Defending Freedom

I've been to nice recently. Too calm, too collected, too darn perky. I was going to post a standard Veteran's Day post yesterday. Then I saw with our pal Liz Kaeton (not linking to her blog under any circumstances) wrote. And it's taken this long for me to cool down enough to write. Her one virtue is an easy, conversational writing style.

For everyone's convenience, I've reproduced her post in full, below. Let the fisking begin. Her blatherings are in Times font, my responses are in Georgia.

I support our troops, but not the War in Iraq or the War in Afghanistan.
The second part is accurate. But your support of the troops consists of saying you support the troops and pressing for their immediate withdrawal which renders everything that they have accomplished to date futile. No one is ever more idiotic or deceptive than a hippy who won't grow up. No one.

That's not an oxymoron. Neither is it unpatriotic.
See above statement in re: stupid and self-deceptive. And you don't love America. You love the bits that you like. You hate the rest of it. Your prior writings exemplify the level of your hate. You also continue to practise the Big Lie. Helpful tip: Saying your not unpatriotic doesn't make it so.

I love this country. I am as patriotic as the most patriotic person, but I love this country enough that I am against war - especially these two.

I love this county, I support our troops and I do not support the War, but I am not a pacifist. That takes real courage - courage I confess I have searched for but have not yet found.
You are a pacifist, unless the war is against the people you despise. The right, the whites, the middle class, the religious, the Christians and any one else who actually believes in a higher standard or who tries to be ethical or moral. You're a lefty revolutionary type and you very much believe the ends justify the means. You have used the old cliche about omelets and eggs.

I fear I am too much of a coward to be a true pacifist.

That's one way to put it. I wouldn't have said it quite that way. I agree you are a coward. And I also agree that you aren't a pacifist. But here you are trying a bit of deflection. By pleading guilty to what you believe to be a lesser offense and admitting what you hope will be seen as a flaw, you hope to gain the reader's sympathy and gain acceptance of the farrago of rubbish that follows.

So, I have settled for this peace: I think the most patriotic thing we can do is to do everything we can to end these wars that are not ours and bring our young men and women home.
Of course, you can provide no justification for that remark. Instead of 'think' the better word is 'feel'. Thinking has nothing to do with what you have written.

In many ways, these two wars feel like Viet Nam all over again. Even my father - who fought on the Pacific Front in WWII, and was very proud to have been decorated with the Purple Heart - was very much against the Viet Nam War.
It feels that way because the only experience you have or will ever admit to having of war is Vietnam. The two current wars are not even remotely like Vietnam. If you bothered to become informed about them, then you would know that. But, because you are ignorant about Vietnam, not to mention every conflict the US has engaged in since that time, you come up with nonsense. Helpful hint to anyone who wishes to be informed about the current conflicts. Here are some useful websites, chock full of accurate and current information. And your Dad being a vet and all, that means his opinion informs the current day's issues. Nice.

One year, when I was about 9 or 10 years old, Veteran's Day fell on a week end. We left shortly after he had marched in the local Annual Veteran's Day Parade and traveled to a Military Cemetery outside of Boston to visit the grave of one of his buddies who had died.

After we had laid a small bouquet of poppies near the headstone, my father said to me, "Look around. Look at the gravestones. What do you see that's the same?"

I dutifully did as my father said, walking slowly among the markers on the graves, fingering the cool marble stone and listening to the dry leaves crackle as they were blown across barren field by the brisk November wind.

"Dad," I said, finally, "Everyone of these stones has PFC before the name. What does PFC stand for?"

Cue the class warfare.

My father smiled briefly, proud of his daughter's correct observation. His smile was suddenly clouded - the way the sun goes in and out in the November sky.

"Private first class," he said sadly.

"What does that mean?" I asked.

"They are the youngest soldiers - the newest soldiers - the ones with the least experience in war."

"Look around," my father continued after I considered his words. "You won't see too many graves marked 'Captain' or 'Lieutenant' or 'Colonel'. Oh, there are some, but most of the graves here are the PFC's."

Not to interject reality or anything into this affecting story, but the single most casualty prone rank in WWI, WWII, Korea, Vietnam and modern times is Lieutenant. There are less of them overall than PFC's. You have to ascend to field grade officer ranks to see any dramatic reduction in casualty rates.

"Like your friend?" I asked.

"Like me, too," he said.

He grew very quiet and said, "We were very young. Too young. We were young warriors, fearless young turks, ready, we thought, to die for our country. But, when death came to our friends, we were never ready. But, we had to keep going. We had to keep going . . ."

He took a few drags from his Lucky Strike and his eyes trailed off over the tops of the gravestones to a long ago battle in a country far, far away.

