Relations between Church and State in Britain and the Netherlands: an Introductory Essay

Abstract

‘The problem of the relations of Church and State… raises topics which go down to the root of all political philosophy, and forces us to face the whole problem of the true nature of civil society and the meaning of personality’.¹ This judgement, delivered more than seventy-five years ago by the Anglo-Catholic monk and Christian socialist, Neville Figgis, has acquired a new significance in our own day. For a growing number of engagé Christians-theologians, church leaders as well as ordinary believers — the secular implications of membership of a church are a matter of profound concern. Yet, though their vision of the role Christian communities should play within the State may seem novel, they stand in a tradition almost two thousand years old. By their actions they mean to inaugurate a new phase in Church-State relations, which have usually been too cordial and easygoing.