Integrated Faith

Compartmentalization can help us manage conflicting feelings, but integration is the way to go when committing to Christ.

In March 2022, Bonnie Kristian, a columnist at Christianity Today, said in that publication that public reaction to the pandemic had caused her to have a more positive view of social welfare as a means to help the poor.

That might not sound like a surprising statement, but in her case, it was, because politically, Kristian declares herself to be a libertarian. And libertarianism as a political philosophy advocates only minimal state intervention in the free market and the private lives of citizens.

Individual freedom is a prime value for libertarians. When it comes to welfare, libertarians generally believe that private charity is a better way to help the poor because, they say, it avoids the shortcomings of government programs and therefore reduces poverty and the number of impoverished people. And that, in turn, libertarians say, benefits all of us.

Thus, for Kristian to declare that she’s taken a more positive view of social welfare as a means to help the poor is, for her, ...