"War is a terrible thing," he said almost whispering his words over the rows of graves that held the bodies of young PFCs.

I looked at my father's face, lined with sorrow and pain and suddenly, it all came clear. In that moment, I understood the terrible nightmares that woke us up in the middle of the night - a sound so horrible and so loud as to wake the dead.

I realized, then, that it must have been the dead that had awakened him.

Suddenly, I understood his frustration and anger when he would 'get an attack of The Malaria', as he called it - which brought him right back to a place and time he'd much sooner forget and never have to relive ever again.

I couldn't possibly have understood - still can't possibly understand - the full cost of war, but I knew he had paid - and was continuing to pay - a heavy price for playing his part in The War that was supposed to have ended all wars. But didn't.

"War," he said again, "is a terrible thing."

He said it as fact and he said it as prayer.

I understood then, that some may have fought for freedom for all, but all may not ever again be fully free.

Pray for our Veterans on their Day.

Pray for peace in our time - and their's.

And bring them home ASAP, so they will never have closure. So that everything they have fought for will be forever in vain. So that evil will triumph, so that no other country will ever take the US seriously again. So that Elizabeth Kaeton can live the rest of her life in peace, knowing that the country where she lives has been doomed by her actions. that the grandchildren she purports to love will be the slaves of one faction or another. Pray for the people of Chatham, New Jersey and especially for the congregation of St Paul who have to endure the rantings of a narcissistic sociopath. And pray that nothing she desires ever comes to pass.

As for me, I'm praying for a miracle. I'm praying for the Reverend Doctor Elizabth Kaeton to repent and come to the fullness of faith in Christ Jesus her Lord. But then again, I've always liked long shots.

Bad Bishop

Tim Fountain has posted a news article from the Episcopal News Service about the nine missions that are to be closed in South Dakota. Go and read.

The thing that strikes me is the degree of cowardice shown by the South Dakota leadership. Were I bishop and I had decided for financial reasons to close missions, I would visit them to check them out first. Having resolved that they needed to be closed, I would make every effort to deliver the bad news myself. And if the members of one of the missions sent me a certified letter, I would sign for it.

What is this feeling?

A revisionist confronts Orthodoxy and is unhappy

The following comes from this thread. Starting at #38, Tom Woodward, a priest and one of the leaders at the now-defunct 'Episcopal Majority', pops up. Hilarity ensues. For the record, any post by a smartass calling himself 'mousestalker' is me.
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Because I am slow, I just realized why it is revisionist priests and, presumably, bishops have such difficulty at reasserter sites. They are used to being treated with respect because of their office and to be deferred to as having authority.

Unfortunately, at StandFirm it's the American Revolution and they are Crown appointees. Their titles and ranks make them suspect and while they use roughly the same words, the accents and emphases are different, not to mention the goals.

Or to use another analogy: I used to be in a relationship with a drunk. She was sober when we started dating, but she turned to the bottle afterwards. It was a rather difficult time. My wife was in a relationship with an addict. He was clean when she met him, but he resumed his drug use and their relationship foundered. My wife and I share that same history and it's a commonality that has brought us closer as we both learned from the experience. Neither of us have any great desire to repeat our previous relationships.

I think the reasserter websites are healthier than revisionist ones because of the shared experience of pain. We have all been at least singed by bad religion and it has made us demand healthy religion, sound religion, Truth rather than bullshit. Generally, we are all on the same page and can provide support and comfort to one another. And it has made us skeptical of the odd revisionist parson who pops up and expects to be treated with as much deference as in his home parish.

To Tom Woodward and any other revisionist preacher who may come this way. I do not hate you. I am well aware of my sins. But you are not my confessor, spiritual guide or priest. I am not under your authority. And while I will always be civil, I do not trust you, intellectually or spiritually, unless and until you earn that trust.

You're the charming guy who has a flask in his pocket and is slightly slurring his words. And you've just crashed our Al-Anon meeting.

The Importance of Public Morality

Pete Hitchens goes yard. Just read the whole thing. Then take a break and read it again.

The money quote for me is "A person properly schooled in right and wrong is safe with any weapon. A person with no idea of good and evil is unsafe with a knitting needle, or the cap from a ballpoint pen."

{H/T Kim du Toit}

Father Jake Swings, Misses

Terry Martin has written a post about how hard the Bishop of Rochester, Michael Nazir-Ali is making evangelism by being so narrow and homophobic. The concluding sentence is "And we wonder why some of our younger generations consider Christians to be homophobic, judgmental and hypocritical."

Okay.

Let's look at what the Bishop of Rochester has said according to Terry Martin:

1. Couples who are deliberately childless are being self-indulgent.
2. Just war theory may allow a pre-emptive attack.
3. If the TEC bishops who consecrated Gene Robinson get Lambeth invites, he might not attend.
4. Muslims have created no-go areas in certain large British cities.

