The place of religion in contemporary society

¶ … Religion in Our Society

The history of many states includes the relations of secular and church powers, of state and religious organizations. In order to understand the core the place of religion in state it's important to have a closer look on the origins of these two institutions. There is no doubt that religion or religious beliefs (mythology in its early forms) had appeared before the first state institutions were formed. With the establishment of first states there appeared a question, how will those institutions coexist together, if they have a great influence and power over people even though the nature of power and their character is different.

Historians and philosophers of ancient times said that a state, which wants to appropriate the power and dignity of church, commits a sin, and if the church wants to appropriate the power and the "sword" of the state it looses its dignity and betrays its very principles.

It's not a secret that church on the sunrise of the state era had a bigger power, which later began to be concentrated in the hands of secular government.

Nowadays there have been established and approved two systems that characterize the position of church in the state:

state church, which has a favorable position in comparison to other confessions;

And a regime of separation of church from state.

When making a primary research its important to refer to the origins of the religions and to the religious scriptures to have a closer look on this question from the side of religion, not religious leaders and representatives of different confessions. None will argue that Bible mentions anything about dominance of religion over state. Jesus Christ said: "Give to Caesar what is Caesar's and to God what is God's." These primary scriptures make to think over, and determine the role of the religion as the Lord wanted it to be. Religious beliefs have to live in the consciousness of the person, in his ethical and moral principles. St. Paul said, that people have to "obey the state law not because of the fear of punishment, but because of conscience and sense of duty." St. John as well considered the state law to the greatest secular virtue for a person.

In the theory of state and law there is a lot of definitions for the term "state." Ancient philosophers consider a state to be a "concentration of all moral and mental interest of citizens" (Aristotle) or a "union of people united by common origins of law and general good" (Cicerone).

Today the most popular definitions contain the following about state: state is a social union, which represents independent mandatory reign over the free people on a definite territory, which is naturally established for the protection of the civil order.

The question about state's essence is a question about the state power owner and about its "audience" or people for whose interests it was established.

The majority of democratic doctrine supporters explain their views that the original source and original keeper of power is people, that state's power by its essence has to be people's and has to be realized by the people's control and according to its interests.

One of the main features of a state is its close and organic connection with law, which expresses economically and spiritually established normative and legal expression of a state's will, state regulator of social relations and processes in the society.

At the same time it's easy to find out that law being a regulator of social relations, tightly interacts with religious norms that execute nearly the same functions.

Religion has a unique social value as it supplements the law in the sphere of social regulation. Let's have a closer look on two aspects: regulative function of religion in general and interaction with juridical norms.

Regulative function of religion in social relations is achieved by its hierarchical structure of norms that divide life on "what is allowed" and "what is prohibited," on moral duties. To the basement of normative regulation there were added primary Bible commandments, where the tendency on making mutual concessions, which are expressed in not violating the rights of another person is clearly observed.

There were and there remain lots of examples of states with official religion. For example England recognized the Church of England (or Anglican Church) to be the official religion. English monarch is the head of the church, and what really makes it official religion and shows its integration into the state is the fact that church changes have to be ratified by the House of Lords.

19th century Russia is another good example of a state with official religion- Russian Orthodox Church. All attempts made by Peter the Great in the 18th century to separate church from state failed, as church penetrated into education and public institutions. In Communist Russia, Russian Orthodox Church was substituted by a new religion: "atheism."

Another example of modern official religion in state is Germany, where the nation is taxied for the favor of Protestant churches (in northern lands) and Catholic Church (in the south). Governments also subsidize churches.

The history of our country was directly connected with issues referred to religion, to freedom of religion and freedom of conscience. it's enough to remember the Pilgrims, who left England searching for religious freedoms, and place where they will not be persecuted. Multi-confessional system in the U.S.A. is one of the oldest in the world, oldest in the sense of a relative tolerance and peaceful coexistence. Still cases of religious intolerance and attempts to include Church into secular affairs took place. it's enough to remember witch trials at Salem and all over Massachusetts, persecution of heresies, etc. The influence of different protestant churches on society was more than great as they regulated not only social relations but family and personal life as well.

The penetration of church to state affairs of colonies in early years of American nation took place and was considered to be a common thing. The works of John Winthrop and others even though do not claim to theocratize the state, still argue about key role of religion and religious morality in life of society, telling that colonies were God's blessed land and that those who lived in them had to be submitted to god's orders equally as to existing laws:

We shall find that the God of Israel is among us, when ten of us shall be able to resist a thousand of our enemies; when he shall make us a praise and a glory, that men shall say of succeeding plantations, 'The Lord make it likely that of New England.... Therefore let us choose life that we, and our seed may live, by obeying His voice and cleaving to Him, for He is our life and our prosperity." (Winthrop, John a Model of Christian Charity, 1630)

John Winthrop compared God's power to the power of state and God's laws and morality to the civil duties and civil laws, as he considered civil liberties to be given by Holly order:

This liberty is maintained and exercised in a way of subjection to authority; it is of the same kind of liberty wherewith Christ hath made us free.

