Anton Sorkin (Director of Law Student Ministries, Christian Legal Society), The Life of Significant Soil:
On one hand, the rate of U.S. adults who say religion is an important part of their day continues to drop. … Couple this with a Pew Research Report from October indicating a “sharp rise in the share of U.S. adults who say religion is gaining influence in American life.”
The Tension Between Influence and Importance … While the influence of religion remains important and respondents still seem aware of its utility, less and less are considering religious practice essential. This draws perhaps a contrast between the endorsement of Christian rhetoric in public pronouncements (i.e., influence) and the actual exercise of Christian faith in everyday practice (i.e., importance). Perhaps too many people are content with the pronouncement of faith by politicians than the exercise of their faith in how they love their neighbors. …
For me, among the reasons for this is a distorted relationship with optics and power—whereby the former is driving the climate of American life without the life-giving energy that a mobilized Christian citizenry brings to those in need. … An empowered Church, therefore, elevates its neighbors. It seeks justice for the oppressed, advocates for public policies that enhance human flourishing, models self-control and good judgment, and donates its time and money towards repairing civic life. It is a Church that approaches the relationship with power as a source for service and love, not political ascendency. The greater the power, the more responsibility: “to whom much was given, of him much will be required, and from him to whom they entrusted much, they will demand the more” (Luke 12:48). And part of that responsibility requires the development of a good conscience and a discernment for how we are to walk in these challenging times.
Instead, what we’re seeing is the conflation of responsibility with influence in the context of power, whereby those in power think that to cast a vision for Christian life is more important than modeling a worthy standard for orthopraxy. That as long as you can continue declaring your faith in the corridors of power, then you can ignore the more difficult task of living the Christian ideal and “bear[ing] fruits in keeping with repentance” (Luke 3:8, ESV).
What Law Students Value … A recent LSAC Knowledge Report that tracks the motivation of law school candidates asks why they want to attend law school and what is their ultimate goals when they get there. In this report we find “that helping others and advocating for social justice remain the top motivations for test takers[.] In fact, the mention of helping others increased by about 20%, and advocating for social justice increased by more than 30%, between 2023-24 and 2024-25.” It is clear from the data that the vast majority of those intending to apply for law school hope to find a career that gives them a meaningful opportunity to do good in the world.
In light of all this, and in my earnest desire for the Church to put aside the idolatry of influence in favor of right living, my advice is rather simple: “let us not grow weary of doing good, for in due season we will reap, if we do not give up” (Galatians 6:9). …
Pursuing the Good The good I advocate for is not simply an abstract good. I do have some concrete suggestions. Let me offer three that have been swirling around these last few days.
1. Serve Those With Special Needs (LSSSE Report): In the first of its kind, a recent report (“Report”) from Indiana University’s Center for Postsecondary Research entitled “Disability in Law School” provides a glimpse into the experience of law students with disabilities during their legal education. As the Report points out, one in four Americans have a disability. Among law students, that number is probably 20%. …
2. Offer Encouragement (1 Thessalonians 5:11): My next idea for doing good is to offer encouragement to your classmates and professors. …
3. Pull the Law Towards Love (Jeffrey Baker): My final advice for how to seek the good is more capacious and therefore in fitting manner I will only briefly sketch my advice and then encourage you to read the article in full. Writing in his A Sermon on the Law: The Jurisprudence of Love, [15 Wash. U. Juris. Rev. 313 (2023),] law professor Jeffrey Baker makes a rather categorical and yet powerful claim in his discussion of the primacy of love in the life of a Christian attorney: “If we are not pulling our laws in the direction of neighbor-love, then we are pulling the wrong way.” In reflection on the statistics above, I wonder if we are experiencing an American culture that sees the influence of religion without its revolutionary impact on one’s life and the life of those around us. If Christianity is to lose its cultural influence, it is likely to lose it by being a tepid version of its true nature. It is not from want of true Christian life that Christianity falls apart, but from a counterfeit witness driven by the spirit of the flesh and indistinctiveness (cf, Galatians 3:3: Revelations 3:15).
To restore the true influence and importance of the Christian life, we must begin anew through forms of public repentance and a turn to the practice of love mandated for all Christians. It is why the paper from Baker is so astute, taking not only love as its primary starting point, but also seeking to incrementally inject the leavening of love across the legal profession. Baker writes that without love, what the law tends to yield is “fruits of fear, greed, and hatred.” But if the law sounds in love, we might then see a harvest of blessings that reinvigorates our common life and helps elevate those in centers of need to places of victory. But again, it begins with love. As Baker writes in his rewriting of 1 Corinthians 13,
“If we American lawyers have the most sophisticated jurisprudence and correct politics with shrieking moral certainty, but do not have love, we are a noisy gong. If we have skill, expertise, prestige, wealth, and influence, and do not have love, we are nothing. If we defeat our adversaries to impose our own visions, but do not have love, we gain nothing.”
To do good, the Christian law student must begin to orient his thinking on the very thing that incoming law students already find to be of utmost importance—helping others. With the power of love and the sanctifying work of the Holy Spirit, doing good and making sure the profession serves the same interest could very well position the Christian attorney to be the quintessential exemplar of a new standard of legal practice adapted to the age of AI.
Conclusion. So once again my admonition is this: don’t grow weary from doing good. Easier said than done, which is why the virtue of hope and perseverance must be connected to an eschatological vision of the world and a sanctified vision of personal stewardship. With the former, our hope is tied to the promise of future glory. Christ speaks to this reality with a vibrant illustration of homecoming. “In my Father’s house are many rooms. If it were not so, would I have told you that I go to prepare a place for you? And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again and will take you to myself, that where I am you may be also” (John 14:2-3).
As to the latter, sanctification is tied to personal growth, and personal growth is tied to perseverance. That is why not only Paul, but also Peter, speaks to the importance of overcoming suffering (1 Peter 4:12-19) and weakness (2 Corinthians 12: 5-10) in the procedural aims of emerging on the other end conformed the more into the image of the Son. And finally, in James 1, this point is made plain: “Count it all joy, my brothers, when you meet trials of various kinds, for you know that the testing of your faith produces steadfastness. And let steadfastness have its full effect, that you may be perfect and complete, lacking in nothing” (James 1:2-4). And it should come as no surprise that Peter, Paul, and James all connect the act of overcoming in connection with doing good (see 1 Peter 4:19; 2 Corinthians 12:20-21; James 1:27)!
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