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08/18/2008 America also loves Jesus – not the "love your enemies" Jesus I learned about growing up, nor the "give all you have to the poor" Jesus, mind you, but a new kind of Jesus, a warrior Jesus and a corporate Jesus who says "follow me and I will make you rich." In today's America, war and Jesus have become intertwined. Cars outside your local mega-church have window stickers advertising the church and bearing the likeness of the American flag. Pick-up trucks driving down the street carry window sticker crosses decorated with stars and stripes. Humvees are adorned with "Not of this World" stickers next to "support our troops" ribbons or "power of pride" banners. Today's evangelical Christian is no sissy who believes Jesus was the Prince of Peace. That's old school. New school is Jesus kicks Arab butt. It's what makes John McCain such a perfect candidate. In a nation that glorifies war and the warrior Jesus, he is a saint. You must be careful in criticizing him, or it might be considered sacrilegious. Wesley Clark learned that when he dared to say that being a POW doesn't automatically qualify you for the presidency. Further evidence of the sainthood of McCain is the recent controversy about whether or not McCain was really in a "cone of silence," waiting his turn at Saddleback Church as Obama spoke. After a number of reporters and bloggers found out from pastor Warren that McCain was actually in his motorcade traveling to the church while Obama spoke, and could easily have heard the questions posed to Obama which would also be asked of him, McCain sent out his spokesperson to say: "The insinuation …that John McCain, a former prisoner of war, cheated is outrageous." There you have it – John McCain would never cheat because he was a POW. He may not have been in a cone of silence, but his POW status has him permanently enshrined in a cone of sanctity. Hence, cheating on his first wife is no problem, nor was bombing civilians prior to his becoming a POW. War is sacred, bombing civilians is god's work, and anything one did before or does after canonization is simply irrelevant. John McCain cheat, lie, steal? Impossible! Saint John received a rousing reception at Christian pastor (and multimillionaire) Rick Warren's mega-church in Orange County on Saturday night. As McCain promised more war and more violence, as he related stories of his POW days (some obviously fabricated) the evangelicals in the audience cheered. Yay! More war! More crusades for Jesus! All hail St. Johnny, the Hanoi hero! Unlike Wesley Clark, for these people, being a POW most definitely qualifies McCain for the presidency. For years this combination of war and Jesus seemed strange to me, an alliance that made no sense based on my Catholic upbringing. It has, in recent months, made much more sense to me. The political-corporate masters of our country want power and wealth for a small group, including themselves. But they can't admit that, because sooner or later the people would get out the pitch forks and come after them. So they must keep the citizens pacified and distracted. There are many ways they do this – television and frantic consuming are two excellent distractions. But they are not enough. To keep conservative corporatists in power, and keep the great unwashed masses in line as their health care, their Social Security, their government services are privatized, their energy bills increase and their homes are stolen because of bad loans made possible by conservative deregulation of mortgage and banking industries, people like John McCain and George Bush must use Jesus and war as distractions. Religious devotion and war used to be separate in this country. In fact, some of the most vocal anti-war voices came from the churches. And many Christians found it hard to reconcile the country's march to one war or another with what they had heard from the pulpit: love your enemies, do good to those who persecute you, turn the other cheek. But things are very different today. Now some very clever and powerful people have managed a propaganda campaign that marries Jesus to the military and war. The Jesus of today's mega-church could have been a recon marine, saving the world by killing rather than by dying, or an air force pilot, spreading freedom by bombing civilians. At today's Air Force Academy, only Christians need apply. But war and building an empire for Jesus weren't the first hooks used by the corporate oligarchs to enlist the loyalty of American evangelicalism. First came abortion, followed closely by the scourge of gay marriage. Never mind that Republican presidents promise an end to legal abortion, but nothing is ever done. Never mind that allowing gay men and women to marry has no effect on the individual marriages of heterosexuals, as we have seen since gay marriage became legal in two states. The power elite like Bush and McCain must convince evangelicals they will end gay marriage and abortion. And evangelicals must be reminded, as Rick Warren just reminded them, that abortion has created another Holocaust and that is the reason they must elevate it above all other issues and vote again and again for incompetent boobs who wreck the economy, start unnecessary wars, and implement policies that deprive people of houses, food, health care and retirement income. Never mind that the number of abortions goes up in Republican administrations, that gay marriage is more prevalent now than when Bush came into office. Never mind the killing of babies in Iraq. When one is fighting to save unborn babies, one does not have to acknowledge how many already born babies are killed by American bombs. Nor does one have to see how many babies have no health care, or are going hungry each