How Individual Evangelical Christian [not Church] should think about society and politics in Romania

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How Individual Evangelical Christian [not Church] should think about s…

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How Individual Evangelical Christian [not Church] should think about society and politics in Romania

Introduction
The European Constitution which signed on 29 October 2004 at a ceremony in Rome has failed to mention Christian heritages which are the intrinsic of Europe's identities in Protestant, Catholic, Anglican and Orthodox churches.

The preamble [prelude] declares the European Union is founded on the indivisible, universal values of human dignity, freedom, equality and solidarity as the foundations of Europe's identity in which multi-religion is effectively recognized. However a great challenge remains on the issues of identity. I believe the multi-religious culture in Europe is facing a serious identity problem among the mostly Christian religious people. Tolerating other religions to create multi-cultural society, Europe, makes Jesus “homeless” by which was the founding principles of their cultural development.

The Christianity in the West visualized when Paul cross over with the call of Macedonian and advanced from country to country. It became the heart of European civilization. Former minister in the Danish government Flemming Kofod Svendsen emphasized, “If the gospel had not reached Europe and penetrated the different countries, we would have had quite a different history.”

European civilization was seen as a broadly Christian force, embracing Christian values and beliefs. According to Weber Christianity, especially Protestant, was even dynamic foundation of the Western capitalism which is unique and superior to ASIA. But the Christian faith and its value no longer dominate the public life of European continent. Politics, business, education and communication industry all operate on the basis that they need pay no attention at all to Christian ideals and teaching. The gradual separation and divorce that has developed between Western culture and Christian faith in the previous century is now apparent separation in our time.

Under the impact of modernity, the beliefs, ideals, and traditions that have been central to Western Christian lives are now, intrinsically, secularized. The Creator redundant in the Secularism along with modernity eradicates [wipe out] Christian values and beliefs in public life.

On the other hand, newly joined EU country Romania face an intricacy case in its problems. Even all the efforts are accomplished with the accession to EU, remain problems are a collective worldview in Romanian culture. The cultural maintenances among the Romanian in any social stratum, pre or post communist, the proletarian or the bourgeoisie, there are not much different. Romanian people kept a sentimental attachment toward the parental adherent and cultural inheritances of the Orthodox Church.

In contrast to modern western values, family, community, and tradition are valued highly. There is still a prevailing feudal world view enduring from nineteenth-century serfdom. In conflict with and in direct contrast to the western world view, the feudal view holds that the individual is not able to fend for himself, or alter his status or condition in society. Thus he has to ally himself with a person or entity more powerful who will be his protector. Any dissension from this system is considered a threat and must be resisted. Combined with the feudal world view is European animism, fatalism, and materialism from the west, and communist distrust from the east. Additionally, in practice Romanian education emphasizes rote memorization but not practical application. As a result, in Romania the westerner encounters lack of initiative, lack of education, and lack of thinking for oneself.

People agree that economic stability (inflation) and unemployment is the greatest problem. Widespread corruption and immorality are others. Avoiding the appearance of evil (e.g. not smoking or wearing jewelry) is considered much more important than living ethically. There is great distrust among Romanians. Other significant problems include high divorce and abortion rates, poverty, alcoholism, drugs, prostitution, homelessness, and orphans. The formal absence of the Marxist perspective from the sociology of the past decade does not mean it has completely disappeared.

The fall of the Ceausescu’s dictatorial leadership and the collapse of communism represented one of the most important moments in the history of Romania. During the revolutionary enthusiasm of the moment, large crowds of people believed in the immediate achievement of the democracy and liberty for which they had long waited. Accordingly, Romanians honestly believed in this dream and worked hard for it to come true. They sacrificed a lot in order to build up a new happy life in this world.

Years passed by, however, spiritual thirst replaced in material affluent and people experienced a moral crash or maybe a weakening to reality. People began to realize that now, when material life "just as in heaven" seemed to be a long way from reality, they had nothing left and they had been entirely emptied inside and outside.

People have divided into groups with the positive liberals those who put all the hope to EU accession, mostly new or advantaged acquisitive [materialistic]. Some group of people have nostalgia for old time, and while the other group are struggling to live daily life without having or knowing the future. Some groups have disillusionment on the contemporary political, social injustices and instability.

Even Jose Manuel Barroso, the commission president, told the European parliament in Strasbourg that the Romania had made sufficient progress to avoid any further delay to their membership, yet the absence of a consensus in what constitutes the correct social model Romania cannot establish stability right now.

