Category Archives: Past as Prologue to Future

What If We Burned Every Religious Text?

 

A letter to the editor of our island newspaper suggested that we “gather together a handful of free thinkers . . . and stage a burning of Korans, Bibles and Torahs to protest ALL the Abrahamic religions. Perhaps their pernicious belief in One God, a male god who plays favorites, metes out violent punishments and promises dubious rewards in a fictional Heaven—perhaps these beliefs are the true malignancy and cause of all our suffering. Maybe, if we just burn those pesky books, all the evil in the world will go away . . .”

As a Christian, I could profess anger at the man’s suggestions. But why? The man expressed a sincere conclusion from what he sees in the world. Better to examine why he sees such evil in religion, including Christianity.

His letter was written when a small church in Florida caused a media sensation by burning the Muslim Koran. No matter that leaders of all major religions protested the actions of the fringe group.

I suspect this fringe group was the straw that led to the writer’s suggestion. No doubt he was appalled by terrorists who cause unneeded suffering in the name of religion. Perhaps he remembered the Crusades of the Middle Ages. He appears also to have read passages in the Old Testament written when the Hebrews first sought to understand their God, before prophets like Amos called for justice for the poor as few nations had previously known and which call us today (“let justice roll down like waters, and righteousness like an everflowing stream”).

If we got rid of all Biblical writings, we would no longer have Jesus’ instructions to his followers to love one another. We would not have his example of forgiving those who hated him. We would not have the New Testament letter which encourages Christians to “bless those who persecute you . . . Do not repay anyone evil for evil, but take thought for what is noble in the sight of all . . if your enemies are hungry, feed them . . . ” We would not have Christians inspired by Christ’s teachings to care for the hungry, the thirsty, strangers, the naked, the sick, and the prisoners.

Do some people who call themselves Christians do despiteful things? Certainly. But so do people who profess no religion. Christ told us how to tell his true followers. “You will know them by their fruits.” Christian teachings don’t cause evil, but the failure of Christians to live them out does.

“Even the Good Parts of It.”

 

Sometimes good works are done for wrong reasons or out of ignorance.

Richard Holbrooke, the U.S. diplomat who brokered an end to the genocidal Balkan wars of the 1990’s, was influenced during his entire career by the tragedy of America’s involvement in Vietnam.

He spent his first diplomatic postings in the 1960’s in that country, taking part in efforts to “win the hearts and minds” of the Vietnamese. He saw those efforts fail, and disillusionment followed as he realized that American power, great as it is, has limits.

 

 

Holbrooke wrote: “But then finally it all seemed to come down to one simple, horrible truth: we didn’t belong there, we had no business doing what we were doing, even the good parts of it.” (quoted in The Unquiet American: Richard Holbrooke in the World, page 105, from an article he wrote for The New Republic, May 3, 1975.)

 

Holbrooke died suddenly in the middle of his diplomatic mission in another war, this one in Afghanistan. He saw differences with Vietnam, including the fact that America had been deliberately attacked by enemies with bases in Afghanistan. However, he also detected similarities with the quagmire that became Vietnam: ” . . . the existence of an indefensible border harboring enemy sanctuaries; American reliance on a corrupt partner government; and, most critically, the embrace of a counterinsurgency doctrine, which he had learned through painful experience was an exceedingly difficult military and civilian strategy to execute.” (The Unquiet American, page 95.)

How did the United States become involved once again in nation building? Because we allowed our justifiable anger at the 9/ll attacks to carry us too far.  To attempt even good things that we had no business doing. Emotion overrode reason.

 

Catching Waves Instead of Drowning

 

A frustrated pastor I know suggested that the reputation of Christians is one of the main reasons those outside the church prefer to stay out.

Too often, we are perceived as arrogant, judgmental, and legalistic. We want to pass laws, so it is suggested, to force everyone to “my way or the highway.” Some say we are ignorant of the world outside our own country and equate the American way with God’s way.

