By making the vision of God and the contemplative life the highest aim of life, by emphasizing the spiritual as godly and withdrawal from the world as holy, the middle ages in a sense surrendered the world to the devil. The world and matter were either to be tightly governed by spirit or to be renounced, or both. Sacerdotal celibacy was emblematic of the fact that the kingdom of God and the common life were incompatible. The kingdom had to be superimposed upon the world; it could govern the world, but it could not coincide with the world. The Reformation doctrines of justification by faith, the priesthood of all believers, and the Christian calling and vocation made possible the potential coincidence of the kingdom and the world as an historical objective, not, of course, to be fully realized in this life but to be approximated and the proper goal of historical activity. Thus the Reformation was a liberation and the promise of life, but a promise thus far unrealized.
Rousas John Rushdoony — By What Standard? An Analysis of the Philosophy of Cornelius Van Til
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