Truth, Discernment, and the Refusal of Enforced Unreality

When powerful institutions command people not to believe their own experience, Christians ought to recognize it as abusive. Not because all experience is trustworthy or reliable. But because God does not require Christians to surrender reason, conscience, or discernment to the state. Christianity treats truth as a moral obligation and coerced falsehood as spiritually deforming. This diagnosis may seem partisan, but it’s actually confessional.

Anglican theology—especially in its comprehensive form—is well-positioned to explain why. Below, I’ll outline a theological vision rooted in Scripture and the Christian tradition that names the dangers we face and why the church cannot simply capitulate to them.

Truthfulness as Moral Obligation

Christian discipleship isn’t truth optional. It begins by taking reality seriously because creation matters, and God is faithful to what God has made.

Do not bear false witness. This commandment (Exodus 20: 16) prohibits more than perjury; it names a collective sin: the refusal to perceive social reality truthfully—the bending of shared perception and memory for political ends. False witness defames others, but it does something to truth itself: It socializes deceit.

Truth in the New Testament is relational: Christians are commanded to “speak the truth in love” (Ephesians 4:15) and to “put away falsehood” (Ephesians 4:25). Jesus names deception as bondage (“If the Son sets you free, you will be free indeed,” John 8: 32), and false teaching belongs to Satan, “the father of lies” (John 8:44).

Insofar as authorities train Christians to distrust reality unless validated by power, they’re not doing politics; they’re undermining truth-telling as a Christian virtue.

Richard Hooker grounds our moral obligation in Christian anthropology: What it means to be human. We’re created subject to law—but not arbitrary power. Rather, we’re under “the law which reason teacheth all men” (Laws I.8.3). To demand that Christians deny reality is to violate the moral agency that God gave them.

Discernment Is Not Defiance

Discernment is biblical; Christians must practice active judgment.

Test the spirits is not limited to testing the gifts of charismatic ministry; Christians “test everything” (1 Thessalonians 5:21). Paul tells Christians to refuse conformity to the world and be renewed by the transformation of truth. This presupposes that minds can be formed—not surrendered.

The Bereans are commended not because they obeyed the Magisterium but because they judged it (Acts 17:11). Anglicans treat this approach to teaching and learning as normative and mutual. Reason is not rebellion; it’s God-given and meant for faithful discernment.

When governors demand that people “Stop trusting your eyes; trust us,” they’re asking for functional faith—but without revelation or repentance or grace. It’s like trust without verification because the object of trust is not God but power.

Hooker is clear that political authorities may influence judgment. They may never command it. Unexamined assent is not obedience; it’s obedience training.

Political Authorities Are Not Omnipotent

Christian theology does not say: Be obedient to the state. Christians pray for their governors and live in hopes of a common good (1 Timothy 2: 1-2), nor does Scripture demonize government (“Let every person be subject to the governing authorities,” Romans 13:1). Where God grants civil authority, it can mediate justice and serve societal flourishing.

But Scripture also gives limits:

Jesus’ disciples weren’t crucified for defying Caesar. They were martyred when commanded to worship him—and violate God’s will. Political authority does not have the final say.

Nor does Revelation hold up patience as a virtue for Christians living under pagan rule. The Book of Revelation contains perhaps the church’s clearest warning against governments becoming beastly.

Authoritarian regimes are not new, but they have a timeless spiritual signature.

Power becomes demonic when it demands epistemic loyalty: When citizens are expected to trust an official story over their consciences and lived moral realities.

“We reject and despise…” says the Barmen Declaration, “the false doctrine that political powers and organizations, and national and racial interests, may set themselves above this Church and present themselves as its lord.”

Experience Isn’t Ultimate—but Governments Aren’t God

To be clear: This is not an experience-only argument. The Christian faith trusts more than what we see with our eyes. Perception can deceive; memory is faulty; sin infects our judgment.

