Dealing with Guilt 4 - law and order? Education? ...

Thursday, Oct 15, 2009. What is the relation between the topic of guilt and the questions around law and order? Partly, Christianity is seen as a particular set of rules and there is a stream of conservatism which basically tries to enforce this set of rules as general pattern how life has to be. But the questions are much broader. How do we lead our life? How do we educate our children? Is something like discipline a positive category for our education? In some countries it still is - for example in the UK. In others, like Germany, these terms are linked to a dark past and the modern civil society tries to stay away from it.

Why do we need to talk about the law when we talk about guilt? Because it is guilt to violate the law. And to live together in a civilised society, we need to agree about basic rules or laws which are feasible and which are then supported by a broad majority of people. When people violate the law, there need to be sanctions, and any violation is what we would call guilt!

The bible does not provide a civil law. It gives general rules, but the rules are strongly linked to the love of God and to his forgiveness. There is a special agenda in the bible - the Jesus agenda about healing and about a new creation. The bible also formulates the need for worldly government, for structures which order our life and our community. This government needs to be carried out in the light of the eternal God. But it is quite worldly and to a good extent it is a temporary one, since the full reign of God is the goal and future of history according to both the Old and New Testament view.

We need to take rules serious, but in a balanced way. This means that violation of rules leads to sanctions. Children need to learn to follow rules. They also need to learn to violate rules when the original purpose is no longer supported by them. There is a goal behind the rules, that is an important point. It can be guilt against someone, to break the law. It can be guilt to follow a law when the law supports injustice! And all our rules must inherit something from the overwhelming love of God. They should learn from the grace of God. But still the grace of God does not support unjust or cruel or ignorant actions of any type. We need to express and carry out both love and consequent sanctions. We need to react to guilt, we cannot ignore it. But we need to work on it with the tools which God gives us. [R.W.E.P., jesusnetwork.eu]

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