Church, State and Public Justice

Church, State and Public Justice PDF

Author: P. C. Kemeny

Publisher: InterVarsity Press

Published: 2009-09-20

Total Pages:

ISBN-13: 0830874747

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Abortion. Physician-assisted suicide. Same-sex marriages. Embryonic stem-cell research. Poverty. Crime. What is a faithful Christian response? The God of the Bible is unquestionably a God of justice. Yet Christians have had their differences as to how human government and the church should bring about a just social order. Although Christians share many deep and significant theological convictions, differences that threaten to divide them have often surrounded the matter of how the church collectively and Christians individually ought to engage the public square. What is the mission of the church? What is the purpose of human government? How ought they to be related to each other? How should social injustice be redressed? The five noted contributors to this volume answer these questions from within their distinctive Christian theological traditions, as well as responding to the other four positions. Through the presentations and ensuing dialogue we come to see more clearly what the differences are, where their positions overlap and why they diverge. The contributors and the positions taken include Clarke E. Cochran: A Catholic Perspective Derek H. Davis: A Classical Separation Perspective Ronald J. Sider: An Anabaptist Perspective Corwin F. Smidt: A Principled Pluralist Perspective J. Philip Wogaman: A Social Justice Perspective This book will be instructive for anyone seeking to grasp the major Christian alternatives and desiring to pursue a faithful corporate and individual response to the social issues that face us.

Church and State in America

Church and State in America PDF

Author: James H. Hutson

Publisher: Cambridge University Press

Published: 2007-11-12

Total Pages:

ISBN-13: 1139467905

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This is an account of the ideas about and public policies relating to the relationship between government and religion from the settlement of Virginia in 1607 to the presidency of Andrew Jackson, 1829–37. This book describes the impact and the relationship of various events, legislative, and judicial actions, including the English Toleration Act of 1689, the First and Second Great Awakenings, the Constitution of the United States, the Bill of Rights, and Jefferson's Letter to the Danbury Baptists. Four principles were paramount in the American approach to government's relation to religion: the importance of religion to public welfare; the resulting desirability of government support of religion (within the limitations of political culture); liberty of conscience and voluntaryism; the requirement that religion be supported by free will offerings, not taxation. Hutson analyzes and describes the development and interplay of these principles, and considers the relevance of the concept of the separation of church and state during this period.

Separating Church and State

Separating Church and State PDF

Author: Steven K. Green

Publisher: Cornell University Press

Published: 2022-03-15

Total Pages: 330

ISBN-13: 1501762087

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Steven K. Green, renowned for his scholarship on the separation of church and state, charts the career of the concept and helps us understand how it has fallen into disfavor with many Americans. In 1802, President Thomas Jefferson distilled a leading idea in the early American republic and wrote of a wall of separation between church and state. That metaphor has come down from Jefferson to twenty-first-century Americans through a long history of jurisprudence, political contestation, and cultural influence. This book traces the development of the concept of separation of church and state and the Supreme Court's application of it in the law. Green finds that conservative criticisms of a separation of church and state overlook the strong historical and jurisprudential pedigree of the idea. Yet, arguing with liberal advocates of the doctrine, he notes that the idea remains fundamentally vague and thus open to loose interpretation in the courts. As such, the history of a wall of separation is more a variable index of American attitudes toward the forces of religion and state. Indeed, Green argues that the Supreme Court's use of the wall metaphor has never been essential to its rulings. The contemporary battle over the idea of a wall of separation has thus been a distraction from the real jurisprudential issues animating the contemporary courts.

What Is the Relationship Between Church and State?

What Is the Relationship Between Church and State? PDF

Author: R. C. Sproul

Publisher: Reformation Trust Publishing

Published: 2019-03-14

Total Pages: 56

ISBN-13: 9781642890549

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In the United States, people often hear the phrase "separation of church and state." Many assume this means the government should rule without taking God into account. But that idea is a distortion of the truth. In this booklet, Dr. R.C. Sproul explains where the government ultimately gets its authority: from God Himself. God ordained the state to protect life and promote justice. Christians must respect and honor their earthly authorities but at the same time remember that God is the highest authority of all. The Crucial Questions booklet series by Dr. R.C. Sproul offers succinct answers to important questions often asked by Christians and thoughtful inquirers.

