The President: A Tyrant Discovers the Kingdom of God

Religion and political power can be dangerous if combined and aimed at people deemed to be apostate or heretical. In calling for the Crusades, our Roman Catholic popes put their political power behind the theocratic and political goal of taking back Jerusalem and Constantinople/Istanbul “for Christ.” Those popes and the kings and soldiers who went to war with the Muslims there wittingly or unwittingly violated Jesus’s preachment to love rather than fight enemies. Christianity and political power have not mixed well, historically. The U.S. Constitution forbids the federal government and, presumably, the states, to establish or sponsor a religion or even favor one. Theocracies, such as those in the Calvinist colonies in New England (except for Rhode Island, which allowed freedom of religion), would be excluded as a political form for the Union as well as its member-states. Rather than meaning “sub-unit” or “province” as in Normandy in the E.U. state of France, the American Continental Congress has applied “state” in the generic sense of a polity with a yet-to-be-determined political system. Hence while the Articles of Confederation were in force, before the U.S. Constitution, the states could legally form theocracies. The film, The President (2014), is fictional, but this doesn’t stop its portrayal of a toppled president in hiding from looking realistic, given the cases of Muammar Gaddafi in Libya and Saddam Hussein in Iraq. The character arc of the president while he is in hiding, or “on the run,” captures a generally unknown way in which Jesus’ preaching on how to enter the unknown Kingdom of God can apply to political power in a good way. This is not to advocate theocracy, however. Rather, individuals who wield power, whether in government or business, can come to see the very nature of power differently and gain new insight into the Kingdom of God preached by Jesus.

The full essay is at "The President."

Pope Francis: Possessing Nuclear Weapons is Indefensible

Pope Francis said late in 2017 that the nuclear arms race had become irrational and immoral. The irrationality itself rendered even just the possession of nuclear weapons as immoral, according to the pope. Whereas past popes had recognized deterrence as a legitimator, both irrationality and the extent and “upgrading” of such weapons were factors in Pope Francis’s admittedly personal view. Yet was his basis only moral, or religious in nature? 

With “such sophisticated nuclear arsenals,” the pope said, “we risk the destruction of humanity, or at least a big part of it.”[1] The proliferation of the weapons is relevant here, even in the pope’s answer to what has changed: “Irrationality is what has changed.”[2] Surely irrationality is a staple of human nature, rather than appearing all of a sudden in 2017. The pope must have had in mind the reckless rhetoric exchanged by the North Korean dictator and the American president. Unfortunately, even a large, established nuclear power, an old cold-war warrior, can allow for irrationality even though institutional safeguards exist as checks. But as time goes on and leaders come and go as weapons proliferate as well as become more powerful, we can conclude that the psychology of human nature is itself too weak. 

Ethically speaking, the harm that could befall a significant portion of humanity from nuclear bombs renders the possession thereof as immoral, given the element of irrationality in interpersonal and thus intergovernmental relations. But is the objection also religious in nature? If our species is made in the image of God, then destroying a part or all of the species can be said to be condemnable on religious grounds. The Catholic doctrine of humanae vitae can be taken in this sense, rather than that human life itself is sacred, which could be reckoned as a self-idolatrious claim. We have a spiritual nature—an innate yearning for the transcendent.[3] To expunge this nature is condemnable on religious grounds.

The pope can thus be criticized for having based his opinion on a moral position rather than going on to use the occasion to preach on the distinctly religious element (or grounding). A species that can not only conceive of transcendence beyond the limits of human cognition, sensibility, and perception, but yearn for it even though it remains beyond is also that species that can so easily lose perspective in altercations and lash out irrationally such that much harm is done to the species or a part thereof. If we are angels, a saying goes, we must be killer angels. But must we be? Are we not also capable of exerting will-power, self-discipline, especially if we can be watchful and hold in check powerful individuals who are in the sway of irrational emotion? Or is the proverbial cat out of the bag, with no one willing to destroy the most powerful weapons? Will time eventually catch up to our sorry species?

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1. Francis Rocca, “Pope Calls Nuclear-Arms Growth Illegitimate,” The Wall Street Journal, December 4, 2017.

2. Ibid.

3. This point enjoys considerable space in my book, Spiritual Leadership. 

A Self-Governing Chinese Catholic Church: Conflating Statecraft and Religious Authority

In late December, 2016, as the Chinese government was negotiating a deal to improve relations with the Vatican, Yu Zhengsheng, a senior Communist Party leader, “endorsed the notion of a self-governed Chinese Catholic church.”[1] The key point, I submit, hinges on governance. In what sense does governance apply rightfully (or fittingly) to a religious organization? This is a question to be put both to the Chinese government and the Vatican.

Yu Zhengsheng meeting Chinese Catholic religious authorities (Source: Yao Dawei/Xinhua)

From one standpoint, the sort of governance that naturally applies to states seems less than fitting applied to religious organizations. Most obviously, a religious organization and a nation-state are of two distinct domains. More subtly, the sort of authority wielded by a government can, if applied within a religious organization, undercut spiritual authority and spirituality itself among the faithful. Rendering the governance of a religious organization as including that of a state, such as the Vatican is, naturally incurs the sibling rivalry with other countries. Put another way, were the Roman Catholic Pope not a head of state, Chinese officials might have felt less need of a self-governed Chinese Catholic Church. Yu Zhengsheng would have been less likely to urge that spiritual leaders in China “adhere to the principles of independence and self-management.”[2] Put another way, a more spiritual and less political church would be less of a threat to any government, including that of China. Spiritual leadership from the Pope would be more likely to pass as if through a semi-permeable membrane into China.

