How faith supports the political process

I am a little sick of hearing about how precious and wonderful and essential democracy is in the face of its complete failure to election of a President of the United States that shows so little aptitude for the job. Liberal democracy, we hear, is the best system ever, delivering freedom and opportunity to millions. It must be admitted that in many ways liberal democracy has delivered the goods. But something has gone terribly wrong and not only in the USA but here in Australia where the political process has become unworkable.

The worm in the apple is the almost complete destruction, carried out under the name Enlightenment, of a sure ground of identity. Before Descartes' grounding of the self in cognition, men and women who lived in Christendom understood themselves as being children of God who were made in the image of God. This was the foundation for the self that predicated all other identities. It meant that as a child of God we owed Him allegiance and worship. Self-identity was directed away from the self to the transcendent. This identity was assumed for all people, Christian or not. It is the basis of today's universal human rights. Of course it was often observed in the breach, particularly regarding native peoples, but it still stands as the foundation of Western Societies.

This conclusion was based not on observation and rationality but on a theological view of the world. The move to human rights language hides this central fact.

The influence of this idea on the civilization of the West is incalculable. The proper functioning of public service is a case in point. Without the transcendent identity of the self, that displaces personal desire and ambition, it is difficult, if not impossible, to become a public servant in the mode indicated by its name. In properly functioning public service, self-interest is displaced by the duty to work for the good of the people of God. One is a servant of God even when individual faith may be absent.

When one looks to the developing world one thing continues to stand out: public service is often corrupted by self-interest. This means that countries are often ungovernable so bogged down as they are in bribery.

Philosophers, scientists and sociologists have, if not killed God, done Him great damage in the eyes of many. They have done this through ignorance of what the Christian tradition actually teaches about God. Taking popular and shallow notions of what God is they have found it easy to dispense with him. Subsequently many, who, thus deprived of a foundation for identity, have fallen back onto Descartes foundation of the self in the self. We now live in an age in which we are expected to lift ourselves up by our own bootstraps and many of us are feeling the strain of this impossible task. Narcissism is always near at hand because worship of God is transferred to the self.

To make matters worse we are supposed to execute this acute action by the use of reason alone. The truth is that one cannot reason one's way to a meaningful identity. Well, you can, but that identity is so shallowly rooted in reality that it is a fragile plant indeed. To listen to an ancient tradition about identity would be to betray Cartesian scepticism and to fall into the error. After all, we are all supposed to be modern so why should we pay attention to ancient traditions?

Having based the self on the self we now discover that we are dominated by the will to power and by desire. We feel we must make a name for ourselves, a name that will be remembered after we die so that in death we will not be forgotten and so still "live". This is modernity's version of the defeat of death: become famous. Desire is ever present and unlimited in its demands. Without any critique, desire runs rampant and we build houses that are too big and have life-style aspirations that demand luxury and place a heavy burden on the planet.

Since our identity is built on desire we set about to build the Kingdom of Desire. These cathedrals of desire are dotted all over the landscape and are called shopping malls. The children of God have been changed into the children of desire and this is applauded because it keeps the economy humming along.

The turn to the self that is the central component of modernity has implications for the whole of society, obviously. In the absence of a transcendent source of identity there is only the ego. This is the fatal flaw that besets modern man and his governing systems. It is fatal because it can only lead to the "over man", the person motivated only by the will to power. It is a flaw that has the capacity to corrupt public service and our precious democracy.

I say this because when our political life is infected by the will to power then it is essentially nihilistic. We see this when John Howard justifies obnoxious foreign policy by simply citing that it is in the national interest. We see it in the present Federal government when it cannot have mercy on established refugees in our detention camps and bring them to Australia; a sentiment sadly supported by the Labor Party that should know better. We see it when Colin Barnett cosies up to One Nation to share preferences because it is politically expedient. We now live in an age in which the ends justify the means no matter what damage is done to those who cannot protect themselves.

Even when our politicians claim to serve the public they are, quite often, serving themselves in their will to power. Presently, the Federal government cannot enact obviously positive reforms simply because the opposition has suggested them first. Thus governing the country runs second place to political expediency and the will to say in power.

There are two mutually exclusive things in our world, service of the self and service of God and hence our neighbour. When the only foundation for the self is the self, the first will win out and the second, though often proclaimed, will be a facade. This is why we are so cynical about politicians and we long for a leader who is able to transcend petty political infighting.

Any identity built on the understanding that we are children of God will entail penitence and self-examination. This is because such a one will always be assailed by the ego and constantly tempted by the will to power. A true servant of the public whose motivation is derived from the service of God must be a disciplined actor. He or she will have to ignore the pressures to conform to the party line that has as its un-questioned presupposition that the grasp on power must be maintained at all costs. Such a one will also have to ignore the temptations of the "over man" to rise above the limitations of creaturely life. He or she would take their frail humanity seriously, confess their mistakes honestly and not be driven by ambition to greatness.

There must be many in our public service that can be described in this fashion otherwise such service would be in chaos. Thankfully the tradition of public service inherited from Great Britain still abides, but for how long now that its foundations have been quietly weakened?

It is amusing considering the above to reflect on the push to separate Church and State as though the Church is some kind of irrational infection that will derail rational governance. There is often unease when politicians confess their faith and they are warned that to mix religion and politics is an altogether bad thing. However, if there is some truth in the above argument about identity and the ability to work in a detached manner, then we should give thanks to our Christian heritage and give it its due rather than trying to banish it from political life. It may be the very thing that saves us from electing someone like Donald Trump who, as I have pointed out, is the final working out of the Enlightenment's turn to the self. Trump is nothing but self, a giant ego that cannot see past his fog of self-aggrandisement.