There’s an interesting relationship between those advocating an actively Christian government and those calling for a flattening of the progressive income tax.

They consist of the same people. Both are conservative and support both these stances.

The interesting thing is their logical inconsistency in embracing these two views. Free-market Christians are living oxymorons. They argue for integration of certain religious values into our government but advocate the exact opposite of such values when economics enters the picture.

Christian groups exerting political influence are doing so with the aim of making “immoral” behavior illegal. This attitude can be easily seen in their anti-abortion stance and their attempts to ban gay marriage.

Given the philosophy of “if it is wrong, then it should be illegal,” such groups ought to be very much in favor of a progressive income tax.

Think of it as a sin tax.

There’s a great Biblical anecdote to explain this. Christ is approached by a man who asks what he needs to do to get into Heaven. Jesus responds: Be nice to mom and dad, don’t kill or steal, etc. But that’s not all.

In an unusual burst of clarity, Christ comes flat out and tells him, “Go thy way, sell whatever thou hast, and give to the poor.” (Mark 10:21, KJV). Jesus then goes on to explain that a humped quadruped has a better chance of fitting through the eye of a needle than a wealthy man has of enjoying the afterlife.

This is striking because it is an uncharacteristic thing for Christ to say. Typically he taught through fables and parables. That he felt the need to make such an incredibly clear-cut statement says a lot about how deeply important the issue is. There are many other instances in the Gospels where Christ condemns the rich.

If a behavior prevents one from getting into Heaven, it’s a sin. Being rich is, without a doubt, a sin.

It logically follows that the government should discourage it, in the view of most politically active Christians.

Unfortunately, “rich” is a nebulous term, and no one agrees on how much money a person can have before they’re rich, so we can’t just ban being wealthy like we can abortions.

We can safely say that the more money a person has, the more likely it is that person can be considered rich and sinful.

From this perspective, the progressive income tax makes perfect sense as an excise tax. As income increases, sin increases and tax increases.

It may not be as effective as outlawing abortion and gay marriage, but it operates on the same principle.

It seems that most conservatives who call themselves Christians have mentally constructed a barrier between religion and economics.

Adam Smith’s “invisible hand” has transmogrified from a consequence of human affairs to a divine force more powerful than the words of Christ.

Even a cursory inspection of Jesus’s words teaches us that Christ made no such distinction between economics and morality.

Never did he say, “Thou shalt act in thy own self interests as free market forces hath the best solution to scarcity, but otherwise thou shalt obey my word.”

More reasonable Christians like to counter this by saying that people have to come to this on their own terms through charitable giving, rather than forcefully leading them away from sin.

The theory goes that if we rework the progressive income tax, people will be more inclined to give to charity.

A nice idea, but there’s really no historical evidence to support it. Studies have found virtually no connection between tax breaks and increases in charitable giving.

Most donations in this country are not made from the rich to the poor.

Over 80 percent of donations in this country go not to the needy but to cultural institutions like orchestras and museums. It’s basically the rich giving to one another.

We live in a country where the top 10 percent of the population controls over 70 percent of the wealth.

A country where one in every five children is below the poverty line. A country where roughly 85 percent of the populace calls itself Christian.

If this doesn’t strike you as perverse, it should. It is time to overcome our obliviousness to the logical inconsistencies of many modern conservatives.

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Ben Byrne is a senior in graphic design from Edina, Minn.