What is the Christian response to Iraq?

WaPo has an ongoing series on "faith issues" where they pose to an array of theologians and/or well-known Christians (sometimes to a person who fits both descriptions) questions that are occasionally interesting. The one this week is

Some political leaders say we need to get out of Iraq now. Others say we are obligated to stay and try to restore civil order and authority. What's the moral position? Is there one?

Marcus Borg's response, of the one's that I have read -- I confess to have summarily ignored Chuck Colson's response -- is by far the best, in my opinion.

Borg points out that the first three centuries after the resurrection were the centuries of Christian pacifism -- the Christian position was that there was no way for the faithful to legitimately participate in war. After Constantine, when Christianity went from being in an adversarial position with respect to the state to the religion of the state, Christian thought changed to legitimize war under certain conditions -- for a war to be "just" in this new scheme it must be defensive, and all other options must be have tried before war is begun. Pre-emptive war is categorically forbidden under the "just war" model.

Borg says,

I am dismayed that our country violated Christian teaching by launching a pre-emptive war – a war of choice, as it is often correctly called. And I am dismayed that a President who is a born-again Christian could have been so unaware of the history of Christian teaching and wisdom about this issue. It is a galling defect in his re-socialization as a Christian.

The heresy that is American evangelicalism today is captured in the event of the Iraq War. Not only is it a pre-emptive war begun by the most overtly "Christian" president in a generation, and one who if anything wears his Christianity more prominently on his sleeve that the other principle candidate for "Christian" president, Jimmy Carter, but his greatest and most loyal support comes from the "evangelical" community in the United States. That such a thing can happen -- a Christian President can lead the country to pre-emptive war, that this can happen in such a determined rush with what were clearly lies and deliberate mis-information, that the vast majority of the most religious people backed him so completely and continue for the most part to do so -- begs the question: What the hell good is Christianity?

In my opinion there are only two alternatives: a) It's not a damn bit of good, and "faith" in Jesus is crap; or b) The evangelical church in America today is a heretical religion, and until its adherents realize that they have been deceived, not only by Bush but by the vast majority of the evangelical leaders who went along with this disaster (Dobson, Falwell, Kennedy, etc.), they are propagating a lie.

Borg's solution is obviously the only Christian one, and easily recognized by anyone who has ever experienced what it means to be really rescued by the God of grace. But those who set up the idol of American nationalism in the temple that should only accommodate the God of Jesus, will reject his argument, even as they claim to be "Christian":

So as a country, we are involved in a war that is wrong and that never should have happened. Given that, what is the responsibility of Christians, of people who affirm that Jesus is our Lord? When one commits a wrong act, of course one is responsible for minimizing the consequences of that wrong act. So how should those of us who are Christian respond in this situation?

The first act should be confession – confession that as a nation, we were wrong to do this. Confession is about repentance – which means going beyond the mind that we have. Our national mind in the wake of 9/11 has been shaped and manipulated by fear – despite the fact that one of the most common affirmations in the Bible is “Fear not,” “Do not be afraid.”

Interestingly the evangelical heretics who bloviate about gays and prayer in public schools and proclaim that this nation has lost its Christian roots, have no problem with pre-emptive war and the crusading mentality. They have no need of repentance. Jesus was a servant and said that his disciples would also be servants. If that is true and it is possible for there to be a Christian nation (I categorically deny this possibility), how can a Christian nation be anything other than a servant? How is it that those who would have us be a Christian nation would also be the ones who are so enthusaistic about going to war?

Southern Baptists in the lead on the march backwards

From the Baptist Standard [my writhing is in green ...]

Global warming debate generates heat

By Marv Knox

Texas Baptist Standard

SAN ANTONIO - Southern Baptist Convention (SBC) messengers generated some heat during their annual meeting as they debated the government's responsibility to address global warming.

They also stood by the SBC resolution committee's decision not to address how many people actually populate Southern Baptist churches.

Otherwise, they quickly dispatched seven of eight proposed resolutions June 13.

The global warming resolution did not generate debate on its basic points: global temperatures have risen for decades, [even if they hadn't the basic argument would be unaffected] "scientific evidence does not support computer models of catastrophic human-induced global warming" [this, and evolution is a theory with no good evidence] and major steps to reduce greenhouse gases would unfairly impact the world's poorest people.[all those climate scientists, demographers and insurance policy writers simply don't know what they are talking about]

But messengers disagreed over the SBC resolutions committee's call for the government to do something about climate change.

The committee's proposal encouraged "continued government funding to find definitive answers on the issue of human-induced global warming that are based on empirical facts and are free of ideology and partisanship."[a WTF moment ... how would they know non-partisanship when they saw it?] It also supported "economically responsible government initiatives and funding to locate and implement viable energy alternatives" that would reduce greenhouse gas emissions.

Bob Carpenter of Cedar Street Baptist Church in Holt, Mich., proposed deleting the two sections of the resolution that called for government action.

"For 70 years, beginning with the Franklin Roosevelt administration, we've endured expansion of government," Carpenter said, calling government "part of the cause of the problem rather than the solution."

The government cannot provide simple solutions to problems, he said, adding, "hundreds of millions of tax dollars already are being spent" by the government on global warming. He said that private enterprise is a founding principle of the country. "We solve problems ... when government stays out of the way."