It should be noted that one must not confuse Christianity and evangelism with Christian Nationalism. In my view, there is a difference between the pre-Constantine and post-Constantine churches. The pre-Constantine church was birthed on the day of Pentecost. Jesus’ disciples, apostles, and the early church furthered the kingdom of God to the marginalised, the oppressed, the outcasts, and the Gentiles. The missionary movements of various disciples and apostles critiqued the exclusivism of the existing cultures and spoke boldly about the equality of the body of Christ. The Acts of the Apostles give us an insight into the social conscience of the early church. We are told they kept a common purse and cared for the sick, orphans, widows and lonely. In short, the pre-Constantine church presented and worked for an equal and just society, and believed it to be the nature and precept of the kingdom of God. Our ancestors of faith extended Jesus’ mission and ministry to realise God’s kingdom.
The post-Constantine church was born on Constantine’s conversion day to Christianity. Within an instant, the church morphed from people living and preaching the kingdom of God to the support of the monarch and the Roman Empire. This phenomenon abuses the faith for the nefarious gains of the elite while subjugating the masses through the misrepresentation of Jesus’ teachings and ministry. The one who challenged and dared a person with no sin to cast the first stone was now preached as the creator of division between the sinner and saved, believer and non-believer, and Christian and non-Chrisitan. This nationalism imposed divisive policies as Christian values, and the penal code was submitted as God’s moral code. This deliberate and calculated manipulation legalised slavery and encouraged discrimination against divorced persons and members of the 2SLGBTQ community. Sadly, the church started to protect political ambitions instead of cultivating and nurturing a culture of inclusion and the kingdom of God.
But the Spirit did not cease to anoint God’s people. Many have been blessed with the courage to reinvigorate the church and society by challenging these corrupt and immoral systems. Ms. Rosa Parks’ denial to give up her seat on the Montgomery bus was a Pentecost moment. Archbishop Michael Peers’ apology to the Indigenous people for the sin of ‘trying to make Indigenous on Caucasian image’ and the Residential school system was the Holy Spirit speaking through him. Bishop Michael Ingham’s consent to authorise the blessing of same-sex couples in the Diocese of New Westminster was led by the Spirit.
Chrisitan Nationalists, both within the Anglican Church of Canada hierarchy and society at large, will bemoan these courageous actions and the leading of the spirit as evil and contrary to the will of God. Sadly, the hunger for power and desire to keep the Body of Christ divided has blinded their eyes and shut down their minds to accept these actions as an attempt to restore the so-called “children of the lesser God”. The illusions of grandeur about themselves prohibited them from seeing another manifestation of the Spirit. The civil rights movement, the restoration of Indigenous rights and autonomy, ordained ministry, and equal marriage for 2SLGBTQ are rooted in the courage, vision, and faithfulness to fight for an equal church and a just society just equal church and society.
At the 2012 Diocesan Synod, our Diocese of Rupert’s Land requested the bishop to authorise the blessing of civilly married same-sex couples and it passed with an overwhelming majority. The bishop consented and initiated a process to acknowledge and respect lay and clerics’ consciences and to live with a diverse theological position. A couple of years later, the diocese created an Urban Indigenous Ministry Coordinator to provide spiritual care and ministry to Indigenous persons. In 2020, an anti-black racism committee was formed to combat racism in our churches. Most recently, the MNO Synod and Diocese of Rupert’s Land formed a joint committee for 2SLGBTQ+ education, advocacy, and policy to provide a platform to advocate for queer, non-binary, and transgender members of our community.
The underlying theme of all the initiatives is to strive for an equal and just society and transform the church. These committees, hopefully, will represent and model themselves as a return to the pre-Constantinian church. Our struggle today is to re-establish the passion and vision of the early church and the disciples and to further the kingdom of God. Our challenge is to speak out against Christian Nationalism and its followers. One caveat for all those who are inspired and committed to an equal and just church is not to compete with one another. Instead, mutual respect and support for each other’s mandate will be a model of unity and equality. The title of this article is a call to come together to build new structures and to uphold and support all disciples in their journey with God. The Master said, “a time to break down and a time to build up” (Ecclesiastes 3:3 NRSV). Now is the time to come together to break down harmful ethos, theology, and structures to build the city of God.
