by Ivan Gruikin and Tsveta Ivanova
(reprinted from GeorgeBalakov.net)

This is the BEST documentary on the planned takeover of America from within that I have ever seen.  This is a MUST SEE for every American who values family, faith, liberty and freedom.  It reveals the structured, long-term plans of the radical socialists over the past several decades and see just how close we are to the point of no return.

I implore you – please take the time to watch this with your family THIS WEEK (it’s only online for free for a limited time).  Share it with as many people as you can.  Let’s come together and take our nation back before it’s too late.

AGENDA: Grinding America Down (Full Movie) FREE to watch for a limited time. from Copybook Heading Productions LLC on Vimeo.

Excellent analysis by Dutch Sheets

It has been a week since the presidential elections in America Many have asked me for a response. I felt it wise to wait a few days in order to think, process and prayerfully consider my opinions. And though it is probably impossible to filter out all of my own thoughts, theologies and paradigms in order to hear only the Lord’s. I have made a great effort to do so.

The waiting has also allowed me to read and process numerous responses from other spiritual leaders, which has been beneficial. As you can imagine, there are several views among these leaders as to why Barack Obama won the election. I have decided to use theirs to frame mine. This is a longer than average response, but I believe many people would prefer clear, thoughtful responses at this crucial time:

1} Some are saying this election is simply a sign of the end-times, that we are marching toward Armageddon, and nothing can be done to stop it. In their thinking, it has all been pre-planned by God.

Without arguing eschatology, I’ll simply state this isn’t my view, and that my theology allows considerably more time to accomplish much before the Lord returns.

2) Another position I’ve heard often is that God is sovereign, so we shouldn’t worry about the results. These individuals’ definition of God’s sovereignty means that He is in control of everything, therefore they contend that nothing happens on earth which He doesn’t cause or directly allow. To them, the results of this election must be Gods will and His purposes will definitely be accomplished. Their bottom line response then, is, “Don’t worry about it. In fact rejoice.”

Those who espouse this doctrine can often be heard making statements along the lines of. “Put your faith in God. not a leader or political party Regardless of who wins – He is still on the throne and knows what He is doing. Trust Him.” This thinking comforts many, which is usually the context of the statements. Unfortunately, this theology also removes from us any responsibility for the outcome.

I struggle with this explanation, just as I do Ihe first one. I don’t believe the fact that God is sovereign equates Him to being responsible for everything that occurs on earth I contend that most, if not all. of what occurs on earth is the result of choices we humans make. Common sense alone dictates that many things will take place on earth today that are not God’s will, nor did he “allow” them for some unknown reason (i.e.. murder, rape, immorality, idolatry, etc.).

The solace we take from blaming bad things on God’s sovereignty is not only bad theology: it often breeds irresponsibility. I can accept any encouragement to keep my faith in God, rather than a person or political party and I do, in fact, make every attempt to do this. This doesn’t change the fact, however, that it does matter greatly who is the President or leader of a nation In fact, scripture makes very clear that entire nations were sometimes judged with great devastation (and others were blessed!) because of the actions of their leader!

3) The third explanation I’ve heard is that many of us simply have a wrong perspective about America and the election, a paradigm rooted in pride, nationalism and a desire for American exceptionalism. They contend that God is simply restructuring the nations, moving the chess pieces in order to accomplish His purposes, and America’s economic, spiritual and moral demise is all a part of this.

They further imply that those of us who endeavor to make a spiritual demand on what we perceive as America’s covenantal roots and promises – asking God to reconnect us to them – are guilty of looking back, not forward. Our appeals for the Lord to pour out His Spirit today, just as He has in our history, are chided as living In the past, not the future. Those of us who cry out for, prophesy concerning and believe that a Third Great Awakening is near are mocked as yearning for the past.

Let me say very clearly, I do believe an awakening has already begun, an outpouring of the Holy Spirit that will impact the world more than any in history. I believe this will include America, as well, impacting it on the scale of our First and Second Great Awakenings. I also believe America can be reformed, restoring us to our God-ordained purpose, though this will take years to accomplish. I believe these two goals – awakening and reformation – define my calling.

In light of the above criticisms, however, I have taken an honest and deep look into my heart and mind to see if my passion for an awakening in America is rooted in pride or nationalism. Is it, as the article stated, to keep America number one in wealth and power? I can honestly say that I never remember having such a thought. I weep, not over the potential loss of wealth, power or status, but over souls and the possible forfeiture of God’s purposes. I weep over 55 million aborted destinies, and the hideous potential of another 50 million. And I can truly say the intercessors and leaders I know well have the same motivations. I’ve never heard even one of them nostalgically lament the loss of America’s status They are, in fact some of the most unselfish people I know.

My response to those who would have us simply “move on” and “accept” the murder of babies and the loss of a generation to Hell – which is exactly what will happen if we don’t receive a Third Great Awakening – is short and decisive never!

4) The fourth explanation offered is that America is being judged, and that Barack Obama and his policies are part of the judgment. The reasons given for the judgment are the inevitable result of God’s laws of sowing and reaping, and His determination to ‘wake us up’ as a nation. Many of these individuals believe the results were inevitable – no amount of hard work or prayer could have turned the tide I certainly believe America is and will continue to reap judgment. And I believe the fruit from the reelection of Barack Obama will be our most severe judgment to date. Let us not forget that the political party Americans just voted back into power boldly favors abortion, homosexuality, homosexual marriage, and that they voted God and the support of Israel out of their platform. And. I might add, boo-ed when God was put back in the platform after the potential fallout was realized. God is not mocked, however, and will have the last word.

Our economy will surfer greatly. The financial devastation and quality-of-care deterioration associated with socialized medicine will be staggering: more liberal, pro-abortion. Constitution disregarding. anti-God Supreme Court justices will be appointed (meaning more babies will die. marriage will be dishonored and immorality will be defended); Islam will be emboldened; our military will be weakened; and devastations from natural disasters will continue and perhaps increase. This is the short list.

The fact that Obama is a judgment, his policies will increase judgments, and this will be used by God to turn America Is clear to me What is not so dear is whether or not the outcome was controlled by God as a part of His judgment, or if He was giving us another choice and we rejected it I cannot agree that because America had gone too far. God mandated the outcome. I believe He was stilt offering America an opportunity for grace. We chose judgment not God.

There were too many strategies, dreams and assignments given by the Holy Spirit for me to believe God was not offering us a different outcome. But we must always remember these things are just that – offers – not guarantees. God makes these offers, and then He watches and measures our response. This brings me to the final explanation I’ve heard.

