Manhattan Declaration: A Call of Christian Conscience » Evangel

The Manhattan Declaration is a 4,732-word statement signed by a movement of Orthodox, Catholic and evangelical Christian leaders who are collaborating around moral issues of great concern. Its signers affirm the sanctity of human life, marriage as defined by the union of one man and one woman, and religious liberty and freedom of conscience. The Manhattan Declaration endorses civil disobedience under certain circumstances.

The original 148 signatories include 14 Roman Catholic bishops, 2 Eastern Orthodox bishops, 20 presidents and 19 faculty members from seminaries and college—including our own Russell Moore—46 leaders of various ministries, 22 pastors, 10 magazine editors and publishers (including First Things editor Joseph Bottum), and various other luminaries.

First Things has posted the text here. You can sign the declaration here.

(Thanks to Touchstone magazine for the information on the signers.)

Comments (15)

Anthony Mator
November 20th, 2009 | 5:27 pm | #1

Trying to decide whether my signature would be an asset or a liability.

Blue Collar Todd
November 20th, 2009 | 6:28 pm | #2

This is a timely document. We are seeing the increasingly bold attempt by Democrats to compell the tolerance of sin and make Christians propagate it. Once certain sins are deemed an unquestionable public right Christians will become easy targets for persecution.

I am posting this with my iPhone so hopefully it goes through.

Frank Turk
November 21st, 2009 | 12:14 am | #3

What if I agree with the morals of this document but think it makes a false appeal to the Gospel? That is: what if I think that the Gospel is the solution to these issues but is not defined by these issues?

Anthony Mator
November 21st, 2009 | 12:28 am | #4

The Terrible Turk strikes again.

Rachael Starke
November 21st, 2009 | 1:14 am | #5

…the Gospel is the solution to these issues but is not defined by these issues.

Exactly. And yet, in one very eloquent document, they seem to have managed to distort the Gospel, while attempting to compassionately apply it.

Is it wrong to wish that they had somehow stuck to applying it, appealing simply to their communality as American citizens, and sent those interested in each one’s definition of the gospel to their own relative corners? Would that have been less of an unintentional equivocation than this seems to be?

I honestly think a more effective, more consistent declaration could have been drafted that appealed to history and our commonality as citizens submitted to the Consitution, and that included representatives from every faith practiced in America.

I could sign that.

I don’t know that I can sign this.

Even though I really, really want to.

David T. Koyzis
November 21st, 2009 | 10:36 am | #6

Here’s my take on the document. I do not believe its drafters are under any illusion that what they are doing is redemptive in itself. In that respect I cannot see how it distorts the gospel. If I’m missing something, I’d like to know.

That said, I believe the first two sections are stronger than the third, on religious freedom. With respect to the latter, I am uncomfortable with the excessively individualistic understanding of conscience, as in the following:

“Christians confess that God alone is Lord of the conscience. Immunity from religious coercion is the cornerstone of an unconstrained conscience.”

This is not a fully accurate account of the human heart and its created capacity for communion with God and with his other image-bearers. We are conditioned by the communities of which we are a part, and our consciences are formed by these communities. God’s call to us comes through these same communities, and our consciences are continually “constrained” by them in numerous ways. I don’t think the authors would deny this, but I found the language here troubling at the very least.

Remarkably, the section on marriage sounds to me as though it was written entirely by Robert George, with his Roman Catholic natural law perspective. The section on religious freedom reads as if it was written by a protestant influenced in part by Enlightenment individualism. Of course, any document that is the product of more than one hand is almost certain to read as such, and this is no exception. But I wonder whether each section ought to have been vetted more carefully by representatives of the three Christian traditions.

If we confess that we are saved by grace in Jesus Christ, then this salvation affects the whole of life, including the way we treat others. This has political ramifications in so far as we are called to do justice, especially to the most vulnerable amongst us. I see this document as an effort to articulate the implications of this salvation for these three issues.

As for signing the document, I note that it does not seem to be open to those living outside the US, as all the residence choices are US states.

Francis Beckwith
November 21st, 2009 | 2:53 pm | #7

In my forthcoming book Politics for Christians (IVP, 2010) I address many of these concerns. Here’s some excerpts:

Because many Christians reside in liberal democracies in which citizens play an integral part in electing their leaders, shaping policy, and enforcing laws, these governments allow Christians to do justice at a level of participation that their brethren in the ancient and medieval church would have considered unthinkable. What this justice constitutes, and how best to go about implementing it, is the subject of great debate amongst Christians. For example, as I noted above, all Christians agree that we have an obligation to help the poor. Some support a strong welfare system, while others believe that such a system may sometimes work to harm the poor and their future prospects.

