Christians shouldn't forgive
I have been reading and adding comments to the following blog post by Ben - http://roughageman.blogspot.com/2006/08/conservatism-2.html
The thrust of it focuses around whether some deserters should have been shot to death or not in world war one. In his post he states categorically and I quote "In my eyes, there is no pardon for these men, just as there is no pardon for anyone else who thinks themselves above democracy."
I am not sure whether Ben claims to be a Christian or not, my impression is that he does. Neither do I know him personally so I cannot comment on his attitude per say - however - it has made me a tad annoyed.
I cannot believe anyone who is a Christian can portray such a message. Examining the statement he makes "... there is no pardon..." means that they should not be forgiven - is pardon not the same as forgiveness - or near enough. He therefore justifies these people being killed without any consideration. I can appreciate that people killing people is part of the world we live in, fair enough - but to support it and say its ok - is that right? He goes on to say that the people shot for dessertion had no consideration for those giving up their lives for freedom. A pointless and fruitless comment that only serves to bring about fear in peoples lives from within.
Jesus preaches forgiveness at all levels - as Christians we should stand up for justice, mercy and truth and not support this crappy world where people are "allowed" to kill other people because they are seen as weak and inferior. Jesus wouldn't so why should we. For God's sake get a grip.
The thrust of it focuses around whether some deserters should have been shot to death or not in world war one. In his post he states categorically and I quote "In my eyes, there is no pardon for these men, just as there is no pardon for anyone else who thinks themselves above democracy."
I am not sure whether Ben claims to be a Christian or not, my impression is that he does. Neither do I know him personally so I cannot comment on his attitude per say - however - it has made me a tad annoyed.
I cannot believe anyone who is a Christian can portray such a message. Examining the statement he makes "... there is no pardon..." means that they should not be forgiven - is pardon not the same as forgiveness - or near enough. He therefore justifies these people being killed without any consideration. I can appreciate that people killing people is part of the world we live in, fair enough - but to support it and say its ok - is that right? He goes on to say that the people shot for dessertion had no consideration for those giving up their lives for freedom. A pointless and fruitless comment that only serves to bring about fear in peoples lives from within.
Jesus preaches forgiveness at all levels - as Christians we should stand up for justice, mercy and truth and not support this crappy world where people are "allowed" to kill other people because they are seen as weak and inferior. Jesus wouldn't so why should we. For God's sake get a grip.
posted by monty at
11:31 PM
13 Comments:
hey man, La pointed your blog out to me, I'm glad to see I'm worth mentioning, and yes, I would indeed call myself a Christian.
As a summary of where I stand:
I have a very liberal view of Christianity, there's nothing that annoys me more than heirachial church; church orthodoxies & cliches or the conservative apistle-convicting attitude that some Christians take like:
`But Paul said.... thus, you need to get right before God!`
I believe more than a few aspects of Christianity are pluralist and as there is no moral absolute on earth no man can be certian of his standing before God.
I also believe the only three things you need to be a Christian (other than the obv) is in Eph4:32 and Matt22:37-38 and all other qualities (like fruits of Spirit etc) are inevitable extrapolations of these.
My views on society are what lefties call conservative, but what I call what would have been the norm up until the fall of Thatcherism. Well, at the moment, I stand a (which is basicly conservatism with Progressive Liberalism)
The last of my great philosophies is that the Gospel message and it's apistolic knights are written to the individual - for the human heart about the human heart. But this particular holy ideal of love and forgivness and the like is not meant to be applicable to an inter-national, inter-epoch, inter-age stage. In short, I don't think Jesus' great revelations and teachings were meant to be applied to the judicial system, Parliament or the UNGA.
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Before I get carried away, allow me to quickly outline how that works in this scenario...
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The very term `[political] conservatism` means to conserve the value of a nation - I use the word `value` polymorphicaly to mean not only the economic crutches and trade of a country and other assets such as natural or labour resources but also as a term that means values such as democracy, freedom of speech and all that those two terms encompass.
