Stephen Wolfe

Kevin DeYoung has chosen the CN study committee members. They are free to contact me at any time. To aid them in their study, here's a selection of my work:

Study Report (Part 2) and DeYoung's Syllogism youtube.com/live/HROzpCRDy… via @YouTube

highly recommended will save everyone a whole lot of grief

@ArthurJack87 @michaeljknowles And surrounding sections

@ArthurJack87 @michaeljknowles No. See Institutes 2.2.13.

Every Reformed Protestant affirmed natural law until recently. @michaeljknowles This is just a really bad talking point that Roman Catholics have repeated over and over.

@Heritage @michaeljknowles Seriously embarrassing.

‘The American founders established a government that very closely resembles the ideal regime laid out by St. Thomas Aquinas. The framers may not have been reading Aquinas, but they were reading the men who read him.’ - @michaeljknowles

Livesteam tonight at 8 EST. I’ll address the Study Report and DeYoung’s latest syllogism.

Mixed syllogism

@hornj To say, "everything that God has created is good in its accidental qualities," would be false. But that does not speak of substance. Nothing God has created is evil in substance. That's a Manichean heresy.

@hornj The first premise is imprecise. All that God makes is good in substance.

what is happening

@ACity_on_a_hill @michaeljknowles Name one person prior to the 20th century who explicitly rejected natural law.

@PerfInjust @michaeljknowles If true, then reform has a major defect.

@michaeljknowles Honestly, there really is nothing distinctly Roman Catholic that influenced the American founding, and the founding repudiates much of what Rome taught at the time concerning the church's power vis-a-vis the state.

@ashred113 @presbycast Thanks for reading the book.

@PerfInjust @presbycast The problem with CN is that it is grounded in theonomy. The Old Covenant was literally abolished by the death of Christ (Eph 2:15), and being a ministry of condemnation (2 Cor 3:7-13), it's time is now over (Heb 7:19, 8:13) and cannot be "Christianized". Neo-judaizing much?

Your periodic reminder that the author of the most scholarly book on Christian Nationalism envisions "measured and theocratic Caesarism" for an upgraded, Christian America. He also idealizes early New England as a CN model more than any other region, including the South.

The church's relationship to morality is instructing people on morality as one is before God and as one on the way to eternal life. The state's relationship to morality is morality as such and in its outward aspect.

When two entities have the same formal end, there must be subordination somewhere. If church and state have the same formal end, one must be submitted to the other, making one of them an instrument of the other.

Sounds neat. But a total disaster of false inference and conflation. First of all, it isn't valid. But, to be fair, an argument doesn't have to contain all the premises. Second, DeYoung's argument would seem to grant both church and state the same formal, intrinsic, and earthly end. But since the state's absolute end is public virtue, the church (in this understanding) must be subordinate to the state, for the church is rendered necessary to the state's absolute end. Indeed, it must be a formal part of the commonwealth by its nature, and thereby under the state. Or DeYoung would have to switch it around, make the state subordinate to the church, since the church is claiming the state's end (viz. virtue). The correct way to put it is: the church's supernatural end is piety and eternal life, but the secondary effect of its ministry supports the state's pursuit of public virtue. The church is necessary for public virtue, not having public virtue as its intrinsic formal end, but in its supplying the foundation and means of sustaining virtue via piety and moral instruction. Thus, the intrinsic ends of church and state are distinct yet mutually supporting (by divine design), and there is no formal subordination between them. DeYoung is stating things even Erastians would avoid.

Put another way, if the absolute, intrinsic end of the state is public virtue and one end of the church is public virtue, then the church is subordinate to the state. For when any end is granted, so too are the means. The church is a means for the state's end, and therefore subordinate to it. When two entities have the same formal end, there must be subordination somewhere. If church and state have the same formal end, one must be submitted to the other, making one of them an instrument of the other.

Sounds neat. But a total disaster of false inference and conflation. First of all, it isn't valid. But, to be gracious, an argument doesn't have to contain all the premises. Second, it would grant both church and state the same formal, intrinsic, and earthly end. But since the state's absolute end is virtue, the church (in this understanding) must be subordinate to the state, for it is necessary to the state's end. Indeed, it must be a formal part of the commonwealth by its nature, and thereby under the state. The correct way to put it is: the church's supernatural end is piety and eternal life, but the secondary effect of its ministry supports the state's pursuit of public virtue. The church is necessary for public virtue, not having public virtue as its intrinsic formal end, but in its supplying the foundation and means of sustaining virtue via piety. Thus, the intrinsic ends are distinct yet mutually supporting, and there is no formal subordination between them. DeYoung is stating things even Erastians would avoid.

An interesting syllogism @RevKevDeYoung just used on stage with @JonathanLeeman at Coram Deo in talking about the role of the church versus the state: “Political orders require virtuous people. Only Christianity can form truly virtuous people. Therefore, the Church of Jesus Christ has the missional task of preaching the Gospel and forming a virtuous people.”

@IVMiles @RevKevDeYoung @WestminsterTS ...for when any end is granted, so too are the means. The church therefore is a means for the state to achieve its end.

@IVMiles @RevKevDeYoung @WestminsterTS It is stated poorly. If the church's intrinsic end is public virtue, then it must be formally subordinate to the state, since the state's absolute end is public virtue.

The Witherspoonian proposition. Glad @RevKevDeYoung lays it out in layman’s terms. Have Presbyterians believed their religion is political? Yes, because the church is the chief moral catechizer of the American people. More of this in my upcoming book with @WestminsterTS Press.

@DJR69422 @ReallyOldLife @QuixoteSword That makes no sense, because the condition for the reward of the covenant works is the law of nature.

@PerfInjust @ReallyOldLife @QuixoteSword Before the foundations of the world (before nature) there was a Covenant. Nature would not exist without IT!

serious about logic