Abstract

The author believes it tobe one ofthe duties Christians have to accept the state ofthe basic Iaw as a matter of their own concern. This acceptance has a character of critical solidarity with an order needy and capable of improvement. It includes the willingness to cooperate in three tasks: the rejection of falsifications and erosions of essential structural elements in constitutional law, the bridging of the gap between constitutional standard and constitutional reality and the further development ofthe constitutional order in a future-oriented way. The fundamental structural principles of the constitution - the principle of democracy, the concept of a state based on the rule oflaw, and the concept of a social welfare state - are used to illustrate these tasks more thoroughly.