A political theology

A while ago I sketched out some basic elements of a political theology (at least the theology part); a way to think about how Christians should engage in politics. I’d been asked to write a paper for a committee meeting for our national denomination and those preliminary thoughts were part of the building blocks for this bigger paper. It’s long, and has footnotes, so here it is as a PDF

Here’s the summary (the conclusion actually, so you don’t have to wade through all that other stuff).

My contention is that it is the Gospel itself that provides a political theology; that our engagement with the world should be shaped by our anthropology — including an understanding of the effect of sin and the idolatrous replacement of creator with creation at the heart of worldly power — and that our political speech and action should be the cruciform proclamation of the crucified king; that we on one level we should not expect this to be persuasive, and indeed should expect a degree of ridicule or persecution, but also that in a truly secular democracy having our beliefs properly understood is our best chance to have them understood, ‘represented’ or recognised by our laws and lawmakers. Our anthropology — our understanding that all people are essentially religiously motivated, worshipping, image bearers means that this approach is actually politically legitimate in a way that transcends different governments and cultures; it is the approach we might expect Paul to adopt in the Roman Empire (as indeed he does in Acts), that the early church adopted in that same context, and that we might expect faithful witnesses and ambassadors for Christ to adopt in both western democracies and other contexts throughout the modern world.