Anglicans have historically been rightly suspicious of sola experientia. Anglican theology has always affirmed that we test our experiences—and rightly so. Through scripture. Yes. Through reason. Of course. Through tradition. Certainly. Through prayer. Undoubtedly. And through communal discernment.

This conversation is not about trusting our experiences at all costs. It’s about who—or what—we trust instead. The alternative to fallible sense perception is not healthy epistemological whateverism. It’s not obedience to state authority. Experience-betraying commands teach citizens to distrust their moral and empirical perceptions. When governors say “Do not believe what you just saw; repeat this slogan,” they’re demanding epistemic loyalty.

Christianity cannot enmesh itself in any power. Anglicanism has resisted such monistic collapses by refusing both absolutized subjective experience and forced-unreality politics. Truth is always sought within communities, remembered moral ecologies—among scripture as norming witness, reason as God’s gift to humanity, tradition as communal memory and testing, and experience as where reality encounters us, particularly through the faces of our neighbors.

God doesn’t require us to turn our brains off. Idols do.

Image of God Includes Moral Agency

To claim our experiences have been seized by autocratic horror isn’t hyperbole if we recognize what’s at stake: our moral agency. God created humans in God’s image, which means several things, including our shared capacities for perception, judgment, conscience, and truthful speech. A regime that replaces trained dependence on experts with trained incapacity to trust our own moral perception intends to degrade that reality.

As Newman memorably puts it, conscience is “the aboriginal Vicar of Christ” (Letter to the Duke of Norfolk). Our consciences make us responsible to God and are thus bound up with Christian discipleship. Our consciences can err, but we may not be commanded to sin. Discipleship is Transformation, Not Programming

The answer to “Don’t believe your eyes” is not hypervigilance. It’s faithful discernment: wary, not trusting; sober, not cynical. Instead, Christians should pause before panic, seek confirmation, look for corroborating evidence, examine fruit, refuse cynicism, and—when human dignity and lives are at stake—hold fast to conscience.

The public responsibility of the church, writes William Temple, is to “announce the principles of Christianity and show where particular social institutions or movements harmonize with or depart from those principles; and to equip Christian laymen to play their part.” This task includes clashes over truth itself.

To err is human; to repent, Christian. But Christians cannot be trained to disregard reality to remain loyal to the state.

I Bow Before The Cross

Listen to Bishop Doyle's sermon, "Epiphany 4A - I Bow Before The Cross" held at St. John's Episcopal Church, Sealy, TX

More at www.texasbishop.com

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An Embodied Christian Call to De‑escalation, Dignity, and Truthfulness in Immigration Enforcement

O God,… we thank Thee for Thy Church, founded upon Thy Word, that challenges us to do more than sing and pray, but go out and work as though the very answer to our prayers depended on us and not upon Thee… Help us to realize that man was created to shine like the stars and live on through all eternity. Keep us, we pray, in perfect peace, help us to walk together, pray together, sing together, and live together until that day when all God’s children, Black, White, Red, and Yellow, will rejoice in one common band of humanity in the kingdom of our Lord and of our God, we pray. Amen.

— Martin Luther King Jr.

A pastoral and theological statement for this moment — with particular concern for Minnesota.

Introduction

Episcopal Bishop of Minnesota Craig Loya

I write this statement not as a political pundit but as a pastor and teacher of the Christian faith, as a bishop in the line of the Apostles, now having served in that particular office for 18 years. I have read and followed events regarding immigration throughout my time as bishop and have made no secret of my belief that the church is called to serve all people. Over the last month, I have been watching events across the country, with particular interest in Minnesota.

The Church exists to care for souls, which means I will care for souls on both sides of any partisan debate. I will speak both to Republicans and Democrats, to Independents and the politically exhausted, to immigrants and citizens, to agents and to those who fear the agents, to people who protest and to people who feel threatened by protest. I will not tell anyone how to vote. But neither will I stand silently when fear overwhelms our public life. How could I? Our hearts grieve at what we are bearing witness to in the world around us, especially as it has to do with immigration.

