Participants: Lincoln Steed (Host), Nicolas Miller
Series Code: LI
Program Code: LI000354A
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00:26 Welcome to the Liberty Insider.
00:28 This is a program bringing you discussion, news, evaluation, 00:31 up-to-date information on religious liberty. 00:35 My name is Lincoln Steed, editor of Liberty Magazine 00:38 and my guest on the program Dr. Nic Miller, lawyer, author, 00:43 college professor, history professor... 00:45 Andrews University. 00:47 At Andrews University. 00:48 Really a multifaceted, renaissance man. 00:52 Oh, you're very kind, Lincoln. Yeah. Good on you. 00:55 And... 00:56 Am I gonna kick him under the table today? 00:59 I was... 01:00 You got ahead of me. 01:02 I thought better of the joke 01:03 but years ago when we did the program we used to... 01:06 Kick each other under the table. 01:08 Cue each other under the table. 01:09 It was Lincoln's first, he used to preach all the time 01:12 and he wasn't used to give and take 01:13 of a television program. 01:15 And so he'd launch into a monologue 01:16 and I have to remind him where he was, 01:18 where he could... 01:20 Well, I think... 01:21 He's developed over the years. Position that you relies over. 01:25 Anyway the topic for today. Yeah. 01:27 Let's talk more about the Protestant Reformation, 01:29 which again I'll boost your book. 01:32 500 year anniversary of the Protestant Reformation. 01:36 Reformation and the Remnant discusses 01:38 the ideas of many of the leading reformers 01:41 and, help, how they help solve problems 01:43 in our church today, 01:44 few churches discussing or even arguing 01:47 about creation and evolution, 01:49 ordination, ordination of women, 01:51 last day events anything along those lines. 01:53 I didn't know you got all those covered. 01:54 The reformers have something to say about it 01:57 and so it's a book, can be got on Amazon 01:59 and in Kindle and in various places so... 02:02 Very good. 02:03 But we were talking about the last time 02:06 the building of the separation of church and state 02:09 based on the teaching 02:11 of Luther's priesthood of all believers. 02:12 I think it's the most important thing 02:15 to come out of the reformation in some ways. 02:17 Well, and, you know, 02:18 justification by faith is pretty important. 02:20 But as far as an impact on civil society, 02:23 I think that the priesthood of all believers, 02:27 which lead to broader acceptance 02:29 of democratic kinds of government 02:32 but also the separation of church and state. 02:35 But we left with the question 02:36 once you separate church and state, 02:39 what realm or what room is there 02:41 for the state to deal with matters of morality? 02:45 You know, some people say, "You can't legislate." 02:46 Once you believe 02:48 in the separation of church and state, 02:49 you can't legislate morality. 02:50 Well, it seems to me 02:52 the state does legislate morality, doesn't it? 02:54 Well, I think so 02:57 but there are some people today... 02:58 Is it Christian morality that's maybe? 03:00 Okay. 03:01 But the state is dealing, 03:02 by definition is dealing with morality. 03:04 Murder, theft, perjury, adultery all these things... 03:06 It deals with interrelations between human things. 03:08 Human things. 03:09 That's morality. Which are morality. 03:10 Well, let me put it, 03:12 let me put the argument to you like this then. 03:14 I had a professor at university that I attended 03:19 who was devout Catholic historian. 03:21 And he made the argument that he and I agreed 03:24 that the priesthood of all believers 03:25 led to this importance of the individual 03:28 and the separation of church and state. 03:30 Well, he argues 03:31 that the separation of church and state 03:33 lead to societies that we have in the West 03:35 that cannot agree on any moral values 03:39 except for the production and consumption 03:43 of more things, of goods. 03:45 And, therefore, human rights, and order, and the environment, 03:50 the environment itself through global warming 03:52 and degradation we are threatening 03:54 because our only shared value is production and consumption. 03:58 Well, yeah, he is right, but think about it. 04:01 Is that what Protestantism has done? 04:02 Is he right about that? 04:04 We need to return to the medieval church? 04:05 It seems to me that the Protestant Reformation 04:07 is, as I said in another discussion, 04:13 led directly through the wars of religion in Europe 04:15 to the establishment of the modern states. 04:18 The secular, pluralist state 04:20 that allows room for all religions. 04:21 Right. 04:23 And then continuing beyond that was still rivalry 04:26 between Catholic states and the Protestant states. 