The Church State Corporation

The Church State Corporation PDF

Author: Winnifred Fallers Sullivan

Publisher:

Published: 2020

Total Pages: 223

ISBN-13: 022645469X

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"What is a church and what work does "church"-the church-do today in American law? In Church State Corporation, Sullivan argues that the appeals to "the church" we find in legal opinions express what she calls a "Christian mystical political theology" that naturalizes religion in the American legal imagination and limits the law's ability to acknowledge religion more broadly. To pinpoint the work the church does in US law, Sullivan examines two recent Supreme Court cases, Hosanna-Tabor v. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (2012) and Burwell v. Hobby Lobby (2014), in order to map the contours of the "church-shaped space" at the heart of what constitutes religion in US law. Sullivan also examines a constellation of church property cases, cases developing corporate personhood such as Citizens United, and what the "Angola Church"-a collection of churches formed within the Louisiana State Penitentiary at Angola-reveals about the range of the church's influence in US law. In all, the reader is treated to a remarkably thought-provoking analysis of the ways the church persists in US law, one that calls into question our basic assumptions about our supposedly secular age"--

Liturgy of the Ordinary

Liturgy of the Ordinary PDF

Author: Tish Harrison Warren

Publisher: InterVarsity Press

Published: 2016-11-01

Total Pages: 189

ISBN-13: 0830892206

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Christianity Today Book of the Year In the overlooked moments and routines of our day, we can become aware of God's presence in surprising ways. How do we embrace the sacred in the ordinary and the ordinary in the sacred? Framed around one typical day, this book explores life through the lens of liturgy—small practices and habits that form us. In each chapter, Tish Harrison Warren considers a common daily experience—making the bed, brushing her teeth, losing her keys. Drawing from the diversity of her life as a campus minister, Anglican priest, friend, wife, and mother, Warren opens up a practical theology of the everyday. Each activity is related to a spiritual practice as well as an aspect of our Sunday worship. Come and discover the holiness of your every day.

Separation of Church and State

Separation of Church and State PDF

Author: Philip HAMBURGER

Publisher: Harvard University Press

Published: 2009-06-30

Total Pages: 529

ISBN-13: 0674038185

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In a powerful challenge to conventional wisdom, Philip Hamburger argues that the separation of church and state has no historical foundation in the First Amendment. The detailed evidence assembled here shows that eighteenth-century Americans almost never invoked this principle. Although Thomas Jefferson and others retrospectively claimed that the First Amendment separated church and state, separation became part of American constitutional law only much later. Hamburger shows that separation became a constitutional freedom largely through fear and prejudice. Jefferson supported separation out of hostility to the Federalist clergy of New England. Nativist Protestants (ranging from nineteenth-century Know Nothings to twentieth-century members of the K.K.K.) adopted the principle of separation to restrict the role of Catholics in public life. Gradually, these Protestants were joined by theologically liberal, anti-Christian secularists, who hoped that separation would limit Christianity and all other distinct religions. Eventually, a wide range of men and women called for separation. Almost all of these Americans feared ecclesiastical authority, particularly that of the Catholic Church, and, in response to their fears, they increasingly perceived religious liberty to require a separation of church from state. American religious liberty was thus redefined and even transformed. In the process, the First Amendment was often used as an instrument of intolerance and discrimination.

Church Growth

Church Growth PDF

Author: C. Peter Wagner

Publisher:

Published: 1986

Total Pages: 326

ISBN-13: 9780842302876

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Trends among the world's 20 largest churches; The local church as a church planting base; Church growth and the Holy Spirit; Using computers to support church growth; Who's who in church growth.