The lessons of our history in this country should humble us. The slave trade continued for decades after the American Revolution, and slavery as an institution endured for almost a century after this nation was formed, supposedly “under God.” Yes, enlightened Christians led the way to abolish slavery, but many rank-and-file Christians thought slavery was okay because, after all, Abraham had slaves, didn’t he? Slaves had always been around. They were part of the natural order.

If more Christians, including Christian slave owners, had worked to liberate slaves and find a way to resolve the dilemma, both moral and economic, that the young nation found itself in, perhaps the Civil War could have been avoided.

If Christians had sympathized with the desire of some women to move beyond post World War II suburbia, the women’s movement might have developed a more humane thrust. An implied hatred of men might have been replaced by an understanding of the need for men to share responsibility for the home. Women simply followed men out into the same hectic, materialistic lifestyle instead of fostering a partnership. Christians might have redeemed the issue.

What would happen if Christians caught the waves of the future instead of trying to catch up after the waves broke? Or even drowning in them?

Learning from Jesus’ Stories in Today’s Conflicts; Guest Blog by Dr. Lloyd Johnson

 

I met Dr. Lloyd Johnson at the Northwest Christian Writers Association Renewal conference in May. We discovered a mutual interest in Middle East issues, though with different emphases.

Following are excerpts from the bio on Dr. Johnson’s blog  http://lloydjohnson.org/

“Following the man of Galilee, and learning from Jesus’ stories, I began to write tales about people struggling with the issues in their lives and the current conflicts in that part of the world.  We in the United States learn of the Arab Spring but have little information about ordinary people’s daily lives in Israel and the West Bank.

Previously, as Clinical Professor of Surgery at the University of Washington,  I taught and practiced general and thoracic surgery in Seattle for many years . . . . Additionally I worked as Professor of Surgery at the Haile Selassie I University in Gondar, Ethiopia for three years.  I served for two years in the U.S. Air Force as a flight surgeon,  and volunteered in hospitals for several weeks each in Kenya, India, and in Pakistan with Afghan refugees.”

Here is one of Dr. Johnson’s entries, posted on June 16, 2012

“THOSE WHO CANNOT REMEMBER THE PAST ARE CONDEMNED TO REPEAT IT.”

from George Santayana (1863 – 1952), The Life of Reason, Volume 1, 1905

Memory is a gift.  When you wake up in the morning, you may still remember what happened yesterday—or 20 years ago.  Sleep does not erase it.  Like memory in your computer, it should still be there on re-start.  You need the anchor of memory to know who you are and how you relate to the rest of the world around you.

Santayana addressed long term recollections of history, ours or others, that are crucial to teach us how to live in the present.  We can choose to learn from the past or not.  Both the good and the bad events.  Father’s Day brings inspiring memories to me.  Many are not so fortunate to have had a loving dad.  But at age 18 I lost him tragically, to a drunk driver. Devastated, I learned to forgive and not live in bitterness.  The past is history, only to inform the present, not paralyze it.

Paul, the famous Jewish apostle, wrote to his friends in Philippi, “Forgetting what is behind, and straining toward what is ahead, I press on…”  He had much to forget—persecution to death of Jesus followers, and then becoming one himself, his own beatings, shipwrecks, imprisonments and finally execution.  He determined to not let the past poison his life, or that of others.

“Never again” is the appropriate slogan for remembering the Holocaust.  But how do its survivors and their descendants deal with those memories?  Perhaps some do forget.  Others forgive and move on.  But dwelling on the tragedy seems to fuel Zionism’s fires to burn others.  Quoting from Jewish writer, Mark Braverman:

“…Israeli writer Avraham Burg sees the Holocaust as the central reality for Israel—infecting every aspect of daily life and even driving government policy:

‘In our eyes, we are still partisan fighters, ghetto rebels, shadows in the camps, no matter the nation, state, armed forces, gross domestic product, or international standing.  The Shoah is our life, and we will not forget it and we will not let anyone forget us.  We have pulled the Shoah out of its historic context and turned it into a plea and a generator for every deed.  All is compared to the Shoah, dwarfed by the Shoah, and therefore all is allowed—be it fences, sieges,…curfews, food and water deprivation, or unexplained killings…Everything seems dangerous to us…(2008, 78′” Braveman’s page 87

“Our world-view—our attitude toward the other—is so totally conditioned by our sense of our entitlement, undergirded by the idée fixe of our eternal victimhood, that we cannot see the other except as a threat that must be neutralized.”   Braverman’s “Fatal Embrace,” page 93.

