Peace and freedom

Over the weekend I finished reading two books. The first was entitled While Europe Slept: How Radical Islam is Destroying the West from Within, by Bruce Bawer. Bawer is gay, so his perspective is shaded by the difference between the liberal social policies of Western European nations toward gay marriage and the position of Islamic shariah law. He has lived in the Netherlands and Norway and observed life in most of Europe. What he sees is a capitulation to the demands of radical Muslims in the name of multiculturalism and “peace.”

Here are a couple of interesting passages:

It’s not surprising that we’ve ended up drawing two vastly different morals from World War II. For Americans, the moral was that tyranny was evil and must always be resisted; for Europeans, the moral was that war itself was evil and must be avoided at all costs. (p. 99)

War is evil, but when a tyrannical enemy wages war against you, brutally killing the innocent, is it morally responsible to say, "Oh, well, whatever?" Read on...

From Lisbon to Helsinki, from Dublin to Rome, “peace” is the mantra, and nowhere is this more surely the case than in Germany. Today’s Germans reflexively oppose war—war in Iraq, war anywhere, war against anybody for any reason whatever. For Germans today, the very idea of armed combat is tied up inextricably with Hitler, Nazism, the Holocaust, and a profound, implacable sense of national guilt. All these things are part of one nightmarish continuum—one evil, ugly bundle. Germans realize, too, that for the world around them, the very idea of war is bound up with images of Germans in uniform. For a German today, the simple act of putting on military dress recalls immense historical infamies and imposes a feeling of culpability to heavy to shoulder. One can well understand why a German might feel that his country’s only hope for redemption, given its history, lies in peace, peace, and more peace—at whatever cost—and in proclaiming at every turn the German people’s repudiation of their forebears’ crimes. (p. 132)

For the sake of argument, let’s speculate as to what life would be like if a pattern of capitulation and appeasement were to continue. You might have what Boston Globe columnist Jeff Jacoby recently described in his column Life in an Isalmist US. Here’s an excerpt:

``Prayers for the Assassin," Robert Ferrigno's latest thriller, is set 35 years in the future, when the United States has been transformed into the Islamic Republic of America. It is a country in which university professors can lose their jobs for being ``insufficiently Islamic," cellphone cameras are illegal, and men can only dream of ``loud music, cold beer, and coed beaches." There is still a Super Bowl, but the cheerleaders are all men. Mt. Rushmore still exists, but the presidential faces on it have been blown up.

Read the rest for an idea of what life for women might be like.

Or, as Bawer fears, you may have a complete inability of liberal leaders to take a stand against the encroachment on their freedom, resulting in the ascendancy of neo-Nazis and other militant right-wing groups. Incidentally, America’s conservatives have no parallel in any European democracy. Bush and the Republicans are so far to the right of any European that they invariably sound the “Hitler” alarm when discussing America’s president.

The other book I read is called Painting the Map Red: The Fight to Create A Permanent Republican Majority by Hugh Hewitt. In this analysis, Hewitt offers several recommendations, not the least of which is to highlight the difference between the Democrat view of “peace” with the Republican view of “victory.” Nobody likes war and no one relishes casualties—unless, of course, you feel that you can exploit them for political gain. Then let’s just keep the body counter ticking so that everyone can see that “War, what is it good for? Absolutely nothin’!” and “Support our troops! Bring them home!” and the rest of the hippie, European-style “peace” slogans.

In the book of Jeremiah, the prophet delivered this message from the Lord: “I am against the prophets who wag their own tongues and say ‘The LORD declares.’ Peace, peace, they say, when there is no peace.” The Hebrew word for peace is “Shalom,” and when used in a Biblical concept, it reminds us of the spiritual peace that we have in knowing that our sins are fully and freely forgiven for Jesus’ sake. We have been reconciled to God. God no longer hates us because of our sin, but loves us in Christ.

