I am thinking about putting the nonviolence series to rest for a while. I’m not sure I want to abandon it completely. And I know that there are still issues to discuss and, yes, suss out.
But in moving toward a discussion of the nonviolence advocate and his relationship with the nation state (i.e. America) I’m not sure that a civil and productive discussion could be maintained.
On the way to church yesterday, I saw a guy riding a motorcycle, pulling a cross decorated to look like the United States flag. There are many reasons I find that offensive, but I’m not sure that these issues can be discussed in a positive manner in today’s climate.

With that said, I have a few thoughts.

1. Do we merely believe in Jesus or do we believe what Jesus believed? This question, posed by Clarence Baumer, has shaken me this past week. I’m good at professing a faith in Christ. But have I moved enough in my discipleship where I hold the same beliefs that Jesus did: that the meek will inherit the earth, that loving your enemies is the right way to treat them, that turning the other cheek is more effective than retaliation? I think if we are honest then we will find that there are truths that Jesus held dear that we don’t necessarily share. It’s a sobering thought, but Jesus didn’t operate according to logic, reason or earthly practicality. For us to adopt that belief system means more than merely imitation. It necessitates transformation.

2. “Just War” advocates and nonviolence proponents are not that far apart. Therefore we must work together to find ways to alleviate the amount of violence in this fallen world. David Augsburger, in his tremendous Anabaptist primer and Mere Discipleship companion piece, writes:

Those who teach just war ethics are not on the opposing side from those who teach nonviolence because both seek to limit the use of violence–the just war believers through a limited participation in war; the nonviolence disciples through constructive practices of peacemaking that, if followed, point toward the elimination of war. As friends we press one another to be more faithful to our goals, more consistent in our practices.

Although, I completely reject the notion of just war and militarism, that does not mean that I am unable to work with those who disagree with me toward the cessation of violence. I do not believe that the use of violence can be reconciled with the teachings of Jesus. I do not believe it is the way of Christ. However, I am in full fellowship with wonderful brothers and sisters who disagree sharply with me. Yet we are still children of God, saved by grace and grace alone. May we work together.

3. We must continually make sure that we do not conflate the missions of the Kingdom and America. The “America as Christian Nation” notion does not baptize all that we do regardless of the consequences. Clay Jenkinson, Theodore Roosevelt scholar-in-residence at Dickinson State University recently had a tremendous article in the Bismarck Tribune. Here is an excerpt:

Most Americans, then and now, do not share Jefferson’s and Paine’s distaste for the Bible or their antagonism to institutional religion. A solid majority of the Founding Fathers were Christians in some sense of the term. Some of them, like Patrick Henry, wanted an official established religion in each state. Most believed that religion was an important restraining mechanism in human affairs. Many of them, if we could lift them out of their context and into ours, would probably be distressed by the degree to which we have chosen to prohibit religious activity in the public square.

It is easy for religious conservatives to compile anthologies of pro-Christian sentiment from the founders’ writings, including – with a bit of disingenuous manipulation – from the works of Jefferson. There is room for an honest debate about what the founders intended, but any honest participant acknowledges that there is plenty of “evidence” on both sides of the argument. In other words, there is no definitive “intent of the Founding Fathers” on religious questions.

It is certain that the United States is a more religious country in 2006 than it was in 1806. For Jefferson, who declared in 1822 that “there is not a young man now living in the U.S. who will not die an Unitarian,” this would come as a surprise and something of a disappointment. Jefferson, like Paine, believed that science and reason would emancipate mankind from faith systems, and that at some future, but near, date, all people would admire, though not worship, the one universal deity.

If there were an unambiguous intent of the founders, there would be no special reason for us to follow their lead 219 years later. Their intent was to perpetuate slavery. Their intent was to count every five slaves as three for the purposes of apportionment and representation. Their intent was that senators would be elected by state legislatures. Their intent was that the Electoral College would sit in independent judgment about who was fittest to be president. Their intent was to exclude all women, almost all African-Americans, all Indians and white males without property from voting or holding public office.

We have discarded all these 18th century notions because they do not serve us well in the 21st century. Nor, in a nation with as much religious diversity as the United States, does it make any sense to force the 5.8 million Muslims, the 5.2 million Jews, the 1.5 million Buddhists, the 1 million Hindus, and the 433,267 Wiccans, pagans and Druids under one Christian tent. About this the First Amendment is very clear.

The government of the United States is overwhelmingly tolerant of the widest possible variety of religions and religious sensibilities. Nobody is legally punished for being a Mormon, a Christian Scientist, a British Israelist, a Mennonite, a Deuteronomist, a Scientologist or a member of a Native American peyote tradition. Members of each of these groups have held public office in the United States. We have no test oaths that prevent Catholics or Anabaptists from holding public office. A Catholic has been president. A Mormon (Gov. Mitt Romney of Massachusetts) plans to run for the presidency. Joe Lieberman, who is Jewish, nearly became vice president of the United States in 2000.

In this our happy and tolerant republic, tax exemption is afforded to individuals and groups whose religious views would be unrecognizable to the Founding Fathers, and deeply abhorrent.

The “wall of separation” between church and state works. We have the freethinking Founding Fathers, among them Tom Paine, to thank for that great gift to human freedom and diversity.

Any thoughts?