The chaos of politics

Many, many years ago, theology was the queen of the sciences. This was before the word "science" was allocated exclusively to the physical sciences. Back then, "science" referred to all fields of knowledge and theology was at the top of the heap.

This made sense because knowledge of God predicated knowledge of everything else. Knowledge of God was systematic in that it sought to be a theory of everything, a universal understanding. As such, heterodoxy could not be tolerated and was severely punished.

The natural sciences are similar in that, for example, Physics seeks a unifying theory of everything. Chemistry relies on the systematization of elements known as the Periodic Table. Biochemistry maps all the chemistry of life.

The common theme of the natural sciences is that they seek to describe and systematize all physical phenomena. Exceptions indicate that something is wrong with the theory.

A scientific colleague asked me if there was research in theology. A fair question. The answer is in the affirmative. Indeed, in all the oldest and most prestigious universities in the world theology is very much alive and engaged in new ways to talk about God.

The field of Church History reveals the development of the science of theology from the earliest days of the Church, the early and high Middle Ages, the Renaissance, Reformation and the onset of the modern age. During this development, theology relied on scripture, philosophy, history and the acts of preaching and pastoral care. These concerns are still present in contemporary departments of theology that sit well in the modern research university.

Systematic theology is to God as physics is to the natural world, an attempt at unity. In the words of Karl Barth, "theology is the most glorious and happy science."

I began this essay thinking about political parties and how they organise what they stand for. One would think that the above discussion of organised systems of thought that we find in the natural and theological sciences would help. But upon close examination, it is found that political parties are rag bags of ideas, pragmatism, historical wounds, sectional interests all cobbled up in the form of a party bearing a name that purports to describe them.

Ideology has become a dirty word. Communism was ideologically systematic and look at what became of that! Political parties do have ideology, even when they boast to being pragmatic. They also, through their history, have gathered things that do not fit their ideology.

For example, the Australian Labor Party began as a social justice movement on behalf of workers. In Britain it had its roots in ideas of Christian social justice. It supports humanitarianism and community so that the poor and disabled or those with unfortunate upbringing are not left behind to fend for themselves. Thus, Labor is committed to big government and redistributive taxes.

However, Labor has also been influenced by "progressive" influences that, for example, have backed liberal abortion laws and voluntary assisted dying. This does not fit well with a communitarian focus that would care for parents and children. The policy on asylum seekers is also at odds with the traditional focus on social justice and humanitarianism.

Here we see the traditional ideals of a labour movement distorted by ideas of individual freedom and rights and by the wedge politics of border security.

While both the ideology of Liberal and Labor Parties has been affected by Enlightenment thinking, often to their detriment, the Liberal Party is more so. Liberalism comes straight from the sunny humanism of John Lock and Jean-Jacques Rousseau and from American writers such as Ralph Waldo Emerson with his essay on self reliance. Think of Scott Morrison's slogan "Those who have a go will get a go." A great idea until you think of all those people who find themselves in a situation in which it is impossible to "have a go". Labor would take them with us, Liberals would, presumably, leave them to rot.

One would think that the Liberal Party would have some attachment to conservatism in a good way, that, for example, it would be ill at ease with liberal abortion laws and voluntary assisted dying thus conserving long held views by the Church and the judiciary. However, no political party in Australia will make a sound about these issues because of the overwhelming popular support of liberalisation. Where the nation goes, there the government must follow.

One would also expect a conservative government to back well-established public institutions like the ABC and the CSIRO.

Menzies was conservative in a good way. During the WWII when the Japanese bombed Darwin and were on their way to Port Moresby on the Kokoda track, prime minister John Curtin supported hateful propaganda against them. Menzies "lambasted the Government's use of hatred at an instrument of war." (Ham, Kokoda p296)

But alas, those days have gone, both for the Labor party and the Liberals, they both have largely abandoned at least some of their roots.

Democracy itself tends to distort well-founded policy. For example, many countries have an estates tax that acts to reduce the wealth gulf between the rich and the poor and to aid government in acting for the good of the community. But since it has been labelled the "death tax" it has become political poison to even mention it. Likewise, the relabelling of the refugee crisis as an issue of "border security."

It is amazing how easily the electorate is swayed when its own safety is allegedly threatened. The only amelioration of this lies in public education, not in maths and natural science but in the arts. For the humanities are studied because they make us more human and more able to see through the false barriers to good governance that political parties have erected all over the place for them to remain in power.

Theology is part of the humanities, and it properly sits at the head of them. The study of theology trains us to think systematically about what constitutes the human and is a very good foundation for life in politics. Alas, this is a path rarely taken with the consequence that political life has become debased as is obvious to anyone who is aware of the goings on in Canberra.

Without a clear view of what humans are for, governments have no view of the future, they have no plan for the development of a community that strives towards the good. Most of their time is taken up in holding on to power while the nation languishes.