Church and State as Seen in the Formation of ChristendomAllies, T. W. (Thomas William)
Religion
Church and State as Seen in the Formation of Christendom
Allies, T. W. (Thomas William)
Church and state; Church history -- Primitive and early church, ca. 30-600; Religion and state
Education, so far as it embraces instruction in the several arts and
sciences which subserve man's natural life, belongs to the domain of the
State; so far as it embraces the formation of the spiritual character in
man, which includes instruction in religion, and that not only as it
concerns dogma, but also philosophy and science, belongs to the domain of
the Church. If the State exercises its natural right over education with
regard to the former, without allowing the supernatural right of the
Church over the latter, which in itself would be no more than a separate
action in its own sphere, it would constitute, at the same time, a
complete infringement of the Church's rights in her spiritual power of
teaching and jurisdiction.
This is enough to show that the separate action of the two Powers in
their respective spheres leads to the disjunction of man's natural life
from his supernatural end. This was not the intention of God in creating
the two Powers, and placing man's life under their joint government.
5. Another relation between the two Powers which may be conceived, is
that of hostility upon the part of the State to the Church. This cannot
be reciprocal. The Church can indeed and must resist, with her own
weapons, unlawful aggression against the exercise of her rights in
administering the "things of God," but she cannot war against the State
as such, because it is in her sight "the minister of God." The hostility
of the State which invades the Church's exercise of her Priesthood,
Teaching, and Jurisdiction constitutes persecution. There are many
degrees of this. A heathen State may aim at the complete destruction of
the Christian Church within its borders, as at times the Roman emperors
did. A Christian State may also vex and hamper with every form of
impediment the exercise of the Church's powers. A State which has been
Christian, becoming heretical or apostate, may assault the Church with a
hatred, combined with deceit, which shall surpass the malignity of the
Roman State of old or the heathen State at any time. In the course of
centuries every degree of persecution has been exercised by the State,
heathen, Christian, heretical, or apostate, against the Church, by the
permission of the divine Providence; but no one will pretend to say that
such a relation as hostility on the part of the State, and of suffering
on the part of the Church, is the normal relation intended by God in the
establishment of the two Powers. On the contrary, the States which
persecute the Church, while they fulfil the divine purpose for its trial
and purification, incur punishment in many ways for their crime against
God in assaulting His kingdom, and, if they persevere, have been and are
to be rooted up and destroyed.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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