Across the country, immigration enforcement has become a flashpoint of fear and rage. In Minnesota, that tension has sharpened into tragedy and public crisis.

In recent weeks, Minnesota has seen increased federal immigration enforcement, described by the DHS as the largest operation ever, alongside mass arrests, major protests, and increasingly fraught encounters between federal agents and Minnesotans. This includes multiple shootings involving federal immigration agents in Minneapolis this January alone, including both the killing of Renée Good and this weekend’s shooting that killed Alex Pretti. Nationwide demonstrations have followed over the past week, bringing unrest beyond Minnesota state lines.

Many Minnesotans who support aggressive enforcement are motivated by real concerns: the rule of law, public safety, fairness to those who immigrate legally, and the fear that communities can’t absorb disorder. Those concerns deserve a hearing. But no concern, however sincere, justifies dehumanization, disproportionate force, or policies that treat human beings as leverage.

In parallel with this violence, we have watched the conflict escalate rhetorically and tactically: on threats to invoke the Insurrection Act, talk of “occupation,” and weaponized public speech hardened into competing moral absolutes.

This is precisely the kind of moment that Christians should practice what I have elsewhere called an embodied apologetic: arguing not merely with words but demonstrating publicly, concretely, and nonviolently what we believe about the human person, the nature of authority, and the lordship of Jesus Christ. 

By demonstrating, I mean far more than marching or civil disobedience. I mean demonstrating the love of Christ to all people. Remembering that in the migrant in our midst, we see the neighbor as defined by Jesus and the stranger God tells us to care for. 

Groundwork: immigration enforcement and the theological depth of creation

To sit quietly while immigrants are demonized, blamed for crime, or dehumanized is to sit quietly while Christian doctrine is being threatened.

The Christian claim is that the Word became flesh, that humanity is encountered, named, and raised to new life in the material particularity of Jesus Christ. The Christian faith does not treat bodies, human lives, or human faces as incidental. When Christians claim that the incarnation altered the universe, we mean that the material world has theological depth.

Every human being bears the image of God, including the migrant at the border and the undocumented worker. That includes the asylum seeker fleeing gunfire and the citizen bystander who gets caught in the middle. It includes the protester holding a sign in the street and the federal agent wearing the uniform.

Human dignity is not conferred by paperwork, politics, or popularity. Human dignity is linked to God by the very generosity of the Godhead to bring us into being.

And when we understand human sinfulness not simply as “bad behavior” but as the fracture between what God has made and our too-often selfish desire to remake creation in our own image…well, then we have a theological framework for our contemporary moment.

The doctrine of sin explains our predicament. But the Christian gospel that Jesus Christ entered into our fractured humanity to redeem and reconcile us to God is our explanation of how things change.

As Christians understand human brokenness and healing, we are neither naïve about fear and disorder nor resigned to it. We recognize sin; we name it; we flee from it. But we do not stand and watch it with holy indifference.

We do not sanctify fear, baptize cruelty, or call dehumanization “prudence.” To insist otherwise isn’t pragmatism; it’s theological divorce: declaring some aspects of creation safe for politics and using Christian language to justify policies or tactics that degrade human dignity or scapegoat racial and ethnic minorities. The Church cannot allow this faith, the faith of every Christian generation,  to be twisted in the service of anti-immigrant cruelty.

Which means we cannot accept a public order so structured that it trains us, through constant repetition and a steady diet of dehumanizing rhetoric, to see some people as contaminants, vermin, or existential threats by virtue of their very existence. That’s not realism. It’s idolatry.

And when that mythology attaches itself to nation-states, bullets inevitably follow. The Church has seen where such theological claims lead when fused with nationalism, racial mythology, and demands for unquestioned allegiance.

