I’ll Tell You Why
Dear Rick,
You’re on, big boy. We’ve finally got something going here: engagement. As long as playground rules are in effect, I’m proud to participate.
We are not pacifists because of Adolph Hitler, Nazism, and World War II. That was a “Christian” war; Christians started it, and Christians needed to finish it. Okay; cultural Christians. But Hitler was baptized, was he not? As were his minions.
It’s the whole “never again” thing. It is a sin to kill another human being. Always has been; ever shall be. And (not “but” this time: and) if one has the ability and opportunity, then it is a sin to stand by and take no effective action or support no effective action—action that includes everything up and to raising one’s hand in anger—while an entire people are being slaughtered. Either way it’s a sin, and life makes you choose, and you don’t get an indulgence slip first. You just act, one way or the other, without a guarantee, and you throw yourself on the mercy of God. Like off the high dive backwards blindfolded and there might be water in the pool and then again there might not be, neither.
It’s sin boldly time but believe more boldly still. Sin: you don’t have to; you just can’t help it (Faulkner and Guthrie). The grace of God is not to be presumed upon; it can only be received as a free gift each time it is inevitably and inexorably given.
Or maybe it’s one way to answer the old ordination question so popular, legend has it, among Southern Presbyterians: are you willing to suffer the tortures of hell for the glory of God?
If you decide to shoot that paper hangin’ son of a bitch, then you are not a pacifist. If they kill you for trying to kill him, then you might or you might be a martyr to a holy cause, but you will not be a pacifist. Maybe you can plead temporary heterodoxy, but that frees you only in the doctrinal eyes of the law. The Spirit of the thing convicts you. Because you’ve crossed a line. A clear one. You have resisted the evil doer in an ultimate way. At least relative to his life, the only one he’ll ever get. You’ve taken him out, and pacifists do a lot of wonderful things, but they don’t do that.
So. If you can get around Hitler, Nazism, the Final Solution, and World War Two, then you’ll be a pacifist, my son. But not before. Hitler, et alia are the great exception. But does it prove the rule? Or break it? You tell me.
As Ever,
Dee
You’re on, big boy. We’ve finally got something going here: engagement. As long as playground rules are in effect, I’m proud to participate.
We are not pacifists because of Adolph Hitler, Nazism, and World War II. That was a “Christian” war; Christians started it, and Christians needed to finish it. Okay; cultural Christians. But Hitler was baptized, was he not? As were his minions.
It’s the whole “never again” thing. It is a sin to kill another human being. Always has been; ever shall be. And (not “but” this time: and) if one has the ability and opportunity, then it is a sin to stand by and take no effective action or support no effective action—action that includes everything up and to raising one’s hand in anger—while an entire people are being slaughtered. Either way it’s a sin, and life makes you choose, and you don’t get an indulgence slip first. You just act, one way or the other, without a guarantee, and you throw yourself on the mercy of God. Like off the high dive backwards blindfolded and there might be water in the pool and then again there might not be, neither.
It’s sin boldly time but believe more boldly still. Sin: you don’t have to; you just can’t help it (Faulkner and Guthrie). The grace of God is not to be presumed upon; it can only be received as a free gift each time it is inevitably and inexorably given.
Or maybe it’s one way to answer the old ordination question so popular, legend has it, among Southern Presbyterians: are you willing to suffer the tortures of hell for the glory of God?
If you decide to shoot that paper hangin’ son of a bitch, then you are not a pacifist. If they kill you for trying to kill him, then you might or you might be a martyr to a holy cause, but you will not be a pacifist. Maybe you can plead temporary heterodoxy, but that frees you only in the doctrinal eyes of the law. The Spirit of the thing convicts you. Because you’ve crossed a line. A clear one. You have resisted the evil doer in an ultimate way. At least relative to his life, the only one he’ll ever get. You’ve taken him out, and pacifists do a lot of wonderful things, but they don’t do that.
So. If you can get around Hitler, Nazism, the Final Solution, and World War Two, then you’ll be a pacifist, my son. But not before. Hitler, et alia are the great exception. But does it prove the rule? Or break it? You tell me.
As Ever,
Dee
posted by Rick at 7:15 AM
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