How involved should religion get into politics and how involved should politics get in religion?

How involved should religion get into politics and how involved should politics get involved in religion?

The recent visit of Pope Francis to the United States raised an interesting question. How involved should religion get into politics and how involved should politics get involved in religion?

One reason for the importance of this topic is that religions make claims on people’s allegiance. For example, Islam has traditionally held that all people should obey Allah. It is inevitable that religious commitments will sometimes overlap with politics. Sharia Law is another good example of this. As Ayatollah Khomeini said, “Islam is politics or it is nothing.”

This is hardly a new issue. In the wake of the Protestant Reformation, European societies wrestled with determining what roles the church and state should play in each other’s sphere.

Robert Bellah, a famous sociologist in the 1960’s, picked up an idea that originated in France (surprisingly) and debated for a weaker form of a full of integration of an established church and state. He called it “civil religion,” where a particular church or religion does not have an official status, but uses religious concepts in a public manner to shape laws and social constructs. It means the imbedded and understood religious values of a nation. These can be expressed through public rituals, symbols and ceremonies on sacred days. This can act as a cohesive force, a collective set of values that nurture social and cultural assimilation. An example of this principle being put into place is when Abraham Lincoln used Christian imagery (of every man being equal under the eyes of God) to justify an end of slavery and in doing so justified the morality behind the American Civil War.

There are few modern defences defending the integration of creed and politics. T S Eliot, believed in integrated of faith and politics. He believed that a democratic society rejecting the influence of an established church was a dangerous concept, because in doing so they would cut themselves off from the moral wisdom that comes with the ethical teachings in religious texts, such as the gospels. Because of this, he believed that secular societies would disintegrate and degenerate into chaotic tyranny. Of course he was a Christian! So far, that has not proven to be true, although the current moral decadence we sometimes view on crass TV shows such as the “Jeremy Kyle Show” might have proved that now the natural progression of the whole of a secular society is into moral decadence and tyranny. He argued that it is the government’s duty to provide its citizens with the necessary resources to live well and live a good, happy and above all, honourable life. One such resource is a sense of belonging to a common culture rooted in tradition. He believed in this sense of “belonging”, contrasting a sense of rootlessness and social fragmentation. Nonetheless, Robert Bellah provides a good intermediary in between secularism and total integration of church and state. It is in fact what we know today see in England (we are still TECHNICALLY tied to the Church of England, but culturally we are not)

However, Bellah’s argument, in an ever globalising world where borders become more blurred and more nationalities and religions are intertwining with each other, this argument could be perceived as a little outdated. Porous borders and more sophisticated transport infrastructure facilitate different ethnic groups and religious groups to immigrate and travel from country to country. We can see this in the current refuge crisis, and the upset sentiments of male white Americans who used to dominate the United States and the political process. They argue that should remain neutral among different religion because it is unfair towards the religious minority, especially in a democratic system. The actual word “democratic” stems from the Greek word “demos” which literally means “the common people.” And since the government is supposed to represent all the people, deliberately favouring any group of citizens in their pursuit of good as THEY understand it would be unfair (sneakily using T.S. Elliots logic against him ;-)).

The United States in fact is a country built on immigrants, beginning with first wave of colonialist European powers in the 1600’s, the Irish immigration in 1845, and later Italian immigration, heavily concentrated in areas like New York. The only ethnically “pure” citizens of the United States should be the Indians. But they were marginalised and thrown to the side quite a while back. So I do not think it is right to adapt the Bellah ideology to American society especially, and the theory it is becoming less and less adaptable to the globalised, modern age.

Another argument for a allowing a wide range of a religious groups came from John Locke, another famous thinker. John Locke was one of the founding philosophers of the theory of “Empiricism.” He was very much a reformist and published “A letter concerning toleration” in 1689. He was writing in a time amidst a fear that Catholicism would spread over Britain and be imposed upon the people unanimously. Remember a century earlier Henry VIII had orchestrated the Protestant Reformation! John Locke was writing in opposition to the philosopher Thomas Hobbes, who believed in defending Christian faiths and Christian denominations. John Locke believed every religion should be tolerated and allowed to thrive. That way, he said, it would prevent any single religion from becoming so powerful as to threaten the peace.

Central to this argument is a Protestant view of a religious body as a voluntary society composed only of people willingly joining it, a sharp contrast with medieval pre-reformation view of the church, that the church should have authority over anybody within a certain geographical domain. The pre-reformation e.g. a village/country.

