Today marks the 100th anniversary of the first Armistice Day: 11/11/18. The guns fell silent; the fighting was over. There would be treaties to conclude and exchanges to be made; but for the soldiers, 11am came as a time of relief and reflection. 100 years on from that momentous day, families around the world can think about how their ancestors played some part in the Great War.

This war was truly monstrous in its scope: fighting took place on different fronts; empires drew in their colonies and dominions; and the extended trench warfare became a hell that no-one had expected at the beginning of the conflict. Truly, this war changed the world: it finished the Belle Époque and spawned a new generation of Nietzsche’s descendants: nihilists and existentialists.

Left with the question, “What were we fighting for?”, it robbed many of the truth that sometimes wars must be fought. It is my hope that in the reflection on the senselessness of WWI, people will not forget that Allied soldiers in WWII gave their lives for an important cause: to destroy the Nazis and Imperial Japan; to vindicate the principle of human dignity; and to protect their families and friends from vicious onslaught.

WWI destroyed the old order of Europe: triggered by a complex set of alliances and imperialist ambitions, it ended the ruling power of the Habsburgs, Hohenzollerns, and Romanovs. All people paid for the folly of this war. The soldiers suffered appalling conditions at the front, hurt by disruptions to supply lines and wounded by appalling weapons such as mustard gas. At home, civilians worked in the munitions factories and saw their own means of living cut short as naval warfare disrupted trade. By the end of the war, families in Germany were mixing sawdust with flour to make bread. Once the war had ended, people were then subjected to the dreaded Spanish flu, causing somewhere between 50 and 100 million deaths.

On this day of reflection, as we think about the soldiers, it is important to remember that many never came home. Their families had that awful loss added to the other suffering set out above. Children grew up who had barely known their fathers; wives were left to remarry or remain widows, haunted by the memory of their husbands’ deaths. Some gave their lives heroically, trying to protect their fellow soldiers or helpless civilians. Others simply fell in action or were carried off by diseases that thrived in the unsanitary conditions of the trenches.

Such trying conditions made it hard for a man to remember his humanity, but these men somehow carried on. It is true that there were outbreaks of mutiny, but the overall picture is one of perseverance and insight. The famous Christmas Day football match of 1914 (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christmas_truce) allowed soldiers on both sides to see the humanity in each other and know, however silently, that most of them were not in favour of pointless aggression. This war, for all the initial fervour of joining up, was not a people’s war. It was a politicians’ war, brought on by ties of honour and the perceived need to protect national interests.

As I bring this post to a close, mindful that it is impossible to do justice to the memory of the fallen and the survivors in so few words, I would like to leave you with this thought. Our ancestors struggled through a terrible situation: some lost their faith, while others kept it. They are an example to us that amidst all the rage, which they must have felt towards their political leaders and those of the other side, we must keep a calm head, we must not let our own anger eclipse the vision and compassion of Christ. As you look through all the poems and songs that reflect on the Great War today, I invite you to look at one that pre-dated it, Rudyard Kipling’s “If”, and see if you can see some glimmer of light that made it through that dreadful conflict.

The US mid-terms this year are very important for the future prosperity of America and the world. Think I’m wrong? Persuade me otherwise. The victory of the Republicans is important not only for the effect it will have on power and control, but as a symbol of the perseverance and existence of conservative, “normal” people in the USA and the Western world. This is not to say that one should always vote Republican or that all Democrats are unprincipled (or all Republicans virtuous). Nevertheless, the stark contrasts between the two halves of American society and the need to preserve the Republic that was handed down by the Founders require voters to make a tactical choice to defend themselves and the future of their descendants.

The Democrats in their espousal of leftist causes have drifted away from their roots: 18th and 19th century politicians would not recognise them, nor indeed would early 20th century Democrats. Were some of the latter alive today, they would probably be Republicans or Independents. The threat that this leftism poses is grave and affects the following areas:

• Education;
• Civil order;
• Free speech;
• Religion;
• Economic progress;
• Public health;
• International security;
• Freedom of conscience;
• Integrity of the family; and
• The sanctity of life.

