Participants: Lincoln Steed (Host), Ed Cook
Series Code: LI
Program Code: LI000195B
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00:06 Welcome back to the "Liberty Insider".
00:07 Before the break, with guest Ed Cook, 00:10 we were talking about many, many things said the Walrus. 00:14 Yes. To get poetic. 00:17 But it was all devolving, revolving around secularism, 00:22 which Pope Benedict has really picked on as his issue 00:25 in his point of view-- Correct. 00:26 The point I was getting at is that, you know, 00:28 we recognize from a Catholic worldview, 00:30 you've got the church and you've got the state. 00:32 And so, they don't believe that there should be a third 00:35 or even fourth ideology that should exist. 00:39 And so for that reason, they believe 00:41 that from American perspective of the first amendment 00:46 for government is to partake a neutral role 00:48 towards religion neither for nor against. 00:51 They would argue and say that opens the door 00:53 for secularism or in religious indifference. 00:56 And so, for Roman Catholics I think that they're taking 00:58 the approach now of saying, we need to unify 01:02 different religious groups to present 01:03 a united front against secularism. 01:06 And basically, contain that and then they address 01:09 the issue of separation of the church and state. Okay. 01:11 They're hacking back to the long held 01:13 Catholic view and even the early Protestant view, 01:16 that you had to acknowledge God, you couldn't be secularist. 01:20 And if you really think about it, much of the early 01:24 American experience in the American papers 01:26 was played out with that in mind because it was not acceptable 01:30 in early Americana, or America, the colonies 01:33 to be someone, a disbeliever. Correct. 01:36 It was acceptable to be idealist 01:37 which was sort of deep cover for a cynic. Yeah, yeah. 01:41 And so people like Thomas Jefferson and Franklin 01:46 they had pass muster on any form of orthodoxy 01:49 that I can think of and really a much closer 01:52 to a secular free thinking. Correct. 01:55 But in that era, 01:57 maybe we should get back further in the Middle Ages. 01:59 Yes, if you were a nonbeliever 02:01 you were not only spiritually cast in out of darkness, 02:04 the law would come down on you. Correct. 02:06 Was not acceptable to opt out of religion. 02:08 And even in--you know, in America 02:10 up through the colonial era, 02:12 you find that on many of the statutes of the different 02:14 colonies, they required individuals. 02:16 For example, you could not miss the Sunday services at any time, 02:21 if you did it was once in a given month 02:23 and you have to have a good excuse from these. 02:25 And if you follow their logic through even on civil law, 02:29 you swear on the Bible. 02:31 A secularist or an atheist, 02:33 he is not gonna give you a valid honest, 02:37 he can't be sworn in that sense. 02:39 I mean it's not the binding document to him. 02:41 So they would suspect under civil constraints, 02:45 but I think you are right, here the Roman Catholic Church 02:48 is more and more restating its chairmanship 02:53 of all believers even though-- 02:56 They're trying to redefine the playing field 02:58 that's what they were doing, you know, by simply saying-- 02:59 Even though they accept that these are now not 03:02 structurally part of Roman Catholicism, 03:04 but they are under our umbrella. 03:05 But the umbrella must be of faith, 03:08 beyond that not acceptable. Correct. 03:10 And so what they are doing is they're recognizing 03:12 what the playing field is in actuality 03:15 from their premise of their worldview. 03:17 They were trying to redefine it to say, 03:19 instead of saying secularism and then church and state. 03:23 We need to contain secularism 03:24 so it does not--and so it's not antagonistic 03:27 and undermines religion. 03:28 And then once we've done that, then we need to clearly 03:31 define the role of church and state in the modern society. 03:34 Yeah. So there's a lot of play. 03:36 Yes, definitely. 03:37 So but where do you think it's all heading 03:39 with this attack on secularism? 03:41 Do you think--that's one question, but do you think 03:45 that the attack on secularism by American Protestantism 03:50 is this in concept with what Rome is saying, 03:53 or they are just two parallel tendencies? 03:57 I look at that, not as distinct or parallel tendencies. 04:01 They're actually an overlapping. 04:02 In other words, when one goes back to the time period 04:05 of the 60's, 70's, when Roman Catholicism 04:08 began to advocate for social issues, and ethics, 04:12 and so forth, abortion, and other things. 