Why the Dominionists are Wrong

What it is

Dominionism, also called Reconstructionism, is a political movement on the Christian right that says, basically, that

1. Only Christians should hold political office.
2. Old Testament Law (with the usual revisions and caveats from the New Testament) should be the law of the land and trump all secular law.

More detail can be found here.

In other words, these are folks who want to establish a Christian theocracy in the United States, and presumably in other countries.

My response

I hope everyone understands that mainstream Christianity, at least in the US and Commonwealth countries, is very much FOR separation of church and state and AGAINST theocracy. As C.S. Lewis put it back in the '50s, theocracy is the worst possible form of government, since it gives the state the highest pretensions.

I do not want to see the US ruled like ancient Israel, the Byzantine Empire, Calvin's Geneva, or Spain under the Inquisition. Not to mention the Lord's Resistance Army.

To me, the Christian spirit in politics is exemplified by people like William Wilberforce, Julia Ward Howe, Dorothy Day, Raoul Wallenberg, and M.L. King, Jr.

The Dominionists remind me of the Israelites in 1st Samuel who told the old prophet, “make us a king to judge us like all the nations.” The Lord’s response was:

1 Samuel 8:11-18. "This will be the manner of the king that shall reign over you: He will take your sons, and appoint them for himself, for his chariots, and to be his horsemen; and some shall run before his chariots. 12 And he will appoint him captains over thousands, and captains over fifties; and will set them to ear his ground, and to reap his harvest, and to make his instruments of war, and instruments of his chariots. 13 And he will take your daughters to be confectionaries, and to be cooks, and to be bakers. 14 And he will take your fields, and your vineyards, and your oliveyards, even the best of them, and give them to his servants. 15 And he will take the tenth of your seed, and of your vineyards, and give to his officers, and to his servants. 16 And he will take your menservants, and your maidservants, and your goodliest young men, and your asses, and put them to his work. 17 He will take the tenth of your sheep: and ye shall be his servants. 18 And ye shall cry out in that day because of your king which ye shall have chosen you; and the LORD will not hear you in that day."

But they replied "Nay, but we will have a king over us." And in the end, as he so often does, the Lord gave them what they wanted.

I, for one, will fight with all I've got to make sure that never happens in the United States. I don't want some Taliban-like regime to impose Sharia in the US and I don't want the Christian Taliban to do that sort of thing either. I don't want to see witches burned at the stake; prostitutes burned alive if their father is a priest; homosexuals and sabbath-breakers executed; or female prisoners made into concubines of occupying troops. Humans are fallen; human beings given great power almost never handle it well. I like democracy and human rights, and I will do anything I can to stop the Christian fascists.

And I feel that way because I am a Christian, because I think human beings are made in the image of God and enjoy God-given natural rights, and because I take the salvation of souls seriously! Aside from the sheer nastiness and repression inherent in living under such a regime, I can't imagine a better recipe for turning Christians into legalist hypocrites and non-Christians into resentful second-class citizens who associate Christ and Christ's church with tyranny and oppression. I think Dominionism/Reconstructionism is of the Devil. Period.