Pray for the City
An article for The Living Church's Blog, first published 12/12/19
“But seek the welfare of the city where I have sent you into exile, and pray to the Lord on its behalf, for in its welfare you will find your welfare” (Jer. 29:7).
In his recent piece for Covenant, George Sumner offers a reflection on an eminently reasonable question before the church: Why not get out of the (legal) marriage business altogether? Bishop Sumner’s reflection was prompted by Beto O’Rourke’s ill-considered and even less well-informed remarks about doing away with tax-exempt status for religious organizations that don’t toe the current preferred public policy line. But it is a question that has been considered for many years, even before the current questions relating to same-sex marriage were before us.
So why not “go European,” as Bishop Sumner puts it? Why not amend our canons so that clergy do not sign marriage licenses and only bless the unions of people already in possession of a valid marriage certificate from the secular authorities? Currently, of course, this would require that they get married by a justice of the peace. A complete shift to the system Sumner describes would take a change in the law in most if not all states.
I concede that the proposal may indeed be the most practical way forward for the Church. That doesn’t mean I like it, but I’ve given up on the pretense that I have to like something in order for it to be the case. This proposal, and indeed the more extreme proposal that churches lose tax-exempt status, either as a result of their beliefs or wholesale through a revocation of the idea of religious tax exemption itself, might actually be beneficial to the overall health of the Church. In the case of marriage, removing the legal question would likely take some of the heat from debates around marriage in the various communions, because only the most religiously committed would even see the point of having a priest bless their union.
In the case of the revocation of religious tax-exempt status, I think that this sort of clear demarcation between church and state might be the best medicine to help American Christians realize that neither patriotism nor, especially, nationalism is part of our faith, and that our baptismal certificate is our most significant citizenship document.
Despite the hope I would hold out that such clarity would be a gift and a means to combat a very clear sickness in the church in the United States, I cannot neglect to pay heed to the fact that it would likely mean the closing of numerous smaller congregations, or at the very least a major shift in the way we do ministry.
Even more importantly, I hear the words of Jeremiah ringing in my head to “seek the welfare of the city where I have sent you into exile…” (Jer. 29:7). I cannot in good conscience support such a shift in our canons, or a policy shift in our nation to do away with religious tax exemption altogether, for the same reason: it will damage one of the most honorable and wondrous aspects of civic life in the United States: a “thick” civic culture that helps mediate between the sphere of government and the sphere of the private and individual.