04:13 You found that many evangelicals during the preceding 04:16 two decades, they began to unify more, 04:19 envision with Roman Catholics. 04:21 So due to that uniting of purpose in society, 04:25 you find that even though they have some 04:26 theological differences they unite together 04:28 in societal purposes to establish laws 04:31 that they feel, reflects more of a Christian norm. 04:33 And so based on that the idea of antagonism towards secularism 04:38 and viewing secularism as a threat, you find that not just 04:41 Catholics, but also evangelicals 04:44 unite together with them in that view. 04:46 Do you think--well, I'm saying something that's accepted, 04:49 but what do you think of the role 04:51 of was it John Neuhaus in "First Things" magazine? 04:54 Do you think he was a major player in bringing this, 04:58 coming together or is that just a political--was he rallying 05:05 them to parallel political action? 05:09 I think that he was definitely-- he had definite impact 05:12 and had influence in reaching to out of the evangelicals, 05:16 and in essence what he did is he took a Catholic concept 05:20 of how society should be structured, 05:22 and was able to present it in language and with arguments 05:25 they could appeal to evangelicals. 05:27 And so he did a great effort in paving the way 05:31 for that and bringing about more of what we see today 05:33 in that unified effort among those groups. 05:36 Now coming back there to your question, 05:37 before you asked that you know, how do I see 05:39 it playing out in the future? 05:41 In essence I believe that there is more and one can see 05:45 this in the current Supreme Court here in America, 05:48 in the last 10 to 12 years, there has been more of a shift 05:52 to instead of taking a neutral stand towards religion, 05:56 there is more of a leaning of favoritism 05:58 towards religion in society. Oh, I think it's very much. 06:01 And I would say that that is a reflection 06:04 of how you find in society itself, 06:06 the picture that's being portrayed 06:08 that secularism is this giant that is opposing 06:11 and detrimental to religion. 06:12 And therefore, government needs to step in to help 06:15 the religious group that is-- being persecuted in essence. 06:19 I think I have mentioned on this program. 06:21 This is a good context. 06:22 I listen to a lot of things and a lot of Supreme Court 06:26 arguments whenever they broadcast it, 06:28 which is not all the time. 06:30 But I heard the justices on a case that I forget 06:34 riffing on for about two or three hours 06:37 and I sat transfixed and something came up 06:40 about church state separation. 06:43 And you know, the majority of them were Roman Catholics, 06:46 but that's a big misleading because they're not 06:48 all of the same political theological strap. 06:50 But the significance, I think is that they have a soft spot 06:54 for religion, they are hardly anti-religious. 06:57 And so they started riffing on about, was it acceptable 07:01 for the state to build a church for a given religion. 07:05 I would think not myself but I was shocked that they, 07:08 I forget who introduced it. 07:10 The justice that introduced it, he said, yes, it's okay. 07:14 Then the others chimed in, yes, it would be, okay, 07:16 as long as we built a church for anyone else 07:19 that wanted us to build a church. 07:21 And then they started joking about it, 07:23 then they went off from the other topic. 07:25 And every now and again, they would hop 07:27 back to this and laugh about it. 07:28 And to me it was like a wink, wink, nudge, nudge. 07:31 It's all, okay, as long as the state 07:34 is evenhanded in a support of religion. 07:36 Let me interject on that, that is one of the current 07:39 trends in modern church state relations, 07:42 is that--there has been a distinct period 07:45 in American history, where one can look at and say 07:48 this was the separationist time period and then a shift 07:52 for a period of about 15 years where there was debate 07:56 and discussion going on at the intellectual level 07:58 among justices, among constitutional scholars, 08:01 among historians that were revising American history. 08:04 And after that we're now moving more into 08:07 what is identified as in accommodationist perspective 08:10 where government should not be recognized 08:13 as neutral towards religion, but actually 08:15 proactive in supporting religion. 