As a Christian, my standards of behavior are molded by the words of the Bible. In my personal relationships I am guided by the words of Jesus which can be summed up with,
(Matthew 5:39 KJV) But I say unto you, That ye resist not evil: but whosoever shall smite thee on thy right cheek, turn to him the other also.As a general principle of life this is very important. The concept of forgiveness and patience is built into the American philosophy. The problem is the perpetual, misguided and possibly insane bully that looks on forgiveness and patience as a sign of weakness. That bully, personal or national, ramps up the violence in the face of Christian virtue.
That is why we need to balance a partial teaching of the Bible with a more extensive examination and use our God given ability to reason as we look for solutions. The Bible also tells us,
(Romans 13:4 KJV) For he is the minister of God to thee for good. But if thou do that which is evil, be afraid; for he beareth not the sword in vain: for he is the minister of God, a revenger to execute wrath upon him that doeth evil.You don’t need to read that many times to see that one of the functions of government is to use the sword to deal with evil. The sword has to be carried by someone. They can, if motivated and guided properly, be doing God’s work.
We are faced with a great evil. We have a large group of bullies who are using their big muscles, lack of good will and repeating rifles to extend, expand and execute evil. They say it is in the name of God. If they were Christians making this claim I could refute them with our holy book, the Bible. Since it is Muslims and their holy book is the Koran, I cannot do that. Neither can other Muslims because the teaching of the Koran allows this kind of behavior and if they speak out against it they are tortured and murdered.
The problem is not going to just go away while the president takes vacations, plays golf and takes advantage of photo ops.
My fear is that maybe a rational response is impossible. It may be the only way we can fight this evil is to get people so stoked up that they lash out at those who want to destroy us. A reasoned response isn’t in the cards. You don’t fight bullying with reason, you fight it with force.
I continue to hope for either another answer or a waking up to the danger.
Youssef, Michael, Blindsided, No City: Kobri, 2012.
homo unius libri
I honestly wonder if the war won't start in the streets, between people of different beliefs, with the government salivating at the chance to declare martial law.
ReplyDeleteIt would not surprise me if our current leaders felt that way. They might be surprised at the response of an already angry population at such a move. I think all the race baiting going on would also play to that tune.
DeleteGrace and peace