1. G-d and Caesar
– Intro
This is the third of a three part
series on G-d and Caesar. It is a look at the way Christian symbols and
identification have been utilized in the last three national elections. I thank
you for coming this morning to consider these troubling considerations.
2. Review – Politics Under a Divine Imprimatur
In the first session, we began
by discussing how the January 6 insurrection at the U.S. Capitol was marked by
three patterns of expression. The first was nationalism, the second the use of
deadly force and the third was a claim that these actions were consistent with
if not ordained by the god of the Christian tradition.
That session focused on the work of
John Dominic Crossan in which he delineated the values of the Kingdom of Ceasar
and the Kingdom of G_d. The conclusion there was that, ironically, the MAGA
movement which has claimed the mantle of Christian faith is in fact marked by
the values of the kingdom of the Caesar who killed Jesus.
In the second session, we discussed
how the archetypes of messiah and antichrists. We discussed how Donald Trump
has been constructed in messianic terms by his followers. We examined how
messianic figures arise in times of great social tensions and how some within
the American electorate have interpreted our own times through the lens of the
Apocalypse of John of Patmos with its predominant figure of an Antichrist.
Finally we considered how the understanding of antichrists, plural, have historically
been applied to those whose values stood in opposition to those of the Jesus
movement. Again, while I am unwilling to cast Donald Trump or any of his regime
as the Antichrist, it seems apparent to me that the values of MAGA are often
the very antitheses of those of the Jesus movement, hence we are looking at the
spirit of the Antichrist or antichrists, plural.
3. Democracy and Calvinism
In this session, we will broaden our discussion a bit to examine how the values of a particular tradition within western Protestantism is impacting American political thought today. Our focus today will be the role that the thought of Jean Calvin and the Calvinist tradition have played in the rise of MAGA to power.
4. “A Republic, if you can keep it…”
5. Roots in Judaic, Christian Thought
While there are few instances of direct democracy in America - the New England town hall meetings and Iowa caucuses a couple of exceptions to that rule - ideals of democracy have informed our politics in America since our beginnings. Democracy is rooted in values that arise from our Judeo-Christian heritage. The primary root of democracy is the imago dei, the image of G_d that all human beings are said to bear and which we are bound to respect. From our common origins in G-d, presumptions of human dignity, the right to live fully human lives and the equality of the value of each human being all arise.
The ministry of Jesus provides a
textbook argument for that equality based in the divine image. Jesus readily
crossed socially constructed lines to engage those his culture saw as less than
fully human – lepers, prostitutes, tax collectors, Samaritans, Roman soldiers,
children – and inevitably affirmed their humanity in his exchanges with them – You
are the salt of the Earth, you are the light of the world! St. Paul
provides a bit more spotted record though some of his more memorable statements,
such as his letter to the Galatians, pointed toward this equality under the
rubric of the divine image: There is no longer Jew or Greek, there is no
longer slave or free, there is no longer male and female; for all of you are
one in Christ Jesus.
6. Presumptions of Human Dignity, Equality
Democracy presumes that if everyone
is equal, everyone should have an equal voice in decision making for our
collective lives together. With equal access to that process, decisions can be
made by majority votes of the electorate.
But a true democracy is more than a
mere majoritarian process. The obligation to respect the rights and dignity of
all citizens prevents minorities from being tyrannized by majorities, a value that
is written into our constitution itself. Democracy does not vest in majorities
the power to vote its minorities off the island.
American democratic theory is deeply
grounded in Christian thought. Jefferson’s assertion in the Preamble to the
Declaration of Independence that “all men are created equal” reflects the
notion of equality upon which democracy is based as do the protections against
the tyranny of the majority in the Bill of Rights for which Jefferson strongly
advocated. Yet, America has always been a work in process, its ideals ever the
measure against which its efforts – and failures - to meet those ideals are
measured from the Trail of Tears to concentration camps of Japanese-American
citizens in WWII to the roundups of immigrants today.
But the values of the Gospel and the
Hebrew Torah are not the only religious values that have shaped American
democracy.
7. Role of Jean Calvin
Scholars of American religious history estimate that at the time of the American Revolution, up to three of every four colonists were affiliated with a religious tradition influenced by Jean Calvin. Among the more readily identifiable scions of Calvin were the Puritans of New England, the Scotts-Irish Presbyterians of the middle colonies who quickly spread down the Appalachian chain to the west and the low-church Anglicans of the southern colonies all of whom evidenced the theological influence of the man some called the tyrant of Geneva.
