The Case for Christian Nationalism

9. Liberty of Conscience | II. Principle (Part 2)

Previously:

The Case for Christian Nationalism

Wolfe gives three justifications for what he sees as the civil magistrate’s ability to have “cognizance of what would be good for the soul,”¹ which is an argument that none refute; cognizance does not automatically transfer to authority. For example, the President of the United States likely knows that eating McDonalds every day is detrimental to a citizen’s long-term health. Does that mean he has the right to limit Americans to two Big Macs a month? I will address how Wolfe’s three examples of cognizance similarly do not transfer over to authority.

His first point is that a civil magistrate can “order outward things in the interest of mental health,” but magistrates are usually intentionally limited in their reach with such measures. Most often, preventative mental health actions are limited to people who present a physical threat to themselves or others. Therefore, this point actually works against Wolfe’s argument and for the position of restricting only physical harm. Next he attempts to equate the Second Table to the First, writing, “So, at least with regard to natural religion, the magistrate can have principled cognizance of true and false religion as captured in the First Table of God’s law. The Second Table-onlyists are thus refuted.” No such thing has happened; that he would attempt such an argument is laughable, because the Baptist view of liberty of conscience in no way denies that the magistrate can have a cognizance of the First Table. The argument is whether he has the scriptural directive to enforce it. The last argument he gives is that, because any man can know true religion, the magistrate is not excluded from such knowledge. This is obviously true, but also has no bearing on whether the magistrate has the right to impress such knowledge on other citizens.

Further arguments for “supernatural knowledge” are then given, most of which have the same issue as the previous three.² I will address the details of each of these briefly:

1. Though Scripture is indeed “a possession of the people of God”, civil rulers are not always “installed by and from the people of God.” As shown in Romans 13, they are always “instituted by God”, even if they may be tyrannical towards the people of God. A majority Christian nation can, and likely would, elect Christian civil magistrates, but if that magistrate based his actions on Scripture, he would leave blasphemers in peace, as all Christians are instructed to do.

2. We do not “elevate the magistrate’s abilities in unaided reason”, nor would we “downgrad[e] his abilities in theology,” for ability and authority are not the same thing. Who would argue that when someone is elected to public office their unaided reason becomes elevated? Are officials not simply given more responsibility to exercise with their existing reason?

3. Though, because of special revelation, the civil magistrate can know the Triune God, this has nothing to do with whether he has the authority to use state-violence to force such orthodoxy of practice in others.

4. The notion that earthly civil government has a natural function of “ordering the people to their supernatural end” is a self-referential argument, based upon earlier statements in the book, that has already been refuted.³

5. There is no scriptural basis for the claim that, “The magistrate is the first among the people of God who sit under the instituted teaching ministry that they have constituted.” As far as the spiritual kingdom is concerned, the magistrate is of equal standing to all other non-ordained members.

6. Wolfe repeats his faulty assertion of a scriptural precedent for the Christian family carrying over to the civil magistrate⁴, making the ridiculous claim that, “To deny the possibility of a Christian magistrate entails denying the possibility of a Christian father.” This statement is hyperbolic and authoritarian in nature, in that it argues for a singular father-figure to rule over the nation.

Wolfe yet again mixes the temporal and spiritual kingdoms by claiming that ministers “pronounce positive judgments” and that civil rulers “legislate a negative”, omitting the negative judgment in First Table matters exercised by the spiritual kingdom through church discipline. Overall, his epistemological argument is based upon false equivalence, self-reference, and a highly assumptive interpretation of natural law.

Next:

The Case for Christian Nationalism

1. Stephen Wolfe, The Case for Christian Nationalism (Moscow, Idaho: Canon Press, 2022), 362-364.

2. Ibid., 364-369.

3. See chapter 2, Redeemed Nations.

4. See chapter 4, Perfecting the Nation, section III, Objections.