5) The fifth and final explanation is there simply wasn’t enough desperation, prayer, repentance and humility on the part of the church in America- Others disagree, contending that millions prayed concerning this election, and there was enough. One leader boldly proclaimed he was positive there had been enough effort, therefore God caused Obama to be elected for other reasons.

Of course, only God really knows for sure if this is true; the rest of us are merely offering educated opinions. Personally, I’m not so certain there was enough effort by the church. I don’t believe God was looking for quick, easy, one or two sentence prayers offered up during our quiet times or normal church services. I’m afraid most believers in the United States are still looking for convenient, inexpensive answers to our plight. There are none. God was looking for sacrifice, passion and desperation.

To illustrate my point, how many congregations in America do you think turned even one of their services into prayer meetings? I can guarantee you not one in ten thousand did so. How many of them conducted even one church-wide prayer meeting? I would be surprised if the total lime most churches gave to public prayer for the elections over the month leading up to it equaled even fifteen minutes. How many pastors prayed a total of an hour concerning the election? I’m confident I have international students who prayed more for this election than the average American pastor I would exhort those who are “certain” there was “enough prayer” to be somewhat cautious.

There are times when God. in His perfect balance of mercy and justice, can save through the prayers of a small remnant. However, I believe He is asking more from us at this time in our history. Until the desperation and commitment of more believers is commensurate with our condition, I don’t believe He can heal us. Obviously, in order for this to happen, we will have to change the watered down, make-it-quick-and-easy version of American Christianity we created to grow our churches.

Finally. I want to address the question. “Were the efforts and prayers of those who did offer them simply wasted?” The answer is a resounding NO!

I woke up Wednesday, the morning after the elections, thinking of Wilberforce. the great English statesman who spearheaded the effort to remove slavery from the British Empire. It took him 40 years, but he and his co-laborers won the battle. They did so incrementally God gave the same one-word encouragement – “Wilberforce” – to two other friends of mine on the same morning. Just as He did for Wilberforce and his fellow reformers. God is storing up every prayer we prayed, and every act of obedience we performed. Nothing was wasted.

It would also be appropriate to think that our prayers and worship accomplished nothing at the present time and will only be used later. The Holy Spirit spoke to another friend of mine the morning after the election saying, “Your prayers and worship did prevail… though not in the way you wanted. Because of them, however. I will now deal with this man who has mocked Me and My laws.”

Two more friends of mine had dreams in which Barack Obama was named Belshazzar {see Daniel chapter 5). This was the ruler in Babylon who saw a hand writing on the wall of his palace – as lie and his friends were mocking God. The ominous message written by the hand of God was, “You have been weighed on the scales and found deficient.” The writing went on to say Belshazzar’s reign would end.

I don’t know what form the judgment of the Lord will take, but I am quite confident that God has put up with all of the mocking He intends to from Barack Obama. and that Daniel 5 is now his passage. I say this without malice or ill will, but nonetheless, confidently.

I encourage those of you who prayed and worshiped over this election – your prayers were not in vain. Just as surely as slavery became illegal in Great Britain – the day Wilberforce died! – we will prevail in our efforts to see America awakened. “Let us not lose heart in doing good, for in due time we shall reap if we do not grow weary,” (Galatians 6:9).

This video is an excellent overview of the history and development of the Rapture theology in America and the effect it has had on our culture.  Highly recommended viewing.  Please leave your (respectful) comments below.

Running time: 24 minutes

Dennis Peacocke is one of my favorite teachers and authors.  This article is reprinted in it’s entirety from his monthly newsletter, The Bottom Line”.  I encourage you to connect with Dennis and avail yourself of all that he has to offer through his website – GoStrategic.org 

“But seek first his kingdom and his righteousness and all these things will be given to you as well” – Matthew 6:33

Here in the United States, in New York City, we have a home-based railroad terminal called Grand Central Station. All railroad tracks in the greater New York City area and beyond lead in and out of this nexus. Grand Central Station is, so to speak, the common point of departure for all railroad traffic.

So it is in God. The message of the King and his Kingdom is scripturally designed by God to be the point of departure for all other doctrine. Every track of doctrine, beginning with the message of salvation in Christ, is to go out from and stay integrally connected with the central point of the King and His Kingdom. Theological error or imbalance can then be easily described as either turning any subordinate doctrine into a place of its own “Grand Central Station,” or disconnecting its relationship back to the Kingdom’s context and preeminent position.

By this standard, much of our current and past theological foci are misplaced, disconnected, or in direct competition as “false Grand Central Stations “being claimed for adherents.

I do not praise Satan, but rather recognize his malevolent genius for the ways he has worked to divide and conquer the Church. He has “helped” so many valid doctrines either disconnect from Christ’s place for them, or claim a priority only belonging to the King and his Kingdom. Virtually every denomination has some core focus or doctrine that has misplaced the centrality of the Kingdom and defined itself as that group’s Grand Central Station. I dare say, no other theological error in the history of the Church has caused more damage since it’s insidious nature has allowed its existence, largely unidentified, to remain so prevalent inside the Church for so long.

Today, all over the world, the message of Jesus as a current King pressing a current Kingdom upon the earth through his people and through his Holy Spirit, is slowly moving to rectify Satan’s ingenious plan! Praise his glorious name, Christ is on record as saying that His return is dependent upon this Gospel of the Kingdom being preached (and engaged), and then the end will come (Matt. 24:14). The sheer spiritual audacity of any believer or group attempting to say otherwise, or attempting to place a subordinate doctrine in the Kingdom’s place is… I have no words.

Brothers and Sisters, we need to repent for any complicity in this ungodly misshaping of Scripture in an attempt to one-up Jesus’ prayer for “Thy Kingdom come” at some later date than it’s gradually emergence throughout history, its manifestation now, and its full revelation when he returns. Where is the message of the King and his Kingdom in your theology? Does it have any misplaced doctrines parading as its own Grand Central Station with the message of the Kingdom functioning on a parallel or even subordinate level? The New Testament message Jesus brought was to preach and demonstrate the Kingdom, and that is the bottom line.

By Joseph Mattera

In this article, Joe identifies the unfolding secularism that is overtaking our cities and calls for concerted action by believers to take a stand against this onslaught.  I could not agree more with Joe’s conclusions.  Let’s take a stand together!

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As a Christ-follower who has lived in New York City all his life, I have witnessed the increased secularization of our great city, especially within the past year. For example, not only was same-sex marriage made legal in our state, but there were also laws passed that put undue regulations on pregnancy crisis centers, laws making it necessary for churches to renew and prove their tax-exempt status annually (or face the consequence of having their tax-exempt status revoked), a policy enacted by the mayor that banned nativity scenes and Christmas trees from the Staten Island Ferry terminal, a decision by the mayor to ban clergy from participating in the ceremonies marking the 10th anniversary of September 11, 2001, and most recently, the mayor and city officials have given our churches notice that they can no longer rent publically funded community facilities and public schools for Sunday worship. (Note: This past week, the New York City Housing Authority reversed course because of the pressure put on them by our churches.)

