Why Governments Love Christianity

If you're a Christian, you've likely been taught the value of things like submitting to authority, or turning the other cheek, or trusting that your reward is in Heaven. While those things can be part of a healthy life, they can also conveniently be used for harm.

I don't think we talk enough about the people who love Christianity for the wrong reasons. 

A great example of this would be a corrupt government. A corrupt government may love Christianity because it tends to produce an idealized citizen for them to manipulate: a citizen who is powerless, obedient, and waiting to be rescued.

Think about how much of the traditional theology shapes Christians to be passive followers. We often teach that you are born inherently flawed and need to be fixed (see: I hope you get what you deserve). We also tend to paint a picture that you are helpless on your own and in need of saving. Without help in both of these regards, your only outcome is to burn and suffer for eternity. But we must realize the danger these ideas can pose.

If I can't trust myself and I can't help myself, then I'm vulnerable to any leader who can persuade me.

And that is, in fact, what we see happening with many Christians all around us. This explains why much of the church in the U.S. has so willingly embraced Christian Nationalism. It also explains how many leaders in the church can manipulate their church members and get away with all sorts of nonsense. A corrupt government loves Christianity for the same reason a corrupt church leader does: it turns people into easy targets.

But let’s be clear: Jesus didn’t blindly submit to government or religion. He stood up to both. He flipped tables in the temple. He defied authority. He broke laws that dehumanized people. And those systems (both government and religious) worked together to kill him for it.

But somehow we’ve turned our revolutionary leader into a mascot. We've turned a prophet into a brand ambassador for the empire. We’ve built entire theologies to make sure people stay in line, pay their taxes, and never question the ones cashing the checks.

The theological trick of empire is to convince the oppressed that God wants them to stay that way.

Meanwhile, Jesus invites us to wake up. As the author Matthew Raley writes, "Once an individual is thinking for himself, he is ready to meet Jesus." Jesus didn’t come to make us helpless. He came to make us dangerous to injustice, to apathy, and to any system that pretends God’s dream can coexist with exploitation.

If more people who called themselves Christians actually thought like Jesus, they wouldn’t fall for wolves in sheep’s clothing just because they quote a Bible verse or show up at a prayer breakfast. They’d see through the showmanship. They’d recognize that every empire baptizes its violence in spiritual rhetoric.

The German pastor and theologian Dietrich Bonhoeffer wrestled with how to follow Jesus as the majority of his nation (including the Christians) supported the fascism of the Nazis. He offered three options that the church could take regarding the state:

In the first place it can ask the state whether its actions are legitimate and in accordance with its character as state, i.e., it can throw the state back on its responsibilities.

Secondly, it can aid the victims of state action. The church has an unconditional obligation to the victims of any ordering of society, even if they do not belong to the Christian community.

The third possibility is not just to bandage the victims under the wheel, but to put a spoke in the wheel itself.

Jesus didn’t come to start Christianity. He came to start a revolution of love that turns things upside down. He came to invite us into a new way of thinking where the first are last, the powerful are toppled, and the poor are lifted up. Those of us who follow Jesus should be on the front lines of this radical work, not complacently going with the crowd around us.

You don’t need permission from the empire to follow Jesus in this way. Which is good, because the empire (and its representatives in the government and the church) will never give you its blessing. They will gaslight you until you wander off in isolation or learn to fall in line.

The kingdom of God isn’t waiting in heaven. It’s trying to break through right here, right now, through you.

As Jesus said, "May your Kingdom come soon. May your will be done on earth, as it is in heaven." (Matthew 6:10)

Photo by Katie Moum on Unsplash

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