Outchurched

A decade after the Pentagon declared a zero-tolerance policy for racist hate groups, recruiting shortfalls caused by the war in Iraq have allowed “large numbers of neo-Nazis and skinhead extremists” to infiltrate the military, according to a watchdog organization.

The Southern Poverty Law Center, which tracks racist and right-wing militia groups, estimated that the numbers could run into the thousands, citing interviews with Defense Department investigators and reports and postings on racist Web sites and magazines.

“We’ve got Aryan Nations graffiti in Baghdad,” the group quoted a Defense Department investigator as saying in a report to be posted today on its Web site, www.splcenter.org. “That’s a problem.”

While this is obviously morally and ethically wrong, there’s an aspect of it that makes “sense” (in terms of it being “a logical consequence”)… get paid to be taught how to kill effectively, and then get shipped somewhere to “legally” kill people you hate.

The report said that neo-Nazi groups like the National Alliance, whose founder, William Pierce, wrote “The Turner Diaries,” the novel that was the inspiration and blueprint for Timothy J. McVeigh’s bombing of the Oklahoma City federal building, sought to enroll followers in the Army to get training for a race war.

It wouldn’t surprise me if Dominionist Christians were joining the military for the same purpose… to get trained in military tactics and then wage jihad “make disciples of all nations” through might. How many Christians seek to enroll believers in the Army to get training for a faith-based war? Christians have been barking in the media for some time about their perceived “war on Christianity” and the “culture war against people of Faith” and it’s only really a small step from that thinking to the next step… picking up guns to kill infidels non-believers.

Before you roll your eyes and utter something akin to “oh, that Rev. Dan and his nonsensical paranoia,” please read (the full articles) and thoughtfully consider the following:

The Truth about Homeschooling in Tri-Cities:

“So let us be blunt about it: we must use the doctrine of religious liberty to gain independence for Christian schools until we train up a generation of people who know that there is no religious neutrality, no neutral law, no neutral education, and no neutral civil government. Then they will get busy in constructing a Bible-based social, political and religious order which finally denies the religious liberty of the enemies of God.”

The Purpose-Driven Life Takers:

“Imagine: you are a foot soldier in a paramilitary group whose purpose is to remake America as a Christian theocracy, and establish its worldly vision of the dominion of Christ over all aspects of life. You are issued high-tech military weaponry, and instructed to engage the infidel on the streets of New York City. You are on a mission - both a religious mission and a military mission — to convert or kill Catholics, Jews, Muslims, Buddhists, gays, and anyone who advocates the separation of church and state - especially moderate, mainstream Christians. Your mission is “to conduct physical and spiritual warfare”; all who resist must be taken out with extreme prejudice. You have never felt so powerful, so driven by a purpose: you are 13 years old. You are playing a real-time strategy video game whose creators are linked to the empire of mega-church pastor Rick Warren, best selling author of The Purpose Driven Life.”

The game, slated for release by October 2006 in advance of the Christmas shopping rush, has been previewed at video game exhibitions, and reviewed by major newspapers and magazines. But until now, no fan or critic has pointed out the controversial game’s connection to Mr. Warren or his dominionist agenda.

Homeschooling, Paul Weyrich and Christian Reconstruction:

“Theocracy, the direct rule of a nation by God through divinely selected spokesmen, has many exemplars in the modern world. Saudi Arabia, Iran, and Iraq are nations with obvious theocratic tendencies. Israel’s political parties exhibit growing theocratic patterns. In the United States, the Christian Reconstruction movement proposes the purest form of theocracy. Reconstructionism?believes that the law given for the political and legal ordering of ancient Israel is intended for all people at all times; therefore American[s are] duty bound to install a political system based entirely on biblical law.”

Reconstructionist theologian David Barton offered this definition: “The Christian goal for the world is the universal development of Biblical theocratic republics, in which every area of life is redeemed and placed under the Lordship of Jesus Christ and the rule of God’s law.”