Christ alone is Lord. No other power takes precedence over the Church in Christ. And when any political ideology inclines that way, Christians must stand against it. If race-craft and nationalist mythology run rampant unchecked in our politics, they will destroy our democracy. Worse still, they are in the end a theological threat to the church.

If federal agents lose sight of their own humanity or basic constitutional rights amid tense confrontations, everyone loses. We are not only witnessing a newfound morality that allows harm, but we are also allowing a state to do moral injury to those who serve in law enforcement.

De‑escalation is Christian obedience

Because Christ is Lord, we cannot tolerate panic as policy. Christian leaders should call for immediate de‑escalation tactics in Minnesota and nationwide, especially from federal leaders, federal agencies, and ICE. Here’s why and how:

Because life is not a bargaining chip. When policies or tactical shifts treat human bodies as leverage, political leverage, intimidation leverage, violent “force multiplier” leverage, the state courts us into an anti‑human logic that Christians cannot affirm. It’s that simple.

Because fear is contagious. When immigration enforcement looks like a militarized invasion, everyone gets trained to be afraid: parents who teach their kids to hide, workers who avoid hospitals and schools, congregations that fear gathering for worship, citizens who fear recording with their phones, and agents who become afraid, too (more reactive, more quick to see every person of color as a threat).

That fear feeds on itself. Dehumanization multiplies. When any human group is treated as subhuman, everyone’s capacity for recognizing humanity begins to slip away, including the humanity of agents ordered to do their jobs.

Because the Church has something unique to say about what it means to be human.

Unlike many voices in our public life, the Church does not merely talk about human dignity; our allegiance to Christ compels us to embody it. Our witness must not be a slogan; it must be a public pattern of life: prayerful, truthful, courageous, nonviolent, hospitable, committed to the dignity of our neighbors and the strangers who live among us.

For these reasons and more, what we’re seeing must be named:

Agents are operating with increasing combat‑style visibility: helmets and vests, crowd‑control weaponry designed for more confrontational policing, tactical vehicles, and face masks.

Such a posture is often experienced as intimidation rather than order, and it can train communities toward avoidance and suspicion.

Whether you believe immigration law is too harsh or not harsh enough, Christians cannot remain silent about how our public life is changing. Domination is not justice.

When repeated lethal encounters happen across a concentrated operation, even if investigations ultimately exonerate agents in each incident, the moral burden shifts.

The question is no longer simply, “Was this legal?” but “What kind of society are we becoming, if incidents like this become normalized?”

Immediate steps we are asking for, nationwide

Stop. Take a breath. Listen. De‑escalate.

How can federal agencies and federal leaders de‑escalate tactics and posture immediately?

Pause operations that have produced multiple lethal encounters over a short period of time and inflicted widespread trauma across immigrant communities. Commit to visible accountability: name badges, clear chains of command, and timely release of video and incident documentation consistent with due process. Prioritize de‑escalation techniques in training materials and practices — especially community‑engaged operations where children and bystanders are likely to be present. End tactics that reasonably read as intimidation. Even if lawful, if their predictable effect is widespread fear and trauma in communities, stop them and adopt alternatives.

The DHS itself has framed this Minnesota operation as “the largest enforcement operation we’ve ever conducted in Minnesota.” That is cause for additional, not lesser, scrutiny. 

What can state and local leaders do to protect both public safety and civil liberties?

Fully protect lawful protest while continuing to hold protesters civilly and criminally accountable should violence occur. Commit to clear nonviolent crowd‑management techniques that don’t replicate wartime intimidation. Do everything in your power to lower the temperature, rather than rhetorically inflaming the situation. Provide additional support and resources for communities experiencing disproportionate fear, including immigrant communities, communities of color, and neighborhoods receiving saturation enforcement.

What can protesters and activists do to practice disciplined nonviolence? 

Commitment Card for Peaceful Protests
 

You are angry. You are grieving. Many of you are operating in understandable fear for your lives. But Christians do not get to numb ourselves to moral agency in the adrenaline of a crowd. Violence is not leadership. If you condemn dehumanization, you cannot then dehumanize the person in the uniform. If you are going to protest for dignity, you must demonstrate dignity. 

