish two things which are very often confused. The conception of marriage is one: the other is the different question – how far Christians, if they are voters or Members of Parliament, ought to try to force their views of marriage on the rest of the community by embodying them in the divorce laws. A great many people seem to think that if you are a Christian yourself you should try to make divorce difficult for every one. I do not think that. At least I know I should be very angry if the Mahommedans tried to prevent the rest of us from drinking wine.

My own view is that the Churches should frankly recognise that the majority of the British people are not Christians and, therefore, cannot be expected to live Christian lives. There ought to be two distinct kinds of marriage: one governed by the State with rules enforced on all citizens, the other governed by the Church with rules enforced by her on her own members. The distinction ought to be quite sharp, so that a man knows which couples are married in a Christian sense and which are not." - C.S. Lewis, Mere Christianity, p. 99

As Christians, we are called to:

"Do to others as you would have them do to you." -Luke 6:31 (NIV)

"Love your enemies, do good to them, and lend to them without expecting to get anything back. Then your reward will be great, and you will be children of the Most High, because he is kind to the ungrateful and wicked." - Luke 6:35 (NIV)

"Love your neighbor as yourself. There is no commandment greater than these." - Mark 12:31 (NIV)

"Love does no harm to a neighbor. Therefore love is the fulfillment of the law." - Romans 13:10 (NIV)

"A friend loves at all times, and a brother is born for a time of adversity." - Proverbs 17:17 (NIV)

"Love" is found 333 times in the King James Bible. There are 76 verses about caring for widows, 32 verses about orphans, and 56 verses about caring for the poor. If you want my opinion on how to go about getting society to follow the primary rule, this is where I would start. Everything else is secondary.

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1 http://www.heretication.info/_pagans.html^↩
2 http://sourcebooks.fordham.edu/halsall/source/codex-theod1.asp^↩
3 https://www.britannica.com/biography/Justinian-I^↩
4 http://www.jewishencyclopedia.com/articles/9097-justinian^↩
5 https://books.google.com/books^↩
6 http://www.thefinertimes.com/Middle-Ages/christianity-in-the-middle-ages.html^↩

RE: Jim Garlow "If you're on the fence about your vote…"

On August 11, Dr. Jim Garlow, pastor at Skyline Church in San Diego published an article on why to vote for Trump over Clinton. One of my Facebook friends recently posted the article and I began to read it. I didn't have time to finish it, but I was curious to see what his reasons were, since I plan to vote for Hillary. Because of confirmation bias I know I will probably continue to vote for Hillary, but I owe it to myself to at least hear the man out. What are the good points? What are the bad? What are the counter arguments? With that in mind, here we go…

First of all, I really like that the photos used of Trump and Clinton are both decent. There is no outright attempt to sway the reader with a good photo of Trump and a photo of Clinton desaturated with her eyes half way closed from blinking. Even the headline is honest and straight forward. The article gives some background to author who openly admits that he is a conservative. Without reading further, I am assuming he will vote for Trump because he has been a Republican supporter since was eight. The odds he will change his voting pattern is slim. But at least he is working through the problem of how to pick a candidate when you don't agree either is a good choice for you.

Point 1: In his first paragraph he starts off by declaring the Democratic Party evil and the Republican Party good. If this is your view of the world, you're odds of voting for Hillary just went to zero. Regardless of your reasons, you would never vote for someone you consider evil. Why bother reading on? Because I'm still interested in the reasons.

He says that Democrats are socialists, which makes them communists with guns. He clearly doesn't like socialism or communism, but doesn't give a reason why. Many modern socialist countries actually do well including Denmark, Finland, Netherlands, Sweden, and Norway. They have some of the best educational and health care systems in the world. He just assumes everyone thinks those things are evil. Then he says that the Republican platform is the strongest ever biblically, which is fine. He then points out that you should vote for the candidate attached to the best party platform. In other words, if you're a Republican you should vote for Trump. Just because someone is affiliated with a group doesn't mean they will tow the line. Personally, I'd like to see more moderates in politics.

Point 2: He compares Trump and Hillary as both sinners, but claims that Trump is brash while Clinton is devious, lying, cunning, and deceptive. Stop for a moment and realize that he didn't specify Trump's sins and then lays out four of Clinton's, nearly all of which mean similar things. He says, as a pastor, he would rather deal with a "Trump-type" any day over a "Hillary-type" and then goes on to say that the chances of making progress with the "Trump-types" are many times greater than the "Hillary-type." The problem with this language is that we're not talking about counseling someone or changing them. Do you think Trump is going to change when he's elected? No and neither will Clinton, so what's the point of even making this argument?

Point 3: He makes the analogy that it is better to accept alternative treatment than stick to what's scientifically proven. First of all, I couldn't disagree more. He says that the alternative treatment extended his wife's life but doesn't say how he knows that. Couldn't her life have been extended by the standard treatment? Then he goes on to say that the alternative untested treatment is like Trump and the standard treatment that doesn't work is like Clinton. The problem with this analogy is that you can't compare what you don't know. He assumes the alternative treatment will be good, but you can't possibly know that until you've tried it. Until then, you have no idea how bad or good it will work out. You could end up like the cancer patients who went through immunotherapy and died soon after. If you don't like Clinton's policies and track record, fine. But I don't think you can make a case for it being worse than Trump's.

