Recently some politicians have decried statements of the Pope Francis suggesting that he should tend to things spiritual and leave things political alone. Such suggestions were rarely heard when past popes had addressed topics, such as, abortion which were often exploited by some for political leverage. But behind the idea that the Pope should keep silent or should speak only to certain subjects is the issue of the intersection of faith and life.
I am not sure how one separates faith and life in the way suggested above. We teach that from the moment we are baptized God is to be the central reality in our life, "Love God above all things," and that we have been freed from sin and death to be a new creation in the Body of Christ. Christ’s whole ministry was spent impacting the everyday reality of people’s lives. He fed people, he healed people, and he taught people. He taught the disciples and others about the practical realities of sin and grace, "Let him who is without sin cast the first stone," and how to live their lives as caretakers of the least of these (Matthew 25).
Each Sunday in the creed we confess together that God is the creator of all. In Genesis we learn that as creator God has given us a tremendous responsibility as stewards of that creation. Such stewardship means a responsibility to care for, protecting and nurturing, this planet rather than exploiting and abusing it.
We confess Jesus as our Lord and Savior speaking of God incarnate and present to us in the midst of history. Jesus calls us to love God and neighbor showing us how by loving we are to set aside self interest for the good of all. Jesus shows us this in the power of the cross and how accepting the limits of life daily and the contrasting abundance of life with God sets us free to pour out our lives for others. Today Christ is in the midst history every time a believer risks laying down his or her life for someone.
The nine members of of Mother Emanuel AME Zion in Charleston ministered to their killer for an hour reading scripture and praying with him and continued to do so as he then began to shoot them one by one reloading as many as five times. Now God seems to be working something new in Christ as politicians and public are moved to reject the symbols of hate that had surrounded Dylann Roof and warped him into a tool of destruction. As with the cross of Jesus God still brings life from death.
And we confess the Holy Spirit and all the ways through which God continues to support and nurture us. In the Holy Spirit God is continually reforming our lives by grace through faith, through the support of the community of faith, through the sacraments and promise of forgiveness, and a promise that the end of this life is not the end of our relationship with God.
What the Pope sees and understands is that for the believer true faith touches every aspect of life. To be the Body of Christ requires us to be in the midst of the world with all of its turmoil and struggle. There is no way for faith not to impact politics because faith impacts life. It shapes how we interact with our world as creation, it opens our eyes to see the suffering and the needs of those around us, and it calls, gathers, enlightens, sanctifies and keeps us in love with God and our neighbor.
If one’s faith is not impacting the choices one makes and the way in which one lives life why would one bother with attempting to claim the label, “Christian.” Just calling oneself a Christian means very little. Following Christ and living out our baptismal calling is what it means to be Christian. To be a Christian is to be continually reformed, “imago dei,” in the image of God. It is to be Christ today. Being a Christian has consequences, it is what Dietrich Bonhoeffer called, “costly grace.”