What can the Church do?

Hold public prayers for peace and truthfulness.

Explicitly call on Christians to lower the temperature where they are: online, in-person, wherever misinformation, dehumanization, and fury are allowed to settle and fester. 

Teach our people that anger is human, but vengeance is demonic. Demand better of our leaders. Insist on civil institutions that honor human dignity.

Open churches for pastoral care where needed.

For immigrants afraid to leave their homes. For families disrupted by ICE raids and detentions. For anxious citizens who feel too afraid to leave their homes. And yes, for agents’ families who love their children too much to let them keep policing. In the Diocese of Texas, we do not have the luxury of believing only one side of this conflict sits in our pews.

Consider organizing accompaniment/aid in lawful and disciplined ways: Food. Shelter support. Transportation to court hearings. Connections to legal resources. Trauma care. Emergency family preparedness plans. We are currently doing this in the Diocese of Texas, as are many dioceses around the country. You can contribute to our legal fund here. You can contribute and learn more about our convening a multi-faith initiative here feeding people. We will have a new immigration portal up in the near future. I hope this will inspire you to gather local leaders to demonstrate God's love in Christ in various ways to our immigrant neighbors near our churches.

Train de‑escalation teams for vigils/demonstrations: Teams whose explicit task is to lower the temperature, protect the vulnerable, and prevent further harm. Consider training specific leaders for this ministry if it does not already exist in your community.

Preach and teach the holistic truth of Christian anthropology starting now. That Scripture does not sort people into worthy and unworthy buckets as our habit of Christian life. That there is no politics or policy so vital that we should make an idol of it. That we will not hand the American Church over as a get-out-of-accountability-free card to any national leader or political party that demands our silence or allegiance in return for temporary power.

Christianity is a serious faith precisely because it comes with a seriousness of expectation: that we will love our neighbors as ourselves. That we will speak truth to power. That we will love our enemies. And while Christians are not the silent majority, perhaps the silent Church will speak now.

The Associated Press has reported clergy in Minnesota risking arrest as part of their public witness. 
People of faith are beginning to recognize what’s at stake in this moment.

We preach forgiveness, and we preach against sin.

We preach that Christ alone is Lord.

If we say the Word became flesh, we cannot allow policies and tactical shifts that treat human flesh as disposable. If we say Christ alone is Lord, we will not give the silence of the Church to any leader, any political party, or any government agency that demands our blessing as the price of patriotic cooperation.

Social de‑escalation is not merely political point‑scoring. It’s a confession that God’s government doesn’t require us to terrorize our neighbors into obedience, that Christ doesn’t radiate power through humiliation, and that the Spirit produces something other than fear within those who follow him.

Friends, we have been here before in our nation's history. During my tenure, it was not that long ago that we faced the George Floyd period, among others. Yet, many who will read this can remember the fight for desegregation. We must rise to our better angels again in this moment, wherever we find ourselves. So I say:

To the anxious in our congregations: you are not forgotten.

To immigrant communities in our states: you are not alone.

To officers and agents who feel beyond the reach of critique or moral accountability: you are wrong about that. And, you are also not beyond God’s grace.

To the Church: we must not become the chaplain of fear.

Friends: de‑escalate.

Let’s insist publicly, prayerfully, and steadfastly for social de‑escalation in Minnesota and nationwide. Let’s demand accountable governance and policies that recognize our common dignity. Let’s refuse every ideology that functions by dehumanization. And let’s practice an embodied Christianity that shows our neighbors what it looks like when citizens are governed, not by panic, but by the peace of Christ.

Because otherwise it is not merely a political failure - it is a spiritual failure: a society willing to forget what a human being is. May God give us the courage to tell the truth. The discipline to refuse violence. And the grace to become, together, the kind of people who can carry that peace into a frightened world.