Calvin was one of the major
contributors to the thought of the Reformation along with Martin Luther. His Institutes
of Religion would be required reading in America’s new universities, most
born to train clergy. All of the Framers were familiar with its provisions. But
while the Institutes provided aspects to insure the democratic republic would
survive, a number of implications arise from the Institutes that impact
the question of whether democracy can continue in America today.
8. Positive Contributions of Calvinism to American
Democracy
Calvinist anthropology distrusted the human capacity to make decisions given the belief that our souls were tainted from depravity from our births. Thus, there was a major concern to keep power from becoming too heavily vested in any one sector of the new government. The Framers would divide power into three branches, the legislative branch to make laws, the executive branch to carry them out and the judicial branch to determine the constitutionality of the language of the law, the behaviors of those seeking to enforce them and their impacts on the citizens. To insure that no single branch could coopt either or both of the other two, the Framers created powers each branch would have over the other to check their powers and keep them balanced among the three branches. This is classic Calvinist thought at work and one of the gifts from that tradition to our system of governance.
9. Fending Off the Tyranny of the Majority
Another way this distrust of power played out was in the protection of Civil Liberties in the Bill of Rights. Some of the Framers held memories of having been subject to the tyranny of majorities in their homelands. The Constitution was thus quickly amended to prevent that from happening in the new world they were creating. And after the Civil War, a similar protection of the civil rights of the formerly enslaved people would be added to the Constitution through the 13th, 14th and 15 Amendments.
The Calvinist ethos was rooted in
the Hebrew notion of covenant. The very notion of a commonwealth meant that its
citizens and their government made mutual pledges to one another. It’s arguable
that along with the thought of Thomas Hobbes and Jean Jacques Rousseau and
their concept of the social contract, the Preamble to the Constitution also
reflects the Calvinist notion of covenant. It begins with “We the people of the
United States,” states the purposes for the new government and ends with the
words “do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States.” This covenantal form is one of the bases for
sociologist Robert Bellah’s description of our democracy as a “civil religion.”
In this understanding, citizens and
their government have mutual duties to one another. Those duties included the
obligation to engage the electoral process. The Calvinist ethos is evident on
election day in New England where the entire citizenry of some of its small
towns will have cast their ballots within a couple hours of the polls opening
and reported their vote.
So, at some level, American
democracy is in the debt of Calvinism.
10. The Dark Side of Calvinism
But there was a decided dark side to Calvinist thinking as well.
In his Institutes
Calvin developed the understandings of Augustine of Hippo’s construct of
original sin, declaring that all human beings were utterly depraved, our best
intentions and behaviors tainted by sin. This pessimistic anthropology would
play out in some important ways in constructing the new American democratic
republic.
Calvin’s construct of G_d arose from
medieval honor/shame cultures in which the sovereign was absolute and whose
honor could not be tarnished without punishment. Given that human sin was seen
as an offense against the supreme sovereign of the universe, Calvin’s theology
taught that everyone deserved to go to Hell. He described human beings
generally as the damned.
However, Calvin argued that amidst
this universal damnation there were some who were elected to salvation. But no
one knew who. Sociologist Max Weber observed that among Protestants impacted by
Calvin’s theology, those who worked hard, lived respectable lives and met with
financial success appeared to be blessed by G_d, thus revealing that they were
the elect. Hence, Calvinists worked like hell to feel confident they were not
going there. And Weber would locate the rise of the capitalist system in this pattern
which he called the Protestant work ethic.
11. Obedience to Divinely Appointed Sovereigns
But there was more to Calvinism’s
impact on the societies in which it became dominant than its financial aspects.
Like all systems based in the thought of St. Paul, a duty to obey power holders
was seen as paramount among one’s duties as Christians. And Calvin added that
all power holders had been appointed by G_d for that purpose. Thus, to obey
one’s sovereigns was to obey G_d. and Calvin’s Institutes argued against
rebellion stating that if a tyrannical leader came to power, he represented deserved
punishment for human depravity.
All of this served both to preserve
the status quo with its power holders and those subject to that power as well
as to keep those deemed subservient - women, children and enslaved people - in
their places. That provision went hand in hand with another aspect of this
system.
12. Godly Cities
This also raises the dangers of
dualistic thinking. The fear of going to hell is unbearable for most people.
Hence, our tendency is to find ways to repress our own darkness into our
Shadows. But that darkness doesn’t stay put. Inevitably it manages to be
projected onto others. It’s always handy for a godly society to have a
designated group seen as the damned for scapegoats.
What this has meant is in the that
places where Calvinists have been able to gain political power, they have often
chosen to use that power in ways that punished those they declared to be the
damned. Consider the blue laws that were dominant here in Florida until the
turn of the century. Think of the current war on drag shows here in our state.
