To this list Solzhenitsyn could add American conservatism: The movement is increasingly becoming a pagan-influenced ideology, providing long-sought justification for evildoing and providing us the steadfastness and determination to do what we know is wrong and the boldness to call evil good.
Ouch! You mean being an economic conservative and opposing gay marriage & abortion doesn’t make me a Christian?
It wasn’t long ago that I could confidently say that I had zero qualms about waterboarding someone. After all, these guys weren’t grabbed off the streets of Baghdad or Cairo for no reason, they were captured in combat against U.S. forces. These are bad people and they deserve what they get. Issues of efficiency and international law aside, is this something we should support as Christians no matter how effective it might be or whether it prevents another terrorist attack? That is a hard question and one that deserves more than a knee-jerk, flag waving response from one who claims the name of Christ.
One quibble I would have is where Joe says:
The reason that there is a long history of just warfare theory but no corresponding “just torture theory” is because torture is inherently antithetical to justice and morality.
The mere existence and widespread acceptance of a doctrine of “Just War” in no way validates it and I have to say that I am having a serious crisis of conscience where this is concerned. Can the state wage war? Certainly (see Romans 13: 1-7 ). Should a Christian be involved in doing so or be supportive of war? That I am not so sure of anymore. We are culturally conditioned as Americans to see the interests of America as synonymous with the interests of the Gospel. However, ours is a “love your enemies” and “turn the other cheek” kind of faith, not a “get them before they get you” or “if they put on of yours in the hospital, you put one of theirs in the morgue” kind of faith. That might be “the Chicago way” but it is not The Way.
Good essay and thought provoking, you should check it out.
1 comment:
I don't believe water boarding is torture. It does not maim or kill. It's not even painful. It does severely confuse the body and mind into thinking it will die. I don't consider this torture as torture is known through the ages as inflicting excruciating pain, maiming, and often killing. I think it he is completely off base to compare water boarding with anything done through history such as inquisition tactics, etc. This is completely bogus. He has suckered for progressivism's lies of false comparison or claiming immoral equivalency.
I have a problem with the man's first statement.
"To do evil a human being must first of all believe that what he’s doing is good . . . Ideology—that is what gives evildoing its long-sought justification and gives the evildoer the necessary steadfastness and determination."
This belief that he says is required before a human can do evil is a very shallow assessment.
1. A human can believe there is no such thing as evil. He does not account for this in his narrow "must first of all believe..."
2. He is setting up a strawman by first presuming that what he is going to say is evil in reality is evil by God's standard and be proved as such, merely by his saying it is so.
With these fallacies off the top, I could not justify reading more. I've heard these lines before. Am I somehow misunderstanding him?
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