How different is the claim that Islam is a religion of peace, when it was spread at the point of a sword. Islam means not “peace,” but “submission,” and you can live in peace if you agree to submit to the will of Allah. Girls, this means agreeing to be abused and dominated by the male members of your family, your husband, and that if you go outside without your veil, your family will accuse you of being a whore and that you are asking to be raped. This is peace? Anyone can have peace if you agree to surrender to a conqueror’s brutal terms. But at what point do you say “enough?”

In your reading for this week, you come to see another word that carries subtle semantic shading and nuance as well. That’s the word “Freedom.” Just as “peace” may be used by different people in different ways, so also did the Renaissance humanists have a different idea of what “freedom” entailed from that of the Reformation biblicists. Use the comments section to provide your biblical definition of “Freedom.”

Mainline denominations meet

This week's newspapers report on proceedings in some of the major Christian denominations in our country. Among Episcopalians, who defied the wishes of the broader worldwide Anglican communion by electing a female bishop, the issue continues to be the church's position on homosexuality. Should a man who divorced his wife in order to "set up shop" with his gay lover be allowed to continue to serve as a bishop in the church? Sounds like a far cry from "Among you there must not even be a hint of sexual immorality."

Among Presbyterians, the issue of ordination of gay clergy is front and center as well. According to this story from the USA Today,

In a plan devised by a special task force, Presbyterians would keep on the books a church law that says all office-holders must observe either fidelity in heterosexual marriage or else chastity in singleness.

The panel spent years considering the issue before introducing the proposal, which is designed to hold together Presbyterians who support full equality for homosexuals and those who believe change would violate biblical teaching.

As we read about the decline of the Church in the Middle Ages, it cannot be denied that the farther a church removes itself from the Word of God and sets up its own opinions and traditions as authoritative, the less it can expect God's blessings. So it is amazing that one of the Presbyterians' advocates for full equal rights for homosexuals states, "There will be no mass exodus. We've heard all these threats before. ... This is not an issue to divide a denomination over. It doesn't touch the core of the faith."

That all depends on what is meant by "core of the faith." When the Bible ceases to be acknowledged as the divinely inspired and inerrant word of God, but instead is viewed as a book that simply contains the "word of God" inside somewhere, and experts need to sift out the human from the divine, that touches the core of the faith. And the issue that will continue to cause true, Bible-believing Christians in the Presbyterian church to remove themselves from that association will not be some mean, hateful sense of homophobia; it will be the realization that their church refuses to follow the Word of God.

In this week's chapter from How Should We Then Live, you read about the late Middle Ages and the inherent pessimism of humanism. Express your answers to the focus question in the comment section.

No One Mourns the Wicked

Our country awoke this morning to the welcome news that Iraq’s leading terrorist, Al-Qaeda chief Al-Zarqawi, was killed in an air raid on his safe house. His body was positively identified by fingerprints, facial appearance, and scarring. Fittingly, the newly elected Prime Minister of Iraq made the announcement, which precipitated at least a minute of cheering and celebration from the assembled journalists. It can only be hoped—and prayed—that this death will be viewed as a turning point in the Iraq conflict, and that his jihadist followers will be convinced of the futility of their efforts, and that a democratic and free Iraq continue to emerge in the Middle East. Robespierre’s death marked the end of the French Revolution’s Reign of Terror. Hitler’s suicide meant the almost immediate capitulation of Nazi Germany. Will this be a case where the followers believe so much in the cause that they fight on, or are they going to scatter like sheep without a shepherd?

My family and I got to see the musical Wicked in Detroit on Sunday. This Stephen Schwartz-written show (Godspell, Children of Eden, Hunchback of Notre Dame) tells the familiar story of the Wicked Witch of the West from an unfamiliar perspective. From the outset, the play recasts the familiar “good” characters (Glinda, the Wizard, the Munchkins) as “bad,” and the “bad” characters (Elphabah—the Wicked Witch of the West and her sister Nessarose, the Wicked witch of the East) as “good.” The Wizard’s showcase number, They Call Me Wonderful, implies that there is no such thing as “good” and “evil,” only the perspective from which the story is told.

