I won't attempt to provide an adequate overview of Dominion Theology in this blog, but see the links included here.
The crux of DT hinges on its eschatology, or its view of the "endtimes" before the return of Christ. In mainstream U.S. churches, there is no consensus as to when Christ will return, and the reign of a Kingdom of God for 1000 years is viewed as coming about after Christ's return.
Dominion Theology posits that in fact, the reverse will happen and true Christians are already in the midsts of building a Kingdom of God. In fact, Christ will fail to return until they complete their dominion.
From
RapidNet:
Dominion theology is predicated upon three basic beliefs:
(a) Satan usurped man's dominion over the earth through the temptation of Adam and Eve;
(b) The Church is God's instrument to take dominion back from Satan; and
(c) Jesus cannot or will not return until the Church has taken dominion by gaining control of the earth's governmental and social institutions.
More specifically, what does Dominion Theology (DT) teach? Here are the highlights:
More specifically, what does Dominion Theology (DT) teach? Here are the highlights:
(a) The Old Testament (OT) Law is our rule of life for today. Although DT teaches that keeping of the Law is not a condition for salvation, it is a condition for sanctification. (However, some of the COR's official statements appear to specifically condition salvation upon OT Law-keeping!);
(b) In addition, the OT Law is to govern over society as well. Since we are called to subdue the earth (Gen. 1:28), DT teaches that God's Law should rule (or dominate) all aspects of society. This view is known as Theonomy (or God's law), and is described by Greg Bahnsen as: "The Christian is obligated to keep the whole law of God as a pattern for sanctification and that this law is to be enforced by the civil magistrate" (Theonomy, p. 34). This would mean that Christians would be obligated to keep the whole OT Law except in a case in which the New Testament (NT) explicitly cancels a command, such as the sacrificial system;
The presence of this ideology as a component of the current regime is chilling.
Many thinkers, within the government or in a broader religious right constituency of this government, may not even be aware of Dominion Theology as a discreet belief, but it is there and we ignore it at our peril.
From Susan Diamond:
But Barton's message flies in the face of the Christian Coalition's public claims about wanting only its fair share of political power. In his new book Politically Incorrect, Coalition director Ralph Reed writes: "What do religious conservatives really want? They want a place at the table in the conversation we call democracy. Their commitment to pluralism includes a place for faith among the many other competing interests in society."
Yet the Coalition's own national convention last September opened with a plenary speech by Rev. D. James Kennedy who echoed the Reconstructionist line when he said that "true Christian citizenship" includes a cultural mandate to "take dominion over all things as vice-regents of God."
Is this why Reed quit CC?
Now I am neither a conspiracy theorist nor an alarmist, and I don't believe this ideology reflects all or even most of the so-called moral values vote, but I am spooked.
A return to Old Testament civil and moral law, excepting only ritual sacrifices, would impose the death penalty for homosexuality, blasphemy, etc. Anyone remember Gilead from The Handmaid's Tale?
More sources (a scholarly index, both pro and con):
http://www.theologicalstudies.org.uk/theology_dominion.html (more scholarly index, both pro and con)