And I would say that it is no accident that in a heavily Calvinist Bible Belt
practicing first chattel slavery and later Jim Crow segregation, the damned
have always been racially identifiable.
13. Coming to a Church Near You
I should note that Calvinism’s
impact has
not been relegated to the exercise of governmental power. The
Anglican tradition, of which our Episcopal Church is a national church, was
strongly impacted by Calvinist thought. Some of the theologians who midwifed the
Church of England’s break from Rome had been schooled in Geneva. The words we
say as we offer the communion to our parishioners was a major concern for the
crafters of the Book of Common Prayer ending in a compromise which placed both
the Calvinist understanding of the communion as simply a memorial service side
by side with the Catholic vision of the communion as sacramental. Hence was
born the Anglican Via Media, the middle way which is both Catholic and
Reformed.
For those of you who have on
occasion sought boring sermon relief by checking out the back of the prayer
book, you will have discovered the Historical Documents section containing the
Articles of Religion. If you get as far as Section 17, you’ll hear the voice of
Calvin speaking of predestination and election. While American clergy do not
have to subscribe to these articles as our brothers and sisters in the UK do,
this historical document along with the two quadrilateral statements and the
Athanasian Creed do provide an idea of the various theological understandings
that have impacted our tradition historically.
14. Notions of an Elect are the Antithesis of
Democracy
While the notion of an elect is consistent with both oligarchies and authoritarian government, it is the antithesis of democracy. Starting with a Calvinist anthropology, if you do not value human beings, seeing them as depraved, then you will not value their agency as citizens and feel no compunction about preventing its exercise. If you do not believe G_d has any concern for those you presume to be the damned in the next world, what obligations would the elect hold toward them in this world?
A power-bearing elect by definition
implies that everyone other than the elect are incapable of making good
decisions. Given this view, it’s easy to understand how voting rights would be
curtailed. Indeed, even elections become obsolete in such a system. As Donald Trump
said in the last election – Vote for me this time and you’ll never have to
vote again.
15. Now, Imagine….
Now, given this, imagine a country
where a handful of almost exclusively white straight males who see themselves
as the elect exercise virtually all of the power. Imagine a country where the
ability to vote by persons of color is systematically blocked by increasingly repressive
obstacles. Imagine a country where people of color, people who do not identify
as heterosexual, binary gendered, and women who have not lived into socially
constructed gender roles are erased from public memory. Imagine a country where
the elect are privileged to determine what books can be present in libraries
and what teachers can teach in their classrooms.
Imagine a country where in vitro
fertilization is banned because gay couples and single persons are using it to
become parents. Imagine a country where the governmental agency that was
charged with insuring kids with disabilities can receive a free appropriate
public education and those from impoverished families could find financial aid
to follow their dreams in attending college is dismantled. Imagine a country
when those we once saw as fellow citizens are now demonized by power holders as
our enemies because of their political visions, their sexuality, their gender
identification, their race and their place of origin.
16. Framers Rolling in Their Graves
No doubt the Framers, albeit schooled in
Calvin’s thought, would find this alarming. Again, the notions of checks and
balances is patently Calvinist as is the notion of civic duty, the obligation
to participate in the electoral process in a manner designed to serve the
common - rather than the individual or tribal - good. Much is lost when the
dualism of the elect v. the damned and the obligation to submit to authority becomes
the primary aspect of Calvin’s thought utilized.
So will democracy in America
survive? Will we choose to keep our democratic republic, as Franklin challenged
us? Time will tell.
17 . QUESTIONS TO CONSIDER
I want to thank you for your
attention, for remaining here, through what have undoubtedly been troubling
considerations. And now I have some questions to consider.
1. What
difference do understandings of G-d and human nature make in the governments
you create? What difference does it make in the churches you create?
2. Who are the
elect in our culture? Who are the damned?
3. Benjamin
Franklin said the Framers had given us a republic if we could keep it. Can
we? Will we?
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
Harry
Scott Coverston
Orlando,
Florida
If the
unexamined life is not worth living, surely an unexamined belief system, be it
religious or political, is not worth holding. Most things worth considering do
not come in sound bites.
Those who believe religion and politics aren't connected don't understand either. – Mahatma Gandhi
For what does G-d
require of you but to do justice, and to love kindness, and to walk humbly with
your G-d? - Micah 6:8, Hebrew Scriptures
Do not be daunted by the enormity of the world's grief. Do justly, now. Love mercy, now. Walk humbly now. You are not obligated to complete the work, but neither are you free to abandon it. - Rabbi Rami Shapiro, Wisdom of the Jewish Sages (1993)
© Harry Coverston, 2025
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