There have been a wide variety of ways in which thinkers have conceived of this relationship, with many arguing that Christianity directly supports a particular political ideology or philosophy.
[5] Early Christians were described by Celsus as those who refused military service and would not accept public office, nor assume any responsibility for the governing of cities.
Some historical passages of the Hebrew Bible contain intimate portrayals of the inner workings of the royal households of Saul, David and Solomon.
The Christian New Testament instead begins with the story of Jesus, crucified as a criminal who had offended both the Jewish priesthood and the Roman imperial authorities.
It developed alongside the status of Christianity as the official religion of the Roman Empire and persisted through the Middle Ages as one of the most powerful political forces in Europe.
An apocryphal apocalypse of Pseudo-Methodius, written during the seventh century, depicts a saintly Last Roman Emperor who holds his earthly kingdom in anticipation of Christ's return.
According to Pseudo-Methodius, the Last Emperor will wage war in the last days against God's enemies, including Gog and Magog and the Antichrist.
[citation needed] Southern Baptism leans heavily conservative and is involved with the politics of the Republican Party in the United States.
The Hutterite church traces its roots back to the Radical Reformation and Jacoub Hutter, but respect and adhere to government authority.
[23] The Bruderhof, another church community in the Anabaptist tradition, respects the god-given authority of the state, while acknowledging that their ultimate allegiance is to God.
[32] More common expressions of Christian love and commitment to the poor are churches of all denominations that fund localised soup kitchens, charity shops and shelters for the homeless as well as mission programs overseas.
[33][34] In Roman Catholic circles the doctrine of preference for the poor has been important since 1979 and it still drives the church's practice of hospitality to those in any kind of need.
[36] The foundation of Christian anarchism is a rejection of violence, with Leo Tolstoy's The Kingdom of God Is Within You regarded as a key text.
[27] Christian anarchists do not share this interpretation of Romans 13 but given Paul's declaration to submit to authorities they do not attempt to overthrow the state.
An emerging tradition of political thought, Christian libertarians maintain that state intervention to promote piety or generosity can be unethical and counterproductive.
Coercion by threat of violence robs otherwise moral acts of their virtue, inspires resentment and disrespect even for just laws on the part of the coerced, and has a spiritually deleterious effect upon the coercers.
As John Chrysostom, late 4th-century Church Father and Archbishop of Constantinople, writes in his work On the Priesthood (Book II, Section 3), For Christians above all men are not permitted forcibly to correct the failings of those who sin.
Secular judges indeed, when they have captured malefactors under the law, show their authority to be great, and prevent them even against their will from following their own devices: but in our case the wrong-doer must be made better, not by force, but by persuasion.
For neither has authority of this kind for the restraint of sinners been given us by law, nor, if it had been given, should we have any field for the exercise of our power, inasmuch as God rewards those who abstain from evil by their own choice, not of necessity.
For it is not possible for any one to cure a man by compulsion against his will.While Christian libertarians disagree over whether and to what extent agents of the state possess the moral authority to intervene in the lives of citizens, government involvement is generally viewed with skepticism and suspicion.
According to Christian libertarianism, to seize the life, liberty, or legitimately acquired property of an individual by coercion, even for that person's well-being or for the benefit of others, constitutes a violation of his or her human dignity as an image-bearer of God.
The classical doctrine of original or ancestral sin furthermore suggests to Christian libertarians that political (and for some left-libertarians, economic) power ought to be democratically distributed and decentralized to guard against government oppression and the natural human tendency to corruption.
While one of the Church's societal roles may be to promote righteousness in service and humble obedience to God, equal liberty is the highest or only political value.
The state's raison d'être is to prevent rights violations, to quarantine or punish justly, and ideally to restore offenders so they can again peaceably dwell and participate in civil society.
Notable Christian fascist movements include the Fatherland Front in Austria, the Iron Guard in Romania, and the Rexist Party in Belgium.