When Hitler invaded Poland, being a democratic nation it posesed the right to self defence against the Nazi Party. When the channels of diplomacy and common sense are exhausted in the face of a regime that contradicts the values of the political school it attempts to overthrow, armis is the only faesable line to take. God knew that. Aside from the New Testament Christians the first movement of the Bible is littered with wars - not in an offence against the gentile, but in defence of the regime that's endorsed by God. Now try as I might I can't think of some kind of Druid/Buddhist/Hippi war-is-never-the-answer attitude that even touches the New Testament - whether for or against such a philosophy. Back to Poland, I think the only way the New Covenent (and thus New Testament) is applicable is the indivudal's responsibility to forgive Hitler and his soldiers. What good is a grudge between masses? If there is none - then the grudge means as little as the forgiveness. Which is why I think the New Covenenant is exclusive to the individual who chooses to partake.*
Like i said, I think trying to marry New Testament with international thinking is like putting a square peg in a triangular hole - both excellent and proven geometric shapes in their own rights, but the harmony of perfect tessolation breaks down when they get confused. Triangles and squares have lived side by side for years - even compliment each other much of the time, but are not meant to be used interchangeably.
Bringing this back to the deserters - saying `I forgive them` is a fundimentaly Christian and encourageable attitude to adopt - which is especially easy with nearly a century of hindsight between us and the armed dominance of Europe by fascists (and al the other waay too complicated stuff for me that went down in WWI). But for a nation to say to someone in the trench `we forgive you` who merely doens't want to go over the top, then that's not christian at all, and I don't understand how you can say it is.
There are two very distinct moral scenarios there, and as I mentioned before only one is talked about in the New Testament. Now if you ascribe the latter scenario is indeed bypassed by the fudimental Gospel message then the moral maze as I perceive it has been explored in my last blog on the subject...
Therefore, me saying things like `there is no pardon` - of course, God can pardon the deserters as do I, but that's not the issue at hand. In the scenario of the fight against totalitarialism, with soldiers en masse it's pointless to regress their actions to simple Sunday School principles, like ` God loves you so it's okay if you don't want to go to war`. There's an issue of the greater good and a million reasons why all those who are privy to democracy should , by the value of their own lives be expected to surrender theirs so that future generations might enjoy such freedom.
* also if the mass of people were to forgive, the forgiveness would very likely be flawed by the sustained grudges of the few (take all the attempted cease fires in N.Ireland at the end of the last centuy, broken only by one or two soldiers). Forgiveness requires integrity so for a mass of people to claim to forgive including a disgruntled minority is NOT a Christ inspired love and again - therfore not under the banner of the New Covenant.
Ben (I assume its not La writing this).....
So - a simple yes or no.
Assuming the same scenario today - do you think God wants you to kill a deserter as previously happened or not?
Do you think killing deserters is the right think to do?
If you don't - why do you say "I'm glad the deserters had the humiliation and penalty that became their cowardice".
Its not the scenario I cannot understand - plenty of bad things have happened in the past - its your attitude NOW. Your saying it was "OK to kill them" - I say, God would never have wanted that then, and would never want that now. Your attitude lacks love, compassion and forgiveness in my observation.
I cannot understand how a so called Christian defends this stance, whether it is 90 or so years ago or 9 months ago.
Ben
I find your so called "liberal" stance on Christianty fascinating. You twist you argument to suit your stance in the belief that this in some way makes you radical and in fact ends up being totally the opposite.
Whether you like it or not, forgiveness is one of the key fundamental doctrines of Christianity. It has nothing to do with heirarchical church, church orthodoxies or indeed cliches. Not accepting this doesn't make you liberal in the slightest.
No doubt you will say, that it us to God to forgive and not us as humans. But when we ask for forgivenness and it is given to us so freely by grace, then the very least we can do is try to offer that up to others however difficult that may. Our capacity to forgive will never ever reach that of God and in some areas such as the holocaust are definately more difficult than others.