Does a historic ethnic abuse seven decades ago justify another now, the oppressed becoming the oppressors?

 

Communists and Terrorists

 

As the United States seeks to defeat terrorism in the twenty-first century, we might remember our twentieth century struggle with the forces of Soviet communism. We’ve almost forgotten the terror of the nearly half century Cold War with the Soviet Union. The world came perilously close to nuclear catastrophe.

American citizens built bomb shelters and wondered if their children would have a future. Christians feared the Soviet Union’s embrace of atheism.

Yet the catastrophe was avoided, and the Soviet Union collapsed. John Lewis Gaddis has written a marvelous book about George F. Kennan, a U.S. diplomat and Russian expert during those times (George F. Kennan, An American Life).

The book, which won the 2012 Pulitzer Prize for biography, brings alive those times of fear bordering on hysteria. It hints of policies which might serve us in our current conflict.

Kennan was not always right, but he usually was. He cautioned against being drawn into war when American interests are not directly affected. He recognized the limits of our resources and believed we should husband them with care.

Our best defense, Kennan believed, was to become a strong nation morally and economically. He worried that the public often undermined its best interests by yielding to excessive emotionalism in dealing with complex issues instead of taking the time to understand them.

We cannot, he believed, right all wrongs, but rather “distinguish lesser from greater evils.” We should strive to be true to our ideals and in that way be an example that others might aspire to.

Aren’t Kennan’s concepts valid in today’s struggle with terrorists?

He May Be a Brutal Dictator, But He’s Our Brutal Dictator

 

The Cold War between communist nations led by the Soviet Union and anti-communist nations led by the United States fades into memory, buried during the late twentieth century revolutions in eastern Europe. Yet similarities linger in the more recent revolutions, the ones where citizens are revolting against tyrannical leaders in the Middle East.

In those earlier times, the U.S. was accused of supporting dictatorial regimes in certain African and South American countries because the regimes touted themselves as anti-communist. Now the U.S. is accused of propping up former dictators like Ben Ali in Tunisia and Mubarak in Egypt. These men clamped down on the growth of Islamists in their countries, so we supported them even if they employed brutal methods. Egypt, especially, became a huge recipient of U.S. aid.

Have such policies backfired as newly-freed citizens elect their own governments, seemingly more attuned to the Islamists? Was it better when we supported corrupt leaders who became wealthy by showering their cronies with public largesse? Who didn’t quibble at torturing their own people?

We don’t know if the new Islamists will continue to support democratic elections once in power. We don’t know if they will allow religious freedom. Perhaps if we had been less supportive of the former dictators who tortured them, the new governments now would be more supportive of our policies. In that earlier confrontation with the Soviet Union, at least the eastern Europeans knew we were on their side and became our friends once they gained their freedom.

We should question both the wisdom and the morality of giving support to inhumane governments. (As we now accuse the Russians of doing with Syria.) It can lead to disastrous consequences later.

 

Ozzie the Iceman, Murdered Because?

 

The ice-preserved body of a man estimated to have died over 5,000 years ago was found in 1991 in the Ötztal Alps. He is called Ötzi or Ozzie because of the place where he died and was amazingly preserved in his glacial resting place.

Ozzie appears to have died because someone pierced him with an arrow.

Why was Ozzie murdered? No way to know, of course, but we can guess. Maybe Ozzie and his murderer wanted the same animal for food. Or maybe Ozzie was not of the killer’s tribe and so not to be trusted. Then again, perhaps Ozzie and his murderer wanted the same woman or the same piece of hunting ground or the same cave.