The consequences of failure in these areas will affect not only America, but the world as a whole. A weak America allows unscrupulous foreign governments to exploit not only their own citizens, but the peoples of other nations. The comforts that we take for granted in the West today are all powered by one means or another and until the day when we are weaned off foreign oil and foreign uranium, policing of the seas will remain an important issue. Should some exploitative nation take the mantle of “World’s Policeman” from America, the oil will still flow, but it will cost us all more – and not only in comfort. The generosity of America and her allies, an imperfect but persevering hegemony, allows us all a greater deal of freedom in our political choices than we might enjoy under the aegis of a tyrannical nation. One has only to look at the history of nations dominated by the USSR to see the consequences of an American eclipse.

Education

Education is, to a great extent, in the hands of the government, Federal and State. Even in non-state schools of various stripes, the requirements of the government are seen in the form of strict curriculum rules. These rules in the hands of an extremist leftist government could compel schools to teach revisionist versions of history, non-gendered versions of biology and psychology, and anti-Christian versions of civics and religious instruction. These musings are no longer the province of the “reds under the beds” brigade; they are no longer the vapours of paranoia. Such controls are introduced by increments – and have already been introduced – until a point when a sufficient mass has accumulated to empower a final push to eliminate all forms of conservative, traditionalist, and classical liberal thought. Teachers who espouse such views will be frightened to speak in classrooms for fear of criminal prosecution or dismissal. In a world dominated by leftists, employment law would be altered to permit “fair dismissal on grounds of hate speech, etc”.

It is not for the teachers that I fear, however – important though their plight is. It is for children and parents. A continuing leftist trend will make it hard for many children to learn to think independently and for parents to support them. Imagine a world where  children are taken from their parents by social services on grounds of religious or political brainwashing. Think it will never happen? In the UK, people who foster children have had their applications scrutinised because of their traditional view about homosexuality (https://www.christianconcern.com/our-concerns/fostering/eunice-and-owen-johns-council-reinstate-application). From such beginnings, worse things can grow.

Education is vitally important: it affects all areas of life. As the state continues to grow, it will continue to erode the possibility of home-schooling one’s children, while opposition to vouchers and interference in Christian faith-schools could blunt their outreach to poorer families. This is not to say that people cannot break from the propaganda: the phrase “taking the red pill” (a reference to The Matrix and Plato’s “Allegory of the Cave” in his Republic) is popular all over the internet. Nevertheless, for people who are not accustomed to thinking for themselves, shifting out of the leftist narrative is difficult. An education system that denies children counterpoints to its ideology will keep many in the dark, and increased censorship on social media and other parts of the internet could make access to independent material harder.

___

The brief space of a post prohibits a greater discussion of this matter, but I invite comments and subsequent posts exploring the other areas affected by our current political strife. The mid-terms will not resolve everything in a day, but they are crucial as a step to prevent any more expansions by a hostile state. The work of the President to reduce the “Deep State”, and bureaucracy and legalism in general, requires co-operation from the legislature on some matters. It is important to vote for candidates who will protect the liberties of American citizens.

Today I thought I’d share an article from the Mises Institute:

https://mises.org/wire/california’s-feminist-corporate-coup

Modernism with its revolt against tradition has become increasingly harsh in its criticisms of the past, in particular the Victorian and medieval periods. Why these two periods? Because they serve as symbols for the might of temporal Christendom, now much diminished. The medieval period saw the Crusaders wrest control of Israel from Muslim hands and hold it for an extended period. The Franks in particular have become the objects of a kind of sacred memory as they are honoured for their contributions to the Crusader armies and, before that, for the victory of Charles the Hammer over Muslim armies at the Battle of Tours in AD 732. As for the Victorians, the height of the British and French empires allowed missionaries to penetrate into the heart of territories that had either almost forgotten Christianity or had never known it.

We can, of course, explore these themes in depth and develop a more rounded picture. Such triumphalist rhetoric is just that – rhetoric. War and imperialism are not the stuff of Christianity: Christ was crucified by soldiers – He did not command them. Nevertheless, attempts by revisionists to strip our ancestors of their virtue are misguided. No one is claiming that our ancestors were all saints, devoid of sin. They made mistakes and they committed terrible acts of brutality. But they also were defenders and inquirers after truth and justice. Europe had a right to defend itself from the armies of the caliphate, and the Crusades were provoked by incursions against the Eastern Roman Empire and attacks on pilgrims. The Victorians put a stop to barbarous practices in the lands they conquered and established courts of law whose traditions are still observed today with varying degrees of fidelity.

