Christianity is not a religion of peace! It is a religion of war and combat. This will be illustrated by a very recent event that took place in Central Africa, and then proven through a theological discourse by myself.
Muslims in Bangui, Central Africa, attacked a church on Wednesday, called the Church of Fatima, and slaughtered thirty Christians with bullets and grenades. Rev. Freddy Mboula of Notre Dame de Fatima in Bangui recounted the horror:
We were in the church when were heard the shooting outside… There were screams and after 30 minutes of gunfire there were bodies everywhere.”
The church premises was guarded by Christian militants, but unfortunately the warriors ran out of ammunition, and that is when the Muslims, “like a roaring lion looking for someone to devour” (1 Peter 5:8), commenced their attack.
A 76-year-old priest named Paul-Emile Nzale was amongst those murdered. According to another report:
The Rev. Paul Emile Nzale told The Associated Press that the gunfire and grenade attack took place Wednesday afternoon in a displacement camp at the Church of Fatima in Bangui, the capital.
An Associated Press reporter counted at least 20 bodies taken to a hospital in the city because the morgue was not in service.Wednesday’s attack is the largest in Bangui blamed on Muslim rebels since their Seleka coalition left power in January.
Here is a video on the attack:
A local priest named Bekas said that African peacekeepers (many of whom are French soldiers) took to long to come to the church.
Local Christian youths were engaged, firstly because of the Islamic attack on their church, and secondly on account of the lack of response from peacekeepers. They determined that the government, nor the peacekeepers, were not going to do anything to efficiently prevent more violence on Christians.
The Christian youths at first began to burn tires in protest, and barricaded the streets with them, and then, they attacked a mosque, although they killed no one as the mosque was empty. One of the militants responsible for the attack on the mosque said:
It’s very sad. What hurts us most is that France is here to protect the civilian population. MISCA is there to protect the population but when we called the Burundians they didn’t come
Some may argue that their actions were unbiblical, but those who do are forgetting the theological construct surrounding the Christian spirit of war. Within Christianity, there is an intense militant nature, consisting both of spiritual and temporal combat against evil. One only needs to read the Bible from beginning to end to only find that it is purely a whole story of wars and religious struggles between the City of God and the city of the devil, to understand that Christianity is about war.
Christ Himself warned those who thought that His teachings were about pacifism, when He said, “Think not that I am come to send peace on earth: I came not to send peace, but a sword.” (Matthew 10:34)
Some may say that the actions of the Christian militants are not Scripturally based because they are not part of a government. A Christian war (or holy war) must be done by a government and not by individuals, for when Paul says, “avenge not yourselves, but rather give place unto wrath: for it is written, Vengeance is mine; I will repay, saith the Lord” (Romans 12:19) he is speaking of individual violence and not a religious war done by the state, since in the next chapter he completely supports the use of the sword by the state to execute the vengeance of God, and to advance God’s law over the wicked:
Let every soul be subject unto the higher powers. For there is no power but of God: the powers that be are ordained of God. Whosoever therefore resisteth the power, resisteth the ordinance of God: and they that resist shall receive to themselves damnation. For rulers are not a terror to good works, but to the evil. Wilt thou then not be afraid of the power? do that which is good, and thou shalt have praise of the same: For he is the minister of God to thee for good. But if thou do that which is evil, be afraid; for he beareth not the sword in vain: for he is the minister of God, a revenger to execute wrath upon him that doeth evil. (Romans 13:1-4)
I have written a detailed essay on the role of government in conducting Christian Holy War, which can be read by clicking here.
While Christian holy war must be organized by a legitimate government, there are certain extreme circumstances in which the Church can conduct holy war without the use or necessary aproval of government. This type of holy war is for international conflict between nations (for that can only be done with a legitimate state) but for the purpose of self-defense from local enemies, and these circumstances are illustrated in Sacred Scripture.
One of the figures in the Bible who significantly exemplify the Church’s office of self-defense and religious fighting is the priest Jehoiada, one of the more overlooked persons within sacred history. In his day the religious institution of Israel was under the tyranny of queen Athaliah and her sons, as we read in Chronicles:
For the sons of Athaliah, that wicked woman, had broken up the house of God; and also all the dedicated things of the house of the Lord did they bestow upon Baalim. (2 Chronicles 24:7)
Not only did Athaliah bring Baal worship into the Temple, but she also kidnapped the infant Joash, who was the rightful heir to the throne, and kept him in captivity for six years. It was the priest Jehoiada, and not the government, who rescued the king. It was the priest Jehoiada, and not the state, who “fetched the rulers over hundreds, with the captains and the guard” (2 Kings 11:4), and conveyed a meeting with them to organize a militant attack on the queen and rescue the king. It was the priest Jehoiada, and not a king, who ordered the warriors to kill those who came within range of Joash, saying,
And ye shall compass the king round about, every man with his weapons in his hand: and he that cometh within the ranges, let him be slain (2 Kings 11:8)
It was the priest Jehoiada, and not a government politician, who provided the warriors the weapons, and moreover, he obtained the arms from the temple, and not a secular office, showing how the Church itself can store arms:
And to the captains over hundreds did the priest give king David’s spears and shields, that were in the temple of the Lord. (2 Kings 11:10)
And after Jehoiada placed the crown on Joash’s head and anointed him as king, when the queen, Athaliah cried, “Treason, Treason” (2 Kings 11:14), it was the priest, and not a government official, who declared to the warriors:
Have her forth without ranges: and him that followeth her kill with the sword. (2 Kings 11:15)
Jehoiada with young king, surrounded by warriors
Jehoiada “made a covenant between the Lord and the king and the people, that they should be the Lord’s people” (2 Kings 11:17), and it was because of this act, that the people under the influence of the priest, and not a king, “went into the house of Baal, and brake it down; his altars and his images brake they in pieces thoroughly, and slew Mattan the priest of Baal before the altars. …And all the people of the land rejoiced, and the city was in quiet: and they slew Athaliah with the sword beside the king’s house.” (2 Kings 11:18, 20)
Therefore, when the Christians of Central Africa take up arms to protect their churches from the Muslims, they are utilizing their divine right, just as the people of Israel, under the order of the priest and not a king, protected their Temple from the heretical pagans, and even took the lives of the wicked. The Church does not necessarily need government troops to conduct self-defense or local holy war, for Elijah, an authority of the Church and not a government, ordered the people, and the officers of Israel, to
Take the prophets of Baal; let them not one of them escape. And they took them: and Elijah brought them down to the brook Kishon, and slew them there. (1 Kings 18:40)
When the Christians of Central Africa attack mosques, they are doing this out of necessity, since they did not make any attacks on Muslims until the jihadists were committing mass persecutions on them, just as Elijah and the people attacked the prophets of Baal, or the Hebrew people under Jehoiada killed Mattan, because if they did not, the pagans would have oppressed them, and uprooted the true Faith.
The true spirit of Christianity is that of war, war against the world, war against the flesh, war against evil and the guiles of Satan. Our weapons are both spiritual and temporal, armed with both “the sword of the Spirit” (Ephesians 6:17), and “the stroke of the sword” (Esther 9:5), “The sword of the Lord, and of Gideon.” (Judges 7:18) One strikes the demons while the other strikes the slaves of demons who attempt to persecute the children of God. The Sword of Christ is the sword that destroys the false peace to advance the true peace.
We must educate ourselves on our war against Islam and evil, TO LEARN MORE ABOUT CHRISTIANITY’S WAR AGAINST EVIL, CLICK HERE TO GET OUR NEW 2-DISK DVD SPECIAL ON CHRISTIAN MILITANCY