04:31 And then, you know, 04:32 I'm very Anglo-centric on English history 04:34 but, you know, we studied endlessly 04:36 the rivalry between Catholic Spain 04:39 and Protestant England. 04:41 And there is no question that England, 04:43 and the Netherlands, 04:44 and other emerging Protestant states 04:48 became very business oriented. 04:50 Right. 04:51 Because it released the individual 04:53 from a certain status to control, church state, 04:58 it was very centralized 05:00 and I think it's not just random, 05:02 I think business and trade 05:04 and all the rest blossomed under Protestantism. 05:07 And then as Protestantism became 05:11 about the passage of time less spiritual, 05:15 we've got capitalism. 05:16 I think capitalism came straight out 05:18 of the Protestant Reformation. 05:19 So is this Catholic critique correct 05:22 that therefore you only thing you have left 05:24 is the production and consumption of goods... 05:26 If you lose your spirituality. 05:27 Protestantism devoid of spirituality 05:30 is capitalism in its purest nastiest form. 05:33 But if... But if... 05:35 And I'll even go one further. 05:36 And then the next stage of that is fascism. 05:40 Well, if so... 05:42 And we're on that way. 05:43 If Protestantism believes 05:44 in the separation of church and state, 05:46 how is that not just devaluation 05:49 or the loss of spirituality 05:50 but we would say essential teaching 05:52 of it is separation of church and state. 05:54 Therefore, my Catholic friend would say, 05:57 "No, it's not the dissolution of Protestantism 05:59 that's coming up with raw capitalism. 06:01 It is the very logic of Protestantism 06:03 when you separate the church and the state, 06:05 you separate the state 06:07 from all moral transcendent values." 06:11 What do you say to that? Well, to a point. 06:13 I think it's true. 06:14 But the missing element, 06:16 and I'm always talking about this in Liberty... 06:20 Well, I put it another way, what I said once, 06:21 there is way too much religion in the world, 06:23 way too much religion, not enough spirituality. 06:26 All right. 06:27 And religion without spirituality 06:29 taken to its extreme 06:31 was the old world church and state conflation. 06:34 And they didn't have to worry about spirituality, 06:36 you control religious behavior. 06:38 Right. 06:39 That sort of short circuited the thing. 06:41 The ideal is what Protestantism brought about, 06:44 separation of church and state, 06:45 where the private spiritual life 06:47 is vibrant and alive, 06:49 and the state just facilitates the mechanical operation 06:52 of individual lives. 06:54 But you take away the spirituality in the society 06:58 of a Protestant structure like the United States was, 07:03 you've got real trouble. 07:05 And I think that's true but I do also think 07:07 that there is something 07:09 that my Catholic friend is overlooking. 07:11 And that is there was a robust heritage 07:14 of natural law morality 07:17 that Protestants cultivated, kept alive, developed. 07:21 And so they believe 07:22 in the separation of church and state 07:24 but that didn't mean 07:25 the separation of the state in morality. 07:26 You're not heading towards Jefferson, are you? 07:28 Well, not just Jefferson, all the American founders... 07:31 But the view that 07:32 they would talk about wasn't a Protestant view. 07:35 Well, the Declaration of Independence 07:37 uses language, life and liberty, 07:40 that all men are created equal, 07:41 they are endowed by their Creator 07:43 I like the language that their idea of natural law 07:46 on the testimony of Jefferson alone 07:48 was something more... 07:52 Well, it was certainly non-Christian, 07:54 it was more esoteric. 07:55 Well, it wasn't... 07:57 And let's get real direct on it. 07:58 It was more what the masons are pushing as the grandmaster 08:02 that lies even beyond all religious designation. 08:04 It wasn't anti-Christian. 08:05 It was consistent with Christianity. 08:07 No. No. 08:08 It saw itself as superior to Christianity, 08:10 Christianity was just a later development. 08:11 John Locke was a strong exponent of it. 08:14 And John Locke was a head of Puritan background 08:16 and was a committed Christian. 08:19 Jefferson was lucky and his view went to this, 08:23 I mean, nearly all masons not by accident. 08:26 Because this is what I was trying 08:28 to get in another discussion. 08:29 There is really a line of secular rights of men 08:35 that you can't say was developed 08:38 by the reformation, it sort of a yin-yang thing. 08:40 Well, it came from the French Revolution 08:43 had a rights of men, didn't they? 08:44 Well, the French Revolution is where it came to a bad end. 08:46 Fraternity, equality... 