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Politics, Public Paganism, and the Way Forward:
The Ambrose Option
By Dr. Jeffery J. Ventrella
Introduction
The last five Dicta editions analyzed in some detail the pagan impulses in our culture – and churches – that inform and deform our thinking about law and policy. Yet, the public square still exists, and Christ claims that every square inch of it is His.[1] How should Christians live in light of this claim? Some churches and ministries become “activist factories” exchanging the Donkey or Elephant for the Lion who is the Lamb. In doing so, they become instrumentalist and transactional, focusing on pragmatics instead of principle.[2] Other churches and ministries take a different approach and become dualistic, claiming that the Kingdom is reduced to and identical with the institutional church, and thus Christians functionally abdicate responsibility for what happens “out there” in the yucky world.[3]
On a related score, many Christians are increasingly dissatisfied with the foundation of our constitutional republic, classical liberalism, viewing it as an insufficient bulwark against secularist and neopagan social and political gains.[4] This includes the GOP Vice-presidential candidate, Senator J.D. Vance.[5]
Proposals for how to read and react to our cultural situation seem to take two broad—and perennial—avenues, corresponding to dualisms between the “heavenly, spiritual, and eternal” realm and the “earthly, carnal, and temporal” realm. The church is told there are only two options: Pietism and world flight,[6] or an aggressive embrace of worldly ways.[7]
Are our only choices between Rod Dreher’s Benedict Option, which counsels retreat (albeit “strategic”) from the culture war, or Andrew Isker’s Boniface Option, a call for an all-out frontal assault in the culture war largely predicated on the neo-pagan Bronze Age Mindset?[8] The correct answer to these invitations should be a polite, but firm “neither”.
A Short Manifesto for Principled Cultural Engagement
The question of Christian engagement in the world always seems to involve these twin all-too-familiar risks: either (1) the Christian retreats from public engagement into a cocoon of privatized pietism[9], or (2) the Christian swash buckles into the public square like a clanging cymbal or a bull set loose in a China closet, precipitating public relations and legal setbacks.[10] Here, I offer what I believe are three basic characteristics[11] Christians should embody in order to effectively engage culture, and then offer an “option” of my own that avoids these dualistic ditches.
Competence
A story is told about a Priest and a Rabbi who became friends. They would enjoy coffee together, attend opera, and even some sporting events. One evening they attended a boxing match, something the Rabbi had never seen. One scene captivated the Rabbi: A Latin American competitor entered the ring, knelt down, and made the sign of the cross. The Rabbi with bold enthusiasm demanded to know: “What’s that mean, what’s that mean!!??” The Priest responded, “What’s what mean?” The Rabbi explained: “That man, after he entered, he knelt and did this thing with his hands; what’s that mean!!??” The Priest wryly responded: “Oh, that; that doesn’t mean a darn thing . . . unless he can fight.”[12]
Piety is never a substitute for technique.[13] One cannot “do good” culturally, politically, or legally unless he does certain things well, with excellence and skill. Far too many zealous people rush into cultural battles (or their daily jobs or social media) armed perhaps with having the “right answers,” but yet have failed to cultivate, forge, and hone the skills, character, and expertise necessary for implementing those answers in an effective way. Christians must be both pious and competent as they voice and implement choices pertaining to social engagement. A free society rooted in ordered liberty valorizes competence. Competence lubricates an effective feedback loop—namely, a free marketplace is based on individual responsibility and accountability; competence results in success and incompetence results in consequences. Both individual responsibility and accountability stem from Christian concepts.[14]
What’s Your Textual Orientation?
Pop Quiz time![15]
1. TRUE or FALSE: Delilah sheared Samson’s hair.[16]
2. WHERE in the Bible does it say: “Ashes to ashes, dust to dust”?[17]
3. TRUE or FALSE: The Bible says “Pride goes before a fall.”[18]
4. TRUE or FALSE: Noah’s ark landed on Mt. Ararat.[19]
5. FILL in the BLANK: “The ___ will dwell with the Lamb.”[20]
6. TRUE or FALSE: Elijah was taken to heaven in a fiery chariot.[21]
7. Question: How many wise men came to visit Jesus while He lay in a manger?[22]
8. TRUE or FALSE: The Bible says “There is no God.”[23]
9. TRUE or FALSE: Jesus stumbled and fell while carrying his cross.[24]
10. Question: Where is 6-6-6 found in the Bible?[25]
You were not expecting a sword drill (or “Baptist Air-Conditioning Exercise”) in this Dicta. What is my point? We at times are so certain about our own picayune preferences—Psalms or hymns; PowerPoints or hymnals; Bible translations and textual traditions; schooling modes (home, Christian, classical)[26]; dating or “courtship”; the color of the carpet—and yet we often do not even know the normative text of our Faith!