I’m sure there are even more examples of secularization that I am not remembering at this time. The point is, there is an underlying ideology that we must understand so people of faith can proactively resist these trends instead of always being on the defensive and reacting to the anti-faith bias of many cultural elites.

It is not as though Christians are in the minority in New York City. There are more than one-and-a-half million Evangelicals in our city, not including mainstream Protestants, Roman Catholics and Eastern Orthodox believers, which may bring the number up way past half of the eight million residents of our city!  Thus, it is a minority of people in power who want to rid the city of any religious influence in the public sphere.

The trend towards secularization first started after the Protestant Reformation in Europe in the 17th century, when the so-called Enlightenment first separated faith from reason. This began with Thomas Aquinas in the 13th century, who first taught that discovering truth is possible outside of divine revelation. Hundreds of years later, this resulted in elevating human reason over faith as a reaction to the abuses of the Roman Catholic Church and also to the horrible religious wars between Catholics and Protestants, e.g. the Thirty Years War in the 17th century which devastated Germany more than the two world wars!

This trend towards elevating humanity and human reason over and against God and all gods is continuing to be unpacked today in society. It is primarily disseminating its false gospel in universities that Christian parents pay thousands of dollars per year to fund! (Many saints don’t tithe to God yet they will pay +$30,000 annually to fund an education that robs their posterity of their faith!)

The following are some of the traits of the secular city:

The Establishment Clause of the First Amendment is twisted to mean the exclusion of church from state, or the exclusion of God from state

The First Amendment of the U.S. Constitution, which has to do with Congress not establishing a religion for the nation or any of the states, has been said to teach the separation of church and state. This is not true. This term really came from a private letter Thomas Jefferson sent to Danbury Baptists in 1802. Jefferson was not a writer or signer on the U.S. Constitution. (He was in Europe during the Constitutional Convention of 1787.)

The secularists then broaden the meaning of the Establishment Clause to justify using the judicial system to disallow any exhibition of religion and faith in public buildings.

The most sacred values are human autonomy and human rights

Christ-followers agree with having respect for all human beings, irrespective of their sexual, cultural and religious orientation. But we believe, like the original Founding Fathers of this nation, that a democracy cannot work without morality and religion, and that the only God-given right we have for human freedom is the ability to practice virtue.

Secularists believe human rights include a right to be independent from both God and man, that we are free to live any way we want, even if it is destructive to the overall health of society.

But if everyone in our city observed the Ten Commandments we would be blessed and the quality of life would go through the roof!

Sex has been successfully separated from marriage, procreation and family

When the sexual revolution hit the United States in the 1960’s it sowed the seeds of family and societal destruction. An ideology of sex for pleasure prevailed over the previous model, in which sex was primarily for procreation within the bounds of a man and woman committed to each other in holy matrimony.

Separating sex from marriage has resulted in millions of fatherless children, 50 million aborted babies, an outbreak of AIDS, hundreds of STDs, more fragmented families, and millions of fatherless men who are now populating our prisons!

Alternate forms of family and marriage now replace the nuclear family

Every vesture of the Judeo-Christian value system starts with God and marriage. Before there was a church or human government there was a man and a woman committed together in marriage (Genesis 2:29-22).

If a city is going to be secular then its main goal would be to legalize unbiblical forms of marriage so the nuclear family structure would no longer be the norm but only one of many family structures. This in turn continues to disempower families and gives more power to the state, which wants to be savior and god for every individual.

Strong biblical family structures depend less on big government entitlements. Thus same-sex marriage really has nothing to do with homosexuality but everything to do with the ideology of the secular city.

Religion has been relegated to the lower realm of subjective feelings as distinct from the higher, more important realm of scientific fact

The secular city enthusiasts don’t want to rid the world of religion. They believe, like Marx, that religion is the opium of the people: it calms us down, gives us some morals, and makes us better citizens.

They don’t want to rid the world of religion; they want to relegate religion to the realm of the mystical, subjective and impractical realm, which has no influence upon the two steering wheels of society: politics and economics. With this done, religion would never be taken seriously regarding public policy, which would threaten their view of the First Amendment’s Establishment Clause.

The state replaces the family as the main provider, educator and moral advisor of children and all citizens

A secular city takes the place of mothers and fathers by giving education, moral values and an overall worldview to its citizens. This is why the secular state discourages the practice of home schooling, and in some cases even charter schools: because they are not totally under the control of the city and state.

The idea behind the welfare system is to make more people dependent upon the secular city so that individuals can survive without honoring their parents—and living independent lives—knowing that even if they are not in good graces with their biological families the city will support them anyway!

The secular city wants to control education, morality and the trajectory of all its citizens. It disempowers individual achievement and glorifies the corporate accomplishments of the city citizens.

A religious ecumenism with primary allegiance to obeying the state is set up as the new recognized state religion

Mayors of secular cities don’t want to do away with religion. What they despise is absolutism in religious groups. They want every religion to be equal so there is a kind of smorgasbord faith in which every road leads to god and to heaven. The claims of Christ being the only way to God are anathema to the state! If the ground is level and every religion is relativized then the city knows that people will not have an ultimate commitment to any god but the state!

Whether we like it or not, this is going to become the picture of every city in the United States unless the church stands up, becomes politically active, and seeks the face of God for revival, renewal and restoration of our call to disciple the nations.

This article was printed in it’s entirety.  You can read the original article on Joe’s website here.

By Joseph Mattera

In this article, Joseph identifies the striking differences in the mindsets that exist between a biblically correct New Testament “Ecclesia” Church and the typical congregation we find in America today.

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As we examine the New Testament, we see that Jesus called for the formation of the ekklesia in Matthew 16:18. In Greek culture an ekklesia was the ruling body that governed the polis or city state. Thus Jesus didn’t create a new word but borrowed from a common political word to describe His goal for those who would be His disciples: that they would represent His kingdom will on earth with binding and loosing powers that would govern the heavenly principalities (Ephesians 3:8-10, 6:10-18) and thus transform earthly communities where each ekklesia was established. This is a great difference in function from the typical congregational idea of simply assembling together as found in Hebrews 10:25.

