Reepicheep on The Anchored Argosy

If shepherds had more wisdom, perhaps we wouldn't feel the need to pose a dichotomy between the sacred and the political. But, because as a church we still struggle to articulate and teach deep wisdom, we fall prey to these tribal identity traps, and thus feel a need to say "don't sacralize politics and vice versa", as a hedge against our worse tendencies. It's the old problem of "everyone doing what is right in their own eyes". I recently ran across a really good example of this dichotomy in action, and how as a church we tend to lose the plot. Someone was complaining about the recent scandal of some Church of England ministers casually baptizing folks from the Middle East who were claiming asylum, to undergird their asylum claims. Ostensibly, these ministers were typical liberals, more concerned about social justice than the truth. But the conservative complainer was lodging his complaint in precisely the wrong area. He was miffed that these casually baptized folks were sullying the national identity, enabled by the Ministers. It made him feel dirty as an Englishman, or something. What he should have complained about was not the asylum status of the immigrants, but the casual nature of the baptisms. If they were true converts, then who the hell cares if that resulted in legitimate asylum claims? Let the Englishman feel dirty, if they're real Christians.