Most likely, Ozzie wasn’t murdered because of religious hatred. Killing appears to have been with us for thousands of years, with or without religion.

What can wrench us away from this deadly trait? Surely, only a complete transformation of our characters. A man once preached a transformation through a realization of God’s love for us. Then, knowing love, we may choose to love our neighbors as we love ourselves.

From Bach to Hitler

 

I just finished reading In The Garden of Beasts, by Erik Larson. It’s the story of an American family in Germany during the 1930’s as Hitler came to power.

Any reader of this story or student of this time in history asks why a civilized nation like Germany allowed such a depraved group of leaders to take over their country. How did the country that produced  Bach and Beethoven produce Hitler and the Holocaust?

One senses that citizens, weary of war and economic hardship (as a result of World War I), allowed this charismatic speaker to hypnotize them into believing that he could lead them out of their difficulties. And if he told them that a particular group (the Jews) was responsible for those difficulties, how easy to believe this simple lie. As the losers in World War I, the Germans chafed at their humiliation. When Hitler appealed to their pride by suggesting they were, in fact, a superior people, they wanted to believe him.

A reasonable people surrendered their reason to anger and pride.

Religion: As American as Apple Pie

 

The first religious controversies in the new United States erupted between the “established” churches and the more spontaneous religious persuasions: Methodists, Baptists, and others. If the colony or the state didn’t have an established church, many religious citizens supposed, a godless society would result.

Out of the controversy came the First Amendment to the Constitution which forbade Congress to  set up an established religion. Americans were free to choose, without coercion. No persuasion was to be favored by the government.

Amazingly, the citizens of this country with no government-sponsored church, knowing a hodgepodge of differing persuasions, became more religious than Europe with its established churches.

A few Jews were present in America from early days. The first synagogue was established in Rhode Island in 1763.  Discrimination existed against Jewish groups in certain times and places, but the country never suffered the pogroms and organized persecution of the Old World. More Jews fled to North America for freedom and safety and founded thriving communities.

Catholics began coming in large numbers in the nineteenth century, eventually becoming the largest individual religious denomination in the U.S. Irish Catholics, particularly, were discriminated against at first but soon became part of the mainstream, as evidenced by the election of John Kennedy as the first Catholic president in 1960.

Now Muslims and Buddhists and Hindus have come. Atheists, agnostics, and those with no religious persuasion grow in numbers also. (See previous blog, Religious Freedom: Going Deeper.)

If past history is any indication, competition sharpens religious conviction over the long haul. Though some drop away, others rediscover the core of their faith and with it, renewal.

Boxing Up Our Alleluias

Many in the Christian faith begin the observance of Lent this week. Lent commemorates the forty days leading up to Jesus’ crucifixion. Lent was not part of my childhood church tradition, so I’m still learning about it. This past Sunday, during the children’s time in the worship service, we “boxed up” our alleluias. In our church we will not sing any songs with that praise word in it until the glorious Easter morning.

I thought about the periods of “boxing up” that have occurred in the Christian faith from the time of the first Easter. The influence of Christians in the world has waxed and waned throughout the centuries, depending on how well those who called themselves by Christ’s name lived up to his teachings. At the present time, in the countries that made up the old Christendom, we are in a period of retreat. We have lost influence. Our alleluias are boxed up for a time.

How long will it be until we can let our alleluias out of the box again?  That depends on how Christlike we choose to be in this present time.

 

The Rest of the Story

Critics of Christianity often criticize its followers for their failings: the Crusades, the Inquisition, the religious wars of the 1600’s and so on. What often is missed is the rest of the story, that is, what happens to the Christians when they fail so tragically to live the Christ way.