Cristian Parvulescu, dean of the Faculty of Political Science from the National School of Political and Administrative Studies scrutinizes the instability of contemporary Romanian society as a result of:
[1] long historical fracture
[2] Communism brought fear to a state level
[3] non-practicing Christianity
[4] manifulated information under the unqualified media workers
[5] Romanianism vis a vis Protestantism or failure of Protestant tangibility

On the other hand, Emil Constantinescu, the President of Romania from 1996 to 2000 views the lack of solidarity and lack social cohesion of contemporary Romania has come from:
[1] the failure of the implementation of some radical reforms
[2] disappearance of the concept of private ownership
[3] lacked a sense of individual responsibility
[4] the existence of an oligarchic system based on the same old Communist Party
[5] the collocated mentality based on Orthodox tradition

The socialist Ovidiu Romosan marks the dysfunctional phenomenon occurred in Romanian society because of:
[1] hypocrisy of the Church’s leaders
[2] provincial gaps between Transylvania, Oltenia and Moldavia
[3] lack of vision implies a diagnosis of the existing situations
[4] lack of a pragmatic culture
[5] celebrity culture in media products

Beside of those analyses, widespread corruption at the level of the clerks in administrative posts is affecting the social system so much. The surveys of the World Bank on corruption indicate that “about two-thirds of the Romanian publics believe that “all” or “most” officials are corrupt.” The survey also shows that corruption exacerbates [To increase the severity, violence, or bitterness of] poverty, either directly or indirectly, and economic consequences such as lower foreign investment and slower development of the private sector.

An absence of socio-political leadership model after 1989, no doubt, is a stagnating the reform in democracy. A stagnant democracy subsequently tolerates the corruptions that exerting to the development of the infrastructures. The incompetent infrastructure under the lack of responsibility exacerbates foreign investment making economic development halting.

What is wrong right now is that corruption became a functional dream, and we need corruption. But now corruption doesn’t allow the market to work, because the Government helps corruption and this is one of the reasons why the E.U. quarrels about corruption in Romania. This is the only support for the Romanian capital when it hits the foreign capital. Because the foreign capital always wins on the market because it has the technology, money and anagement strategies.

Thus our task on missions is how to stimulate the socio-biblical and political leaders to view on the issues of questions such as :

1. How does Church or Christian make society closer to Christian ideals?
2. How should the Church relate to politics or the political orders?
3. How Churches can strongly influence transition from authoritarian rule to democracy?
4. How the Church leaders provide platform for politics in their ministries?
5. Is it a good idea for Churches [Christians or Christian leaders] to get involved in politics?
6. Why or under what circumstances?
7. Should Churches make political endorsement in elections?
8. Should Churches stay away from politics completely?
9. How Christians can be effective in politics?

The ECPM’s declaration can be an answer for such questions. The second ECPM congress in Brussels on 7th of December 2006 has adopted “A Christian-Social Contribution to Europe“ as its foundational principles on political and social lives in Europe.

Principles

Not to discuss doctrinal view or conviction
Not to intolerant to different views
Not to seek personal benefits
Not to insist obstinately to owns opinion
Not to have prejudice to certain or unknown person
Not to late an established meetings
Not to exclude other confessions such as

Also in the sphere of the state, good men are called to plan for good. They need to have a good philosophy, but this is not enough for success. Civil leaders must have a clear and simple plan that they can communicate to the people. They also must have a demonstrated capacity to inspire people and to lead. If the vision that they communicate is too complex, the people will not understand it, and there can be no success.

President Reagan had great success in communicating a simple vision for America in 1980. It was a good plan. It was simple enough to understand. It was communicated well. The man who communicated the vision was a proven leader. He inspired the confidence of the people. His message had three simple points:
1. Communism is evil. We must not compromise with it.
2. Excessive taxes will destroy growth. Reducing tax rates would help the economy. With growth in the economy, total tax revenues will increase with lower rates.
3. The governement is too big and is too bureaucratic. Government regulations on industry need to be reduced for economic growth.

Reagan had a philosophy of life. (See Kengor's great book "God and Ronald Reagan" to learn more about this.) But Reagan needed to turn that philosophy of life into a simple political platform. Then he needed to lead people with optimism and proven ability that inspire confidence. This he did (often with humor).

Evil men also know these things. They will try to inspire the confidence of the people in order to win their loyalty. It is necessary for good men to plan for good in ways that demonstrate credible and inspire confidence.

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