4/25/2005

Hotel Rwanda: Relativism, Moral Anarchy & Genocide

I recently watched this film and was profoundly disturbed, moved, and horrified by the scale and tragedy of the genocide which unfolded in Rwanda between ethnic Hutu's and Tutsi's beginning in April 1994. In fact, more than 800,000 men, women, and children were murdered in Rwanda during this unbelievable reign of inhumanity lasting less than four months. This was among a population of less than 8 million!

There were several revelations about this event that struck me which I think are relevant to our examinations of religion and culture. The first is the fact that it was the French government who supplied the Hutu's with weapons and then they along with every other Western power refused to intervene in the prevention of this African holocaust.

What is interesting to me is that the French, who have been so vocal in their outrage toward America, and President Bush in particular over the U.S. initiative to liberate Iraq, seemed to have no moral indignation whatsoever over the abandonment of a whole nation to barbarism. I would argue that this is the inevitable result of postmodern relativism that characterizes so many Western European nations today, and France chief among them.

In the absence of any clear moral convictions these cultures have become indifferent to the oppression of others because they lack any absolute moral commitments. "Who are we to say that this or that is wrong?" Such cultures cannot even condemn the ideologies which lead to genocide. They certainly condemn genocide after the fact but then it is obviously too late. It is only when you are in possession of clear moral convictions rooted in a concept of absolute truth that you are compelled to intervene in order to enact justice.

Of course the French were not alone in their abandonment of the Rwandans; the U.S. under the Clinton administration was equally ambivalent in their response. In fact, recently declassified government documents show that this same lack of moral conviction and the resulting priority of politics over principal were dominating factors in the U.S. indifference.

What is so notable about the 20th century is that great physical power has been acquired by men who have no fear of God and who believe themselves unrestrained by any absolute code of conduct. I would add, if this "code of conduct" does not derive from God then who? History has demonstrated that there have always been many who are willing to author and impose their own moral categories and in every instance the results have been catastrophic. Will we continue to stray further from the truth or will we awaken to the inevitable disaster? Will we return to this one truth? - "I AM the Lord thy God, thou shall have no other gods before Me."

3 Comments:

At 8:19 AM, Blogger S. Michael Craven said...

Dear John,

I am afraid that you fall far short in both your theology and understanding of the biblical record. To begin with, man not God is the originator of violence. God created mankind perfect, without sin. God established the boundaries by which mankind was to live and God established the consequences for violating those boundaries. In the absence of these “rules” and the accompanying consequence there could be no justice.

Man chose of his own free will to break those rules and in doing so rejected God’s authority opting instead for his own. The result was catastrophic. Death, pain, suffering, malice, envy, strife, etc. all entered the world and humanity and creation have suffered ever since. In other words, sin entered the world. (This is the one doctrine of Christianity that is absolutely provable, all men are sinners.)

From that moment forward every living thing was born spiritually dead and physically dying. Spiritually dead because God made mankind for relationship with Himself but in the wake of our sin that relationship was severed [by man] and we have all been looking for something to fill this God-given need ever since.

In essence the world in which you rightly acknowledge is full of evil and violence is a world of already dead people. They are creatures who in and of themselves have no hope of restoring this broken relationship or reversing the conditions of their fall from grace. We are born spiritually dead [permanently separated from the source of life for our souls] and within about 72 years it will become apparent that we are physically dead as well. It is within this context that God intervenes, not out of any obligation but out of His mercy; to breath new life into some of these “already dead” creatures.

Romans chapter 9 speaks of this, “What if God, choosing to show his wrath and make His power known, bore with great patience the objects of His wrath [justice] – prepared for destruction. [Already dead] What if He did this to make the riches of His glory known to the objects of His mercy, whom He prepared in advance for glory…”

God, throughout scripture uses the willful choices of sinful beings to fulfill His purposes in order to save His children. Yes, some of the atrocities that are committed are horrific and disturbing but these acts are committed by sinful men who are acting in accordance with their sinful desires. God never makes them do anything that they were not already willing to do. Again scripture confirms this in saying, “God causes all things to work together for the good of those who love Him.” God is working to reconcile humanity to Himself and thus save us from our sin state; it is man who is working to kill each other.

You propose that it is the Abrahamic religions that are responsible for all of the violence in the world. You and I both know that this is a preposterous statement. Crime and violence occur every day throughout the world and these are more often born out of greed, envy, and covetousness.

The alternative you propose is a world in which we “let go of the child-like concept of a personal god [then] men have to accept responsibility for their atrocities, no longer able to justify their killing as divine will.” This is your solution?

It seems to me that what you propose has already been tried. Remember the Soviet Union? The first nation in the world established upon atheistic principles. Did this succeed in eliminating violence, greed, lust, envy, and strife? Quite the contrary, the “Black Book of Communism,” published in 1999, computed the number of corpses that communism accumulated since the Russian Revolution in 1917. The total adds up, in the 20th century alone to more than 100 million. How do you explain this? Where was the influence of religion in this culture? What about Cambodia, North Korea, China, Nazi Germany?

John, you look at the world, full of sin, hatred, and violence and you accuse God when it is so clearly man who is the source of these things that you rightly despise. Instead of seeking after God as a source of hope and salvation you trust in yourself, in the illusion of inherent goodness despite overwhelming evidence to the contrary. You simply refuse to accept the truth and instead you have made yourself God and believe that humanity would be better served by you and your ideas. Don’t you think that is a little arrogant?