But there are many grey areas over this WW1 issue. If you'd taken the trouble to read my first post on the subject I said that there were bound to be some men who deliberately deserted, were on the make, crooked etc and they deserved to be punished. But Shot at Dawn? All of them? Even those with shell shock? That cannot be right. And no amount of you so called "liberalism" will convince me otherwise.
In my mind its no different to that of the argument of the death penalty.
I am sure in life you can find the most horrible crime possible. Does that person deserve death - on the face of it in our human anger, rage, irritation and hate - yes.
However the death penalty as well as all other forms of punishment by death inevitably places the fact we send people to death without knowing healing, forgiveness, mercy and grace that Jesus clearly talks about.
The same argument applies to euthanasia and abortion. We are never meant to be custodians of the end of life I am fairly sure. Once we take matters into our own hands, we remove the possibility of preaching to that person and seeing that accept Jesus as Lord and Saviour.
I may not be able to come out with clever language and clever bible phrases - neither am I the most literate person either - but I am secure in what Jesus teaches in the New Testament - and executioners is not one of them.
Hello Monty! This is just really to acknowledge that I have had a good look at your posting and the comments. I followed the link from Joolians "Now I'm getting serious" blog. I like to leave evidence of a bit interest.
Oh yes, one question that occurs to me reading your comments: Are you a pacifist? That is, do you believe that a Christian should never pick up a gun and use it? Fair enough, you may draw the line at deserters, but do you exclude all killing by Christains who may take up military service? And what about the police? I can’t imagine a police force that does not at some point have to use coercion. If we sanction coercion, then do we stop short of allowing police to use guns? What do the police do if they have to deal with a gunman?
As you may know the Jehovah’s witnesses are pacifists (they never sign up). I remember once probing a doorstep JW as to his attitude to the police – he had some difficulty dealing with inquiry because it seems that the distinction between police and the military is a grey area.
Timothy
Thanks - not I am not a pacifist. As Ben allures to there is often a need to defend yourself and others by force. So no, in that sense I am not.
What i am against is the needless taking of life and that includes deserters. I cannot at all see any point in killing someone because they were cowards. I appreciate that that is many years ago and the world is somewhat wiser (a little). But with hindsight I feel it was probably a mistake to kill people because of desertion.
The question still remains that has not been answered in my mind which is the fundamental point.
If freedom was of jeopardised today and people deserted - would Ben (as this is whom the question really is directed) stand and say "Yes shoot them to their death because they weren't prepared to give up there lives because of whatever reason".
I cannot believe that in my humble teachings of Christianity God would want that and that Jesus would say its ok. Even if its law of the land, its still not something right.
I see Monty, so it's really down to this desserter issue.
No - not in its entirety. Take the case of the burgler.
I cannot recall the Norfolk farmers name (Martin something) whom shot a burgler for entering his house.
Firstly I think there is a level where you need to protect your family and home - but I don't think its justifiable killing someone unless you truly believe your life or your family life is in danger. You may never know at what point that is but to simply shoot to kill a burgler without good cause - surely is wrong. It takes into no account the desperate need the burgler was in to do what he is doing. No excuse for burgling.
Yes I buy that: i.e. scenarios of self defence where disabling an attacker may lead to that attackers death. But if pure self defence is the criterion for acceptable violence, then that also covers situations where the attacker may not be responsible for his actions (e.g. he’s mentally ill) or he may be a German soldier in the last war, many of whom were excellent soldiers who fought honorably and with courage (at least on the Western front) and did not deserve death, and yet the allied forces felt justified in killing them for the greater purpose of ending the killer Third Reich. It was an unfortunate metaphor but Ben’s rabid dog comes to mind.
