[Peace-discuss] Torturing 'em for Jesus
E. Wayne Johnson
ewj at pigs.ag
Mon May 4 12:42:14 CDT 2009
Last week I said somewhat publicly that the GOP was morally bankrupt
because of its absurdly disingenuous stance on waterboarding and torture.
Bible scholar Laurence M. Vance, author of Christianity and War, (and
this hour-long lecture on the subject - Christianity and War - Laurence
M. Vance <http://www.liberty4urbana.com/drupal-6.8/node/42>)
had this to say about Christians and torture in a article today at
LewRockwell.com (http://lewrockwell.com/vance/vance170.html) :
> Can a Christian waterboard an A-rab for Jesus?
>
> For the Christian, there is no other way to do it.
> The Bible says: "And whatsoever ye do in word or deed, do all in the
> name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God and the Father by him"
> (Colossians 3:17). It also says that whatsoever we do, we should "do
> it heartily, as to the Lord" (Colossians 3:23). We should do
> everything "to the glory of God" (1 Corinthians 10:31).
>
> Can a Christian smash someone against a wall in the name of the Lord
> Jesus? Can a Christian heartily lock someone in a dark box for hours
> at a time? Can a Christian deprive someone of sleep to the glory of
> God? Can a Christian give thanks to God while he hangs someone from
> the ceiling?
>
> Sure he can, but not without violating the whole tenor of the New
> Testament.
Full text below...
****************
Waterboard an A-rab for Jesus by Laurence M. Vance
In a recent column
<http://www.lewrockwell.com/margolis/margolis145.html>, Eric Margolis
labeled the Republicans as "America's champion of war and torture."
Those are some harsh words -- harsh but true.
The recent release
<http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2009/apr/16/torture-memos-bush-administration>of
the Bush torture memos and the revelation
<http://www.nytimes.com/2009/04/20/world/20detain.html> that the CIA
waterboarded Abu Zubaydah 83 times and Khalid Sheik Mohammed 183 times
/before/ Bush claimed that we don't torture has elicited a predictable
response from conservative Christians who think the Republican Party is
the party of God: silence.
It is also no surprise that a new survey
<http://pewforum.org/docs/?DocID=156> by the Pew Research Center for the
People & the Press shows that of four major religious traditions in the
United States (white evangelical Protestant, white non-Hispanic
Catholic, white mainline Protestant, and unaffiliated), white
evangelical Protestants are more likely to believe that the use of
torture against suspected terrorists can often or sometimes be
justified. In fact, the more often people attended church, the more
likely they were to justify torture.
A similar poll <http://pewforum.org/news/rss.php?NewsID=16465>
commissioned last year by Faith in Public Life and Mercer University
reported that almost 60 percent of Southern evangelicals believed that
torture was often or sometimes justified.
When the Spanish did it, it was torture. When the Japanese did it, it
was torture. When the Germans did it, it was torture. When the Khmer
Rouge did it, it was torture. But when waterboarding was done by
Americans under a Republican administration, it suddenly became an
"enhanced interrogation technique."
Such has not always been the case. Waterboarding-like techniques used by
American soldiers during the Philippine Insurrection and the Vietnam War
were condemned. But that was before the "war on terror" where anything
goes in the name of "national security."
"Khalid Sheikh Mohammed was not waterboarded 183 times," says a
Republican hack
<http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2009/04/28/despite-reports-khalid-sheikh-mohammed-waterboarded-times>
at Fox News. That number is "highly misleading" and a "vast inflation"
because "the much-cited figure represents the number of times water was
poured onto Mohammed's face -- not the number of times the CIA applied
the simulated-drowning technique on the terror suspect."
Okay, so how many "pours" does take to be waterboarded? If a prisoner is
removed from his cell, taken to an interrogation room, forced to endure
one "pour," and then taken back to his cell -- can we not say he was
waterboarded because he only suffered one "pour"?