If we are to develop and embrace Christian convictions to inform ordered society and public justice, we need to know our Bible at the very least, and we ought to avoid the temptation to convert our “anthill” preferences into “mountains-to-die-on” precepts.[27] Or, perhaps better, as Jesus himself put it, we ought not tithe our mint, dill, and cummin while ignoring the “weightier matters of the law.”[28] Far too often people seeking the limelight label a policy or legal position “Christian,” which helps to gain followers or funding, yet there may be nothing “Christian” about it; sometimes the proffered view is even flatly confuted by the Bible.
Textual ignorance is a problem and arrogant textual ignorance is worse. Because the Bible itself addresses society and public justice, we must know it.[29] Or, put differently, to be Christlike, we must know what Christ is like as scripture reveals Him and His will for the created order.
What’s Your Theological Orientation?
Just as important, however, is understanding the Faith confessed as a whole unit[30]—that is, as it is articulated in its confessions and creeds.[31] Creeds provide a foundation and structural cues for ordering society and maximizing public justice. This is because, first, these statements of faith or mini-systematic theologies summarize or crystalize scriptural teaching, thereby forming and providing the church’s non-negotiable identity. Al Mohler notes:
“The church must also stand on confessional fidelity as a hallmark of its identity. The faith once delivered to the saints must be expressed and defined and defended in confessional form.”[32]
Second, there are, and must be, creedal implications for law and policy because law and ethics correlate with theology and doctrine as these Dicta have repeatedly demonstrated. This correlation between creed and conduct is recognized by leading legal scholars: Cass Sunstein, a non-Christian, and his co-author, Adrian Vermuele, a Christian, note that the Nicene Creed, like the U.S. Constitution and the Declaration of Independence, reflects “enduring legal and political frameworks.”[33] Indeed, as Jonathan Burnside noted, “law is a backstage pass to theology.”[34] Law and theology correlate and, accordingly, much of the “culture wars” stem from which theology and therefore which law will gain ascendance in society. Put differently, law and policy issues reflect worldview commitments.
Accordingly:
Every social order rests on a creed, on a concept of life and law, and represents a religion in action. Culture is religion externalized, and, as Henry Van Til observed, “a people’s religion comes to expression in its culture, and Christians can be satisfied with nothing less than a Christian organization of society.” Wherever there is an attack on the organization of society, there is an attack on its religion.[35]
In sum: To rightly order society and to influence culture in that direction, Christians must know the Faith’s foundational text and its foundational creeds and confessions, as they all supply key content for understanding reality as it really is. Despite its many critics, classical liberalism actually invokes key aspects of “real reality” as it structures society’s political economy: A valorized, yet fallen, individual imbued with liberty, a limited State, civil society teeming with innovative mediating institutions, a virtuous market with free trade—all operating within an overarching moral framework. Attacks on Classical Liberalism by socialists and Progressives, as well as the New Right’s trendy embrace of “post-liberalism” actually undermine society’s Christian foundations.[36]
The Ambrose Option
With the Edict of Milan in 313 A.D. the practice of Christianity ceased to be illegal. This became known as the “Constantinian settlement.”[37] The empire continued thereafter, albeit with a new aroma of tolerance and liberty, including religious liberty, furnished by the budding public application of Christian precepts societally.
Seventy years later, another emperor, Theodosius, permitted immigration in the empire’s eastern region—this policy of welcoming aliens and strangers itself derives from Christian precepts rooted in the Old Testament, now being applied beyond Israel to Roman society.[38]
Four years later, in 387, a cleric (ironically from Milan) performed a now-common and routine “religious, spiritual, and heavenly” ritual of initiation: baptizing a disciple named Augustine. That’s what clerics do and, according to the thinking of those with a dualistic frame of mind, supposedly only do: spiritual and “otherworldly” or “higher” or “heavenly” things.[39]
But in 390 the empire experienced an uprising in the east, specifically involving immigrants in the city of Thessaloniki. This riot resulted in the death of a Roman military officer. When the news reached Emperor Theodosius’s ear, he immediately sent troops to quell the riot, and in the process sent a message by indiscriminately slaughtering about 7,000 immigrants: men, women, and children. The message conveyed? Don’t mess with Rome.