The general principle here is this: that is that the moral dilemma element can never be completed eliminated and some ‘collateral damage’ is inevitable. The choice between evils can be so severe that we face “kill or be killed situations”. There will always be scenarios given to us in this world where killing the innocent is the only choice available - Unless of course someone can furnish us with a proof that such scenarios never really genuinely arise in our world. If they could prove this then we have a new law of nature and I’ll include it my physics blog. For myself I can’t see a way out on this point and until such a time that contra evidence is submitted I believe that there will be circumstances where the moral dilemma cannot be avoided.
Now let me emphasise that I tend to favour your’s and Joolian’s sentiment about not killing deserters, on two counts:
1. The straight moral issue: many brave men where shot at down who were not cowards.
2. The moral dilemma issue: My gut feeling at present is that killing deserters is not covered by the collateral damage principle.
That’s my gambit. I feel confident about the moral issue, but I must admit that on point 2. I feel much weaker and it’s largely based on gut feeling at this stage - in short it’s the bet I’m placing just at this time. I am vulnerable to attack here and Ben could well come up with some argument whereby he shows that killing innocent deserters does sometimes come under the collateral damage principle. However, if you feel you can strengthen point 2 you’re welcome – it needs strengthening if it is to survive – Just as Ben needs to strengthen his handling of the straight moral question, about which he has said not a lot.
Timothy
Thanks for a very sensible and considered reply - its quite enlightening.
What I would say is this, and I am not as intellectual as yourself and Ben so I apologise if I labour a point.
I beleive at certain levels of freedom there is going to be collateral damage. That needs to be carefully managed and protected because this truly is the high cost of freedom.
Taking an example: If I shoot a burgler, I am doing that out of fear of what could be and a situation developing that I have calculated is personally of too much risk - irrespective of whether the person burgling me is sane, on drugs or mad. Its a stand of our defence when everything most precious (say my life is at stake). That is probably because I love my wife and family and I love my life. Not that I think this should be the norm (and neither do I have a gun) but its about appropriate levels of protection.
Lets say though I decided that I was too chicken to shoot the burgler, and they killed my wife and it was my fault by I was too scared to stand up for them - or I froze and got "stage fright" for a better word. Burgler escapes and I have lost something precious.
According to the discussions we are having - should I not be bound to the same accountability - that being I failed to protect the most precious. Assuming I am accountable the same way as these deserters were - I would then be shot to death for my cowardice.
But that is self defeating - because killing me might leave my kids, my aunts my uncles etc behind that I can do something for - maybe not kill for them, but other skills. Something I could bring of worth and value is taken away from them.
But more so - I cannot imagine the creator of the universe blankly going to someone "I agree with you, kill these people because of their cowardice and lack of support to the country or whoever".
Very finally - if we put people on firing lines or death penalties - what we are effectively saying is this - that we believe because of your crimes there is no way you could be possibly healed, changed or restored. If Jesus is real, and as Christians we live a life where are meant to be in a relationship with him - as executioners we say - "No chance this guy could ever meet with God in a relationship - so we terminate him".
So ultimatley Ben's stance on saying "They deserve no pardon and deserved to die" fallls squarely on its arse as I truly believe no one deserves to be killed. It happens, sometimes in the face of great change, sometimes through cowardice, sometimes through shear madness, people killing other people occurs. But to say "thats ok" and take a stance that it was ok to shoot them and they deserve it for whatever reason - Im sorry thats not fundamental christianity but shear arrogance.
As a very final note, I wonder how many world war 1 suvivors (if they are now any) would agree with this. I suspect the answer would be few - with most saying there was enough death to deal with instead of us inflicting death from within.
Rant over - not meant personally directed at yourself - I find your posting nature very pleasant to read.
Thanks for the reply. I think we need to take onboard the ideas about death taking away the opportunity for healing and restoration.
Anyway, where's old Ben - about time he gave us another lug full, to get us going again.
One thing that occurrs to me re healing and restoration. St Peter, I suppose, is an example of the biggest deserter of them all! Deserted the British army? Peanuts! Fancy having "I deserted God" on your CV on judgement day?
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