A Christian’s moral obligation to do justice may also involve concern for the public culture and how it affects the virtue of its citizens. Political theorist Robert P. George refers to this as a community’s “moral ecology.” We know that film, art, television, literature, the internet, and other forms of entertainment and expression have the power to shape and influence a culture. This is why companies advertise. They are fully aware that a well-crafted image or a string of carefully fashioned words has the power to change minds and hearts. This should not surprise us. Jesus uttered parables, not doctrinal treatises, in order to teach theological truths, just as Plato penned his entertaining dialogues in order to offer philosophical arguments on an array of issues concerning the nature of knowledge, reality, politics, and law. Everyone knows the story of the Good Samaritan, but virtually no one, except for a handful of professors, can recite to you the version of Immanuel Kant’s categorical imperative they were taught in college. Stories and images matter.

Just as the natural environment of the Earth requires an ecological balance, so does the moral environment of a culture. Just as a polluted river has the potential to negatively impact fish, wild-life, recreation, and industry, a polluted culture can impair the moral ecology of a community. This seems uncontroversial. There is no doubt, for example, that the relentless teaching of anti-Semitism in Islamic schools in the Middle East, and its importation to American mosques, has had a profound effect in shaping Muslim attitudes toward the state of Israel and the Jewish people. Thus, it is not surprising that in the United States some of the fiercest political and legal battles are over public school curricula. Activists from many sides clash over the content of everything from sex education courses to the teaching of evolution in science classes. For all sides know that ideas have consequences and that whoever controls what and how ideas are communicated in the schools shapes the beliefs of the next generation. This is no less true of other cultural phenomena including the assorted media that incessantly bombard us from all angles, such as radio, television, film, and the internet. Consequently, if a Christian is truly concerned about loving her neighbor as herself, she should be just as worried about her neighbor’s loss of virtue resulting from, and contributing to, an imbalance in her community’s moral ecology as she is with the loss of her neighbor’s physical health caused by an excess of automobile emissions. Of course, Christians will disagree on how best to address this concern.

And yet, the Christian has to be careful on how far he or she will extend the power of the government to protect a community’s moral ecology. Take, for example, the debate over gay rights. There is a wide range of opinion on this subject, even among Christians. Very few, if any, Christians, even very conservatives ones, argue for the state to criminalize homosexual behavior that takes place in private between consenting adults, though most Christians would not argue that homosexual practice is good or ought to be celebrated by the state. Others defend not only these privacy rights, but also support laws that protect gays from employment and housing discrimination. And some liberal Christians go even further and defend the legalization of same-sex marriage.

And yet is clear to the Catholic and Orthodox Churches and virtually all Evangelical Protestant scholars that a society that embraces same-sex marriage is one that has affectively abandoned a fundamental truth about human beings—marriage is a one-flesh communion between one man and one woman –supported by both Scripture and natural law that is essential for the common good.

A Christian must be prudent and wise about how he or she addresses the volatile issues that arise out of the debate over gay rights. First, one must never forget that homosexuals, even if we believe that homosexual behavior is immoral and harmful to those who practice it (as many of us, including I, believe), are persons made in the image of God. Thus, we do not want our support of the sanctity of marriage to obstruct our love for those for whom Christ died, including our homosexual neighbors and friends. For this reason, the Christian should focus on what he or she supports rather than merely on what he or she opposes, though at times we cannot avoid speaking frankly about what we believe about human sexuality and the nature of marriage. In those cases, we should ask our dissenting friends and neighbors to extend to us the tolerance and open-mindedness they often (and I believe, inaccurately) claim that we lack.

Second, because Christians, even in the United States, live in widely different communities, one has to be realistic about what one can achieve by the political process. In some locales, the best one can do is make an effort to protect the Church from being coerced by the state to violate Christian moral theology. In Massachusetts, for example, soon after the state’s Supreme Judicial Court in 2003 required that the state issue marriage licenses to same-sex couples, Catholic Charities, which was at the time in the child adoption business, was told by the state that it could no longer exclude same-sex couples as adoptee parents, even though the Catholic Church maintains that same-sex unions are deeply disordered and sinful. Because it did not want to compromise its moral theology, Catholic Charities, sadly, ceased putting children up for adoption. Even if one supports gay rights, this forced departure of Christian kindness from the public square is an appalling violation of religious liberty. For it means that a religious organization with an outstanding track record in placing children in loving homes had to stop that activity simply because it will not acquiesce to the state’s requirement that it abandon its theological un-derstanding of the nature of marriage and family. It seems to me that in situations like this, Christians have a right to resist through legal means such an intrusion by the state on the practice of the church’s moral theology.

