The Terrible Price of Sacralism...Ignorance
by Design
Historically
the Sacralist impulse has led to the confusion of common nation with the
Kingdom of God. The nation's agenda and policy are cast in theological and
redemptive terms. Conflicts with other nations are not understood as two fallen
nations in a fallen world fighting over control of the City of Man, they're not
understood as rival evils, competing Beast-powers. Instead it's good vs. evil,
one side is white and pure while the other side is corrupted, black, and thus
evil.
One
side, in this case the United States becomes a manifestation of Christ's
Kingdom, or at least its proxy, and thus by extension the soldiers in its army
become something akin to Holy Crusaders.
Speculative
theology wedded to Sacralism can generate an argument or position for any
occasion. Justification for war and violence is easy enough to come up with
using twisted hermeneutics applied to Old Testament Israel.
When the
population is uninformed, ignorant and highly subject to propaganda then it is
no great task to manufacture consent. Our world has grown very complex and we
have access to information like never before, but with that access comes a
double edged sword. The powers that be can be called out much easier, it's
harder for them to hide things. But on the other hand, medieval kings and Roman
emperors would have salivated at the prospects of using something like
television to promote and sell policy. More than enough information is
available for us to discern what is happening in the world, but if no one knows
how to think or work it out, then it does little good.
Generally
speaking it's pretty easy to take a non-aggressive impotent country and paint
them as a fire-breathing aggressor, an imminent threat to the very existence of
the nation wishing to start a fight. The Establishment Media (wittingly or
unwittingly) in 2002-2003 helped the Bush Administration convince the public
that America's existence was at stake. Iraq was going to attack any moment and
so by attacking them, we were actually defending ourselves, and preventing a
mushroom cloud from appearing over an American city.
An
absurd argument, but it proved an easy sell in the face of not just
geo-political ignorance, but hysterical fear combined with ignorance. And
though few in the media actually suggested or verified the extreme scenarios
proffered by the administration, the imagery worked, the fear was at work among
the masses.
The
powers that be even recruited some leaders of the False Church to draft and
sign a letter to President Bush assuring him that attacking Iraq would be
defensive and in accord with "Christian" Just War Theory. The Land
Letter represented a low point for the American Church as the Southern Baptist
lobbyist Richard Land, former special counsel to Nixon and unrepentant felon
Chuck Colson, Dominionist D James Kennedy, and perhaps one of the worst
offenders of promoting the false gospel of Cheap Grace and Easy Believism,
Campus Crusade founder Bill Bright, signed a letter that twisted history,
promoted heresy and encouraged a war that has resulted in hundreds of thousands
dead. Pope Urban II would have been proud.
The
effects of the American invasion of Iraq have not ended. It has affected the
whole region and will continue to do so for at least a generation.
Rather
than understand America's imperial mission over the past century and its
worldwide aggression, especially ramped up since 1991... rather than work
through the theological implications of what was happening, most Christians went
along with it all. I wonder how far it could have gone before some of them
would have really started to question what was happening? What would have
happened if there had been another attack and Bush had been granted unlimited
political capital for several more years?
Rather
than Churches teaching Christians to have a Biblical Worldview, these same
synagogues of Satan lauded and praised American 'Servicemen' as they 'served
and defended our freedom' by militarily occupying dozens of countries around the
world and in March of 2003, by bombing a country that had already been betrayed
and ravaged by the United States for over a decade... a country that many
workers within the NGO community claimed had been subject to a genocide on the
part of the United States with over 1.5 million dead between 1991-2003.
We
weren't liberating the Iraqis. We'd been systematically destroying their
country for over a decade. The illegal no-fly zones and the sanctions had only
strengthened Saddam Hussein. Few were sorry to see him go in 2003, but you're
hard pressed to find any Iraqis outside of Kurdistan happy with the results of
the American invasion, few that would say life is better, or that they've been
liberated. The Kurds are happy to have him gone but their feelings toward
American can only be mixed at best. American ally and up until recently
American proxy Turkey has slaughtered the Kurds in the tens of thousands.
American policy calls the Kurds in Iraq freedom fighters, but just a few miles
away in Southeast Turkey, they're terrorists.
