The Political Theology of the New Right by Rolf Schieder

THE POLITICAL THEOLOGY OF THE NEW RIGHT By Rolf Schieder [This article published on March 21, 2019 is translated from the German on the Internet, www.feinschwarz.net.] Can the ideology of the New Right be considered theology? What distinguishes the New Right from the political theology of the 1960s and 1970s? Rolf Schieder analyzes the apocalypticism that generates the state of emergency. The term “political theology” had a good sound in the blissful time after the 1968 unrest. Alongside many others, Johann Baptist Metz, Dorothee Soelle and Jurgen Moltmann urged a politically vigilant, emancipatory and ecumenical theology. This political theology understood itself as liberation theology. At that time, the people were still regarded as a revolutionary subject – not like today as a heap of xenophobic “populist” idiots. Political theology was institutional-critical and part of a movement that sought to change the dominant political, social and economic pecking order in a radical and revolutionary way. Whoever emphasized the purpose of institutions as promoting freedom and the independent dignity of the political was quickly decried as reactionary at that time. The question whether a political decision was worse or better was hardly raised in light of the pressure to fight on the side of the good or on the side of evil. Christians must be socialists, it seemed to us young political theologians. This was a question of faith, not a question of political economy and rational deliberation. The field of politics was the preferred place of the status confessionis. Carl Schmitt’s Grandchildren Fifty years later, we are confronted today with a political theology of the New Right. This is also radical, socially-critical and polarizing. Political compromise is not sought. Rather, the masses are mobilized in the struggle against evil elites who threaten to “corrupt” the people. Carl Schmitt wrote the screenplay for today’s political theology. His “Political Theology” written in 1922 was a reaction to Hans Keisen’s conception of the state as a constitutional state legitimated by the transparent application of laws that needed no civil religious justification. Legitimation by procedures should be enough. In contrast, Schmitt propagated a priority of the political before the law and constitutional state procedures. “The normal proves nothing,” Schmitt argued. “The exception proves everything.” Whoever decides over the state of emergency is sovereign.” Whether a state of emergency actually exists is ultimately unimportant. The power to define a state as a state of emergency and to generate a decision –making pressure is crucial. In these