What does the Federal Constitution have to do with me?
FEDERAL CONSTITUTION SERIES (PART 1)
Jesus and His disciples have always demonstrated a strong appreciation of what their surrounding society was experiencing. They understood the nature of norms and values and how it affected life and living. In fact, their words strongly alluded to, even confronted, the underlying beliefs out of which their world was patterned. By confronting those values through His words and deeds, Jesus was actually uprooting injustice and laying down the very foundations of the Kingdom of God. Throughout the whole canon of Scripture, the authors and prophets demonstrated a deep understanding of their times to describe the various political, economic and social trends that were undergirding life in their nation and around them at their time. They presented a complex web of interrelated national and international events. Their readings of the times were tied to the values of the Kingdom of God, His justice and righteousness, as God revealed to them His response and message for society surrounding them and beyond. In short, the people of God were not detached from the world that they lived in. They were not living godly lives under a bowl. The Malay proverb, katak di bawah tempurung, casts a different perspective to this picture. In fact, in the prophetic books, God often called His people to look around them, away from merely performing religious rituals, to bring about God’s justice and mercy in their land, so that nations will be drawn to Him. By being in touch with their surrounding realities, they were being in the world. By working with God to bring justice and end oppression, they would have been not of the world.
So what does the Federal Constitution have to do with me?
“What does the Federal Constitution have to do with me?,” one might ask.
“Any constitution is a mixture of political, economic, philosophical ideals. It reflects the values and vulnerabilities of the nation: its dreams, its demand; (it describes the) economic, political, historical, existentialistic reality,” said Emeritus Professor Shad Saleem Faruqi in his opening session on the Federal Constitution at the Dream Centre.
Hence, the Constitution of any land has everything to do with life itself within a nation, and thus has everything to do with its citizens and non-citizens. It informs the context in which the modern Christ-follower lives in and impacts how we respond and relate to other communities unlike ourselves. “It is also full of conflict. For example, the demand for liberty versus the demand for order and stability; the demand for keeping the Constitutional ideals entrenched versus the demand for bringing changes according to the times through the amendment process. So the Constitution is really not an ideal document. Rather it is a document for reconciling conflicting demands in a way to produce the least friction.” Therefore it is a document that directly affects life in the nation, and also a document in which communities in society – including the Christian community – would need to contend with. Therefore, it is a document that informs our witness and how we are to live as citizens of the land with rights and responsibilities. It is with this posture that we proceed with highlights from Prof Shad Saleem Faruqi’s sessions in the coming articles.
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