The idea of conversion was not merely meant to fill seats for church growth on Sundays but to nurture disciples who would turn the world order upside down (Acts 17:6). Since the late 19th century the idea of church as a ruling ekklesia has largely been lost and replaced with rescuing sinners from this world and living secluded pietistic lives to make it to heaven. We went from changing the world to resisting the world, from engaging the world to protecting ourselves from the world.

This is totally contrary to the original Greek meaning of the word ekklesia, which means being called to engage the world and govern it. Now, pastors are happy to have a lot of people show up on Sundays, whether they affect the culture or not. Thus, church attendance in this nation is at an all-time high but cultural effectiveness is at an all-time low!

If the church is going to recapture its cultural commission of discipling nations and having global influence, as found in Genesis 1:28 and Matthew 28:19, it has to learn the difference between building an ekklesia and a mere congregation that assembles together.

This also explains why God has had to raise up some parachurch ministries that function more like “special forces” with a call to reach cities. It may not be a pure New Testament model, but until local churches stop being inwardly focused and effectively reach their cities, God will continue to call special forces out of its ranks.

This also explains why sometimes a smaller-sized church can have more cultural influence than a megachurch that compromises the gospel. Many megachurches are not ekklesias but are merely gathering places that have very limited influence in the heavenly and earthly realms.

Furthermore, this also explains why some churches experience more strategic-level spiritual warfare and others don’t; mere congregations have lower-level spiritual warfare than those that function as the ekklesias of communities.

The following are some of the contrasts between the two concepts:

• The ekklesia challenges the status quo; the congregation assembles to find peace in the midst of the cultural environment.
• The ekklesia demands a commitment that involves the vocational calling of all its members to represent the kingdom in all of life; the congregation demands a commitment that involves Sunday ministry and church programs.
• The ekklesia trains people for all of life; the congregation trains people for church life.
• The ekklesia effects change in the surrounding community; the congregation only affects change in individual souls.
• The ekklesia is at war against demonic entities in the heavenly spheres; the congregation is at war to have church growth and bring deliverance to some individual members.
• The ekklesia sends out people to serve their communities; the congregation calls for their communities to attend their Sunday worship experiences.
• The ekklesia is only satisfied with bringing the kingdom on earth; the congregation is satisfied if their members have joy in their hearts.
• The ekklesia expands kingdom influence by converting people to be Christ-following disciples; the congregation appeals to the felt needs of people so they will continually depend on a 90 minute Sunday worship experience to feel good about themselves.
• The ekklesia is outwardly focused on stewarding the earth; the congregation is focused on making it to heaven.
• The ekklesia engages in Spirit-empowered humanitarianism; the congregation on Spirit-empowered pietism.
• Those in an ekklesia know they have been sanctified to serve others; those in a congregation believe they are saved for the sake of sanctification.
• The ekklesia embraces God’s sovereign human design for the saints since their physical birth (Ephesians 1:4); the congregation only honors what God has done in saints spiritually from the time they were “born again.”
• The ekklesia preaches Jesus rose from the dead to “fill all things” (Ephesians 4:10); the congregation preaches Jesus rose from the dead merely to save individuals from hell.
• The ekklesia believes in a divine cosmic plan that includes this present earth; the congregation believes in a (postponed) cosmic plan that (largely) excludes this present earth.
• The ekklesia disciples whole nations (Matthew 28:19); the congregation disciples individual ethnic people groups.
• The ekklesia has a vision for the whole community; the assembly for their whole congregation.
• The ekklesia aspires to influence each of the seven cultural mountains of society; the congregation aspires to function only in the mountain of “religion.”

This article is reprinted in full from Joseph Mattera’s website.  Consider becoming a premium member if you enjoy Joe’s insights.

By Joseph Mattera

Again, another excellent article, reprinted in full from Joseph Mattera’s website.  Here, Joe offers some very relevant commentary on why we must learn to be governmental in the church if we are going to bring transformation to our culture.  There is a reason for the moral decline in our nation, and this identifies the strategy to turn things around.  Keep up the good work, Joe!

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There is a seismic shift taking place today in the marketplace and the church. We need to understand how to respond if we are going to bring systemic transformation. This article deals with how the church should apply the gospel in response to cultural shifts.

First of all, it is a mistake to believe that the culture will shift because of a church revival or a societal awakening. Often, we as believers think the key to societal transformation is to convert masses of people. But the truth is that everyone is led by the decisions of the approximately 3-5% of people who make up the cultural elite in a society. Thus the only way to affect cultural change is to convert the elite who formulate culture in every sphere of society.

Second, it is a mistake to think that political victories will bring transformation. For example, abortion was legalized in 1973 yet the fight still rages on; same-sex marriage has been legalized in several states in the Northeast but the battle will never stop; homosexuality has been normalized by art, media and entertainment yet the rank and file of America still reject it.

The truth is that politics is only one expression of societal power. We need to influence the other mind-molding sectors of society if we are going to dictate the direction of culture. For example, we need to influence the Ivy League universities—especially Harvard, Yale, and Princeton—to change public policy, education, science, views on economics, etc. We need to influence major news outlets like the New York Times, CNN, MTV, etc. and not write only for Christian newspapers and appear only on Christian television stations like TBN.

Hence, we need to train the ekklesia to take the lead, not only in church but by actually being professors, board members and chief executives of leading elite entities in art, music, entertainment, education, media and public policy (for example, the Hoover Institute and the Manhattan Institute).

Having famous athletes and entertainers getting saved and giving testimonies is not nearly enough. We need revivals and multigenerational strategies to place our leading thinkers and practitioners in the highest levels of highbrow culture—like God did with Daniel and the three Hebrew youths in Babylon—if we are going to see societal change (read Daniel chapter 1).

Third, we need to nurture and/or convert those who are part of the emerging “creative class” who comprise between 12-30% of the population but have by far the most wealth producers and will drive the economy for generations to come (read Richard Florida’s book The Rise of the Creative Class). Those in the creative class used to be considered mavericks and non-conformists but are now part of the mainstream and part of a movement that has radically shifted the future of business and culture! Some of the characteristics of this new creative class-driven economy are:

• Businesses are moving towards creative urban centers such as New York City and San Francisco. Thus geography is essential because it is moving from corporate driven to people driven; companies are moving to where the most creative people live, not just where there are tax incentives and highways.

• Typical hierarchical structures are fast becoming a thing of the past. New companies accommodate creative people who like to be self-managed, set their own hours, and are free to think, create, and dress informally. Autonomy, diversity and self-identity are valued more than conformity, conservatism, and group think. These people like to play at work and work at play; the lines between work and leisure are becoming fuzzier.

• Top-down autocratic leadership, which expects people to just follow orders and not think on their own, is no longer effective. Companies are now encouraging creative people to join their ranks who are semi-autonomous and self-managed with leverage to set their own hours.