However, that baptizing cleric, who had discharged his “spiritual” and “higher” duty by preaching and performing the sacraments, learned of these killings. He was not satisfied merely with his supposedly “higher” calling of conducting spiritual rituals. He confronted Emperor Theodosius to his face.[40] This cleric, Bishop Ambrose, possessed the moral clarity, moral conviction, and moral courage to engage temporal matters in the public square for public justice and the common good. He rejected the fable that his calling confined him to only doing supposedly otherworldly “heavenly” tasks in spiritual spaces involving preaching, prayer, and pious rituals. Instead, without hesitating or flinching he informed the Emperor that as a Christian man,[41] taking one innocent life violates the Lord’s law; how much more does taking 7,000 innocent lives compound his sin? Ambrose then barred the Emperor from the Eucharist until he repented. And Theodosius did so, by God’s grace, seven months later.
Ambrose’s action was not optional, outside, or beyond his vocation as Bishop, but rather cohered with and expressed it. What he believed (theology) and how he acted (ethics) correlated. The lesson here is plain and counters all sacred/secular dualisms: religious conviction should actuate and generate public religious exercise for the common good. This incident illustrates something about how ordered liberty should look: there must be public and civic space—that is, liberty—for the Faith to be proclaimed and practiced, including its moral precepts beyond the church’s doors. Paganism often wins the game precisely because Christians have left the playing field.
A rightly formed Christian, like Ambrose, ought to reject any dualism that pits law against gospel, sacred against secular, nature against grace, clergy against laity. Dualism at best privatizes the faith and over time will, at worst, subject society to increasing injustice. Neither is an option for ordered liberty, nor for the faithful Christian community.
This “Ambrose Option” illustrates a course of conduct that reflects Christian calling, protects human flourishing, and promotes the common good for all, while avoiding the invocation of and reliance upon, an overreaching Leviathan State.[42] In fact, the State comprised the very problem here! Classical liberalism “incarnates” these precepts at many points.[43]
This Christian conception of the public sphere provides a foundation for ordered liberty. That foundation establishes that (1) no ruler is above God’s law; (2) arbitrarily destroying humans made in God’s image and likeness—irrespective of tribe, clan, citizenship, etc.—manifests injustice, and therefore (3) the State, and thus its positive law, have roles as well as limits or boundaries. This is a crucial recognition, as Benjamin Wiker explains:
By recognizing a moral code that stood above all merely human laws and judged them, the Christian Roman civil law instilled in the minds of the converted the profoundly revolutionary truth that the sovereign’s will is only law insofar as it conforms to God’s revealed moral law—and no farther.[44]
Notably, Ambrose did not invent or improvise his actions. Rather, he applied the developing Christian practice of public justice based on God’s universal moral standards. Glimpses of this began emerging soon after Christ’s Ascension. For example, already in the second century Tertullian advocated for and coined the term, “religious liberty.”[45] Gregory of Nyssa preached boldly against a predominant social evil: chattel slavery.[46] Emperor Justinian’s Christian-based legal code protected conscience and religious liberty among both pagans and Jews.[47]
Ambrose of Milan exhibited competence, and he possessed a proper Christian textual and theological orientation. So armed, he did not retreat from matters of public justice or “culture war,” but engaged—not with the carnal weapons of the world, but with the Word of God—and it bore fruit for generations to come, not least through his discipleship of arguably the greatest theologian the western world has ever known: St. Augustine. Ours is an increasingly mixed society of Christians and pagans—just like his.[48] And it is, so to speak, the “Edict of Milan” of our own day—classical liberalism—that likewise provides us all the place, space, and opportunity to follow in his footsteps and choose the “Ambrose Option.” Only in this way we will be faithful to Christ’s Lordship over Every Square Inch.
