“Our Nation is Built on Freedom From Religion”

5. “Only Christians are seeking to legislate morality.”

People in our groups resented what they saw as the efforts of Christians to impose their morality on others. But non-Christians aren’t the only ones worried about inviting government into our bedrooms. I don’t believe that is the role of government and even less the right way to sway people to the cause of Jesus. But the bigger fact for all sides of this debate to recognize is that every law imposes someone’s morality. As Al Mohler explained in an interview for this project, “People assume Christians are trying to impose morality when others supposedly are not. But in reality all politics, all legislation, all public policy is a war of rival moralities.” Every piece of legislation—environmental law, military appropriations, foreign aid, social welfare, taxation, traffic laws—touches on moral issues. Like Mohler says, “There is no such thing as a morally neutral stance when it comes to legislation.” He continues, “Christians are unapologetically involved in this for the same reason that others with rival world views are involved. Based upon our deepest convictions, we feel that our approach will lead to the greatest human flourishing. We have competing visions of what will lead to that, and that conflict is what we see in our headlines today.”

Redefining Winning

We should not be frustrated by objections to our faith in the realm of politics or any other area. We should expect opposition. As Christians in the west we got so used to living in a dominant Judeo-Christian culture that we have forgotten where we came from.

Our biblical ancestors were always a minority group seen by others as exceedingly peculiar. Check the Old Testament. The nations that challenged Israel were notorious for their religions based on sexual immorality and child sacrifice, and their foreign policy consisted of raping and ransacking their neighbors. In that context God’s holy people were deemed eccentric and unhelpful and despised. In the New Testament world dominated by an empire ruling from Rome, Christians were rebels and outcasts politically, socially, sexually, and morally. But in the last five centuries or so Christians grew more and more comfortable in our position as the cultural majority. Now that Christendom is dead and culture has moved on, everyone is like “This is wrong. We’re being discriminated against. They hate us.” Actually this experience is normal according to the biblical storyline. As God’s modern people we should feel right at home in this new world where we are on the margins and not at the center of culture.

Pastor Rick Warren once told me, “Our goal is not to win America but to win Americans.” Politically speaking, we have to deal with the fact that we are on the losing team. We no longer dominate culture. We are also-rans in the contests over same-sex marriage and other social issues. It is unlikely we will ever again get a victory parade. It is very hard to get people fired up about a losing team, especially young people.

We need a new definition of winning. Winning is not “The majority are Christians, the laws all favor us, we overturn all the decisions, and elected officials will sit next to us in church on Sunday.” Winning is “We were faithful to Jesus and we trusted him with the results.”