History is like that. Some say that those who win the wars get to write the history. From the winner’s vantage point, your opponent was “wicked.” World War I is a case in point. France won, Germany lost, ergo, France good, Germany wicked. In the United States’ war against Mexico, President Polk won—and added the so-called Mexican Cession (the vast majority of the present southwestern U.S.) to the union; ergo, U.S. good, Mexico wicked. But the complexities of European geopolitics during the late 1800’s and early 1900’s, and the obvious war of conquest waged by the US against our southern neighbors demand the analysis of history from multiple perspectives, not only that of the war’s winners.

I’ve been reading a new history of the Pilgrims and Puritans of the Plymouth and Massachusetts Bay Colonies called Mayflower. In it, author Nathaniel Philbrick retells not only the well-known (if not embellished) tale of Squanto and the first Thanksgiving. He also discusses the labyrinthine challenges of dealing with the Indian sachems, whose skill at manipulation mirrored the Indians’ battlefield strategy of concealment instead of meeting the enemy on the open field. Eventually, the Indian population rose up in widespread acts of brutality, burning villages and scalping the English colonists, in a conflict known as “King Philip’s War” or “Metacom’s rebellion.” Although they fought bitterly, once King Philip was gone, the Massachusetts Indians lost their will. It was hopeless, futile, and became a merciless bloodbath as the English refused to differentiate between ally and foe—the only good Indian was a dead Indian.

From whose perspective can you read this history? Do you take a position hostile to Europeans and act as if the Indians were somehow “noble savages” who were peaceful and warm people until the English came? Do you write history from the vantage point of the victors and relate the acts of the Indians as treacherous, hypocritical, deceitful, manipulative, and demanding of retribution? Do you say that the Indians were only fighting for “their land,” or do you say that the Puritans paid a fair price for the land and so they were fighting for “their land?”

Now what about Al-Zarqawi? Many in the media will be quick to portray him as a hero, a martyr, one who tried to fight for Arab land (Palestine) against the Zionist imperialists (US and Britain). Are he and the other members of Al-Qaeda simply like the Native Americans of long ago, who committed violent acts of terror and murder in an attempt to reclaim what they had lost? Your perspective and worldview will interpret the story and its characters.

In chapter 2 of How Should We Then Live, we move into the Middle Ages. For those who lived in the time of the Renaissance and the Enlightenment, this was a “Dark Age” because of its domination by the Catholic Church’s authority. As you answer the discussion questions in the comments section, try to develop a sense of balance and perspective in pointing out the negative (the influx of humanistic elements into the church) with the positive contributions of this era.

Bigoted Christians

The US Senate has recently taken up (again!) the proposed “Defense of Marriage Amendment.” It reads, “Marriage in the United States shall consist only of the union of a man and a woman. Neither this Constitution, nor the constitution of any State, shall be construed to require that marriage or the legal incidents thereof be conferred upon any union other than the union of a man and a woman.” It is unlikely to pass the Senate with the necessary two-thirds majority in order to pass the amendment on to the states for ratification, however. Senator Edward Kennedy (D-Massachusetts) is on record saying that “A vote for this amendment is a vote for bigotry, plain and simple.” He also says that it is being pushed by President Bush in order to get his “extreme base” to vote. One wonders how, in Teddy’s worldview, those who believe in the traditional, biblical view of marriage are somehow “extreme.”

I might also suggest that, if the esteemed senators wish to allow states to determine their own laws regarding marriage and family, then they ought to be consistent and allow those states to determine their own laws regarding the restriction of abortion, something states have not been allowed to do under the Roe v. Wade decision. It also would be appropriate to actually pass the amendment and see if it is ratified by ¾ of the states. I won’t hold my breath. Perhaps the never-used amendment option ought to be pursued. If 2/3 of the state legislatures approve, a constitutional convention may be called. This provision was included in the constitution in order to circumvent an obstructionist Congress and allow the states to assert their “check and balance” on the central government.

In reading chapter 1 of How Should We Then Live?, you have discovered Dr. Schaeffer’s insight into the reason for the Roman persecution of Christians. In the comment section, state your brief analysis, and consider whether the views of Sen. Kennedy are useful in drawing a comparison to today’s circumstances. Would Teddy make a good Roman?