Point 4: You should vote for Trump because he isn't as scandalous as Hillary (and her husband). He doesn't make a comprehensive list comparing the two candidates. I think if he did, he would find Trump far more scandalous. That's the problem with confirmation bias—you more often see the good in something you already think is good and the bad in something you already think is bad. That's why no amount of fact-checking will ever convince most conservatives that Clinton is the best candidate or most liberals that Trump is the best candidate. Unless you acknowledge that this bias exists and then sit down and look at the facts you have no chance of changing your mind.

Point 5: Trump is surrounded by more good people than Clinton. This speaks for itself. If you think those people are good and that they will influence Trump, I can't argue that. It depends on how you define good people I guess. I'm not a fan of his circle so I guess I shouldn't vote for him.

Point 6: Trump is right on 75% of the issues and Clinton is wrong on 100% of the issues. He doesn't specify what the issues are. Maybe he only means the issues he cares about? In this case, he's right. You should always vote for people you agree with the issues on. The reason I'm voting for Clinton is because she and I agree on far more issues than Trump and I.

Point 7: He uses apocalyptic talk to argue that globalism and a borderless world are evil, because Judgment Day. Even if he's right, which I don't agree with, and this is a sign of the End Times, where does it say in the Bible it is our job to stop it? I thought people like him wanted Judgment Day to come sooner. Maybe I don't fully understand his perspective, but then again, I watch Star Trek where there are no borders and everyone works together for the betterment of mankind. We can't all be pessimists.

Point 8: Not voting is not an option. This is simply a false dichotomy. It isn't evil to not vote…unless not voting means your candidate won't win. He's already set his mind on Trump and he knows that it's Republicans, not Democrats, he needs to worry about sitting out the vote.

Point 9: Similar to Point 8: Don't vote for a third party candidate because Clinton will win.

Point 10: He says that Trump has moved Pro-Life, which so obviously not true. He was pro-choice until a few months ago. I think it's obvious to everyone except the religious right that his religious talk is only there to gather their votes. He restates the false claim that baby parts are trafficked. He commits the Hitlerist fallacy and compares Clinton to a Nazi. He then continues to stand on his soap box about how Clinton is a baby killer. He then says that a vote for Clinton is a vote for genocide. I disagree with everything he says on this point.

Point 11: He says that Trump wants to defend the nation and then compares that to how Clinton has defended the nation. First of all, I don't think you can compare what someone wants to what someone else has done. He might want to defend the nation and be a complete bumbling idiot at it. Then he repeats the propaganda that the Clinton foundation is beholden to foreign nations without acknowledging Trump's foreign ties. In my opinion I think Clinton would do much better than Trump at foreign policy. Trump has already insulted a myriad of foreign countries and dignitaries. The world is cringing at the fact that Trump is tied with Clinton in the polls.

Point 12: He starts speaking more paranoia about how America is at the end morally (even though people are healthier and happier now than ever in our past), economically (even though the stock market has never been stronger), militarily (he might have a point here), and spiritually (I'll speak to this). First of all, is the President responsible for the spiritual welfare of the nation? I don't think so, but let's say it is. Compare Clinton to Trump spiritually: Clinton is a practicing Methodist who knows her Bible verses and leads sermons. Trump does not attend regularly, but makes sure to attend on Easter and Christmas. The rebuttal to this is that Clinton is pro-choice and pro-gay, but while I think she believes the law should allow it, I'm not convinced she believes it is scriptural. Either way, what does that have to do with how spiritual someone is? Trump believes the same things. He's just better at telling the religious right what they want to hear. Either way, I think Clinton is better suited in most of these regards than Trump.

Point 13: I don't know where he's getting these figures from. He says that Clinton will outspend Trump in government spending and then goes on to complain about the national debt. I don't know how he can this. The last report I read had Trump far outspending Clinton.

Point 14: He says that Trump will expose and bring down the systemic evil of high dollar lobbyists. I don't know how he can say that since Trump is where he is because of lobbying.

Point 15: He says that Trump will stop the massive overreach of government while Hillary will extend it. This statement is so vague and accusatory I don't even know where to respond. This simply an assertion of his and while he might feel this is true, it doesn't make it true.

Point 16: I don't know where he gets his information but there are more than three kinds of freedom. Then he goes on to claim that Trump will save them while Hillary will decimate them. There is no example or data to back up this claim. It sounds like more rhetoric that he's bought into in order to make Clinton look like the bad guy.

Point 17: He then makes the same point as number 16, but says that it will happen through the Supreme Court. He doesn't say how or why.

Point 18: He says to vote for Jesus. Evidently, that means voting for Trump.

What can I say? I guess my confirmation bias got the best of me and I'm not convinced that Trump is the better candidate. I don't believe abortion and gay rights are the most important issues of the day for Christians. I don't believe globalization is demonic or will in some way indicate the end of the world is here. Although there have been lots of attacks on her character (most of which are unfounded), I believe her character is much closer to what I want in a candidate. While he's untested politically, I think it's fairly obvious from what he's said and done that he would make a terrible President, even compared to Clinton.