cross-posted from: https://lemmy.ml/post/3377375
I read an essay by a christian a while ago that pointed out that the separation of church and state wasn’t about protecting the state from religion - it was about protecting religion from the state.
The gist of the argument was that religion should be concentrating on the eternal, and politics, by necessity, concentrates on the immediate. The author was concerned that welding religion and politics together would make religion itself political, meaning it would have to conform to the secular moment rather than looking to saving souls or whatever.
The mind meld of evangelical christianity and right wing politics happened in the mid to late 70s when the US was trying to racially integrate christian universities, which had been severely limiting or excluding black students. Since then, republicans and christians have been in bed together. The southern baptist convention, in fact, originally endorsed the Roe decision because it helped the cause of women. It was only after they decided to go all in on social conservatism that it became a sin.
Christians today are growing concerned about a falloff in attendance and membership. This article concentrates on how conservatism has become a call for people to publicly identify as evangelical while not actually being religious, because it’s an our team thing.
Evangelicals made an ironically Faustian bargain and are starting to realize it.
I’d say that the separation is a little bit of both. It protects government from religion, but it can also protect religion from government. Back in England, the head of the church was the king of England. If the king decided that everyone needed to pray while balancing on their right foot, that’s what would be done. So how you prayed was dependent on the government (the king).
Now, the people pushing Christian theocracy are fine with tearing down the wall between Church and State because they all assume that THEIR religion will be the one in charge. But imagine how much they’d howl if a Select Congressional Committee On Prayer determined that all prayer books needed to be rewritten to add in some new prayers and remove old ones.
They’d go berserk over the government interfering in their religious practices. The separation prevents the government from mucking about in religion unless there’s a major issue. (Sorry, no human sacrifices.)
The Christian right doesn’t consider this at all and they could seriously regret it if they ever reach their goal. (We’d definitely regret it more, of course.)