Calvinist “pastor” JD Hall is the author of the popular Calvinist blog Pulpit and Pen that promotes various other calvinist preachers. According to a recent article on his blog, it declares that modern Evangelical Protestants have “lost their way”, and that because “White Anglo-Saxon Protestantism” is at risk and with it the survival of America, that the “answer to the migrant caravan is bullets and bombs:
The Biblical solution to the migrant caravan preparing to invade the United States includes bombs and bullets.
As a pastor and theologian, the answer is clear to me. A nation has a right to sovereign borders. The invasion of sovereign borders by those who are not permitted therein should be met with judicial force. To use violent force upon foreign invaders is Biblical, ethical, and godly. This thesis shall be laid out in detail.
EVANGELICALS HAVE LOST THEIR WAY
[Editor’s Note: This article is longer than that which normally appears at Pulpit & Pen, so as to be informative and most substantive. Please have the patience to read with care]
Preemptively, let me say that American evangelicals have lost their way. The discussion on immigration among evangelicals has been just one part of an overarching internal conflict that has flared up in recent years thanks to the propagation and popularization of secular philosophies which have invaded our academies ever as much as the impending migrant horde threatens to overtake our southern border. Led by mainstream denominational liberals in rainbow-colored clerical garb and New Calvinist social justice warriors on the theoretical right, both groups have coalesced to teach young seminarians and religious activists the tenets of Critical Race Theory, Cultural Marxism, Multiculturalism, Intersectionality, and Victimology. In this bizarre union between the religious left and those ostensibly on the religious right, a potpourri of Arminians, Pelagians, practical agnostics and Calvinists are all seemingly in agreement that the Bible condones lawlessness done in the name of kindness to the sojourner.On this subject, mainstream religious leftists like Rachel Held Evans and Jim Wallis are in perfect union with historically conservative Southern Baptists, Albert Mohler and Russell Moore. The latter have been greatly influenced by the personality of Tim Keller, a popular thought leader among the New Calvinists who use traditional Confessions of Faith like toilet paper. Keller, a Cultural Marxist (by any standard definition and by his own admission) from New York City, has had a powerful footprint among The Gospel Coalition, whose leaders have commandeered the Southern Baptist Convention’s Ethics and Religious Liberty Commission (ERLC), that in an ideal world would be providing Biblical answers to such serious ethical questions as illegal immigration. Instead, that organization – the ERLC – directs the Evangelical Immigration Table, a front organization belonging to George Soros and his National Immigration Forum. In fact, in no place is the union between the left and right more noticeable, as the director for the ERLC, Russell Moore, serves as on the board of directors for the Evangelical Immigration Table along with Jim Wallis (who is famously progressive, denies the inerrancy of Scripture, and is a liberal on virtually every issue of ethical importance). Along with Soros’ funding of this Southern Baptist entity, Clinton globalist billionaire financier, James Riady, has funded New Calvinist institutions – like Westminster Philadelphia and Ligon Duncan’s Reformed Theological Seminary. Riady, who was expelled from the United States for trying to corrupt the American political system with obscene amounts of corrupt foreign cash, is now the financial sugar daddy of the seminaries pushing out Reformed graduates, most of whom are a part of the new Social Justice movement.
HOW LEFTISTS WON OVER THE RELIGIOUS RIGHT
Those on the supposed right who are fully “woke” and fully committed to acts of “social justice” that diminish the rule of law and protection of the nation-state include the aforementioned Albert Mohler, Tim Keller, Russell Moore, Mark Dever, Thabiti Anyabwile, Ed Stetzer, Beth Moore, D.A. Carson, Matt Chandler, and David Platt. While Russell Moore and Chandler both serve the ERLC (Moore as its director and Chandler as a research fellow), neither seem aware that the nation-state is the world’s strongest bulwark for religious liberty. Likewise, Platt, now retiring from the International Mission Board as its president, signed an amicus brief on behalf of the IMB to get a mosque built in New Jersey under the guise of religious liberty (he’s since apologized), but seems blissfully unaware that it is the nation-state that protects individual liberty. Acting in tandem as a gaggle of useful idiots pushing the agenda of globalists like Soros and Riady, these evangelical leaders are subversively undermining the very governmental system that protects the religious liberties they hold so dear.Simply put, Soros and Riady – along with other globalist elites – seek to dismantle the nation-state as a form of governance. A nation consists of three primary building blocks. These include sovereign borders, a common language, and a shared culture. All three of these have been under attack in America from the political left for decades. It is only recently that those claiming religious conservatism have become allies in the subversion. Without the nation-state, there is no government by the People and for the People, which is tasked to defend the rights of individuals (including religious liberty) in the face of claims for the common good. Many of these subversive leaders, like Russell Moore, are proud communitarians, championing utilitarianism over individual liberty. It is difficult to maintain that these evangelical leaders are ignorant or somehow not culpable for their participation in the eradication of liberty when they are knowingly taking cash from men like Soros and Riady.
