“When in the Course of human events it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature’s God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation.
We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. — That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, —
That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness.”
Independence Day
July 4th 1776.
The opening words of our declaration, the Preamble.
Thanksgiving Day and Independence Day are the two civic festivals that are official feast days in the Episcopal Church.
It can be complicated for Christians, the proper way to celebrate this feast day when our primary allegiance is to a different kingdom.
It is an ancient challenge.
The New Testament has a variety of discordant responses to faith and citizenship.
There is the famous statement from Jesus to render unto Caesar what is Caesar’s and unto God what is God’s. But he never really spelled out which was which. He leaves us with that question to sort out for ourselves. It is an important question to wrestle with.
The Apostle Paul in Romans chapter 13 says to be subject to governing authorities because it is given authority by God. Yet in the Book of Revelation chapter 13 the same governing authorities are denounced as a demonic beast belonging to Satan that persecutes the Saints.
Do we fulfill what todays reading from the apostle Paul calls the “Law of Christ” by bearing one another’s burdens, or do we follow the law of the land?
Church and State have repeatedly been dominated by one another in history, both seeking legitimacy from the other. Most so called religious wars in history were actually wars of civil authority seeking religious legitimacy of some sort.
Our own country’s separation of Church and State was a result of people being fed up with the abuse of power that resulted from the Church and State scratching one another’s backs. No Divine right monarchy better tread on me.
It took a revolution to separate Church and State, a separation we still struggle to define and honor and understand.
That separation created the Episcopal Church, separating the apostolic succession of Bishops from being controlled by the English Monarchy. It is hard for us to understand and feel today just how radical that change was, how great a leap of faith. Are we capable today of that kind of change?
Our Catechism says to honor the just demands of those in authority over us. That seems to be the point of tension. Honoring authority then requires us to challenge authority when the demands are unjust, when they break the law of Christ of bearing one another’s burdens.
As people of faith we are to be especially vigilant students of authority, honoring just demands and challenging unjust demands, holding civil authorities accountable to the higher standard of the law of Christ, as Bishop Waldo does in his Pastoral Letter printed in the bulletin. We need to listen to his words and find ways to respond to the wound that is cutting our country so deeply.
The hard part is to know which demands are just and which are unjust, though sometimes it is all too clear.
The Law of Christ requires believers to give water to the thirsty in Jesus name, in doing so we meet and touch Jesus, yet the law of the land forbids it. We find ourselves in the ludicrous situation where giving Jesus water is now illegal.
As people of faith we cannot endorse candidates from the pulpit or on the institutional level, but our faith requires us to influence policy. Our country has always needed and always counted on the wild card of the faith community to guide and influence policy, especially when things go way off track.
Some may consider this politics in the pejorative sense. Granted it is complicated and messy, but it is the law of Christ, the politics of God, bearing one another’s burdens. It is politics in the faithful sense.
The Declaration of Independence is all about challenging unjust demands, that challenge created this country and it maintains this country.
So how to live in that tension? How to be citizens of two kingdoms? How are we to be students of authorities’ just demands?
It all begins with worship, with offering all that we are, by offering up all our flags at the altar.
The bread and wine of our offering is blessed, and transformed and returned that we may in turn be transformed as agents of dual citizenship, who can walk on the edge, honoring the tension, transforming the world into the kingdom where authority’s demands are just, pleasing and good, where arrogant nationalism becomes a humble patriotism whose greatest mark is bearing one another’s burdens.
Independence Day. Keep loving the question. Fulfill the law of Christ.