I
recently read a challenging post from Yoshi Matsumoto concerning the reality of belief in the Gospel, and how it has evolved over time. Essentially, his thesis is that the faithful of the Middle Ages were unabashed hypocrites, saying they believed one thing, and acting on completely different (perhaps "pagan") terms. He goes on to say that it may be that our modern anxieties and discontentments come directly from the fact that we actually attempt to believe and follow through on the teachings of Jesus, in a historically unusual way; especially considering that Jesus's teachings cannot be coherently followed while maintaining an actual, functioning society.
I hope to return to this particular post of Matsumoto's (and in fact, I'm going to start a list right now of posts that I want to return to, so I don't forget). I think his point about medieval hypocrisy probably has some truth, but is also over-inflated and definitely not the whole story.
But I'm very interested in the idea that Christian ethics cannot be consistently followed on a societal scale. Rules such as "no usury", "turn the other cheek", "sell all your belongings", "worry not about tomorrow", "judge not", and so on -- there is a reading of these commandments that sure seem like they would destroy a nation were all its residents to abide by them.
There are a few ways you can resolve this apparent problem. Integralists claim that the commandments are not actually to be interpreted in a way that would make them incompatible with society. Christian anarchists would claim that the commandments should destroy society as we know it. Matsumoto's hypocrites would basically pick and choose when to apply the commandments such that they both feel good, and keep their culture going.
I want to propose that the gospel message is inherently and intentionally subversive. It seems to me that Jesus, in all his preaching, seems to assume the existence of a varyingly just, but fundamentally earthly society; the kings and princes and caesars and judges and tax collectors who rule "the world". Sometimes these forces act justly, often unjustly, most of the time just "worldily", at cross-purposes to the purposes of the Lord. The Christian message teaches us how to live in an unreformed world. Furthermore, I think that the message is basically intended to make us hypocrites -- we are to strive to be perfect, but we all know that this is, humanly speaking, impossible. There is no final rest here on Earth, and the "incompatibility" with regular life is meant to drive this home. We are supposed to live in a divine tension, feeling our way towards God in a world that wants us to think only of itself. The Gospel is like a zen koan, trying to get us into the mental space to live here, but see through its illusions.
So; can society by baptized?