Before the spread of Islam, most Egyptians were Christians. Today, only about ten percent of the population call themselves Christians. Why did so many leave the Christian faith when Islam appeared? No doubt many reasons underlay the change. Some historians point to the Christian schisms that afflicted that part of the world before the Muslim conquest. Christianity lost its good name. The new religion may have struck many as more genuine than the old one.

The shoving aside of religion to the sidelines that began in the 1700’s was caused partly by the appalling religious conflicts of the century before. Pure reason seemed a better way, perhaps, than religious passion, than the killing and torturing of those who disagreed with you.

And for those of us today who call ourselves Christians? If we fail to live up to Christ’s teachings, should we expect any different judgement on us?

To Understand Each Other Instead Of Wars

When I was about eleven, I became a pen pal of a girl my age from Austria, through an acquaintance of my father. We wrote for many years, until both of us married and she moved to Germany with her husband.

I was going through old letters recently and came across one written by her, in beautiful script in English. Like so many American children, I was not conversant in any language except my own, but she wrote in English.

One year we exchanged Christmas gifts, and her family sent us a thank you note. The parents expressed hope that one day we might see each other for “it is possible in these times.” (We have never met, but my mother, on a trip to Europe, did meet and visit with her.)

One sentence of their letter, now before me, stands out: “It would be much better for the people to understand each other instead of having wars.” How little did I fathom at the time the longing in those words.

The parents had lived through World War II and the Soviet occupation of a part of their country. How poignant their wishes now, when so many since then have died and been harmed by conflicts.

Dear Lord, please bring us more understanding, more love, for those different from ourselves.

Remnant Religion

Christian history fascinates: all the advances and retreats, deaths and resurrections of the church over the centuries. Such understanding allows perspective in these times of waning Christian influence in the old countries of “Christendom.”

The early Jewish church became the Gentile church (championed by the missionary, Paul). Following barbarian invasions and Muslim conquests, the church split into Byzantine and Roman. The Byzantine (eastern) church at first flourished while the Roman (western) church languished in the backwaters of a primitive Europe. The Turkish Ottoman Empire eclipsed Byzantium, then came close to conquering Europe following the disastrous Crusades.

Europe and the church survived, but movements like the Renaissance stirred new thinking and brought on the Reformation. Wars for power, sometimes cloaked in religious garb, led to pietists and puritans and to the English church’s break with Rome. The resulting Christian communities fought slavery and poverty and spawned the modern missionary movement, leading to growth in non-Christendom countries of Asia and the southern hemisphere.

Today few barriers prevent anyone in this country who desires it from becoming a church member, yet many churches are dying. As happens over and over, Christians become a remnant, even as the church grows in poorer countries and in nations where Christian commitment can be dangerous.

I Know the Hindu Bhagavad Gita Has Merit, But Have You Tried the Bible Lately?

I attended a Bible study the other day on the Old Testament. We are examining the early, sometimes gory, history of the early Hebrews. Critics of the Bible bemoan the actions of the Hebrew tribes as they took over Palestine. Easy to jettison claims to a unique religion. God’s people acted as brutally as all the others, right?

We would do well to read further, to treat this history as it is: history, warts and all. As the Hebrews matured, prophets stormed on the scene who railed against injustice. Conflict raged between the self-centered power that characterizes all civilizations, including that of the Hebrews, and a unique and growing awareness of God’s love for the world and all its people.

Amos, the prophet, thunders against the Wall Street of his time: “For I know how many are your transgressions, and how great are your sins—you who afflict the righteous, who take a bribe and turn aside the needy in the gate.” (Amos 5:11, RSV) “Let justice roll down like waters, and righteousness like an everflowing stream.” (Amos 5:24, RSV) “Hear this, you who trample upon the needy, and bring the poor of the land to an end . . .” (Amos 8:4, RSV)

The prophet Jonah learns that he must take God’s message to the Hebrews’ enemy, Nineveh, whether he wants to or not, for God loves Nineveh, too.

As relativism increases and the belief takes root that one religion is as good as any other, are we Christians even aware of the unique messages of our Bible?

Doomed to Forever Repeat?

