I think it needs to be said that the original Two Kingdoms approach had the INVISIBLE Church on one hand, and the Crown AND the VISIBLE Church on the other.
Europe of 450 years ago had a near complete integration of Church and State (so much so that many Bishops were simultaneously secular rulers of lands) and a modern USA-style separation of Church and State was unthinkable. Therefore the two kingdoms envisioned by the Reformers was the government AND the official visible Church as the one Kingdom–of this world–and the true eternal Church of the elect–God’s Kingdom of this world and the next–on the other hand.
Given this, a godly ruler was always looking for the council of leaders of the Church–and godly Church leaders were always eager to give it–not artificially dividing the world into religious and non-religious spheres.
Even to our US Founding Fathers the current official agnosticism and even hostility of the state–narrowing the constitutional protection to “freedom of worship” (a favorite term in this current administration)–of the free exercise of religion, would be unthinkable. Very clearly the first Ammendment religious freedom clauses only attempted avoiding one officially recognized Church; it was clearly NOT intended to push pastors out of the public square–as the ACLU and the Left in America does today.
Preachers can and should incorporate ETHICS (which includes political ethics) into their biblical teachings. EVERY decision we make is to one degree or another–an ethical decision–and God is concerned with all aspects of our lives, not just our religious side.
Restrictions by the government on what a minister of the Gospel can and cannot say, are in principle, unconstitutional–and even if it is unfashionable to the educated and legal elites in this country–should be fought.
One of the attorneys who posts on that site wrote this in response:
Posted by mikelmann on October 11, 2012 at 4:33 PM
Ralph, the free exercise clause is alive and well and has recently had the robust support of even the liberal judges. See http://presbyterianblues.wordpress.com/2012/01/11/a-time-to-clap-for-the-united-states-supreme-court/
But I’m mostly interested in this part:
Preachers can and should incorporate ETHICS (which includes political ethics) into their biblical teachings. EVERY decision we make is to one degree or another–an ethical decision–
Let’s start with a constitutional amendment for the good cause of your choice. A consideration of such an amendment will involve, in part, a judgment on what powers are alloted to a government. It will then involve whether that particular expression of power is best exercised by a constitutional change or statute. It will also involve whether the state or federal government should be exercising that power. Then there will be a matter of drafting. Is the particular statute or constitutional amendment drafted well? Is there something about its drafting that will backfire or inadvertently cause other problems? Then, politically, is the particular proposal worth all the arm twisting that will be necessary to get it done, or are there better ways to spend political capital?
There’s enough on a pastor’s plate without having to sort all this out, and there’s nothing about the pastor’s training that suggests any special expertise in sorting it out.
My response to him:
darrelltoddmaurina wrote October 11, 2012 at 6:14 PM
Okay, let's consider a real-life example — a public statewide vote on a constitutional amendment in Michigan, back during its “progressive” era, to outlaw Christian schooling and require all children to attend public school under truancy laws.
In that day, the push to promote the public school system came from secular liberals (Dewey, et al) and anti-Catholic sentiments. The support for private Christian day schooling came from Roman Catholic, Lutheran and about half of the Dutch Reformed churches. (In those days, the CRC was strongly supporting Christian schools and the RCA was often actively opposed to them.)
Court cases have made something like this unconstitutional today, but back in the 1920s and 1930s it was a very real question whether this would be allowed.
Do you believe that pastors of churches that support Christian schooling might have some theological expertise to bring to bear on how their church members should vote on a proposal to bar Christian schooling?