Word to the Wise
Monday, April 28, 2008 - Monday in the Sixth Week of Easter
[Acts 16:11-15 and John 15:26 - 16:4A]In fact, the hour is coming when everyone who kills you will think he is offering worship to God!
There is some terrible irony in those words. Although Jesus is pointing out that the disciples may be persecuted for their faith by being thrown out of synagogues and put to death by Jewish authorities and also killed for denying the civic "gods" of the Romans, the irony comes when one studies the history of Christianity. So often, Christians have done the same. Terrible persecution has occurred in the name of "offering worship to God" by Christians of all kinds! The same reason is offered by certain Islamic extremists for their attacks on anyone whom they consider an "enemy of Islam." The examples could be multiplied over and over again. Religious violence has been studied up and down by scholars of all times. More recently, Rene Giraud has offered a very interesting analysis in his theory about a community's need for a scapegoat. Whatever the cause within any religious system, I find any violence done in the name of God to be a contradiction in terms - certain passages in the Old Testament to the contrary notwithstanding! I believe Jesus' words to Peter at the Garden of Gethsemani are determinative: "Put your sword back in it's sheath. Those who live by the sword shall die by the sword." I am reminded by Pope Paul VI's famous plea to the United Nations: Jamais la guerre! Jamais plus la guerre! (No war. Never war again! I wish our own leaders had been listening. AMEN
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