Notably absent so far from the 2012 presidential campaign (which seems to have started the day after the last state was tallied in the 2008 election) is a discussion of foreign policy. American soldiers still face death in combat in south central Asia. The Euro crisis in Europe seethes with potential for world-wide catastrophe, but most Americans seem oblivious to anything beyond domestic concerns.

Obviously the fact that millions are un or under employed is part of the reason. However, Americans have never been overly interested either in other countries or in understanding the history of today’s problems. Our pattern is to meet some sudden disaster (i.e, 9/ll) with heroic effort and, usually, lots of money, then forget it. We’re not interested in the past, in why the crisis appeared in the first place, to guide us in the avoidance of future crises.

We should be. One of my high school history teachers began our study of the First World War (which led to the Second World War) with the religious wars of the 1600’s that devastated Germany.

A retired U.S. ambassador, David Newsom, made the point in an article (Foreign Service Journal, February, 2005). He called for the understanding of our past actions and how they influence today’s present crises (like Afghanistan). “That understanding can . . . demonstrate how difficult it is, under the pressures of immediate action, to foresee the longer-term consequences of that action.”

The Accidental Journalist

 

When Johann Gutenberg pulled the first printed Bible from his printing press in the mid 1400’s, the act forecast the end of those beautiful Biblical manuscripts, painstakingly illustrated through centuries by hand. In addition, the opportunity to influence through writing now opened to multitudes more. The age of the accidental journalist had begun.

Today, anyone who has a computer and access to the Internet can become a writer, a journalist, a blogger. To earn a full-time living from writing may be difficult, but increasing numbers write part-time. They write, not to be paid, but because they have ideas to express.

What will happen if fewer journalists are paid to be gatekeepers, to develop expertise, to know what is of value to report and what isn’t? What does that mean to our society? Good or ill?

What did the Gutenberg invention mean to society? Good or ill? The answer: both. The loss of hand-crafted beauty. The gain of more freedom to suggest ideas and change. The risk that freedom and change would be used unwisely. Which they were at times.

Because of the printing press, we were given classics like The Pilgrim’s Progress, written by a working class minister, and inexpensive versions of the Bible in everyday language. We were given trashy novels, too, and pamphlets that incited readers to war and hatred. With the Internet, one must sift among competing words and rants to find the gems. It does allow, however, for more gems.

No Religious Preference

The fastest growing religious preference today is “no preference.” Those opting out of organized religion are not necessarily antagonistic atheists. They simply view the church as irrelevant.

In some ways the church is a victim of its own success.

During Europe’s Middle Ages, alleviation of human suffering and ignorance was the responsibility of the Church. No one else was concerned with the vast majority of human society: the poor (most of the population), the sick, the abused. Kings and nobles concerned themselves with land and power. When high church officials became like their secular counterparts, monastic and other movements called a remnant back to the path of service.

Gradually, as modern states arose, the Christian conscience infiltrated the greater society. Great Britain abolished the slave trade. Governments set up schools, hospitals, orphanages, and insane asylums. Religious groups still carry on this work in less developed countries, but secular organizations, like Doctors Without Borders, have joined them.

Today, birth, marriage, and death registration are performed by the state. Only the very devout mark the births of their children in religious ceremonies. Fewer and fewer couples bother to marry, even when they have children.

Yet the needs remain, the needs that spawned the growth of Christianity centuries ago. In a rootless, alienated, angst-ridden society, Christians offer the antidotes of commitment, community, and hope. The ancient agape love of the early Christians is as much an answer to postmodern society as it was to that of the Roman Empire.

Christianity cannot be sustained by laws. It never could, and Christians put their faith in peril whenever they ally with Caesar.

Christians now must practice religion the old-fashioned way: through intentional communities of faith to carry out callings of love, discipleship, and ministry.

The Bible and Wolf Hall

I finished reading Hilary Mantel’s Wolf Hall the same day I was in a discussion where someone asked, “Why is the Bible so important? Why do Christians study it, spend so much time on it?”