• A person being loyal to one community and one company for the rest of his or her life is a thing of the past. People are now moving from company to company every several years based on new opportunities to accommodate their interests, increased skills, need to meet new friends, creativity, and desire for change and advancement. (Because of the information age we are in, there are now also virtual communities with much information changing and being exchanged every day. This is making it harder to have cohesive communities and set societal norms which results in fragmentation and postmodernism.)

• Diversity is in; conservative values are respected but not the norm. Only 23% of the families in the United States are nuclear families. Alternate family structures are now becoming the norm.

How should the church respond?

• The church should build authentic communities to model the city of God before we attempt to transform the city of man. We have to honor unity, family, and kingdom unity with churches in our regions before we can transform the pagan systems and cultures around us.

• World-changers need to experience creativity, leadership, covenant, unity, purpose and kingdom power in the church community (ekklesia) so they can be adequately discipled to recreate these things in the secular arenas to which they are called.

• We need to start investing a good portion of our monies towards educating and cultivating the most creative people in our churches and place them in every leadership sphere of society starting with the Ivy League schools.

• We have to understand that prayer, fasting and revival among masses of people will not shift the culture, similar to how the 1857 Prayer Revival, the Azusa Street Revival in 1906, and the numerous Voice of Healing, Toronto Blessing and Pensacola revivals have not shifted culture. Only when revivals affect cultural thinkers who prove influential like Marx, Lenin, Freud, Darwin, and Gates will culture shift.  (This is not to say that prayer, fasting and revival are not important. Of course, reaching and renewing masses of people and Christians is important. In this article we are discussing how to truly experience societal transformation.)

Even as we examine the Scriptures we see that God has used people that were already in high places of authority and/or culture before a nation was transformed. (I will deal with this more in a forthcoming article.) As we do a quick review, we find that Moses already was a prince in Egypt before he was called to confront Egypt and deliver the people of God out of slavery; Daniel was serving as a top political advisor to the King of Babylon (Nebuchadnezzar) and later as a prime minister in Persia which positioned him to speak truth to power and transform culture; Nehemiah was the cup bearer of the King of Persia which enabled him to receive the favor necessary to rebuild the walls of Jerusalem; Samuel was the first in a line of great Jewish prophets who also served as the political judge of the nation; David his protégé may have been a great psalmist but he also became a king. Finally, all the great prophets (Isaiah, Jeremiah, Elijah, Elisha, Micaiah, Ahijah, Amos, etc.) did not just prophesy to small crowds of people in the temple or synagogue; they had access to political and cultural elites, even to the highest political office of the land.

Even church history reiterates this. For example, it took the conversion of Roman Emperor Constantine to legalize Christianity, placing it in a position to transform the whole empire. St. Augustine was first the professor of rhetoric for the imperial court, the most visible academic position in the Latin world, before converting and becoming the Bishop of Hippo, which platformed him to become the greatest theologian and thinker of his age. In 800 AD it was Christian Emperor Charlemagne who laid the groundwork for the first cathedral universities, which were the forerunners for all modern universities. Both primary leaders of the Protestant Reformation, Martin Luther and John Calvin, received educations that included vast knowledge of the classics, not only the Bible. (Calvin at one point actually considered becoming a lawyer.) The two leaders of the First Great Awakening (which saved England from the destruction that France suffered later in their revolution, and was also the impetus for the American Revolution), John Wesley and George Whitefield, not only knew the Scriptures but graduated from Oxford. Thus they were already positioned to have the respect of the top decision makers of society.  Furthermore, Whitefield’s American counterpart Jonathan Edwards was a graduate of Princeton and later became the president of Princeton. The abolition of slavery in the British Empire was affected by the Clapham Sect which included William Wilberforce, who was a parliamentarian and a close friend of William Pitt the Prime Minister of England and many other cultural and political leaders. The Second Great Awakening in the United States was led by Charles Finney, a capable lawyer whose preaching was able to relate to many lawyers, judges and top decision makers in culture. He affected the course of our nation which led to the abolition of slavery, the implementation of child labor laws, women’s suffrage and many other things.

As we have already stated, the Azusa Street Revival and other 20th century revivals did not have significant cultural impact because they primarily converted masses of people without touching the cultural elite and top decision makers of society.

• We must understand the delicate balance between infiltrating and engaging the cultural elites and highbrows of society without losing our souls and becoming elites in heart and purpose. The “Be Attitudes” of Matthew 5-7 teach us how to interface with others in our communities.

• The church needs to learn how to avoid the extremes of the Christian Right, Christian Left, and the pietists who avoid cultural engagement altogether.

The Christian Right thinks the answer is only political. This approach clothes the gospel of Christ with a particular political party and pits us against people in the world who we are trying to save. This results in us trying to exert power and control people through legal means and changing laws. Although I believe the laws of a state should be based on the Ten Commandments, and that the law is a school master that brings conviction of sin (and is an emblem of what a particular society values), that in and of itself the law is a very weak line of defense because of the vicissitudes of democratic elections.

This approach also smacks of Constantinianism. Although Christianity became the favorite religion of the Roman Empire in the 4th century, this resulted in weakening the church from within because unconverted pagans joined the Christian community without abandoning their lifestyles and core beliefs.

The Christian Left only accommodates the gospel to the prevailing culture which results in losing the biblical distinctions of salt and light. A church that recognizes same-sex marriage and values the environment more than the Ten Commandments has already lost its soul and reason for existing as a Christian community.

The pietists or Anabaptists take the approach that the church should only build alternative sub-cultures that don’t engage or affirm the prevailing culture.

The kingdom alternative is to take the approach of the Celtic Church in the 6th to 8th centuries. They incorporated the Anabaptist strategy of building an alternative community that was a model for the pagan communities they lived among. However they also recognized God’s favor upon His created order (God blessed His creation and called it good) which many theologians refer to as common grace. Thus their communities of faith embraced the non-believing communities, loved them, and won them to Christ by demonstrating the gospel in everyday life.

The church is called to build what James Davison Hunter, in his book To Change the World, describes as communities of faith that both affirm the good in their surrounding societal structures (hospitals, art, police, transportation, commerce, music, science, education, etc.) while also demonstrating the antithesis against that which is sinful and corrupt, not necessarily only in word but how we live our lives as Christ followers. Davidson also calls this approach having a “faithful presence” and bases it on what God prophesied to the Jewish exiles in Babylon and Persia in Jeremiah 29:4-7. In that passage God told the exiles to build houses, build families, settle down and live normal lives, seek the welfare of the city they lived in, and pray to the Lord for those around them, because as the city was blessed they would be blessed.