I find it curious that you would feel compelled to voice your anger on my blog. I consider you a friend. We both agree in our condemnation of genocide yet you seem to be saying that I cannot rightly condemn genocide as a Christian and that by my being a Christian I am actually contributing to the cause of violence in the world.

As I read your statement, it is you who condemn. You are doing the demonizing. You are making broad generalizations about other people and passing final judgment on them. In doing this, you are contributing to the very ideology that breeds strife, dissention, and violence. Recall that the Nazi’s made similar claims about the Jews. They too blamed the Jews for all that was wrong in the world. Aren’t you now doing the exact same thing except you have expanded your condemnation to include Christians and Muslims?

John, I am not angry at you and yet you speak as if you are angry at me, God, and every other religious person in the world. Don’t you see the irony? You condemn the very thing of which you yourself are guilty. Murder originates in the human heart; first in anger then in hatred and then in violence. Scripture actually expands our view beyond the physical and goes to the source, our hearts when it says, “Anyone who hates his brother is a murderer.”

I appeal to you to search your own heart and there you will find the source of what you condemn and it is only in Christ that we can be set free from this sin. I know my own heart and it is not Christ that compels me toward selfishness, envy, and sin. He calls me to repentance and obedience in order to resist the desires of my sinful nature. I plead with you to come and wrestle against sin with those who have called upon the name of Christ and not against them.

 
At 9:23 PM, Blogger S. Michael Craven said...

Dear John,

I scarcely know where to begin. You have clearly made up your mind about this matter and I believe that you have uncritically embraced so-called thinkers, skeptics and theologians who only approach this issue with their established presuppositions against God. Your only aim at this point is validating your position and you only argue philosophically ignoring the empirical good that Christianity has done in the world and avoiding the ample historical evidence of greater evil which has resulted from non-religious or pagan regimes. Your animosity and blame for all that is wrong in the world is directed exclusively at the God of the Bible. You should ask yourself why this obsession with violence as originating exclusively from religion and in particular Christianity when this is so obviously untrue.

These "thinkers" that you hold in such high regard along with you simply do not understand nor apply a proper hermeneutic to scriptural interpretation. Instead they along with you employ the simplest of interpretive techniques and "proof text" their claims. The Bible does not "depict God as a blood thirsty tyrant," they do!

I too could quote extra-biblical authors one after another with arguments and statements opposing yours but that would not convince you. Unfortunately all these that you quote only offer philosophical arguments against Christianity from a twisted interpretation of scripture avoiding the historical facts and real experience. I suppose if they had their way they would round us up and kill us since it is we Christians who are the source of all “evil” in the world. Do you honestly believe this?

Let me ask you, when you were a "Christian" do you recall being taught to kill in the name of God? Did you ever hear a sermon advocating the murder of unbelievers? Did you ever in your experience in the Church hear anyone say that God desires for us to kill, maim, and murder? Has anyone ever in your entire life attacked you or attempted to harm you in the name of Jesus? Has anyone ever committed any act of violence against you or anyone you know in the name of Christ? Of course not because this is not what scripture teaches. Only men who hate God read scripture in the way that you describe. Doesn’t that raise a question in your mind? Are you suggesting that only “theologians” who oppose Christianity rightly understand scripture and the rest of us are just bamboozled! Please, that is insulting. The biblical word for this is blasphemy and I fear that this is precisely what you are doing.

I am grieved by your open hostility toward Christ and Christians and I implore you to carefully examine what you are saying. I am profoundly sorry that you have come to such a conclusion. Nonetheless, I remain your friend.

 
At 8:29 AM, Blogger S. Michael Craven said...

Brother, I’ll say one thing for you; you’re not short-winded!

The last thing I want to do is descend into endless argument. Each can offer endless examples to support their claim but what we are ultimately talking about are the central teachings of Christianity. Does scripture teach love or does it teach hatred? Is God revealed as a capricious tyrant or a loving creator? Therefore I’ll offer this one last appeal. I return to my earlier questions:

1. Do you recall being taught to kill in the name of God?

2. Did you ever hear a sermon advocating the murder of unbelievers?

3. Did you ever in your experience in the Church hear anyone say that God desires for us to kill, maim, and murder?

4. Has anyone ever in your entire life attacked you or attempted to harm you in the name of Jesus?

5. Has anyone ever committed any act of violence against you or anyone you know in the name of Christ?

There are no believing Christians who would ever think scripture teaches these things. Your position requires me to believe that un-believers have the only accurate understanding of scripture whereas we Christians have had it all wrong.

How do you account for our apparent misunderstanding of scripture if you are indeed correct in asserting that Christian doctrine breeds violence and hatred when every believing Christian interprets scripture to teach just the opposite?

It is my understanding of and relationship to Christ that compels me to speak very carefully to you in the midst of our own disagreement so that I may not be guilty of breaking our fellowship or treating you in a harsh or unkind way. If scripture truly teaches what you say then I would not care what you thought. I do care!

Being Christian is not a cultural or ethnic group although there are many in America who are only “cultural” Christians. This is not a follower of Jesus Christ. Being a Christian is the result of supernatural conversion by the Holy Spirit and everything associated with that change compels people to act in contradiction to their impulses, natures and passions with moral restraint. Do I sometimes fall short of this goal? certainly but I am immediately aware of my sin. I experience conviction of the Holy Spirit living within me. I am then confronted with the challenge to repent and turn from these unholy attitudes or actions. This is not merely “conscience” as this can vary from person to person based on their experience but rather something supernatural that occurs universally in the life of every believer.

Before you respond with a litany of quotes just think about what I have asked. Take care my friend!

 

Post a Comment

<< Home