Lockdown – a Christian's Take
© Bryan Kēhua
I am being a bit cheeky with the title but I did want to lay out some thoughts about Christians protesting against lock downs, especially in light of Brian Tamaki's very public violation of bail conditions by attending a second such protest. Civil disobedience has its place, and Christians need to be critically engaged with their governments' choices.
Romans 13:1-7, an extensive section on the nature of governments from a Christian perspective, exhorts Christians to be obedient to the government that the Lord has placed over them. That is, give them what they are owed, whether that is taxes, honour, respect or your obedience. Jesus Himself was a little more nuanced when he said give to Caesar (the Roman state) what is his and to God what is His (Matthew 22:15-22). It should be remember that they were both referring to an overtly unGodly state apparatus that brought peace at the edge of a sword. And yet Christians were called to obey them.
Does this obedience extend to all things? By no means! Jesus was very clear: render to God what is God's. The prophet Daniel was entirely right when he disobeyed the Babylonian and later Persian bans on Jewish practices of the day. What is more, the bans were motivated by political reasons that were far from spiritual. Christians of the early church also exercised disobedience. They preached the Gospel of our God, Jesus Christ, despite both local and imperial bans on such activity. They willingly risked and, at times, suffered the legal punishments for such disobedience. Paul (the one whose call to obey appears in Romans above) was also not blindly obedient to government authority. Disobedience is only acceptable when the government oversteps the line and contravenes the clear and unambiguous world of God as revealed in the Bible.
Is the government in Aotearoa preventing Christians from meeting together in lock down? No, they are not. With online technology, these meetings are still possible. Had this all occurred thirty years ago, churches might have had a stronger case for disobedience. However, even then, such disobedience needs to be balanced with what is to the benefit of the wider community. We need to be careful when we start on that path.
Essentially, a Christian's attitude to a government should be one of obedience and being law-abiding citizens, except when that government clearly contravenes anything that Jesus taught.
The recent protests in Aotearoa are protests against restrictions of freedom, not the vaccines themselves. Destiny Church's Brian Tamaki has said as much on Twitter, highlighting that he does not care if someone is pro or against the vaccine. These are protests against freedom, for which there is no clear teaching of Christ that the Aotearoa government is violating.
The government is not violating Christians' rights or freedoms in a non-Biblical fashion or for non-Biblical reasons. A possible basis for protesting against the restrictions might based on the philosophical idea of “body ownership”. Some anarchist thinkers (such as Christopher Chase Rachels in Spontaneous Order) have based much of their philosophy on this idea, which basically holds that the individual is the only owner of their body and that no other has any right to violate the body's integrity. Those protesting compulsory vaccination would have a stronger case based in this foundation. However, for Christians, this does not appear to stack up. In 1 Corinthians 6, Paul is addressing matters of sexual immorality, which clearly is a different issue to the present one. However, he makes a comment that I believe applies. Our bodies are temples of the Holy Spirit and we were bought at the cost of Christ, the Son of God (1 Cor 6:19-20). In Romans 12:1, true worship is to offer a sacrifice of our bodies to the Lord. While addressing vastly different issues, the principal is applicable, I believe. That is, the Lord is the owner of the Christian, therefore we do not own our own bodies. Therefore, any stance against vaccination or lock down restrictions based on body ownership is invalid for Christians. Such a stance's validity must rest on a clear violation of the Word of God as revealed in the Bible.
Recognising that lock downs are frustrating, at times psychologically distressing, I do not believe that a constructive response that honours Jesus Christ is protesting en masse in a public space. While my arguments may not be conclusive, and probably not convincing to everyone, the ethical and theological basis for the current protests is shaky at best. A Christian response to these events and in these unprecedented times needs thought and debate.