On Current Conflicts

1900

It is not pleasant to reflect that the two great Christian nations of the globe are engaged at this moment in an enterprise which the Christian religion itself was designed to abolish. We believe it is impossible theoretically to reconcile any war whatever with the principles of Jesus Christ, but even granting that the contentions which the United States and England are advancing in the Orient and South Africa are just ones, it is impossible for us to think that if Christ were the physical ruler of these nations as He is supposed to be the spiritual sovereign, a better way than that of war would not be found for securing justice.

A feature of the present situation which is to us the most disgusting is the attempt of certain Christians in and out of office to justify our hostile position by citing parallels from Jewish history. They are fond of speaking of the "God of battles" and of recalling the times when He used Israel as a scourge for devastating the heathen nations. That absurd parallel, however, breaks down in several points. In the first place we have not heard that God has appointed any Moses or Joshua or David to be a confidant concerning His purposes to destroy any particular race or its liberties. Certainly neither Mr. Chamberlain nor Mr. McKinley have offered any credentials which would validate such a divine commission. Second, we should remember that we are in a new dispensation, when God Himself does not use the same methods for bringing recalcitrant nations to account as He did in the era before Christ. It would be as absurd for us to resurrect some of the abhorrent institutions of the old dispensation which God suffered for a time, like polygamy and slavery, for instance, as to appeal to ancient precedent for our justification in prosecuting such wars as are now raging. Third, and finally, it should never be forgotten that neither England nor America is fighting against heathenism, for whatever may be said against Filipino or Boer it will be impossible to convince many people that an army which halts before battle to offer prayer to God or which hastens to render thanksgiving at that battle's close, is an object of God's displeasure; and a race which is essentially Christian, — Catholic Christian — but so far Christian as to throw off the Catholic yoke as Filipinos have done repeatedly cannot be wholly bereft of God's favor.

Whatever of truth there may be in these reflections, this much, to us at least, seems evident; that by reason of these two wars the rulers at Washington and London have placed the Anglo-Saxon race in a compromising position and have turned back the hands on the dial of progress at least a hundred years. Hereafter and for a long time to come any claim that America and England are God's chosen means for accomplishing the purpose of His gospel, will meet with the same smile of disgust and contempt which the title of Spain's tyrant Phillip provoked when he called himself "Most Christian majesty and protector of the faith." The two most Christian nations are making Christianity everywhere synonymous with perfidy and greed.

—The Ram's Horn, March 17, 1900, p. 4.