night. When one is crusading against gay marriage, one can ignore the infidelity and failed marriages of heterosexuals, including one's favorite presidential candidate. What started with abortion and gay marriage has now additionally turned into support for immoral and illegal wars. How did this happen? How did America develop a version of Christianity that is more in tune with the Inquisition and the Crusades, as well as with the mindset of radical Islam and jihad (holy war) than with the Gospels and even with the contemporary Catholic Church, which has asked forgiveness for its own past collaboration with war and violence, and condemns America's recent warmongering? America has always had something of a reverence for war, ever since its birth via violent revolution. Hints of Christian America's love of war are even reflected in Mark Twain's anti-war "War Prayer," written in response to the Spanish American War. The victory over Hitler and fascism in World War II furthered America's love affair with war. But in the past, traditional Christians suffered some inner conflict even as they supported America's wars. As much as they felt war might be necessary, they regretted it and looked to the Just War Theory to soothe their consciences. Today, it is different. Today there is no conflict between evangelical Christianity and war. Today, the warmongers in the country have succeeded in transforming Jesus into a warrior, and Christians into an army that must kill others to spread freedom and the Gospel. George W. Bush has done more to help this unification of evangelical Christianity and war than any other leader. With his self-identification as a "born again" Christian, his black and white approach to the world, his "with us or against us," good or evil characterization of nations, he has given Christians justification for war, and helped them become the staunchest supporters of empire building and the military. The horror of 9/11 gave him and his corporate sponsors an opening they might otherwise not have had. 9/11 terrorized the people of this nation, and made them feel vulnerable and more receptive to war propaganda. Whatever internal conflict going to war might have caused them - because of their devotion to Jesus - was eliminated by making the war on terror a holy war, a war of good against evil, a war to root out the infidel, a war not just for survival, but for Jesus. John McCain will do exactly the same thing. Not only is he planning to stay in Iraq indefinitely, he is now flexing his war muscles against Russia, itching it seems for a new Cold War. Bush and McCain are two sides of the same coin. They simply are variations on a theme. Bush started by laying out his Christian bona fides and only later showed his warmonger persona. McCain, on the other hand, was a warrior and warmonger first, and only later turned to Jesus talk to help him in his political quest. But both are confirmed corporatists, oligarchs who demand wealth and power for themselves and their closest friends and allies and use evangelicals to hide their true intentions. Bush's Christian protestations have always seemed phony to me, but his evangelical supporters buy his conversion totally. McCain, on the other hand, has had to pander with indirect but powerful stories of his faith, mostly related to the time he was a POW. For instance, on Saturday at Saddleback Church, John McCain told a story he had told before about one of his prison guards signaling his religious beliefs to McCain by drawing a cross in the dirt. However, it is more than likely that the story is not true, in that similar stories have been told by and about Alexander Solzhenitsyn’s time in the Soviet Gulag. Furthermore, Solzhenitsyn's account was known as early as 1973, while McCain, a Solzhenitsyn fan, never spoke or wrote about his cross in the sand story until 1999, when he first ran for president. There are other details of the story that make it unreliable, nevertheless, the connection between war and Jesus is so sacred to evangelicals, that they did not and still do not question the veracity of McCain's account. Just as Bush was god's chosen candidate, because Jesus "changed my heart" and delivered him from drink, McCain must be god's chosen because god sent him a sign via a North Vietnamese prison guard. So here we are again, in the middle of another presidential election, where a Republican Christian warmonger is using his opposition to abortion and gay marriage, and his willingness to be a warrior for Jesus, to gain votes. And as a former POW, he is a warrior saint, which is even more evidence that he is god's anointed candidate. It doesn't matter if a new Republican president wrecks the economy, as did his predecessor, or takes away needed government services from the poor, or destroys the entire safety net erected over so many years by compassionate legislators. It doesn't matter if he lies, cheats, steals, and destroys the middle class. If the Republican just tells evangelicals what they want to hear, that he promises to save unborn babies (which he will not do), they will vote for him and then support any war, any time, any place. The Jesus I grew up with has disappeared, a new Jesus taking his place. New Jesus cares about the unborn, but not the already born. New Jesus hates homosexuals who want to marry, but loves heterosexuals who divorce and divorce and divorce until they finally – maybe - take their vows seriously. New Jesus doesn't care much for the poor and the sick, but prefers the wealthy. And most of all, new Jesus loves war, hates Arabs, and supports the troops. Oh yes, and new Jesus rejects Barack Obama because he is elite and arrogant. New Jesus wants you to vote for John McCain. Old Jesus, where are you? All content © 2005 outragedcitizen.com |