We must consider that we shall be as a city upon a hill. The eyes of all people are upon us

If you stand for your natural corrupt liberties, and will do what is good in your own eyes, you will not endure the least weight of authority, but will murmur, and oppose, and be always striving to shake off that yoke; but if you will be satisfied to enjoy such civil and lawful liberties, such as Christ allows you, then will you quietly and cheerfully submit unto that authority which is set over you, in all the administrations of it, for your good."(Little Speech on Liberty)

Ministers and governors like him had an idea of creating holly communities in the colonies, which would live by the laws of Bible and which would practice God's word. Puritan societies were spread all over the colonies, as they seeked for religious freedom. But there was quite a difference between religious freedom and religious tolerance. The cases of religious intolerance and discrimination were quite often until the union was established.

As Nathaniel Ward notes in the Simple Cobbler of Aggawam 1645:

First, such as have given or taken any unfriendly reports of us New English, should do well to recollect themselves. We have been reputed a collective a wild opinionists, swarmed into a remote wilderness to find elbow-room for our phanatick Doctines and practices:....

I take it upon me, to be the Herald of New England so farre, as to procalime to the world, in the name of our Colony, that all Familists, Antinomians, Anabaptists, and other Enthusiasts, shall have free Liberty to keep away from us, and such as will come to be gone as fast as they can, the sooner the better."(Ward, Nathaniel the Simple Cobbler of Aggawam, 1645)

But already in such strict society as Puritans there were people who appealed for religious freedoms and tolerance, as they considered religion to be the individual choice of a person, not a mandatory belief that had to be observed. Religious tolerance and freedoms do come out from holly scriptures of any religion, they are stated in Koran and in Bible nearly in the same way: "avoid unfaithful" not persecute them but simply avoid. These words have a deep meaning, which refers not just to the religion but also to any other belief and views. Roger Williams was the first minister who introduced the principles of modern religious liberties into the civil practice as he wrote in the Bloudy Tenet of Persecution (1640):

No man shall be required to worship or maintain a worship against his will." Until then, Europe and America had endured what Thomas Paine later called, "the adulterous connection between church and state."

In order to defend the representatives of different confessions and guarantee free participation of citizens in country's public life, there had to be taken measures that would preserve from the dominance of one religious confession over another and from inclusion of religious authorities into government from spreading their influence and dominance there were taken measures that made all confessions equal in rights by separating church from state forever.

James Madison argued about the importance of protecting citizens' religious beliefs, as religion was one of unalienable rights of people that were protected and guaranteed:

that Religion or the duty which we owe to our Creator and the manner of discharging it, can be directed only by reason and conviction, not by force or violence." [Virginia Declaration of Rights, art. 16] the Religion then of every man must be left to the conviction and conscience of every man; and it is the right of every man to exercise it as these may dictate. This right is in its nature an unalienable right. It is unalienable, because the opinions of men, depending only on the evidence contemplated by their own minds cannot follow the dictates of other men"...(Madison, James Memorial and Remonstrance against Religious Assessments 20 June 1785)

Legislature that was issued after the American Revolution had opened a new era in society' relations with church as the U.S.A. had become the first state were religion was officially separated from state:

The amendment stands in these words: "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof, or abridging the freedom of speech or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances."

To these observations one fact will be added, which demonstrates that the common law cannot be admitted as the universal expositor of American terms, which may be the same with those contained in that law. The freedom of conscience and of religion are found in the same instruments which assert the freedom of the press. It will never be admitted that the meaning of the former, in the common law of England, is to limit their meaning in the United States." (James Madison, Report on the Virginia Resolutions)

Other fathers of American constitution argued about the questions of church and state as well, as it referred to the general concept of human liberties. Thomas Jefferson in the letter to Danbury Baptist Association of Connecticut on 1802-JAN-1 wrote:

contemplate with solemn reverence that act of the whole American people which declared that their legislature should 'make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof,' thus building a wall of separation between Church and State..."

Moreover for James Madison the question about separation of church from state and secularization of society was one of the questions of main importance:

Strongly guarded as is the separation between religion and Government in the Constitution of the United States, the danger of encroachment by Ecclesiastical Bodies may be illustrated by precedents already furnished in their short history."

Arguments about the role of church in public life of society continue and nowadays, as the influence of religious authorities over some public questions is quite big and officials have to take it into consideration when making decisions. But the principles that laid into the fundamentals of the state's sovereignty had resulted not only positive feedbacks from people, but trust to the government and further immigration of religious refugees all over the world, who found the freedom of conscience in the U.S.A. And religious independence.

The relations of church and state were developing in different ways but the main focus was directed on saving church's autonomy and creating of adequate conditions for its existence, in order to satisfy people's moral and conscience needs.

Since Jackson's presidency there was established a law that gave the freedom to religious organizations that were acting on the territory of the country. Everyone was free from the church taxes, and churches were free as well in their activities and property issues. As a result there were no religious conflicts, that were typical in European countries and all religious congregations could freely develop without any restrictions from the face of the state. It later shaped the religious diversity that became a common thing in the country, one more time showing that the human inalienable rights in freedom of religion choice were observed.