Religion

Should every religion be protected by the civil magistrate? (or just humanism)?

BrianEschen wrote:Should every religion be protected by the civil magistrate? (or just humanism)?

According to Romans 13:4 a civil magistrate is to be a "minister of God" (it is mentioned twice in this verse). It is from the Greek word dδιάκονος (diakonos); where we get the word deacon from. I believe the implications here are pretty clear. A minister of God is not obligated to protect a false religion. Before someone jumps all over me and says that I'm advocating that the civil magistrate not protect Muslims, Hindus, Roman Catholics, etc., keep in mind that I am talking about the duty to protect the institution, not the people participating in the false religion. The magistrate is required to provide equal protection under the law to all citizens as human beings created in the image of God, but is only required to protect the one true religion (and I don't mean humanism).

Does anyone else have a different take on what it means to be a minister of God and how that relates to protecting false religions?

I feel your interpretation is sound. The Civil Magistrate should be protecting us, not fighting aginst us. From a historical perspective, the founders pushed to protect religion. Moderners like to interpret that to mean all religions, while the founders meant Christianity. The founders sought to protect religion by having the "Seperation of Church and State" to prevent one denomination from controlling all others. I had a conversation with Brian and he pointed out how Josiah and Jehu were kings and followed God's law. They purified the nation by ridding it of all idols and brought the nation back into obedience. I can see that and see how helpful it is, but I wouldn't trust our current government to purify our nation.

CheeseKing wrote:I wouldn't trust our current government to purify our nation.

That is true. There is a big difference between what a government ought to do and what they actually do.