The
Iraqis have not been liberated, they're the victims of Imperial policy. The
6000 American soldiers killed in Iraq and Afghanistan and the tens of thousands
of wounded and maimed are not 'serving' the people of the United States, they
are pawns in a great game, an Imperial strategy dictated by American political,
military and business interests.
Rather
than teach the commandments of Christ, these 'churches' encouraged and still
encourage their young men to shave their heads, be brainwashed, put on the
uniform of death, and wage war on other nations.
And when
they kill, it is justified...the dead are either guilty parties or unfortunate
victims of collateral damage. There's no sin, no crime. Invading another
country and killing its people is not murder, it's service. Manipulating and
conquering other countries isn't theft, it's defending our freedom.
Ironically,
George Bush did more than any other president in recent memory to destabilize
the world order. He generated a whole generation of new enemies who wish for
revenge and an opportunity to strike back at the Empire which has spread a dark
cloud over much of the world. America has been at this for a long time, and
when the Soviet Union fell, the lust for power only increased.
For
Americans the so-called and very misnamed War on Terror has only created more
terror. As a result of Imperial policy both at home and abroad we've lost
freedoms and are sliding toward a police state. Despite the hopes of many very
gullible people, Obama has done nothing to pull America from this path. This
would not be possible if the military was not 'serving' as the muscular arm of
Empire. Are these men and women in uniform serving us? Are these pawns not
actually doing us harm?
They're
not 'serving' us in the least, nor are they making us more free...actually
their willingness to participate in evil policy, or in many cases their
ignorance of what they do...is actually diminishing our freedom.
Some in
a previous generation understood this when instead of cheering returning
soldiers from Vietnam they jeered them. I'm not going to spit on soldiers at
the airport, but I will not under any circumstance stand on applaud returning
storm troopers who are destroying this nation and the world and making me less
free.
Why
aren't the terrorists gunning for Sweden or Switzerland? Why aren't they
setting off bombs in Cambodia, Uruguay, or Botswana? Because these countries
aren't out trying to conquer the world. It's funny when you leave other people
alone and don't steal their land and resources, kill their children, and
corrupt their culture...they don't want to fly hijacked airplanes into your
buildings, which itself was an act of desperation...a guerilla attack...a flea
biting an elephant, trying to get its attention, scare it off.
America
is brilliant at couching its agenda in terms of benevolence, justice, and
altruism. It only takes a little bit of knowledge to see what's really
happening. The Bosnians needed rescuing in 1995 and the Kosovo Albanians in
1999. Look how good the Americans are. Look how caring. It couldn't be that in
post-Soviet Europe America was doing everything it could to gobble up the
remnants of the Soviet bloc? It couldn't be that NATO and the EU were both
seeking to ensure hegemony over as much of Europe as possible while Russia was
on its knees in the 1990's? It couldn't be that the United States didn't want
to see Orthodox-Muslim strife spread and begin to affect other areas of Eastern
Europe and reignite tensions surrounded their ally Turkey? No, it was pure
altruism, because America is good and noble.
But
apparently, that goodness and selflessness didn't extend to the people of
Rwanda, Sudan, the Congo, Turkish Kurdistan, or North Korea? Or were there
other factors, other interests or lack thereof?
Why
weren't our soldiers 'serving' us there? In 1995 why was I 'serving' while I
was moving bombs and missiles around to kill Serbs...but not North Koreans, or
Sudanese?
I just
fail to understand why the public falls for this whole line about serving and defending
our freedom. Fine I understand, people weren't happy with how American soldiers
were treated during the Vietnam era, but they weren't serving us or defending
us there either. Was Vietnam going to attack America? The United States failed
in its objectives and what happened? Aside from destabilizing the whole
Indochinese region, the Americans
eventually learned Communism wasn't a monolith...nationalism never went away,
and from the standpoint of the Vietnamese it wasn't about International
Communism, but more a case of Civil War, a people resisting an occupier.
Communism in so many cases was but a vehicle for the lower classes to express
nationalistic sentiment.
Here we
are 37 years after Saigon was abandoned, and now Starbucks and Kentucky Fried
Chicken have accomplished far more than Agent Orange.
How were
the American soldiers in Vietnam serving the country?
And when
they die, both then and now, they are not only heroes but martyrs. The language
used is often redemptive...our life and salvation is tied to their sacrifice,
they died in order that we might live. It ends up sounding blasphemous.