This past Sunday I attended an annual church meeting and took notes for a friend who could not be there. The pastor is a good historian and makes sure even while conducting congregation business after services, that he cites Gospel passages as guiding principles for each item on the agenda. Having a physical church puts him in the government sights. As “a Conservative Christian” who believes in supporting the secular government as part of his ministry, he has found himself in the unaccustomed position of breaking laws.

It was against the law for him to hold services for half the year.

Then, when the lie emerged as a boldface agenda to erase faith in God in favor of faith in government, he began holding services, in danger of arrest.

Then, when Saint Joseph who Abides dispelled the Vile Usurper, the government began permitting churches to open—but, masks must be worn, distance must be kept, occupancy must be limited and songs may not be sung!

The pastor could not on good conscience go this far for government against God.

He spoke in cautionary tones about Worshipping God in conscientious objection to Government Worship, treading a tight rope.

On with business the pastor and his congregation—a small one which could fit in a house—went.

Budget disclosures were made.

I was impressed with his modest salary.

Then, membership forms were passed out, one for each person in the family, not one per a family. This is a problem as most of the husbands are reluctant to fill out a form with their name, rank and serial number in the War on Thought. One of the ladies asked, worried that her gun-owner husband would not want to be entered into a database of Christians, “Can we register as a family?’

The pastor was candid:

“We have to answer to the state requirements for operating as a 501-C-3 nonprofit. This is necessary to prove that we are not just some shell tax-shelter. The testimonial can be verbal—I would prefer that. But the membership must be written open for…” [I wanted to say “Inquisition” and missed what term he used for audit examination.]

This hit me like a hammer.

I had long thought that the informer, the slave who made, of most slave plots and escapes and revolts, a slaughter and hanging or a whipping and shackling of his slave fellows by the masters, was the prototype for the surveillance state. I suppose that doxing and social media now serve the function of the slave snitch of Plantation America which is alive and well.

However, when one recalls that medieval mortality is measured by modern historians largely through church records, it is obvious that the church has long been the surveillance arm of the state. A refugee from the Soviet Union told me that Russian orthodox priests were all government informants.

I also recall that Plantation Era vestrymen and church wardens of Maryland and Virginia were in charge of assigning the bastard infants of the poor [who were forbidden to marry or have sex out of wedlock] to a master who would own them until age 21 or 31 as chattel.

So, what was the equivalent in 1783 America to the Catholic priest of Medieval Christendom, or the Orthodox priest of the Soviet Union?

The protestant minister of such places as the now defunct God and Country Church on Hamilton Avenue in Baltimore City.

A retreat to the catacombs and to secret house of worship, perhaps via carpooling and walking and at night, and not on Sunday, might be the future of Christian congregations in the hate-washed world to come.