Establishment or separation of Church and State?

Matt, it appears the difference is that in England the church is established by the state. That is not the case here. The 10 commandments nor the recognition of God in our society, establishes a state relgion. We are not mandated to just one denomination. We can follow our conscience here in the US. The State control of church is one of the factors in the American Revoultion. It was not separation of church and state, it was the mandating of state in the church. Our founders were against "orthodox" Christianity but for the free exercise of biblical Christianity. Orthodox was the mandated only denomination. It was popery. Our founders was against it. State mandated denomination is a failure, free exercise ihas been successful. Our problem here in the US is the religion of secular humanism is being promoted in our government and our society. That is what the battle in Montgomery Alabama is about. It is not about a piece of rock. They can take that stone out and grind it into sand, but their object is to remove it out of the hearts of the people and if you look at where our society has been headed for the last 43 years, you can see how the humanist are winning. However they do lose in the end.

 

I'm not quite sure just how accurate those assertions were about opposition to the state churches being a factor in the Revolution. While it is true that before the Revolution, only Rhode Island and Pennsylvania lacked a state church, it was specifically to garner support for the rebel cause that colonial leaders sought to stop oppression of dissenting churches. Pragmatically, because they had grown so large as a result of the Great Awakening, the Baptists, Methodists, and Presbyterians were needed on the American side.

The Anglican Church was the established church in most of the colonies, but outside of Rhode Island, New England was solidly Congregationalist. None of the colonies had ever established Catholicism or Presbyterianism. When the British took New Netherland they replaced the Dutch Reformed Church with Anglicanism, but granted religious toleration to all New Yorkers.

After the Revolution, because of its unpopular ties to England, the Anglican Church was cut loose, and the Methodists separated from their mother church. Congregationalism hung on much longer, however, eventually joined by Presbyterianism. It wasn't until the 1830s that the last state finally decided to disestablish its churches.

Remember, the First Amendment didn't apply to the states in any way until at least 1870. The Bill of Rights prevented the federal government from establishing a national church and from interfering with the states' own state-church arrangements. It took the states quite awhile to unanimously decide on separating church and state, which was a decision they made without unlawful federal interference.

 

Separation of Church and State is a Baptist Distinctive, and as such, we're all duty bound to live by it.

 

Johnv said:

Go ahead Johnv. I will follow Christ not the false doctrine of separation of church and state.

 

You're a Baptist and you're bound by it. The Baptist Distinctives are mandatory. By your affiliation, you're required to accept Separation of Church and State as biblical doctrine; it's not optional.

If you think it's false doctrine, you must renounce your affiliation as a Baptist.

 

If every member of a Baptist church had to adhere to everything that is considered a Baptist distinctive, there would be you Johnv and a handful of others who would be able to call themselves Baptists.

 

Everything "that is considered" a Baptist Distinctive? There aren't that many. They're not ambiguous. Do you even know them?

 

Whose definition are you going to use for the separation of the State from the church?

 

The distinctive is not "separation of state from church", or "separation of church from state". It's Separation of church AND state". They're both separate FROM each other.

The Statement of Baptist Faith adopted by the SBC in 2000 states the following regarding the distinctive:

Church and state should be separate. The state owes to every church protection and full freedom in the pursuit of its spiritual ends. In providing for such freedom no ecclesiastical group or denomination should be favored by the state more than others. Civil government being ordained of God, it is the duty of Christians to render loyal obedience thereto... The church should not resort to the civil power to carry on its work... A free church in a free state is the Christian ideal, and this implies the right of free and unhindered access to God on the part of all men, and the right to form and propagate opinions in the sphere of religion without interference by the civil power.

 

johnv said:

WEIRD
Mandatory, weird. I nor anyone in our Baptist church, signed anything making it mandatory to believe a false doctrine. We are not required to go along with anything that is not biblically correct. I think I will stay baptist just to bug you.

 

Ask you pastor of the Baptist Distinctives are optional. They are not.

There was a thread not that long ago saying a certain church was not Baptist because they did not require a "Believer's Baptism". This, too, is a Baptist Distinctive, and we're bound to adhere to it. Baptist churches can't allow unbaptized members, and can't baptize infants because it's against the Baptist Distinctives.

It's interesting that a beliver's baptism is mantatory, but separation of church and state is not.

 

It does not mean that the are mutually exclusive. It does not mean that if you are religious, you can't participate in the government nor allow your religious beliefs to effect how you perform your duties. It did not mean that the founding fathers couldn't hire a Christian Chaplain for the Congress. It did not mean that that schools could not be funded with decidedly Christian curriculum. It did not mean that prayers to God could not be given by officals of the Government when acting in their capacity as that official. It did mean that they did not want one group facored over another. It did not mean that they felt that the faiths, or the lack thereof, of atheists, Muslims, Jews, and Catholics should be eaually displayed, just that there would be no law prohibiting them from exercising their religion which would also assure that no law would be passed preventing Christians from exercising their rights as well.

 

This may be a shocker to you, buddy, but NNE is "duty bound" to live by 'Baptist distinctives.' And even if anyone is-- then he is not--> since one of those 'distinctives' is freedom of conscience.

 

This is true. One is a Baptist because he follows the Distinctives

- not, one follows the Distictives because he is a Baptist.

 

I think the vast majority of people who are Christians in Baptist churches are Christians who happen to attend a Baptist Church. I doubt they are enthralled by what theologians determine are "Baptist distinctives" and then become Baptists.

 

Ken,

The Baptist Distinctives are normally taught in a Baptist Church. The Christians who don't know what they are and stand by them by virtue of general Bible knowledge are Baptists, they just don't know it yet. Those Christians who reject Baptist Distinctives are not Baptist whether or not they attend a Baptist Church.

Thanks ------Bart
P.S. I was wrong on that part of the Morgan family, I have not met the one you questioned me about, but may soon and would like to.

 

I have never heard separation of church and state taught in my Baptist church.

 

Then I think you would find that a bunch of members of Baptist churches aren't Baptists by your definition. Not that it matters in the long run. Salvation isn't dependent on being a Baptist.