[1]See the upcoming TxC Symposium, Every Square Inch, directly exploring this issue: https://truthxchange.com/
[2] One recent example would be the largely dependable pro-life group: Susan B. Anthony Pro-life America. It issued a statement regarding the GOP’s diluted platform that in effect embraced the abortion pill (which accounts for roughly 62% of US abortions): “The platform allows us to provide the winning message to 10 million voters, with four million visits at the door in key battleground states.” https://sbaprolife.org/newsroom/press-releases/sba-statement-on-gop-platform. It is difficult to avoid the conclusion that “winning’ here is only about garnering votes and not protecting the unborn if one allows a means for killing 62% of the unborn.
[3] For example, many leading evangelicals were completely silent after Roe v. Wade was overruled. See, Erick Erickson, You Shall Be as Gods – Pagans, Progressives, and the Rise of the Woke Gnostic Left, (2024), 73-75
[4] This may be a trendy current claim, but it is tired and easily refuted. See, Sandlin, Virtuous Liberty – A Defense of Classical Liberalism and the Free Society Against Cultural Leftism and the New Right (2023)
[5] J.D. Vance and the Rise of “Post-liberalism” https://www.wsj.com/articles/j-d-vance-and-the-rise-of-postliberalism-1f200696; J.D. Vance Is a Catholic ‘Post-liberal’: Here’s What That Means – And Why It Matters, https://www.ncregister.com/news/j-d-vance-is-a-catholic-post-liberal
[6] Christ AGAINST culture, as Niebuhr noted. H. Richard Niebuhr, Christ and Culture (2001)
[7] Christ AND culture, as Niebuhr noted. H. Richard Niebuhr, Christ and Culture (2001)
[8] For an informed critique of this latter proposal, see, P. Andrew Sandlin, The Old Bronze Age Mindset Meets the “Christian Vitalism”, https://pandrewsandlin.substack.com/p/the-old-bronze-age-mindset-meets
[9] Radical “two kingdom” theology seeks to justify this sort of retreat. For a rebuttal, see John M. Frame, The Escondido Theology: A Reformed Response to Two Kingdom Theology (2011), and Brian G. Mattson, Cultural Amnesia: Three Essays on Two Kingdoms Theology (2018).
[10] This often occurred in conjunction with the so-called “abolitionists” who rightly opposed abortion, but whose tactics actually galvanized cultural and legal opposition. Thankfully, the strategic “incrementalists” prevailed in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization, 597 U.S. 215 (2022).
[11] This is not an exhaustive compilation – for example, evidencing the fruit of the Spirit is mandatory and non-negotiable.
[12] I first heard this story as Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta addressed a class of newly commissioned USMC officers.
[13] Thanks to my friend Fr. Robert Sirico for relating this notion based on the 20th century Thomist Etienne Gilson.
[14] Note that Paul directs that “If anyone is not willing to work, let him not eat” (2 Thess.3:10). There exists an immediate market-based feedback loop—a growling stomach based on individual responsibility and accountability.
[15] Many of these are derived from Gary DeMar, Myths, Lies & Half-truths: How Misreading the Bible Neutralizes Christians (2010).
[16] False (Judges 16:19).
[17] It does not—that is language from the Book of Common Prayer.
[18] False—“Pride goes before destruction. . . .” (Proverbs 16:18).
[19] False—“The mountains of Ararat” (Genesis 8:4).
[20] “Wolf” (not “Lion”) (Isaiah 11:6 and 65:25).
[21] False—a whirlwind (2 Kings 2:1, 11).
[22] Zero—they saw Him in a house and gave three gifts; the actual number of Magi, however, is never disclosed (Matthew 2:11).
[23] True (Psalm 14:1; 53:1).
[24] Indeterminate. No textual evidence exists which indicates one way or another; what is known is that another—Simon the Cyrene—carried the cross and thus some have inferred that Jesus stumbled and fell, dropping the cross. (See Matthew 27:32).
[25] Technically, it’s not, as the Greek and Hebrew reflect 600, 60, and 6. The Bible’s original languages—Hebrew, Aramaic, and Greek—do, however, reflect gematria (values derived because the linguistic symbols contain alpha-numeric coding) totaling six hundred sixty-six (see Revelation 13:18 and 1 Kings 10:14).