And what about Abu Zubaydah? In addition to being waterboarded
<http://www.latimes.com/news/opinion/la-oe-margulies30-2009apr30,0,3309097.story>,
he had a collar wrapped around his neck, was smashed against a wall, was
forced to stay in a pitch-dark box for hours, was stripped naked, was
suspended from hooks in the ceiling, and was deprived of sleep. Is it
not torture if these things only happened one time?
The strict constitutionalist at Fox, Judge Andrew Napolitano
<http://foxforum.blogs.foxnews.com/2009/04/21/napolitano_torture_memos/feed>,
who actually read the 175 pages of torture memos, sees things
differently from the defenders of the Bush regime at his network: "This
is not rocket science and it is not art. Everyone knows torture when
they see it; and no amount of twisted logic can detract from its illegal
horror, its moral antipathy, and its attack at core American values."
Who are these CIA operatives that engage in waterboarding and other
forms of torture? What kind of a man does such a thing? The FBI does
profiles of serial killers. How about a profile of a CIA agent who
tortures prisoners, in the interest of national security, of course?
Are these men Christians? I suppose they are. The majority of Americans
claim to be a Christian of some sort. Can a Christian waterboard an
A-rab for Jesus?
For the Christian, there is no other way to do it. The Bible says: "And
whatsoever ye do in word or deed, do all in the name of the Lord Jesus,
giving thanks to God and the Father by him" (Colossians 3:17). It also
says that whatsoever we do, we should "do it heartily, as to the Lord"
(Colossians 3:23). We should do everything "to the glory of God" (1
Corinthians 10:31).
Can a Christian smash someone against a wall in the name of the Lord
Jesus? Can a Christian heartily lock someone in a dark box for hours at
a time? Can a Christian deprive someone of sleep to the glory of God?
Can a Christian give thanks to God while he hangs someone from the ceiling?
Sure he can, but not without violating the whole tenor of the New Testament.
Christians are told to put off anger, wrath, and malice (Colossians
3:8), to not render evil for evil (1 Thessalonians 5:15), to not give
offense (1 Corinthians 10:30), to abstain from all appearance of evil (1
Thessalonians 5:22), to not be a brawler (Titus 3:2), and to abhor that
which is evil (Romans 12:9). I think this rules out waterboarding.
Okay, but suppose the perpetrators of torture in the CIA do not claim to
be Christians and don't care what the New Testament says? Well, does
that mean it is okay if Christians cheer them on? If not, then what
should Christians do? Should they just be indifferent?
John the Baptist told Herod "It is not lawful for thee to have her" when
he married his brother's wife (Matthew 14:4). He also told Roman
soldiers to "Do violence to no man" (Luke 3:14). Why aren't Christians
doing likewise?
Why aren't Christians letting the CIA and the military know that
waterboarding is torture and that torture is wrong? Could it be that
these institutions are filled with Christians? Could it be that
Christians respect these institutions? Could it be that Christians trust
these institutions? I think all of the above are true.
Where is the outrage from the evangelical community over these torture
memos? I'll tell you where. It is in the same place as the outrage over
the invasion of Iraq, the thousands upon thousands of dead Iraqis, the
over four thousand American soldiers who died for a lie, the bloodbath
that Iraq has become, the Guantanamo prison camp, the CIA secret
prisons, the destruction of liberty in America due to the war on terror,
and America's evil foreign policy.
Christians should be leaving the Republican Party in droves. Christians
should be crawling on broken glass as penance for blindly supporting the
Republican Party. Christians should be repenting in sackcloth and ashes
for thinking the Republican Party was the party of God.
Instead, even as more and more crimes of the Bush administration come to
light, I fear that Christians who are outraged, and rightly so, at the
crimes of the Obama administration and the Democrats will look in the
next election to the Republicans as their savior instead of the
champions of war and torture.
America needs more Christians like John the Baptist instead of John Hagee.
/May 4, 2009/
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