Politics and Religion: Should They Be Separated? - Essay Sample

The idea and suggestion on whether or not should the politics and religion be separated have become highly controversial kept apart, especially in today's world. Religion has been ignored is crucial and a vital political factor, hence increasingly becoming clear that it is playing a significant role in international and local politics. In regards to religion, conflicts are internationally spreading, especially in many places like Israel and Sri Lanka (Adekoya, 2018). This essay argues that politics should be separated from religion, pointing out the reasons from a liberal perspective.

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The majority of people think that politics should be joined together with the Church as a way of o having focused leaders. That is why many end up making the Church and political affairs one thing (Adekoya, 2018). Doing so is a wrong idea since, as a church leader and a political leader, you cannot manage to serve from different angles. In most given cases, you are obliged to concentrate more either on one side as you cannot manage two sides at one given time.

Whenever a church leader becomes a political leader, they tend to ignore the Church and mostly pay more attention to politics (Hendon, 2020). It is not a wrong idea to choose to become a political leader, but you turn up the entire Church to becoming a political site since, as a political leader, you are starting to get supported by the Church.

Separating religion from the politics will ensure that there is a protection of individuals' freedom to exit from their religion hence embracing another religion. Individuals, as well as are given the freedom of interpreting the religious teachings differently. Individuals get greed for the money they will get, especially political leaders (Tuininga, 2017). They may end up ignoring the church activities, and this marks the beginning of the downfall of the Church. As a church leader, it is crucial to note that you are obligated to perform your duty in solemnity to not mislead the individuals (Tuininga, 2017). In most of the given scenarios, it is a matter of fact that individuals will follow their church leaders' steps. That way, as a leader then, combining the politics and the religion will end up resulting in the fall o the Church as they will also support your ideas and hence follow whatever as you ask them.

Separation of politics and the Church is not only good for the politics but as well as the religion. The separation of the two allows the religious sentiment to be unclouded from its real source of strength, this being one of the principles of human nature that are constitutive. It is believed that religious fervor is connected to throwing off the bondage of the political subjugation.

In most instances, being a political leader is after their benefits (Tuininga, 2017). They forget about the wellbeing of others. Instead of mixing these two kinds of leadership, it is virtuous to separate them and focus on one side. To conclude, I support that politics should be separated from religion as a good idea of having religious freedom. By doing so, religion and politics will become two separate things, and hence individuals will be able to evaluate the kind of leaders that they designate.

References

Adekoya, R. (2018). The Church as a stakeholder in the socio-political development of society: The example of Nigeria. Journal of the European Pentecostal Theological Association, 38(1), 50-63. https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/18124461.2018.1434729

Hendon, D. (2020). Notes on Church-State Affairs. Journal of Church and State, 62(3), 585-596. https://academic.oup.com/jcs/article-abstract/62/3/585/5876965

Tuininga, M. J. (2017). Calvin's political theology and the public engagement of the Church: Christ's two kingdoms. Cambridge University Press. https://scholar.google.com/scholar?cites=13789313374736200632&as_sdt=2005&sciodt=0,5&hl=en