The Victorians are also reviled for their “hypocrisy” (particularly as regards sexual mores) as if this were a vice confined to them or at its height under their aegis. Neither proposition is true: each age has its own expressions of hypocrisy and inconsistency. Why today the term “champagne socialist” has such currency as would scarcely be believed during the Cold War, when Russia and China were “the Enemy”. Such cardboard cut-outs fail to accurately represent historical reality – nations may follow broad patterns, but they are composed of individuals with individual motives and knowledge.

All the same, we continue to witness a hatred of the past in both secular and Christian contexts. This hatred calls for an apologia in response, a defence of the things our ancestors got right: their attitudes and their actions. Account must also be taken of particular circumstances that affected their times. The Victorians lived through the industrial revolution; they pioneered a route that was followed by the Americans, the Germans, and the French: there was no rule-book, no list of maxims, handed down to teach them how to handle the social and material shifts of that time. Nevertheless, with all their mistakes, they rose to the challenge: Disraeli propounded social legislation; the churches thundered about the plight of the poor; and the wealthy responded with philanthropy. Unlike the ostentations of Greco-Roman benefactors, who acted for prestige, many of the Victorian philanthropists were motivated by true Christian love that was taught across the denominations. The Catholics preached the legacy of Catholicism in the form of medieval hospitals, universities, and travelling ministries (friars). The Anglicans drew on their pre-industrial experience running parochial outreach. The Dissenters followed the Spirit’s fire of evangelism: they preached to the poor and learned from them what it means to be poor. The austerity of Queen Victoria herself, particularly in her grief, also served as an example, a source of shame regarding former associations of debauchery and indulgence surrounding our 18th and 17th century monarchs.

The past has much to teach us and we should all have regard for the things we have lost, be they secular, liturgical, aesthetic, or supernatural. As a parting suggestion, I encourage you to listen to some medieval folk music: for example, “Mirie it is while sumer ilast”.

–

I was recently watching an episode of an old television programme in which a supporting character was killed. Her companions held a “celebration of life” for her afterwards (the word “funeral” was not used). I found the whole proceeding to be incredibly sad. The show being set in the future, where money and “superstition” have been eliminated, none of the characters believed in the existence of an immortal soul. For them, this dead character would simply “live on in memory”.

This is not living, however. If it is true that there is no immortal soul, no resurrection of the dead, then this world is a very sad place indeed. Each of us could die at any time through some accident, some unknown bodily weakness, or some virulent disease. If the dead are not raised, then death is the end. No one will ever see his loved ones again. There will be no final court of justice to right the wrongs that we have suffered in this life. When all written records and living memory of a person have ceased, he will be unknown to future generations. The uniqueness of an individual will be lost to the void of oblivion.

Such atheistic services can hold no real comfort. There is sadness at the thought of the loved one never living again and those attending will be sad for themselves when reflecting on the fact that they too must die. Thus, striving to defeat the evil of death ourselves, rather than relying on God, corners of the scientific community have turned to the pursuit of immortality, echoing the travails of alchemists and occultists in ages gone by. Some look to transfer our consciousness to machines, others to replacing our flesh with machine parts, still others to unlocking some secret of DNA that makes our cells age and warp.

Our ancestors generally accepted that death was not the end. They saw death frequently in the form of infant morality and in the slow death of the aged, who died in the family home, not put away in hospitals and “facilities”. In the Catholic liturgies of the pre-Reformation era, the Day of Judgment motif was ubiquitous, while the post-Reformation evangelical preaching of great men like John Wesley also appealed to this simple truth:

…it is appointed unto men once to die, but after this the judgment.

-Hebrews 9:27

And so, as people take part in Halloween celebrations or in subsequent All Saints’ Day services, let them think on what death means, and let us hope that some atheists and non-believers are prompted by images of death to think about Christ’s work, to turn to Him, and be saved.

