The theologian and resistance activist Dietrich Bonhoeffer was born on February 4, 1906 in Breslau. The birthday has been pretty much unnoticed by anybody except Garrison Keillor. That’s too bad, because Bonhoeffer represents the best hope for the evangelical church in America to become a moral force again, instead of an instrument of ignorance, darkness and neo-conservative policy.
American Christian leaders need to ask themselves – as Bonhoeffer did in 1942 – Are we still of any use?
We have
been silent witnesses of evil deeds: we have been drenched by many
storms; we have learnt the arts of equivocation and pretence;
experience has made us suspicious of others and kept us from being
truthful and open; intolerable conflicts have worn us down and even
made us cynical. Are we still of any use? (translation from Letters and Papers from Prison)
Why have American church leaders remained silent concerning the illegal imprisonment and torture of detainees at Guantanamo? Why didn’t they speak out forcefully when the horrible abuses of Abu Ghraib became known? Why didn’t they cry out in protest as American forces leveled Fallujah – killing hundreds of non-combantants – in order to ‘liberate’ the city?
On the contrary, the evangelical Christian church America has for the most part been an active supporter of the triumphalist nationalism. American flags are proudly displayed in churches. God is seen as leading the troops in battle. The marines are agents of God, while congregations smuggle bibles into Iraq. The US Department of Defense promotes General William Boykin who travels from one churh congregation to another speaking about the "sacred batlle against Satan" and the "divine miracle" of the George W. Bush’s presidency. The Christian church in America has succumbed to the myth of redemptive violence, which posits a war between good and evil. The grotesque culmination of this worldview was reached earler this week when a three-star marine general told a crowd of laughing and cheering Americans how much "fun" it was to shoot people in Afghanistan and Iraq.
So we need to the courage of Bonhoeffer to speak out against the destruction of the Christian church in what Lew Rockwell has called ‘Red State Fascism‘.
If you follow hate-filled sites such as Free Republic, you
know that the populist right in this country has been advocating
nuclear holocaust and mass bloodshed for more than a year now. The
militarism and nationalism dwarfs anything I saw at any point during
the Cold War. It celebrates the shedding of blood, and exhibits a
maniacal love of the state. The new ideology of the red-state
bourgeoisie seems to actually believe that the US is God marching on
earth – not just godlike, but really serving as a proxy for God
himself.
Along with this goes a kind of worship of the presidency, and
a celebration of all things public sector, including egregious law like
the Patriot Act, egregious bureaucracies like the Department of
Homeland Security, and egregious centrally imposed regimentation like
the No Child Left Behind Act. It longs for the state to throw its
weight behind institutions like the two-parent heterosexual family, the
Christian charity, the homogeneous community of native-born patriots.
What has happened is the Gleichschaltung (literally Coordination – in a totalitarian sense) of the church in America, the same fate it suffered in National-Socialist Germany. To revive the church, American Christians need to establish new Confessing Churches (Bekennende Kirchen) as Bonhoeffer did in Germany. And it is not enough to strive for the cheap grace (Bonhoeffer) of standing on the sidelines and praying for peace. The true disciple of Christ is called to Action, as Bonhoeffer wrote shortly before his execution in "Stations on the Path to Freedom" (Stationen auf dem Wege zur Freiheit)
Nicht das Beliebige, sondern das Rechte tun und wagen, / nicht im Möglichen
schweben, das Wirkliche tapfer ergreifen, / nicht in der Flucht der Gedanken,
allein in der Tat ist die Freiheit.
Tritt aus ängstlichem Zögern heraus in den Sturm des Geschehens,
/ nur von Gottes Gebot und deinem Glauben getragen, / und die Freiheit
wird deinen Geist jauchzend empfangen.
Daring to do what is right, not what
fancy may tell you,
valiantly grasping occasions, not cravenly doubting –
freedom comes only through deeds, not through thoughts taking wing.
Faint not nor fear, but go out to the storm and the action,
trusting in God whose commandment you faithfully follow;
freedom, exultant, will welcome your spirit with joy.