Let's discuss them one by one. Number one, the selfishness of not having children is in agreement with the theology of the Catholic church. Protestant theologians can and do disagree with that position, but it is a legitimate position. It all boils down to what you believe marriage is for. Unfortunately for Terry Martin, the historical Anglican position on marriage is found in the 1928 BCP enumeration for the reasons to get married, one of which is children.

But more to the point, such a view is not homophobic, and I'm not sure that calling it hypocritical is fair. So that leaves judgmental. Well it could be, but what was the context of the remark? Terry+ links to this BBC article. Here's the money quote: "Writing in a diocesan newspaper, Rochester Link, the bishop advised priests to look kindly on those whose marriages broke down because of the refusal of one partner to have a child. He said that such people should be treated with the same sympathy as victims of 'infidelity, desertion or cruelty'." So he was calling for compassion when couples divorce over the issue. I'm sorry, but how is that judgmental?

The second idea is about attacking Iraq. A lot of people were against the idea. I'm quite convinced that going in was a mistake. The money quote for the article Terry links to is "If the Government's promised intelligence dossier on Saddam's weapons stockpile proved convincing, then military action would be legitimate self-defence." Note the use of "If...then". What the Bishop states is a version of the 'Just War Theory'. Just War Theory attempts to answer the question "When may Christians go to war?". I'm not a fan of Just War Theory, but there you are. Again, I'm not seeing homophobia, hypocrisy or judgmentalism here.

What about the third point? Here's the quote: "The Bishop of Rochester, the Rt Rev Michael Nazir-Ali, said he would find it difficult to attend a Church council alongside those who consecrated or approved the appointment of Anglicanism's first openly gay bishop." Well, the consecration of Bishop Robinson was characterized by the Archbishop of Canterbury as straining the fabric of the Anglican Communion. It was in deliberate violation of commitments made by the Episcopal Church. It went against millennia of Church teaching and practice. Further, an absolute majority of the Anglican Communion is no longer in communion with the Episcopal Church as a result of that act.

And I think this is what has gotten Terry's goat. It isn't the couples without children or Just War Theory. It's that Terry Martin thinks that the Episcopal Church is right and the rest of the world, except maybe Canada, is wrong.

But let's get to cases. I think Terry Martin would say that here we see homophobia and judgmentalism and probably hypocrisy. Perhaps someone can explain how it's hypocritical, because I'm not seeing it. Apparently following Church tradition is homophobic, and judgmental. Can someone explain that one to me as well?

Now to point four, Terry Martin objects to the Bishop of Rochester's statement about 'no go areas'. Unfortunately for Father Martin, the Bishop appears to be right.

What is really going on here? Terry Martin doesn't like Bishop Michael Nazir-Ali. And instead of saying so and then explaining why, he resorts to the epithets of the Left, terming him homophobic, judgmental and a hypocrite. He would have called the Right Reverend a racist, but for the happy chance that the good bishop is a person of colour. I am startled that Terry Martin left off a reference to the patriarchy. The sad thing is not that it is invective, but that it is invective poorly done.

What is the Bishop of Rochester's sin? He dares to disagree with a priest on another continent. He dares to express concern about issues that Terry Martin doesn't think are important. He has forgotten that he is a second class Christian from a third world country. He needs reminding that the liberal white elite know best, and he should keep his mouth shut, unless it is to express agreement with his betters. I've seen this sort of reaction before. It's what also happens to Thomas Sowell and Clarence Thomas, among others.

Instead of explaining why the good Bishop is in error, Father Terry simply resorts to a few epithets. He mis-uses some news articles to provide support for a predetermined and poorly thought out conclusion.

This is why the country and the Episcopal Church are divided. Pompous pusillanimous prating priests such as Terry Martin attack their opponents without ever using the Divinely given gift of Reason. He doesn't just attack, he smears, he labels and he doesn't think. Not ever. His conduct in that one post is reprehensible. Unfortunately, his entire website is replete of examples of how narrow minded, bigoted and self-righteous he really is. If just once he would justify his use of the hackneyed labels of the whitebread Left, I could respect him, maybe.

Conclusion: Father Jake is a jerk.

I Changed My Mind

This post was going to be all about the revisionist reaction to the Diocese of San Joaquin leaving the playground. But, the more I read the Swan of Newark, Terrible Terry, Screamin' Susan and the rest of that lot, the more I thought, why bother?

They are entitled to their tantrums. It's a free country and they may say what they wish. If you really want to see what they are saying, you can find links below as part of the revisionist bible, or over at RedStickRant.