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Critical Solidarity – Church and Government

John Gladwin

Giles Ecclestone, my predecessor as Secretary of the then Board
for Social Responsibility coined the phrase ‘critical solidarity’ when
thinking of the church’s relationship to government. In days in
which there was a more substantial interplay between church and
state this was an important boundary to the relationship.
The balance of two themes – ‘critical’ and ‘solidarity’ – not only
describes the relationship both parties need to acknowledge but
also provides a dynamic critique of the reality today. We live in a
democratic nation. The will of the people is meant to hold political
and constitutional power to account. The nature of our democracy
has evolved across the centuries in response to the demand for
change or its necessity.
This article draws upon the history of this nation and its Christian
inheritance. That history includes the development of the values
and experience of the Enlightenment. As Gertrude Himmelfarb
has demonstrated in her study of the Enlightenment, The Roads
to Modernity: The British, French and American Enlightenments1)
the British experience of Enlightenment did not involve the
destruction of the place of church and Christian belief in Britain
(as it did in France). She even maintains that John Wesley was
an Enlightenment figure in his inclusive understanding of the
gospel. Others have maintained, in different ways, the underlying
Christian values that are to be found in Enlightenment thought
and experience.2 Tensions and good and bad moments are to be
found in our history but not the pulling apart of Christian values
and history from the culture and constitution of these islands.
‘Critical’ protects the fundamental duty of the church to hold
fast to the gospel truths that have formed its existence, history and
culture. It is a challenge not only to government but also to church.
‘Solidarity’ takes our belonging and participation in this society

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