From the other standpoint, the sort of governance that naturally goes with religions is less than fitting applied to governments of countries. Yu Zhengsheng’s claim that spiritual leaders should work to promote the “good virtue of patriotism” crosses a line because religious organizations are not in the domain in which patriotism exists. For Catholic priests to urge patriotism would undermine the credibility of their spiritual guidance. Given the Vatican’s own status as a nation-state, the question could be raised: Which patriotism—of China or the Vatican? Hence the Vatican’s involvement in governmental governance naturally invites jealousy in other governments.

Perhaps both statecraft and religious authority are vulnerable to overreaching. Perhaps problems would be simpler were people to apply self-discipline to keeping within their respective domains. The Chinese government should not ask Catholic clerics in China to advance Chinese patriotism and the Vatican should get out of the nation-state business. Keeping to two very different sorts of authority can go a long way to minimizing conflict and category-mistakes.

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[1] Javier C. Hernandez, “Catholic Churches in China Should Be Independent of Vatican, Official Says,” The New York Times, December 30, 2016.

[2] Ibid.

The Dalai Lama’s Reincarnation: By Government Fiat?

Reincarnation is a difficult gig for Buddhists. Being reborn for yet another life is not a good thing; bad karma (i.e., residue from bad choices in life) keeps a soul on the wheel of samsara. Because life-after-life involves suffering, a Buddhist strives for Nirvana, or enlightenment, which releases a soul from the cycle of being reborn yet again. Reincarnation is a difficult gig for Buddhists also because unlike Hinduism, Buddhism denies the very existence of a soul (atman) as an entity. How, then, can something that does not exist go on to be re-clothed in another body for another life? Yet another problem for the devout Buddhist concerns government officials who claim that they can decide whether a certain soul reincarnates, and if so, into which body. In 2014, for example, the Chinese government made it known that it would pick the next reincarnated Dalai Lama—the spiritual leader of Tibetan Buddhists.

In March 2015, Chinese officials declared that the Dalai Lama would indeed reincarnate in spite of the fact that he had announced that his soul might not reincarnate. Zhu Weiqun, a Communist Party official, told reporters that the Dalai Lama had no say over whether he would reincarnate.[1] Zhu said it would be for the Chinese government to decide. “Decision-making power over the reincarnation of the Dalai Lama, and over the end or survival of this lineage, resides in the central government of China,” he said in his capacity as leader of the ethnic and religious affairs committee of the Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference.[2] The decision-making power would of course be used to maintain control over the Tibetan region of China. In other words, Chinese government officials intended to install a puppet Dalai Lama after the current Dalai Lama passes; he in turn was considering not reincarnating so the government could not do so. The decision, he said, “is up to the Tibetan people.”[3] In short, the doctrine of reincarnation was at the center of a control battle between a government and a religious leader.

For a government to make such a decision and even claim the ability to find the reincarnated person after the then-current Dalai Lama’s death necessarily involves brazen presumption. Nevertheless, presumptuousness is also in the Dalai Lama’s assumption that whether he reincarnates is up to him or the Tibetan people. Implicit in the assumption is the belief that a person can know one’s own karma. Since the Buddha was aware when he was enlightened, however, the Dalai Lama could have stated that he had become enlightened and would not, therefore, reincarnate. Absent enlightenment, in other words, knowledge of what will happen after death is faulty at best. I must conclude that both Zhu and the Dalai Lama were taking religious liberties for the sake of achieving and maintaining control of an institution, the Dalai Lama. Buddhist enlightenment, in contrast, is a letting go of such a desire, as well as the suffering that undergirds it. From the perspective of a soul between bodies, what would it matter what is going on back here?  A soul in the process of transmigration would presumably be carried on by its own past karmic residue rather than internally-directed forward so as to maintain control among the living.

In short, this case demonstrates that both government and institutional religion can over-reach. From a governmental standpoint, encroaching onto the religious domain is fraught with competency issues as well as a rather blatant category mistake. From the perspective of a religious functionary such as the Dalai Lama, the challenge involves not getting suckered into a government’s obsession—that of control—at the expense of the religious aims, such as enlightenment (i.e., not suffering anymore). In fact, that the Buddha’s orientation to eliminating suffering had been dwarfed by a reincarnation-metaphysic is itself problematic, for that metaphysic can allow for considerable clutching, and thus suffering. For the Dalai Lama to let go, and thus be free of the suffering that prompts a desire to maintain control and even over-reach, he would have to transcend reincarnation and even his belief that he has a soul. Ultimately, he would need to transcend his own institutional religion; it would not even make sense for him to say that he would or would not reincarnate! 

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1. Chris Buckley, “Feud with Dalai Lama Spills into the Afterlife,” The New York Times, March 12, 2015.

2. Ibid.

3. Ibid.