• The church must also maintain a balance between honoring the traditions of the church and relating to contemporary culture. We are also called to model the power and blessing of the traditional nuclear family and marriage if we are going to be the antithesis to the fragmentation and curse of the alternate family structures of the present pagan world system.

In summary: If we are going to transform culture we need to engage and shift the influencers toward biblical values at the highest levels in every major sphere of society. We cannot only reach masses of people and change political elections. If we don’t reach the 3-5% who are the decision makers, then we will never reach our goals of societal transformation.

As we think about the Scripture in Jeremiah 29:4-7 we realize the most important thing we are called to do is to live exemplary lives that are good witnesses to our surrounding communities. We need to embrace, serve and love our cities and communities, while at the same time train our children and those with the greatest potential in our churches to take the lead at the gates of every sphere of society.

by Daniel L. Dreisbach
Professor of Justice, Law and Society,
American University

Professor of Justice, Law and Society is a professor in the School of Public Affairs at American University in Washington, D.C., as well as the William E. Simon Fellow in Religion and Public Life in the James Madison Program at Princeton University. He received his D.Phil. from Oxford University and his J.D. from the University of Virginia. He is author or editor of numerous books, including Thomas Jefferson and the Wall of Separation Between Church and State; The Founders on God and Government; Religion and Political Culture in Jefferson’s Virginia; and Real Threat and Mere Shadow: Religious Liberty and the First Amendment.

The following is adapted from a lecture delivered at Hillsdale College on September 12, 2006, during a Center for Constructive Alternatives seminar on the topic, “Church and State: History and Theory.”

No metaphor in American letters has had a greater influence on law and policy than Thomas Jefferson’s “wall of separation between church and state.” For many Americans, this metaphor has supplanted the actual text of the First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, and it has become the locus classicus of the notion that the First Amendment separated religion and the civil state, thereby mandating a strictly secular polity.

More important, the judiciary has embraced this figurative language as a virtual rule of constitutional law and as the organizing theme of church-state jurisprudence. Writing for the U.S. Supreme Court in 1948, Justice Hugo L. Black asserted that the justices had “agreed that the First Amendment’s language, properly interpreted, had erected a wall of separation between Church and State.” The continuing influence of this wall is evident in the Court’s most recent church-state pronouncements.

The rhetoric of church-state separation has been a part of western political discourse for many centuries, but it has only lately come to a place of prominence in American constitutional law and discourse. What is the source of the “wall of separation” metaphor so frequently referenced today? How has this symbol of strict separation between religion and public life become so influential in American legal and political thought? Most important, what are the policy and legal consequences of the ascendancy of separationist rhetoric and of the transformation of “separation of church and state” from a much-debated political idea to a doctrine of constitutional law embraced by the nation’s highest court?

The Wall that Jefferson Built

On New Year’s Day, 1802, President Jefferson penned a missive to the Baptist Association of Danbury, Connecticut. The Baptists had written the new president a “fan” letter in October 1801, congratulating him on his election to the “chief Magistracy in the United States.” They celebrated his zealous advocacy for religious liberty and chastised those who had criticized him “as an enemy of religion[,] Law & good order because he will not, dares not assume the prerogative of Jehovah and make Laws to govern the Kingdom of Christ.” At the time, the Congregationalist Church was still legally established in Connecticut and the Federalist party controlled New England politics. Thus the Danbury Baptists were outsiders’a beleaguered religious and political minority in a state where a Congregationalist-Federalist party establishment dominated public life. They were drawn to Jefferson’s political cause because of his celebrated advocacy for religious liberty.

In a carefully crafted reply, the president allied himself with the New England Baptists in their struggle to enjoy the right of conscience as an inalienable right-not merely as a favor granted, and subject to withdrawal, by the civil state:

“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.”

This missive was written in the wake of the bitter presidential contest of 1800. Candidate Jefferson’s religion, or the alleged lack thereof, was a critical issue in the campaign. His Federalist foes vilified him as an “infidel” and “atheist.” The campaign rhetoric was so vitriolic that, when news of Jefferson’s election swept across the country, housewives in New England were seen burying family Bibles in their gardens or hiding them in wells because they expected the Holy Scriptures to be confiscated and burned by the new administration in Washington. (These fears resonated with Americans who had received alarming reports of the French Revolution, which Jefferson was said to support, and the widespread desecration of religious sanctuaries and symbols in France.) Jefferson wrote to these pious Baptists to reassure them of his continuing commitment to their right of conscience and to strike back at the Federalist-Congregationalist establishment in Connecticut for shamelessly vilifying him in the recent campaign.

Several features of Jefferson’s letter challenge conventional, strictly secular constructions of his famous metaphor. First, the metaphor rests on a cluster of explicitly religious propositions (i.e., “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”). Second, Jefferson’s wall was constructed in the service of the free exercise of religion. Use of the metaphor to restrict religious exercise (e.g., to disallow a citizen’s religious expression in the public square) conflicts with the very principle Jefferson hoped his metaphor would advance. Third, Jefferson concluded his presidential missive with a prayer, reciprocating his Baptist correspondents’ “kind prayers for the protection & blessing of the common father and creator of man.” Ironically, some strict separationists today contend that such solemn words in a presidential address violate a constitutional “wall of separation.”

The conventional wisdom is that Jefferson’s wall represents a universal principle concerning the prudential and constitutional relationship between religion and the civil state. In fact, this wall had less to do with the separation between religion and all civil government than with the separation between the national and state governments on matters pertaining to religion (such as official proclamations of days of prayer, fasting, and thanksgiving). The “wall of separation” was a metaphoric construction of the First Amendment, which Jefferson time and again said imposed its restrictions on the national government only (see, e.g., Jefferson’s 1798 draft of the Kentucky Resolutions).

In other words, Jefferson’s wall separated the national government on one side from state governments and religious authorities on the other. This construction is consistent with a virtually unchallenged assumption of the early constitutional era: the First Amendment in particular and the Bill of Rights in general affirmed the fundamental constitutional principle of federalism. The First Amendment, as originally understood, had little substantive content apart from its affirmation that the national government was denied all power over religious matters. Jurisdiction in such concerns was reserved to individual citizens, religious societies, and state governments. (Of course, this original understanding of the First Amendment was turned on its head by the modern U.S. Supreme Court’s “incorporation” of the First Amendment into the Fourteenth Amendment.)

The Metaphor Enters Public Discourse

By late January 1802, printed copies of Jefferson’s reply to the Danbury Baptists began appearing in New England newspapers. The letter, however, was not accessible to a wide audience until it was reprinted in the first major collection of Jefferson’s papers, published in the mid-19th century.

