This post by NJL over at Icthus is one of the best blog entires I’ve ever read. It’s one of the best pieces I have ever read. It is absolutely right. It is absolutely a needed message. This country, more now than in many many decades, is sick with violence, revenge, culturally induced glofification of it, and being inundated with it every day by the leadership of this country, who have chosen to live by it.
MLK knew this. He saw it in the Vietnam conflict, not to mention the brutal tactics used to subjugate his black brothers and sisters. I have never forgotten the words he spoke at Riverside Church in 1967: :
A Nation that continues to spend more money , year after year, on programs of military defense than on programs of social uplift, is approaching spiritual death.
Read this article. the message of it is to the Church: wake up and BE the CHURCH. Confront this mess.
ICTHUS: Building a Culture of Peace
The recent celebrations of Martin Luther King have caused me to reflect on a problem that grew in King’s mind during his ministry. Facing the violent opposition to the civil rights movement, King became convinced that America had a fundamental issue with violence that needed to be healed. This led him to speak out against the war in Vietnam, not merely opposing an unjust war but rebuking America’s way of looking at the world, it’s arrogant heroification of itself and other-ization of the world that fed into its violent nature. King predicted that if America did not confront its ethic of violence, which it would not if the church did not lead it, then it would continue to fight such wars for generations to come.
And so it has. And so it is spiraling out of control, led by a group who have obviously strayed far from the path of the pursuit of justice, but use the jargon to cover their destruction in the name of the most narcissisitic United States we have seen in a couple of centuries.
14 Characteristics of Facist Regimes
Communism, Terrorism; Eurasia, Eastasia.
Christianity and statism don’t mix. The NT communities were fundamentally opposed to the idea of worshipping state gods or participating in armies. The Church has to stop relying on government to do its job.
I would agree that the Church cannot RELY on the government to do what is, and I agree ITS job (ie. The pursuit of and advocacy for, justice, active, sacrificial, serving. But I also believe that ALL of humanity, particularly large and powerful groups formed with an aim toward the “keeping of the peace” and the “promotion of the general welfare” , like governments, particularly those which have the stated ideals such as ours, to LIVE up to that. Kings and emperors have been called byu their prophets to be the best of that sort; and this is a large p[ioece of the story of God’s people as we have it in the Bible, and also in other Holy Books.
True, there is one piece of history that tells us that Governments, particularly those of large, wealthy nations, led by elites of those nations, to place the interests of the elites ahead of that general welfare, and that is all the molre important, realizing this, that the Church remain true and steadfast, and active; the failures of the rulin gparties should not deter the sense of call, and the act of response to that call.
I believe there is also a sense in which the call of the Church is somethign to be proclaimed to all who assume to stand for something that purports to promote the general welfare at the least, and at best, to building a more just society. It is at the core of the prayer “They will be done on earth as it is in heaven. Of course, there will be distortions of that, and that the Church stands for more than just some patriotic notion of “good for all”, but I do believe there is a universal call; one which spans all the great religions, and all the “proogressive” movements which arise as a response to some great injustices and institutions of oppression. I believe that the Church shares a common stream with these; and we have our theological underpinnings that brings home to our souls the meaning of justice; of freedom; of abundant life, and what all those mean.
So this is a relatively brief explanation of why I can’t bring myslef to say “that’s not the government’s job”. I agree that its much more the Church’s job; that it is demanded of it. But it is ALSO the ultimate duty for any “collaborative effort” to “govern”. Promoting the general welfare is something worthy of great expense, a nd great educai ton, and much cooperation (and now, more than ever, across oceans and internationally. We are ALL connected, and we ALL have a call.
I sense that you probably agree with most of this, nkebird, but I felt compelles to respond and elaborate.