I am he that liveth, and was dead; and, behold, I am alive for evermore, Amen; and have the keys of hell and of death.

-Revelation 1:18

Just as the resurrection is the hope of an individual, the Millennium is the hope of nations as entities in their own right.

And I saw thrones, and they sat upon them, and judgment was given unto them: and I saw the souls of them that were beheaded for the witness of Jesus, and for the word of God, and which had not worshipped the beast, neither his image, neither had received his mark upon their foreheads, or in their hands; and they lived and reigned with Christ a thousand years.

-Revelation 20:4

When we really begin to look at the small details of life and set them alongside the big picture, we see a great need for evangelisation and for the return of Christ. Those who hunger and thirst for righteousness are longing to see Christ ruling from Jerusalem over the nations. They long to see the death of Babylon the Great and the destruction of the Beast and the False Prophet. Ultimately, they desire the imprisonment and judgment of Satan, our enemy. The rot, the corruption is everywhere to see.

We may note that there has always been failure and evil in the world; we are fallen beings and there are fallen spirits at large. That does not mean that evil will always have sway over the human world. The earth belongs to God – He has the right to rule it as He sees fit, and He will step in at some point in history to free the earth from despotic governors.

Corruption of the State

The state was ordained by God to ensure civil harmony and as a defence against foreign invasion. These are legitimate aims, and are most easily observed in the acts of the police, the criminal courts, and the army. The state is not entitled to interfere in all aspects of life, however.

We see the corruption in the big controversies on front pages of newspapers and blogs:

• redefining marriage;
• redefining gender;
• hampering free speech; and
• permitting abortion.

But the rot is seen in the small things, the boring aspects of our everyday lives:

• Inheritance tax;
• Capital gains tax;
• Some aspects of income tax;
• Corporation tax;
• Politicisation of education;
• Excessive regulation for businesses; and
• Quantitative easing.

The fingers of the state are in practically all aspects of our lives these days, and our ancestors would find this strange. Roger Scruton, talking about the free market, once remarked that one of the pillars of true conservatism is that we reserve some things from the market. These things we keep for family and church, and so forth. Similarly, we might remark that some things ought to be reserved from the state. The state has no right to interfere in private transactions, in matters of family life and personal expression. Conservatives are horrified by the vision of the state conjured up in Plato’s Republic; we ought to be asking ourselves whether those phantoms are present now even in so called “moderate” and “centrist” states. Where is the liberty our ancestors protected?

Corruption of Culture

If the state has signs of corruption, it inherited the disease from its people. Our legislatures, executives, and judiciaries are staffed by real, fallen human beings. As dangerous values perfuse the populace, they will inevitably find their way into the institutions that govern the people. The rise of leftism is evidence of this: even so called “conservative” parties show signs of the infection in their unquestioning approval of the expansion of the state. When small-government people ask questions or make observations, others around them look at them as if to say, “Are you out of your mind? Why shouldn’t the state be involved in X?” Few it seems are willing to ask the fundamental philosophical question of what the limits of state competence should be.

We have neo-conservatism to blame, in part, for this. Its constant use of the word “democracy” as a buzzword, as a sacred chant, has blinded people to the dangers of democracy and statism. It takes great effort now to introduce people to the ideas of classical liberalism and to show that the Founding Fathers of the United States of America were wary of the excesses of democracy they understood from their study of ancient Athens. A further contributing factor in the rise of this corruption is the decline of classical studies, which would reveal once again what the Founding Fathers knew from their childhood days. Were classical studies to become popular again, they would also need to be taught in a level manner – the leftist tendencies of revisionism would need to be exposed.

Corruption of the Church

The problems in the Church are increasingly being exposed for all to see across all traditions: Catholic, Orthodox, Anglican, Lutheran, and evangelical/dissenting. Some of the most striking are:

• Pederasty;
• Ephebophilia;
• The “Prosperity Gospel”;
• National divisions within the Church (e.g. in the Ukraine);
• Annihilationism;
• Universalism;
• Gay marriage;
• Financial mismanagement;
• Full preterism;
• Ecumenism; and
• Inter-faith dialogue.