The phrase “wall of separation” entered the lexicon of American law in the U.S. Supreme Court’s 1878 ruling in Reynolds v. United States, although most scholars agree that the wall metaphor played no role in the Court’s reasoning. Chief Justice Morrison R. Waite, who authored the opinion, was drawn to another clause in Jefferson’s text. The Reynolds Court, in short, was drawn to the passage, not to advance a strict separation between church and state, but to support the proposition that the legitimate powers of civil government could reach men’s actions only and not their opinions.

Nearly seven decades later, in the landmark case of Everson v. Board of Education(1947), the Supreme Court “rediscovered” the metaphor and elevated it to constitutional doctrine. Citing no source or authority other than Reynolds, Justice Hugo L. Black, writing for the majority, invoked the Danbury letter’s “wall of separation” passage in support of his strict separationist interpretation of the First Amendment prohibition on laws “respecting an establishment of religion.” “In the words of Jefferson,” he famously declared, the First Amendment has erected “‘a wall of separation between church and State’. . . . That wall must be kept high and impregnable. We could not approve the slightest breach.” In even more sweeping terms, Justice Wiley B. Rutledge asserted in a separate opinion that the First Amendment’s purpose was “to uproot” all religious establishments and “to create a complete and permanent separation of the spheres of religious activity and civil authority by comprehensively forbidding every form of public aid or support for religion.” This rhetoric, more than any other, set the terms and the tone for a strict separationist jurisprudence that reached ascendancy on the Court in the second half of the 20th century.

Like Reynolds, the Everson ruling was replete with references to history, especially the roles played by Jefferson and Madison in the Virginia disestablishment struggles in the tumultuous decade following independence from Great Britain. Jefferson was depicted as a leading architect of the First Amendment despite the fact that he was in France when the measure was drafted by the First Federal Congress in 1789.

Black and his judicial brethren also encountered the metaphor in briefs filed in Everson. In a lengthy discussion of history supporting the proposition that “separation of church and state is a fundamental American principle,” an amicus brief filed by the American Civil Liberties Union quoted the clause from the Danbury letter containing the “wall of separation” image. The ACLU ominously concluded that the challenged state statute, which provided state reimbursements for the transportation of students to and from parochial schools, “constitutes a definite crack in the wall of separation between church and state. Such cracks have a tendency to widen beyond repair unless promptly sealed up.”

Shortly after the Everson ruling was handed down, the metaphor began to proliferate in books and articles. In a 1949 best-selling anti-Catholic polemic, American Freedom and Catholic Power, Paul Blanshard advocated an uncompromising political and legal platform favoring “a wall of separation between church and state.” Protestants and Other Americans United for the Separation of Church and State (an organization today known by the more politically correct appellation of Americans United for Separation of Church and State), a leading strict-separationist advocacy organization, wrote the phrase into its 1948 founding manifesto. Among the “immediate objectives” of this new organization was “[t]o resist every attempt by law or the administration of law further to widen the breach in the wall of separation of church and state.”

The Supreme Court frequently and favorably referenced the “wall of separation” in the cases that followed. In McCollum v. Board of Education (1948), the Court essentially constitutionalized Jefferson’s phrase, subtly and blithely substituting his figurative language for the literal text of the First Amendment. In the last half of the 20th century, the metaphor emerged as the defining motif for church-state jurisprudence, thereby elevating a strict separationist construction of the First Amendment to accepted dogma among jurists and commentators.

The Trouble with Metaphors in the Law

Metaphors are a valuable literary device. They enrich language by making it dramatic and colorful, rendering abstract concepts concrete, condensing complex concepts into a few words, and unleashing creative and analogical insights. But their uncritical use can lead to confusion and distortion. At its heart, metaphor compares two or more things that are not, in fact, identical. A metaphor’s literal meaning is used non-literally in a comparison with its subject. While the comparison may yield useful insights, the dissimilarities between the metaphor and its subject, if not acknowledged, can distort or pollute one’s understanding of the subject. If attributes of the metaphor are erroneously or misleadingly assigned to the subject and the distortion goes unchallenged, then the metaphor may alter the understanding of the underlying subject. The more appealing and powerful a metaphor, the more it tends to supplant or overshadow the original subject, and the more one is unable to contemplate the subject apart from its metaphoric formulation. Thus, distortions perpetuated by the metaphor are sustained and even magnified. This is the lesson of the “wall of separation” metaphor.

The judiciary’s reliance on an extra-constitutional metaphor as a substitute for the text of the First Amendment almost inevitably distorts constitutional principles governing church-state relationships. Although the “wall of separation” may felicitously express some aspects of First Amendment law, it seriously misrepresents or obscures others, and has become a source of much mischief in modern church-state jurisprudence. It has reconceptualized-indeed, misconceptualized-First Amendment principles in at least two important ways.

First, Jefferson’s trope emphasizes separation between church and state—unlike the First Amendment, which speaks in terms of the non-establishment and free exercise of religion. (Although these terms are often conflated today, in the lexicon of 1802, the expansive concept of “separation” was distinct from the narrow institutional concept of “non-establishment.”) Jefferson’s Baptist correspondents, who agitated for disestablishment but not for separation, were apparently discomfited by the figurative phrase and, perhaps, even sought to suppress the president’s letter. They, like many Americans, feared that the erection of such a wall would separate religious influences from public life and policy. Few evangelical dissenters (including the Baptists) challenged the widespread assumption of the age that republican government and civic virtue were dependent on a moral people and that religion supported and nurtured morality.

Second, a wall is a bilateral barrier that inhibits the activities of both the civil government and religion-unlike the First Amendment, which imposes restrictions on civil government only. In short, a wall not only prevents the civil state from intruding on the religious domain but also prohibits religion from influencing the conduct of civil government. The various First Amendment guarantees, however, were entirely a check or restraint on civil government, specifically on Congress. The free press guarantee, for example, was not written to protect the civil state from the press, but to protect a free and independent press from control by the national government. Similarly, the religion provisions were added to the Constitution to protect religion and religious institutions from corrupting interference by the national government, not to protect the civil state from the influence of, or overreaching by, religion. As a bilateral barrier, however, the wall unavoidably restricts religion’s ability to influence public life, thereby exceeding the limitations imposed by the First Amendment.

Herein lies the danger of this metaphor. The “high and impregnable” wall constructed by the modern Court has been used to inhibit religion’s ability to inform the public ethic, to deprive religious citizens of the civil liberty to participate in politics armed with ideas informed by their faith, and to infringe the right of religious communities and institutions to extend their prophetic ministries into the public square. Today, the “wall of separation” is the sacred icon of a strict separationist dogma intolerant of religious influences in the public arena. It has been used to silence religious voices in the public marketplace of ideas and to segregate faith communities behind a restrictive barrier.