The term ‘dominion theology’ comes from Genesis 1:26-28 of the Bible where God’s purpose for man is stated: Then God said, “Let us make man in our image, after our likeness; and let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the birds of the air, and over the cattle, and over all the earth, and over every creeping thing that creeps upon the earth.” So God created man in his own image. And God blessed them, and God said to them, “Be fruitful and multiply, and fill the earth and subdue it; and have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the air and over every living thing that moves upon the earth.” (RSV)
…
When it comes to politics, the principles are simple: “The long-term goal of Christians in politics should be to gain exclusive control over the franchise. Those who refuse to submit publicly to the eternal sanctions of God by submitting to His Church’s public marks of the covenant–baptism and Holy Communion–must be denied citizenship, just as they were in ancient Israel.”

The Watch - Christian Hate Sites:

This site lists a large number of “Christian Hate Groups” and sites. Here’s the description of one:

Quote: “Aside from a few media outcasts, if the media professionals you presently encounter are not physically in bed with homosexuals, baby-butcherers, and other varieties of legally sanctioned perverted pagan idolators, they are spiritually, morally and philosophically in bed with them.”

Quote: “We are going to have a civil war in this country, and after it’s over we’ll put these people on trial. They’re killers. But we can’t help it if good men are driven so insane by the images of murdered babies that they execute these so-called doctors before the trials can begin.”

Note: Original publisher of the Nuremberg Files, which posted lists of abortion doctors’ names with their home addresses. When a physician on the list was murdered, a line was placed through the name; when a doctor was wounded, the name was listed in gray. The Nuremberg Files section was shut down by authorities, but the parent web site still exists.

Do ALL Christians believe that it’s good to murder non-believers in the name of Jesus? How popular is this idea of “advancing the Kingdom of Christ” by giving non-believers a fasttrack pass to eternal damnation if they’re presented with a “turn now or burn now” mentality by gun-toting disciples?

I’d like to believe it’s the completely nutjob, fringe thinking of a few unbalanced individuals, but it’s not. It’s a growing meme within the Christian community that “Jesus will come back within my lifetime.” It definitely appears that more and more Evangelicals are embracing Dominionist Theology and are willing to take whatever steps are necessary to bring about Armaggeddon and the return of Christ… especially force and violence.

Whatever happened to the “pray and read your Bible” line of action? Are Christians finding it to be ineffective, and therefore ready to take up arms instead of taking up a magnifying glass and examining their own motives and values? If Jesus “speaks to you” and he’s telling you to take up arms to murder infidels non-believers, my assertion is that you’re not hearing the voice of Jesus (or likely living within the context of anything he has to say).

Dear “Real Christians”: There’s a very real threat to Christianity growing from within your ranks. It’s time to cull Dominionism and expose it for the extremely un-Christlike and heretical false theology that it is. The rest of us will continue to do our best to tolerate your interest in “Faith vs. Reason” as long as your Faith doesn’t include proselytization at the point of a gun. It’s time for you to stand up and be heard: Jesus didn’t shoot people, Jesus loved people. It’s time for those of you within the organization to “cleanse the temple” and boot these very dangerous contemporary Pharisees, and their extremist, heretical theology.

I think we once again need to be reminded of the poem by Pastor Martin Neimoller:

First they came for the Communists, and I didn’t speak up,
because I wasn’t a Communist.
Then they came for the Social Democrats, and I didn’t speak up,
because I wasn’t a Social Democrat.
Then they came for the Trade Unionists, and I didn’t speak up,
because I wasn’t a Trade Unionist.
Then they came for the Jews, and I didn’t speak up,
because I wasn’t a Jew,
Then they came for me, and by that time there was no one left to speak up for me.

I know I’m naive to think that posting about this and then asking folks to reflect on a poem will bring about any effective change… but it’s more effective than picking up a gun or a stick and trying to beat sense into someone (and leaves fewer corpses).

h/t to Crooks and Liars

This entry was posted by Rev. Dan on Friday, July 7th, 2006 at 2:17 pm and is filed under Politics, Dominionism. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.