These issues not only deter outsiders from the Gospel, but they also cause issues of governance and participation within the Church. There is now a choice facing Christians in all these traditions: do we try to remove the corruption from our ranks or do we go elsewhere? This is not an easy decision. There are good reasons to stay, the principal reason being to witness to those who are not Christ’s in the hope that they will repent. Catholics will of course argue that as theirs is the one, true Church, they cannot flee Catholicism itself: such would be apostasy or schism or both. They have “underground” options to consider, however – though these are more common in places of overt persecution than in the West.

***

I am aware that this post is largely assertions rather than argumentation. Such is required given the space of a single post, but it is worth discussing the reasoning behind these claims in the comments below as well as providing examples in evidence.

And said to the mountains and rocks, “Fall on us, and hide us from the face of him that sitteth on the throne, and from the wrath of the Lamb: for the great day of his wrath is come; and who shall be able to stand?”

Revelation 6:16-17

The wrath of God is not a popular subject for preaching in large parts of the Church. If we are remain true to the principle of objectivism, we must preach the wrath of God, regardless of how uncomfortable it may make us feel. It is a significant part of the counsel of God, found throughout the bible, not merely in Revelation. For this reason, those with preaching authority and responsibility should cover it every so often.

A number of errors are common in explorations of this topic:

1. Confusing the wrath of man or the spirits with the wrath of God;
2. Confusing suffering in Gehenna with the wrath poured out upon the earth;
3. Concluding that the wrath of God was exhausted in the past (e.g. in 70 AD) and will never come again; and
4. Spiritualising language to such a point that physical realities are denied.

Other than the appearance of this theme in the bible, why should Christians preach the wrath of God? One reason is that this message reveals an aspect of God’s character. If we claim to know and love the Lord, then we must love His whole personality, not merely the parts that appeal to our need for forgiveness. The wrath of God tells us how God feels about sin; the Jesus who forgave our sin also had harsh words to say about it. God did not intend our world to be dominated by sin. Sin was permitted because it was entailed as a contingent eventuality in the decision to give creatures free will. A time is coming when God’s wrath will cleanse the earth, making it a place fit for righteous inhabitants. The Book of Revelation declares that the kingdoms of this world have become the kingdom of our Lord and of His Christ during the time of God’s wrath, at the Seventh Trumpet (Revelation 11:15). God’s wrath is thus an instrument of deliverance and a declaration of the wickedness of sin.

The wrath of God is also a suitable topic for preaching whose aim is to provoke repentance. While it is desirable that people should be drawn to Christ by His love, repentance presupposes first an acknowledgement of our sin. If we were not sinners, we would not need to repent. The wrath of God is a reminder that sin exists and that it merits punishment. If we are to escape punishment, be reconciled to God, and learn true righteousness, we must turn to Christ. He is the only way to the Father. Apart from Christ, the Lord of Life, there is only death – only death.

Lastly, a literal interpretation of the wrath of God makes it a series of real events that are to befall the earth following the resurrection and gathering of God’s people to meet Christ in the air (Matthew 24:31; 1 Thessalonians 4:16-18). Those who are not part of God’s people at this time will endure horrendous suffering. The suffering earth-dwellers are presented in Revelation as unrepentant -but it is possible that some will repent at this time. (Indeed, premillennial theology presupposes that a subset of these people will populate the earth following the wrath of God.) This picture of stubborn resistance to God tells us that the time for repentance is NOW. Do not leave it to the future, because that future may never come.

The term “atheism” is a charged one, defined in a variety of ways and used loosely in ordinary conversation. By this term, a person can mean:

1. belief that there are no divine beings, including the Creator;
2. belief that there is no anthropomorphic deity, but that some divine essence exists;
3. belief that there are (currently) no reasonable grounds for believing the existence of God; and
4. belief that God exists accompanied by a refusal to worship and/or publicly acknowledge Him.

In classical Athens, atheism appears to have meant simply a refusal to worship the gods recognised by the state, rather than a belief that there are no divine beings. Indeed, it is conceivable that in Roman times, the Greek-speaking parts of the Empire might have referred to Christians as atheists over their refusal to worship the emperors.