[26] A recent further hyphenated sub-distinction describing yet another version of schooling is now “Christian, Classical, and Constitutional.” See, e.g., Tipping Point Academy, https://tippingpointacademy.com/
[27] Jeffery J. Ventrella, “When Preferences Become Precept,” New Horizons, https://opc.org/new_horizons/NH99/NH9905d.html
[28] Matt. 23:23
[29] For example, scripture proscribes theft generally whether by individuals, groups, or the State (Eighth Commandment). Similarly, scripture proscribes envy and covetousness (Tenth Commandment). And scripture, in describing societal justice, proscribes favoring both the wealthy and the poor (see, e.g., Exodus 23:3; Leviticus 19:15; Deuteronomy 1:17). This stands to reason since scripture, according to Paul, equips the godly for “every good work” (2 Timothy 3:16,17) and both the Cultural Mandate and the Great Commission comprise public and societal good works requiring ordered liberty. Scripture supplies the key predicates for ordering society so that those public good works can be optimally accomplished. Accordingly, Christians need to know the scripture.
[30] Francis Schaffer lamented: “The basic problem of Christians in this country in the last eighty years of so [he’s writing in 1982], in regard to society and in regard to government, is that they have seen things in bits and pieces instead of totals.” A Christian Manifesto, (1982), 17
[31] This is not to suggest that creeds and confessions supersede or supplant the Holy Scriptures. Rather, creeds and confessions evidence mature reflection by the Christian community regarding the fundamental tenets of what the Holy Scriptures teach. And those tenets concretize what we are to believe and how we are to live, including living socially and publicly. This contrasts with the “hot takes” approach so rife on social media, takes that often deviate from Christian maturity and even orthodoxy.
[32] R. Albert Mohler Jr., The Gathering Storm: Secularism, Culture, and the Church (2020, 36)
[33] Cass R. Sunstein & Adrian Vermeule, Law & Leviathan: Redeeming the Administrative State 6 (2022), 6
[34] Jonathan Burnside, God, Justice, and Society: Aspects of Law and Legality in the Bible (2011), xxviii
[35] Henry Van Til, The Calvinistic Concept of Culture 245 (2001). Rousas John Rushdoony, The Foundations of Social Order (1978), 219
[36] See Note 5 above.
[37] Peter J. Leithart, Defending Constantine, The Twilight of an Empire and the Dawn of Christendom (2010).
[38] See, e.g., Matthew 5:17–20 and 2 Timothy 3:16, 17.
[39] This sort of thinking is incipiently Gnostic, in effect, if not intent.
[40] This is not unlike John the Baptist confronting King Herod for violating another creational norm: Marriage (Matthew 14:1-4). To assert that the Faith has nothing to do with the political—politicians or policies—is to ignore not only the implications of Christ’s Lordship, but also wide swaths of Scripture’s narrative. See also Jeffery J. Ventrella, Law & Public Policy: NOT a Gospel Issue???!! (2019).
[41] Of course, this ethical mandate applies to all unjust actors, whether Christian or not.
[42] A Leviathan “savior State” cannot comport with Christ’s Lordship. If Christ is the omnipotent King, the State cannot rightly act as such.
[43] This is why calls for increased economic Statism is misguided; yet it is being injected into traditionally liberty-loving associations. “Intellectual Combat”: Inside the fight to Upend GOP Economics, https://www.politico.com/news/2024/07/25/gop-economics-american-compass-00171010’ see also, Senator Vance’s Vice-Presidential nomination acceptance speech: https://www.nytimes.com/2024/07/17/us/politics/read-the-transcript-of-jd-vances-convention-speech.html
[44] Benjamin Wiker, Worshipping the State: How Liberalism Became Our State Religion 70 (2013). Compare this to the contemporary coziness to State power being advocated today on the political New Right by Catholic Integralists and Protestant “retrievalists”, as well as advocates for “National Conservatism” and so-called “Christian Nationalism.”
[45] Robert Louis Wilken, Liberty in the Things of God: The Christian Origins of Religious Freedom (2019).
[46] Simonetta Carr, “Gregory of Nyssa—A Lone Voice Against Slavery” (August 11, 2020), at https://www.placefortruth.org/blog/gregory-of-nyssa-a-lone-voice-against-slavery
[47] Wilkin, supra Note 45.
[48] To understand in greater detail how Christians historically engaged the culture during rabidly pagan eras, see, Peter Jones, Capturing the Pagan Mind: Paul’s Blueprint for Thinking and Living in the New Global Culture (2003); and Stephen O. Presley, Cultural Sanctification: Engaging the World Like the Early Church (2024)