Federal and state courts have used the “wall of separation” concept to justify censoring private religious expression (such as Christmas creches) in public, to deny public benefits (such as education vouchers) for religious entities, and to exclude religious citizens and organizations (such as faith-based social welfare agencies) from full participation in civic life on the same terms as their secular counterparts. The systematic and coercive removal of religion from public life not only is at war with our cultural traditions insofar as it evinces a callous indifference toward religion but also offends basic notions of freedom of religious exercise, expression, and association in a pluralistic society.

There was a consensus among the founders that religion was indispensable to a system of republican self-government. The challenge the founders confronted was how to nurture personal responsibility and social order in a system of self-government. Tyrants and dictators can use the whip and rod to force people to behave as they desire, but clearly this is incompatible with a self-governing people. In response to this challenge the founders looked to religion (and morality informed by religious faith) to provide the internal moral compass that would prompt citizens to behave in a disciplined manner and thereby promote social order and political stability. The literature of the founding era is replete with this argument, no example more famous than George Washington’s statement in his Farewell Address of September 19, 1796:

“Of all the dispositions and habits which lead to political prosperity, Religion and morality are indispensable supports. In vain would that man claim the tribute of Patriotism, who should labour to subvert these great Pillars of human happiness, these firmest props of the duties of Men and citizens . . . . And let us with caution indulge the supposition, that morality can be maintained without religion . . . . [R]eason and experience both forbid us to expect that National morality can prevail in exclusion of religious principle.”

Believing that religion and morality were indispensable to social order and political prosperity, the founders championed religious liberty in order to foster a vibrant religious culture in which a beneficent religious ethos would inform the public ethic and to promote an environment in which religious and moral leaders could speak out boldly, without restraint or inhibition, against corruption and immorality in civic life. Religious liberty was not merely a benevolent grant of the civil state; rather, it reflected an awareness among the founders that the very survival of the civil state and a civil society was dependent on a vibrant religious culture, and religious liberty nurtured such a religious culture. In other words, the civil state’s respect for religious liberty is an act of self-preservation. The unfortunate consequence of 20th-century jurisprudence is that the First Amendment, designed to protect and promote a vital role for religion in public life, has been replaced with a wall of separation that, in the hands of the modern judiciary, has restricted religion’s place in the polity.

Legacy of Intolerance

In his recent book, Separation of Church and State, Philip Hamburger amply documents that the rhetoric of separation of church and state became fashionable in the 1830s and 1840s and, again, in the last quarter of the 19th century. Why? It accompanied two substantial waves of Catholic immigrants with their peculiar liturgy and resistance to assimilation into the Protestant establishment: an initial wave of Irish in the first half of the century, and then more Irish along with other European immigrants later in the century. The rhetoric of separation was used by nativist elements, such as the Know-Nothings and later the Ku Klux Klan, to marginalize Catholics and to deny them, often through violence, entrance into the mainstream of public life. By the end of the century, an allegiance to the so-called “American principle” of separation of church and state had been woven into the membership oaths of the Ku Klux Klan. Today we typically think of the Klan strictly in terms of their views on race, and we forget that their hatred of Catholics was equally odious.

Again, in the mid-20th century, the rhetoric of separation was revived and ultimately constitutionalized by anti-Catholic elites, such as Justice Hugo L. Black, and fellow travelers in the ACLU and Protestants and Other Americans United for the Separation of Church and State, who feared the influence and wealth of the Catholic Church and perceived parochial education as a threat to public schools and democratic values. The chief architect of the modern “wall” was Justice Black, whose affinity for church-state separation and the metaphor was rooted in virulent anti-Catholicism. Hamburger has argued that Justice Black, a former Alabama Ku Klux Klansman, was the product of a remarkable “confluence of Protestant, nativist, and progressive anti-Catholic forces . . . . Black’s association with the Klan has been much discussed in connection with his liberal views on race, but, in fact, his membership suggests more about [his] ideals of Americanism,” especially his support for separation of church and state. “Black had long before sworn, under the light of flaming crosses, to preserve ‘the sacred constitutional rights’ of ‘free public schools’ and ‘separation of church and state.’” Although he later distanced himself from the Klan on matters of race, “Black’s distaste for Catholicism did not diminish.” Black’s admixture of progressive, Klan, and strict separationist views is best understood in terms of anti-Catholicism and, more broadly, a deep hostility to assertions of ecclesiastical authority. Separation of church and state, Black believed, was an American ideal of freedom from oppressive ecclesiastical authority, especially that of the Roman Catholic Church. A regime of separation enabled Americans to assert their individual autonomy and practice democracy, which Black believed was Protestantism in its secular form.

To be clear, diverse strains of political, religious, and intellectual thought have embraced notions of separation (I myself come from a faith tradition that believes church and state should operate in separate institutional spheres), but a particularly dominant strain in 19th-century America was this nativist, bigoted strain. We must confront the uncomfortable fact that the phrases “separation of church and state” and “wall of separation,” although not necessarily expressions of intolerance, have often, in the American experience, been closely identified with the ugly impulses of nativism and bigotry.

In conclusion, Jefferson’s figurative language has not produced the practical solutions to real world controversies that its apparent clarity and directness led its proponents to expect. Indeed, this wall has done what walls frequently do—it has obstructed the view, obfuscating our understanding of constitutional principles governing church-state relationships. The rhetoric of “separation of church and state” and “a wall of separation” has been instrumental in transforming judicial and popular constructions of the First Amendment from a provision protecting and encouraging religion in public life to one restricting religion’s place and role in civic culture. This transformation has undermined the “indispensable support” of religion in our system of republican self-government. This fact would have alarmed the framers of the Constitution, and we ignore it today at the peril of our political order and prosperity.

Reprinted by permission from Imprimis, a publication of Hillsdale College.  You can view the original article here.

In this two part teaching series, Rich Carey (Lionheart Ministries) examines why Christians have lost their influence in culture, identifies some of the major strongholds in the minds of the Church, and suggests some practical ways to establish Kingdom culture in our nation.

Part 1 – Defining The Battleground

In this segment, Rich provides an overview of the struggle for control of culture, then moves in closer for a practical application.
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Part 2 – Pulling Down Strongholds

In this segment, Rich addresses the strongholds of Dispensationalism, Pre-Trib Escapism and End-Times Mentality in the Church.
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ENJOY THIS? The slides and study notes for this presentation are available to members of the Lionheart Tribe. Please consider becoming a member and supporting our efforts to bring transformation to the world.