The terms “divine” and “god” are themselves confusingly used in English, which has led to many English speakers misinterpreting the terms “el”, “eloah”, and “elohim” in Hebrew, and their cognates in Aramaic. These terms indicate the world in which the beings they refer to live, and not the contingency or necessity of those beings’ existence.

“Belief” is also a confusing term. Epistemologists have debated whether belief is a component of knowledge. One can use the term belief to mean assent to the proposition that X exists. In addition, it is often used to refer to trust in X, which of necessity presupposes that X exists.

Consider the following example. A Catholic once asked me, “Do you believe in our Lady?” How was I to respond to this? Did he mean that I prayed to her in a manner that presupposed she could hear me and that she was in a position to do something about my requests? Did he mean that I believed she was a virgin when she gave birth to Christ? Did he mean that I believed she remained a virgin perpetually thereafter? All of the above (and more)? I gave a qualified answer: “I believe that she was a virgin when she gave birth to our Lord.”

Belief is a funny thing. Sometimes we just “know” things without being able to consciously give good reasons for that knowledge. Not only do we hold such-and-such a proposition to be true, but often we rely on it; we let it influence our thinking. How many readers of this post “know” that something in the world changed recently, something shifted, and yet are unable to adequately explain it?

But this is your hour, and the power of darkness. 

-Luke 22:53

Little children, it is the last time: and as ye have heard that antichrist shall come, even now are there many antichrists; whereby we know that it is the last time.

-1 John 2:18

This is my hour. Do you not know Death when you see it?

–The Return of the King, The Siege of Gondor

The confirmation of Associate Justice Brett Kavanaugh is wonderful news. God has broken through, as He said He would. He has kept His promise and is casting the crowns of the rulers of darkness down to the dust. The light on the hill has not been snuffed out. God has honoured the prayers of the righteous around the world and in the United States, the voices clamouring for the rights of the unborn to be vindicated. Judgment Day is assuredly coming.

But the battle is not over yet, and the darkness is often greatest before the dawn. Christ went through the crucifixion before He was glorified in the resurrection. One day He will sit on the throne of glory in Jerusalem, but on Good Friday the King of the Jews was nailed to a cross like a common criminal. The Church as the mystical Body of Christ must also pass through its crucifixion period before Her glorious resurrection.

…we must through much tribulation enter into the kingdom of God.

-Acts 14:22

Even as the Church shines, it shines in the darkness. Antichrist is coming, and there will be struggles throughout the earth. Even if one posits that he will not have a global empire (as I myself do), this does not entail that nations that resist him will be entirely safe.

Why do the heathen rage, and the people imagine a vain thing? The kings of the earth set themselves, and the rulers take counsel together, against the Lord, and against his anointed, saying, Let us break their bands asunder, and cast away their cords from us.

-Psalm 2:1-3

In the borders of the Anglophone countries there are plenty of people who will violently oppose the Gospel, and times of economic and political uncertainty can drive formerly restrained people to desperate measures. The task ahead of the Church is to continue proclaiming the Gospel, including the message that Jesus the King will one day return and pour out the wrath of God on the wicked inhabitants of the earth. They will not want to hear this message – but those who repent before that time will be spared God’s wrath, even if they are not spared the Devil’s persecution.

God will vindicate the words of His faithful followers – but those who refuse to hear will be taken by diabolical deception; they will believe the lie. We must preach the Truth in faith that there are still those who will receive Him. To those that do, God will grant the right to become children of God.

We have seen the work of lies in the UK and USA, and it is natural that two countries that bequeathed the common law and liberty to the world should become targets of corruption. As we give thanks to God for this breakthrough in appointing an originalist Justice, let us reflect on the need to resist falsehood in all its forms. The truth will pierce the darkness like a blade and the world will be divided.

***

Postscript: this post by no means endorses all judgments or opinions voiced by Associate Justice Kavanaugh, but it does take the line that abortion is a species of murder and no court of law has the moral authority to declare murder acceptable. Nor does this post advocate that the kingdoms of this world are the Kingdom of our God and His Christ – but they will be one day, when Christ returns and the times of the Gentiles cease. Then the Church will reign with Christ over the Gentiles and they will confess that He has loved His Bride.