It is important to understand the context in which John Locke is writing in. The Catholic Church, at that time, was a very immoral institution. And its power was based on three things: Indoctrination, fear and money. Catholicism was a long standing religion that had managed, over the centuries, to creep into every aspect of society. The church was the central area for schooling as well. This meant religion and education were intrinsically linked. This meant people were educated in religion, at were ignorant of any other viewpoint or perspective. This is essentially indoctrination from an early age. The Catholic Church had been indoctrinated into the people that they could only get to heaven via the church, that the church was an infallible entity.

This, in turn, gave the priest an enormous amount of power over the locals on behalf of the institution. The priest, in a way, was viewed as their “ticket” to heaven, since they were taught no different or knew no better. Hence, pleasing your priest was seen as pleasing God. The population was held at ransom.

People also had this profound fear (and I think we all do to a certain extent) of going to hell and disobeying God’s commands. The Catholic Church harnessed this to make money, hence their huge amount wealth by the end of the 15^th C. Often richer families could buy positions higher in the church in a belief that they would attain eternal salvation. For poorer families, you had to pay to get married, to get baptised, and to bury a loved one. You also had to pay tithes (10% of your income) to the church, and at the end of a church service the church collected money and you were expected to pay in order to please God. To get a loved one out of purgatory quicker you had to pay money, or ‘indulgences’ to the church, and you were lastly, if that wasn’t bad enough, forced to work on church land for free for a number of specified days.

You can now clearly see the worry that John Locke had. As a progressive thinker, he was worried by the return of these immoral practices. Still, Locke’s Letter makes an important step forward toward a more tolerant and pluralistic world. In contrast to Locke, another famous philosopher, Thomas Hobbes sees religion as divisive and as a source of instability. Therefore the government has the right to determine which opinions may be publicly espoused and circulated, a power necessary for maintaining civil peace. This view rings a bell today, with a huge political issues centring on influxes of immigrants, globalisation, and the seeming dilution of mono-cultural and mono-religious societies.  

However, another challenge for a secular government and society is should a religious minority’s commitments threaten or be threatened by wider interests on the part of the larger society, or are directly forbidden by law. For example Quakers believe in pacifism, yet many live in countries where conscription into the army are law. There was a large issue with this in world war two, when Quakers refused to fight on the front lines and often sent to jail. Many however did help in non-combat situations, such as in the hospitals and rehabilitation centres. Does the right to practice ones faith exempt one from the requirement to serve in the military? Should other citizens carry the potential burden of accepting ones religious commitments? Should religious belief override law?

A common example of conflicts concerning religious and politics is in France. In France, it is illegal to where a hijab or a turban, or any type of clothing worn due to the requirements of religion. The justification was given that such a measure was necessary to ensure all French citizens are united into a whole society, rather than be divided by religion. However, if liberty of conscience includes not a right to think what one chooses as well as expression of that belief, then it seems to me that people should be given free rein to wear whatever one wants.

Religious citizens could therefore feel a conflict of identity between her religion x, and her country and citizenship y. A great example of this can be derived from Sophocles’ play, Antigone. In Antigone, Antigone buries her brother Polynices in contrary to Creon, the king of Thebes’s, order, and because she believes it is an offence against the Gods to leave a man unburied. Here her religious duties supersede her civic duties. For many religious citizens, political authority is less important than religion, since religion is essentially divine authority, and so they priorities religious duties over civic duties.

Clearly this issue will never fully be solved, as a religious person, by definition, must have total faith in their religion to the extent in which it supersedes any other institutional regulation or law. Therefore there will be some aspects of religious practice which directly clashes with the law of the land, leading the conflict and some tension.

Although secularism is proceeding rapidly in many of the world’s societies, religion continues to be an important political phenomenon throughout the world, for multiple reasons. Even the most secularized countries (Sweden is typically cited as a prime example) include substantial numbers of people who still identify themselves as religious. Moreover, many of these societies are currently experiencing immigration from groups who are more religious than native-born populations. The Roman Catholic Church has been kept buoyant through tough times by Polish immigrants, who have revitalised the church. These people are often given substantial democratic rights, sometimes including formal citizenship. And the confrontation between radical Islam and the West shows few signs of dwindling anytime soon. Consequently, the problems discussed above will likely continue to be important ones in the future.