Pacifists - I've rolled my

Pacifists - I've rolled my eyes in disgust at the moral equivalency shown by many liberal American churches - the Catholics, the Lutherans, and my own Presbyterians. A devout Christian, I am also a realist; Einstein's "You Can Not Simultaneously Prepare for Peace and War", a Twin Cities bumpersticker meme, is belied by the real-life stories of Norway, Denmark and the Netherlands (all of which are intensely pacifistic countries; all of which learned that pacifism without the will and means to enforce peace against aggression is worthless; all maintain relatively large, modern militaries) and Switzerland and Sweden (who have long known that pacifism without teeth is suicidal in the real world).

But blithely unpolluted by any memories of occupation, American liberal Christians continue to insist, at best, that waging war makes all belligerents equally guilty. At worst, they blame America and shun the pesky details. The assistant minister at my own church tosses constant anti-American references into her homilies (did you know that if we were only more G-dly, all those poor North Koreans wouldn't be starving? Me either).

Katherine Kersten has a great article on the subject. While the whole thing is worth an urgent read, here's the part that I knew, but needed a memory jog about; it's not a new phenomenon:

In the years leading up to World War II, church leaders were also in the forefront of America's peace movement. In a recent issue of the Weekly Standard, Joseph Loconte of the Heritage Foundation details this embarrassing and largely forgotten episode in American church history.

According to Loconte, as Hitler rolled through Europe, many American church officials seemed more interested in denouncing their own nation than in protesting the Führer's crimes. John Haynes Holmes, a New York Unitarian minister, was typical. "If America goes into the war," he intoned in 1940, "it will not be for idealistic reasons but to serve her own imperialistic interests."

Like their counterparts today, World War II-era church leaders called repeatedly for "peace at any price." Between 1938 and 1941 -- as Hitler bombed London and marched into Paris -- church groups issued 50 statements insisting that a just and durable peace was possible. Harry Emerson Fosdick, the famous Baptist preacher, insisted that American entry into the war could not be justified. "We see clearly," he wrote, "that a war for democracy is a contradiction in terms, that war itself is democracy's chief enemy."

Predictably, Christian leaders also urged Americans to meet Hitler's aggression with love and forgiveness. Here's Albert Palmer, president of the Chicago Theological Seminary: "If your enemy hunger, feed him -- and understand him." Some leaders claimed that Hitler would respond positively to worldwide peace marches, which would show him that violence was unnecessary. "Without military opposition," Palmer wrote ingenuously, "the Hitlers wither away."

The article cites the great German theologian, Reinhold Niebuhr - a major dissident from the "Peace at any Price" school of theology.

Read it. You'll be glad you did.

Posted by Mitch at July 18, 2003 09:34 AM