“Divine Simplicity and Right Relations: A Classical Theist Response to Integralism”

In the last decade, there has been renewed interest within political theology in a theory called integralism. On an integralist account, the coercive power of the state should be put at the service of the spiritual power of the church to promote a right relationship with God. What I will argue is that to the degree that integralists also identify themselves as classical theists, a contradiction emerges in how they wish to facilitate union with God. In particular, when we understand what classical theism takes to be the divine nature, we will see that the coercive methods proposed by integralism prevent humans from standing in right relation with the deity. My argument will proceed first by giving a general account of integralism, then by giving a classical theist account of the divine nature, and finally by looking at the implications of classical theism for integralism.