Tetchytyke
Veteran Member
Just really to bring a new thread out from the Scottish Referendum debate.
I think it depends where you look, and what we mean by "Western society".
The law in most of Europe is based on the Napoleonic Code, which very clearly and very expressly is secular. It was Napoleon who got rid of the last dregs of feudalism by abolishing the Holy Roman Empire. Napoleon was attempting to keep the religious leaders on side but he designed his laws based on equality and freedom before the law (mostly because he was a very minor noble and had struggled under monarchism).
In Napoleon's case, it was the absolute monarchs who attempted to use their religion as justification for the status quo. They had a "divine right" to lead- God wouldn't have made them leaders otherwise, would be- and it was against the religion to question this.
And in Britain it was similar. Absolutism disappeared because the nobles didn't want to pay taxes, and so both sides attempted to use religion to show that they were right. But it was purely about money and about power.
So no, I don't think our democracy is based in Christianity. I don't think Christianity is intrinsically democratic and I don't think democracy is intrinsically Christian.
There is something to be said that some countries are much further behind us on the road to liberalism- Saudi Arabia is still pretty much absolutist and fedual in nature- but I don't think that has anything to do with religion.
Barn said:The question isn't really whether every Christian regime is or has been democratic. The better question is whether, when designing our current Western society, our forebears thought they were expressing their Christian faith.
I think it depends where you look, and what we mean by "Western society".
The law in most of Europe is based on the Napoleonic Code, which very clearly and very expressly is secular. It was Napoleon who got rid of the last dregs of feudalism by abolishing the Holy Roman Empire. Napoleon was attempting to keep the religious leaders on side but he designed his laws based on equality and freedom before the law (mostly because he was a very minor noble and had struggled under monarchism).
In Napoleon's case, it was the absolute monarchs who attempted to use their religion as justification for the status quo. They had a "divine right" to lead- God wouldn't have made them leaders otherwise, would be- and it was against the religion to question this.
And in Britain it was similar. Absolutism disappeared because the nobles didn't want to pay taxes, and so both sides attempted to use religion to show that they were right. But it was purely about money and about power.
So no, I don't think our democracy is based in Christianity. I don't think Christianity is intrinsically democratic and I don't think democracy is intrinsically Christian.
There is something to be said that some countries are much further behind us on the road to liberalism- Saudi Arabia is still pretty much absolutist and fedual in nature- but I don't think that has anything to do with religion.