A few days later the pastor arrived
unannounced at our home with a pack of information about the church and a
copy of the denominational newspaper, The Victorian Baptist Witness.
“You’re a journalist,” he said (he had apparently found out a little about
me). “You’ll like this newspaper.”
I did. As I progressed in my walk with
the Lord, I came to look forward to the paper each month. Packed with news
about Baptist churches and activities, it was a model of its kind, providing
inspiration and sustenance.
So what a surprise in church this Sunday
when I picked up the latest issue, to find it transformed. It had shrunk in
size, and also in name, to Witness. But the most noticeable change
was that it had become a mouthpiece for the anti-Iraq-war movement.
Instead of church news, the front page
was dominated by a large photograph of former US President Jimmy Carter, and
the quote: “We will not learn how to live together in peace by killing each
other’s children.”
Inside, the Nobel Prize winner –
described, strangely, as an “industrious, old sartorial soul” – was lauded
for his work for peace. Fair enough. Jimmy Carter is a prominent Baptist,
though an article intended to draw attention to his anti-war stance might
have noted that some see the roots of the current North Korean nuclear
crisis in the “promise” Carter proclaimed that he received in 1994 from
“Great Leader” Kim Il Sung not to develop such weapons.
But also on the front page were punch
points for four other articles, including this:
Anti-war sentiment builds as the people
say NO to war.
Read that again. You would assume that it
pointed to an article describing how anti-war sentiment is building, and
that “the people” (whoever they are) are saying no, or rather, NO, to war.
Yet the relevant article says nothing of
the kind. It is a report of an anti-war protest by religious leaders in
Melbourne. No evidence is offered to suggest that anti-war sentiment is
building, or that “the people” (other than those at the protest) are saying
NO. That front-page sentence is false.
According to the anonymous author of the
article: “A white coffin and a picture of a mutilated Iraqi child was [sic]
displayed, showing the real impact of military action on Iraq.”
Why not a picture of the tens of
thousands of bodies of Kurds who died in agony when Saddam Hussein gassed
them? Or of the mutilated bodies of the tens of thousands of Shiites
murdered on his orders, some of them buried alive under hot asphalt? Or of
the bodies of some of the one million Iraqi soldiers killed in attacks
launched by Saddam Hussein on Iran and Kuwait?
There are Christian arguments for a war
that would liberate the long-suffering Iraqi people. (See, for example,
my own article.)
Jesus, the “Lion of the tribe of Judah” (Rev. 5:5) called for justice. In
the face of Saddam Hussein’s continuing genocide would He have done nothing
for years and years, then joined a silent protest vigil outside a church
when a war to stop the genocide seemed imminent? That’s been the posture of some church leaders.
For that matter, what
would He have done in World War II? Would He have been a conscientious
objector? Or might He have joined Pastor Dietrich Bonhoeffer in trying to
stop all the slaughter by assassinating Hitler?
Actually, we don’t know. Yet the
Witness article seems to suggest that only those opposed to war are
following Jesus. That to me is false witness.
February 10th, 2003