08:48 Because it wasn't linked to biblical faith. 08:50 It wasn't related to a Christian outlook. 08:54 But the French Revolution, people forget, 08:55 it had its genesis 08:57 nearly as much as Luther's rebellion 08:59 in the overreach and the votary of church. 09:03 No, I think that's right. 09:04 But Madison, even the more orthodox Christian founders 09:09 and Madison was more orthodox than Jefferson, 09:12 they had a strong belief 09:14 in natural law and natural rights. 09:16 And this was a distinctly going back 09:18 to Hugo Grotius, John Locke. 09:19 Right. 09:21 And these were exceptional Protestant thinkers. 09:22 It's all coming together. 09:24 These were convergent streams but I think... 09:27 So they believed in a morality that could be accessed 09:30 through human reason, intuition, and understanding 09:34 that wasn't dependent on the Bible per se, 09:37 was consistent with the Bible. 09:38 But you could legislate it without violating 09:41 this separation of church and state. 09:42 My point is that actually was a developing 09:47 human sense of individuality and secularism 09:51 that was distinct from religious expression. 09:53 Well, I would say they were two... 09:55 I'm trying not give it labels, some labels. 09:57 But there were two kinds, there were two kinds 09:59 of natural law reason 10:01 of one which was more of reformation, 10:03 one which was less religious. 10:05 And so there is a much more secular version 10:07 that has become more dominant in 20th century America. 10:11 But... 10:12 Because the spirituality and even the, 10:14 not just personal spirituality, 10:17 even the acceptance of the authority of scripture 10:20 in its divine origin and so gone. 10:23 No, wouldn't be accepted 10:24 by the secularist view of that morality. 10:26 No, even by religionists. 10:28 You know, the Church of England, 10:29 I can remember... 10:31 Forget the Catholic Church for this argument. 10:33 But I can remember a few years ago 10:34 one of the archbishops of Canterbury 10:37 headlines in Australia was branded 10:39 as the atheist archbishop, 10:44 he didn't believe in the virgin birth, 10:45 he didn't believe in miracles, 10:47 he didn't believe in the resurrection. 10:50 You know, that sort of the bitter fruit 10:52 of logic applied to spiritual things. 10:56 Yes. Yes. 10:57 You know, that is true. 10:59 I think we... 11:01 And it's part of what I'm saying 11:02 is the devolution of the reformation. 11:04 Well, at our founding there were three options 11:08 in approaching religion and public life. 11:10 And we only sometimes remember two of them, 11:13 so there was Puritan, New England, 11:16 which basically had a theocratic outlook. 11:18 And was not keen on separation of church and state. 11:20 Was not keen on the separation of church and state and said, 11:22 you only get morality through the Bible, 11:24 and the state needs morality, 11:25 therefore you have to combine the two. 11:27 Then there was 11:28 the South Virginia and Jefferson, 11:31 which was more secularist enlightenment, 11:33 Bible as a side we only get morality 11:35 through humanism effectively which is over Christianity, 11:42 and sets Christianity aside 11:43 but the middle colonies 11:45 which is where the dissenting Protestants win. 11:48 We talked about the Anabaptists, 11:49 and the Baptists, the Quakers, 11:52 they had a healthy regard for biblical truth 11:55 but that was for the privates' fear, 11:57 but in the public's fear 11:58 there was truth 12:01 that was consistent with the Bible 12:02 but derived from natural law and principles 12:06 that was applicable in the state. 12:07 The Quakers were sort of I'll shoot to it. 12:09 They didn't have much parallel with other religious groups. 12:12 Well, they came, 12:13 they were essentially related to the radical reformation, 12:16 they have things in common with the Anabaptists. 12:17 They were less biblical than... 12:19 The internal life. 12:20 Like being our church, 12:22 you know, the spiritual formation type of Christianity 12:24 where you think long and hard 12:26 and the flooding of knowledge will coming into you sort of... 12:29 They emphasize the internal light 12:31 but it did give them a strong sense 12:32 of the importance 12:33 of individual spiritual preferences. 12:35 And they were persecuted pretty strongly in Boston 12:37 and another places. 12:39 Yes, they were. Yes. 12:40 I think this is a good time to take a break. 12:42 I can see you, you wanting me to interview you. 12:44 You're right. 12:47 We'll be back shortly, stay with us 12:49 and, you know, I want to bring out some more 12:51 contemporary aspects 12:55 of what the Protestant Reformation 12:57 means to us today. |
Revised 2017-04-13