Wolf Hall is set in the England of Tudor times. The main protagonist is Thomas Cromwell, the man who served Henry the Eighth and directed England’s departure from Roman Catholicism. It happens mostly in the head of Cromwell, and I am in awe of how Mantel keeps us there, anticipating the next move in this political drama that changed all of Europe. In a historical novel, we often know the main plot. Yet, it’s the character of Cromwell that so intrigues us. He is set against Thomas More, the hero in A Man For All Seasons, which presents More as a martyr for choosing death rather than bow his conscience to the will of a sovereign king. Not surprisingly, More is a less admirable character in Mantel’s book.

Weaving in and out of the story is the stirring caused by forbidden translations of the Bible into English, the language of the common citizen. People are tortured and killed in ways that sicken us for possessing an English translation.

The story, with its awful renditions of burnings at the stake and other cruelties, is the sort that causes critics of religion to decry religion, to scream that we’d all be better off without it. However, it’s not religion, but power that is the sin here. One shudders at Henry the Eighth’s megalomanic view of himself. Religion was simply a handy club he picked up to beat people who threatened him. History is crowded with tyrants who used other clubs.

It’s the human condition, the propensity to crave power and wealth, to hoard rather than share, the fear of powerlessness, that tempts all of us to the weapons of fear and hatred.

Which brings us to the other theme. The Bible in the hands of everyone who desired it was perceived by Henry as a threat to his power.

The Bible, after all, is for Christians the story of God as love, God who suffered rather than use power to work his will.

A Religious Disconnect

One reason for the 9/11 tragedy is the disconnect between religiously oriented societies and secular societies. This religious disconnect appeared years ago. An unforseen consequence of the collapse of the Soviet Union in the early 1990’s was the loosening of ties between the United States and countries in the Middle East. We no longer shared a common atheist enemy.

The disconnect appeared even earlier, in the 1970’s, with the takeover of the U.S. embassy in Iran. The young Iranians who took the Americans hostage objected to U.S. support for the Shah. They wanted a theocratic rule by the Islamist ayatollah, Khomeini. At that time we tended to see the world as divided between the secular Soviet Union and the secular United States and it allies. This tendency blinded us to another force: religion’s importance in the Middle East and the increasing dissatisfaction with the West’s consumer-oriented lifestyle.

In his book, All Fall Down, about the takeover, Gary Sick writes “We are all prisoners of our own cultural assumptions, more than we care to admit. Those of us who are products of Western cultural tradition … share certain assumptions … .The notion of a theocratic state seemed so unlikely as to be absurd” (pp. 192-3.) Thus we were unprepared for the Iranian revolution which put in place their theocratic state.

What about the recent toppling of other secular governments in the Middle East? How important will religion be to these new regimes?

How Safe Are Religious Minorities In The Arab Spring?

How will countries newly liberated in the ‘Arab spring’ treat minorities? What will be their policies toward human rights? Practitioners of minority religions from Christianity to the Baha’i  faith are apprehensive about their treatment in the new order.

A meeting of countries active in encouraging the recent movement of Libyans to unseat the Qadhafi regime (the Libya Contact Group) is exploring ways to “win the peace” and prevent bloodshed from competing factions in that country. The United States stated its position that the new Libyan government should respect all Libyans, from whatever tribe, region, or minority.

Unfortunately, Christians have not always been as tolerant in the past as they now call for nations with Christian minorities to be. They sometimes used secular authority as a force for their own religion.  When Christianity became popular in the latter days of the Roman Empire, for example, it began to dominate. This led eventually to the medieval, all-encompassing church that sanctioned charges of heresy against all who disagreed and eventually to such atrocities as the Inquisition and wars in the name of religion.

If we are confident of our religious experience, we allow Christianity to compete in the global market place, as the apostle Paul did. Any religion that seeks to dominate by force results in nonbelievers suggesting that the world is better off without religion—Christianity or otherwise.