For this reason, Christian citizens should be aware of laws and court opinions that are de-fended as liberating for one group may in practice nurture cultural and political hostility toward Christians and citizens from other religious traditions. For instance, political philosopher Hadley Arkes points out that a legal regime that endorses same-sex unions sets into motion a certain moral logic that will likely result in the condemnation and marginalization of those, especially traditional Christians and Jews, who resist this endorsement in their communities and institutions. For example (this is my example, not Arkes’s), a philosophy department at an Evangelical Christian college that refuses to hire “married” same-sex couples while receiving federal funds, may, according to this moral logic, have its government funding withdrawn because it would be engaging in unlawful discrimination based on marital status. This is why Arkes refers to one Congressional bill that would have banned discrimination against homosexuals by private busi-nesses, as the “Christian and Jewish Removal Act,” “for it promises to purge serious Christians and Jews from the executive suites of corporations, universities, and law firms.” After all, why would a university hire a Christian philosophy professor who holds “discriminatory” views if the espousal of such views could put the school at risk of civil or criminal litigation? Arkes tells of the case of “the wife of a shop owner in Boulder, Colorado [who] had given a pamphlet on homosexuality to a gay employee. For that offense, she was charged under the local ordinance on gay rights, and compelled to enter a program of compulsory counseling.”

Truth Unites... and Divides
November 21st, 2009 | 5:24 pm | #8

Over here on Justin Taylor’s blog we have these comments by Tom and Dan Phillips:

Tom: ““Romanists and “Orthodox” are idolaters according to the standards set forth in Scripture. Any so-called “Christian” who signs a common statement of faith with them has sinned greatly and has betrayed the Gospel of the Lord Jesus Chirst.”

Dan Phillips: “Not a chance.

Here’s enough to lose me, period, no need to read further:

“We, as Orthodox, Catholic, and Evangelical Christians… We are Christians who have joined together across historic lines of ecclesial differences….”

I still affirm the necessity of the Reformation, and its recovery of central Biblical truths. I don’t see Roman Catholicism or Orthoborgism as variations on a theme. I could never associate myself with something that gives that false impression. The Gospel is not an “Oh, yes, well, that” issue.”

Criticisms that are well-grounded or groundless.

Truth Unites... and Divides
November 21st, 2009 | 6:14 pm | #9

The last sentence above should have been a question:

“Criticisms that are well-grounded or groundless?

John Mark Reynolds
November 21st, 2009 | 8:45 pm | #10

My kids noted that the Phillips need to take a chillax pill.

Daryl Little
November 21st, 2009 | 9:09 pm | #11

I think Dan is right. For a couple reasons.

Why does it not say ‘We fellow citizens of various faiths, or non-faiths, have come together in joint civic responsibilty…’

That makes it not a religious issue but a “for the good of our country” issue.

The trouble with only identifying Orthodox, Catholic and Evangelical… is that is really does seem to imply that the Reformation, and by extension, the gospel (which is what the reformation was really about after all) was not that important, but, now saving babies and keeping gay’s unmarried, now that’s something of eternal importance.
Why call either side to cave on issues that were recognized by all sides then and now, as things worth dividing over, by acting as though those weren’t and aren’t real issues?

And lest anyone think I’m aiming only at the Catholics, is is right to ask them to cave, without being convinced, on the very issues over which they anathemetized and condemned Evangelicals? Unless convinced, why would they do this and why should we expect them to?

It seems that the framers, if not the signatories, of this declaration, have framed it in just that way. To get both sides to concede without being convinced that there is Biblical warrant. How honest is this, really, from either direction?

You may not like Dan Phillips’ forthrightness and in your face style, but at least he’s not allowing the issues to cloud The Issue, and nor should we.

Truth Unites... and Divides
November 22nd, 2009 | 4:06 am | #12

From a Protestant perspective, does signing the Manhattan Declaration subvert the Gospel? Let’s take it deeper, does signing the Manhattan Declaration make the Gospel (ala Protestantism’s 5 solas) adiaphora, a matter of indifference, which would then be a more subtle way of subverting the Gospel? And hence, any Protestant signing the Manhattan Declaration is (unwittingly perhaps) subverting the Gospel because she or he is making the Gospel adiaphora by aligning with conservative Catholics and conservative Eastern Orthodox believers?

Is this the argument that Protestants are making against the signing of the Manhattan Declaration? I want to make sure I understand the argument clearly.

Have I represented the argument accurately? If so, what supporting arguments are there to support this claim? Can they withstand rebuttal?

As an aside, as a Protestant, I feel more heavenly kinship with a conservative Catholic and a conservative Eastern Orthodoxer who signs the Manhattan Declaration than I do with a Liberal Protestant or an Emerger who refuses to sign the Manhattan Declaration. Just because a LibProt argues for the necessity of the Reformation but who is also pro-abortion and pro-GLBT agenda, then I am to be more aligned with the LibProt than the conservative Catholic or conservative Eastern Orthodox believer?

Arthur Sido
November 22nd, 2009 | 7:46 am | #13

Truth unites…and divides

I don’t think the “enemy of my enemy is my friend” argument applies when it comes to the Gospel.

Sausage « City of God
November 22nd, 2009 | 1:17 pm | #14

[...] we take Manhattan: Joe Carter on the Manhattan Declaration an ecumenical sort of political platform. Halden and Bene D [...]

I Respectfully Decline » Evangel | A First Things Blog
November 23rd, 2009 | 1:03 am | #15

[...] Joe posted a link to the new Manhattan Declaration which came out late last week, and in the comments it came out that I agree with the morals of the [...]

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