08:17 And again, I believe that it comes back to the premise 08:20 of what Catholics and others have painted as the picture 08:23 of secularism against religion and therefore, 08:26 there cannot be--government can take a neutral role 08:30 in other words, government either has to be out avertly 08:32 against religion like in the totalitarian 08:35 communist states, or supportive of religion 08:37 which is a Roman Catholic concept. 08:39 Yeah. And it's of course it's a bit of, I don't know 08:42 if the term is used here "Hobson's choice." 08:44 There's problems to go all one way or all the other. Correct. 08:47 I wouldn't want the US or any other civil government to tilt 08:52 against religion, but its a little fraud when they tilt. 08:57 Proactively supporting it. 08:58 And perhaps some of that tilt has been 09:00 accelerated by the fear of secularism. 09:04 But to me at the same time, it puts the light to the fact 09:06 that secularism is in the ascendancy. 09:09 I just don't see it. Correct. 09:10 I thick it's a straw man argument that enables more 09:15 of the same religious control. Correct. 09:18 You know, I would reiterate the aspect 09:21 that for the founding Fathers they recognized 09:24 a healthy separation between both church or religion, 09:28 and government or state, and the middle ground being 09:31 that government is to take a neutral arbitrary role 09:34 in regards to religion in society. 09:36 In other words, neither against nor for, 09:38 and each religion needs to flourish or flounder on its own. 09:42 Yeah. Leave it, leave it up 09:43 to--if it's truly of divine origin, it will flourish. 09:46 If its not, it's going to go in to extinction. 09:48 But government should do nothing to support either, or. 09:51 That's the classic understanding 09:54 of the framers of the constitution. 09:56 How much of that was in form by luck and another thing 09:59 is how much was just an expediency 10:01 of their own deism, we'll never know. 10:03 But they clearly held that view. Correct. 10:06 In fact, in my view in many ways, 10:08 they were thoroughly secular minded men, 10:11 who were very conversant in religious matters 10:14 and the--we're coming short on time, 10:17 but I do think that there's a little bit to be discussed 10:19 about what they thought would happen to the state level. 10:21 But federal government absolutely, they didn't want 10:24 religion in the purview of that government body. 10:27 That's true. So secularism, 10:30 are we going to count it out or in, is it a remaining threat 10:33 or you know, where do you think we go from here? 10:37 Benedict's continuing to rail against it, 10:39 but do you think it is a real threat? 10:41 Personally, I don't believe that it is a such a real threat, 10:45 as it's commonly posed to be in discussions at the moment. 10:48 And based on that I think, that it is actually more 10:51 of an opportunity that religions can take, 10:54 to say that there is this threat from secularism that gives them 10:57 the avenue in, to began more of a support from government 11:01 for religion and therefore, it allows religions 11:04 that have government support to become the dominant factor 11:08 in society and thus establish a union of church and state. 11:13 We live in an era where language is more often used 11:16 to deceive than to eliminate an issue. 11:20 For example, quantitative easing, 11:23 this is the test for today. 11:24 What does that mean? 11:26 I don't think anyone really knows it's a made up term. 11:28 It may affect our lives radically though. 11:31 Secularism, last time I heard that topic discussed, 11:35 it was postmodernism but that era has passed. 11:38 But now secularism, if you listen to Pope Benedict, 11:41 if you listen to many Protestant Christian radio stations 11:45 in the United States and listen to the radical write, 11:48 secularism is the mortal enemy. 11:51 I am inclined to think, that secularism 11:54 is most dangerous because it's most defensive. 11:56 None of us like to be laughed at, or ignored in reality, 12:00 secularism does that to religion. 12:02 But the sticks and stones really won't break our bones, 12:05 it's the true antagonist who very often is another 12:09 competing religion, or someone within your religion 12:12 that has a radically different viewpoint 12:14 they no doubt, put up with yours. 12:16 We need to comprehend secularism 12:18 I think as a positive area for evangelization. 12:25 We need to reach out to secularism. 12:27 It is not the threat the threat is "Godlessness," 12:30 which can happen within the churches easily. 12:34 For "Liberty Insider" this is Lincoln Steed. |
Revised 2014-12-17