What is this enttity called the "church"? There are only human beings who act both individually and collectively.
The author conveniently forgets that the institutional "church" has been an integral player in the politics of worldly power ever since the "church" was coopted by the Roman State.
It is only fairly recently that the INEVITABLE tyranny of the "church" was curtailed at least in some western countries. This being a response to the "religious" inspired slaughters of post Reformation Europe. The "church" still wields enormous power in some countries--Poland is an example.
To claim that "christians" are aliens in the modern world of secular politics is pure humbug.
The recent circus involving the funeral of the late pope and the installation of the current one was a brazen celebration/declaration of IMPERIAL POWER---Constantine lives!
There is an influential body of "righteous" right wing christians that wants to turn the USA into a theocratic state---the Dominionists.

I don't know why we trust religious people to run the country. I have no problem with people believing in their magical fairy stories, but those people would be my last choice for doing, you know, grown up things like making important decisions and so on.

I'd love to see an athiest prime minister one day. Imagine it...you breath deeper, the air tastes better, look outside...beautiful rays of sunlight pour through the autumn folliage, birds chirping..you lean back and smile...you even feel you bowels loosen up a bit...the world just got a little better, there's a rational person in power. Someone able to tell the difference between reality and fantasy...what a relief..

Course it won't happen, not in my lifetime anyway. Because the religious would never accept a non-religious person, we're instead forced to accept religious people. And that is the definition of backwards.

Two more points. Methinks that the author of this essay is full of self-serving delusions---all wrapped up in the usual pious language of course.

He uses the phras "allegiance to the triune god"--what triune god?
The triune "god" is a self-serving cultural and political construct--perculiar to the would be world conquering political "religion" called christianity.
It is certainly not an idea shared by the overwhelming majority of persons on this planet who have some kind of non christian religious affiliation.

He also uses the phrase: "if the church is to succeed in its mandate to work towards establishing a new kingdom"--- Again this is pure self serving humbug wrapped up in the language of seeming piety.

What mandate? Who's mandate?

Again this is the language of a would be world-conquering POLITICAL "religion"--- we are going to convert you to become like us because our "god" has told us to do so.

I wonder if Mr Rudds religion has caused him to face the truths he has opposed for a decade. I mean now he supports the sale of Telstra and the backing of Private schools. All we need now is for him to change his mind on Iraq (which if in power he will) and then you won't know if it is Liberal or Labour in power!

The unavoidable problem lies in the PLUS. Whether it be Labor + Christianity or Liberal + Atheism or Greens + neo-paganism or Democrats + existentialism, we cannot escape the complex, multifaceted aspects of our lives being influenced by a multitude of "isms". No person lives in a vacuum and no political perspective or philosophy of living is pure and unadulterated by a PLUS or, more accurately, several pluses. So Rudd is correct in refusing to allow that the Liberal Party equates with Christendom and the author is correct in calling Christians to not easily align with any particular party. Perhaps a Christian response to the political game is to not withdraw from the game but to deliberately play different roles: at various times a player, an umpire, a spectator, a medic, a coach... If a Christian is firstly one who seeks to live by the Way of Jesus Christ, it will take humility for a Christian person to recognise that that goal will never be fully realised because of the complex pluses that impact life. But let's not go to the extremes of asserting either that Christians are necessarily correct in their views or that they have no right to be part of the game. The moderating position taken by the author, that abandoning imperialistic Christendom for a role of speaking and serving prophetically from the margins, is more in keeping with the values lived out by the founder of the Christian faith.

Thank you Stephen – a balanced and thought-provoking piece.

Looking at some of the comments here, I think the church is now pretty close to being “resident aliens” whether it likes it or not!

Discerning the line between appropriate social and political engagement and retaining our commitment to our primary function and mission is a crucial issue for today’s church. I suspect Hauerwas goes too far towards emphasising separation and distinctness of the church. We are here to be God’s servants to the world, not just to each other. But both Abbot and Rudd show how easy it is to confuse God’s agenda with our personal political convictions.

Dank – you make some good points. I suspect the influences here are not all one way. The values and ethics of western political worldviews such as socialism, social democracy, environmentalism, liberalism, conservatism etc have bee shaped and defined in part by their historical backdrop of Christendom. They are at least in part the church’s grandchildren, and I suspect we can never completely disown them.