This leads to the question as to why these evangelical leaders are on the wrong side of these important Biblical and ethical issues, ranging from immigration to racialism (other than the cash they receive). The partial answer to this question – in their own words – is what they perceive demographically to be the “browning” of America. They suggest and perhaps are right, that the WASP (white Anglo-Saxon Protestant) will soon be the minority in the United States. If the evangelical church should survive, and by some chance even grow in coming years, its melanin count must rise. For that reason, the SBC has employed Affirmative Action in various of its institutions – like the Kingdom Diversity Department at Southeastern Seminary – and in its appointment of denominational leaders. Doctrinal fidelity has suffered greatly in the attempt to diversify the SBC, as heretics like Tony Evans and Sammy Rodriguez have been scraped off the very bottom of the theological barrel to fill speaking spots at denominational events. Their insistence that the church must change demographically in order to survive is not conspiratorial; it is overt and explicit.
The point in all the above is this; the rhetoric on immigration coming out of the Evangelical Intelligentsia is not shaped by a Biblical ethic or sound hermeneutical principles as it relates to immigration. The rhetoric on immigration coming out of the Evangelical Intelligentsia is singularly focused on future survival, and not doctrinal commitment or the work of Biblical ethics.
A BIBLICAL DEFENSE OF THE NATION STATE
Jeff Sessions cited Romans 13 earlier this year in his defense of sovereign borders and was skewered by the Social Justice warriors on the right, many of whom were previously mentioned (above). However, Sessions was right in his citation of Romans 13, and he used the verse properly in context. He would have been equally as justified should he have cited 1 Peter 2. Both passages clearly explain our role in relation to the Civil Magistrate. The government exists to punish the wicked and reward the good. It carries the sword (of punishment) for a reason. We are to submit to those governing authorities so long as it does not require us to rebel against God.Let every person be subject to the governing authorities. For there is no authority except from God, and those that exist have been instituted by God.2 Therefore whoever resists the authorities resists what God has appointed, and those who resist will incur judgment. 3 For rulers are not a terror to good conduct, but to bad. (Romans 13:1-2).
Also…
13 Be subject for the Lord’s sake to every human institution, whether it be to the emperor as supreme, 14 or to governors as sent by him to punish those who do evil and to praise those who do good. 15 For this is the will of God, that by doing good you should put to silence the ignorance of foolish people. 16 Live as people who are free, not using your freedom as a cover-up for evil, but living as servants of God. 17 Honor everyone. Love the brotherhood. Fear God. Honor the emperor (1 Peter 2:13-17).
God invented the nation-state and Citizenship. That’s right, it was God that invented the “nation-state” as the children of Israel came out of Egypt with a concept of social construct not tied exclusively to kinship or geography. While it is true that the three building blocks of a nation are (A) borders (B) culture and (C) language, the development of Hebrew identity as a nation came about in an interesting vacuum in which they did not have a border or a geographical anchor. Historical anthropologists recognize that the Old Testament Israelite nation may very well be the first people group in the world to form a “nation” not tied directly or exclusively to kinship and geography, but instead was a social Covenant between Yahweh and his people. The idea of nation via compact was born. Israel was Israel even outside the Promised Land, because Israel had a Covenant with Yahweh. Those obeying that Covenant were seen as Israelites and those disobeying it were seen as Gentiles, and the concept of “Citizenship” was born. This proto-Citizenship in the historical record is demonstrated in the clear delineation of how Israelites were to be treated under Sinaitic civil codes given by God through Moses and how non-Israelites were to be treated. While aliens and sojourners were to be treated well, Old Testament laws make it very clear that Citizens of Israel were unique and were to be treated with different privileges than those not of Israel. This is seen even in the “Courtyard of the Gentiles” constructed outside of the Temple. It took more to become an Israelite than to simply sojourn in the land. Citizenship requires adherence to the Covenant, and formal admission into the body politic by a special rite.
God invented national sovereign borders. God himself gave the boundaries for the nation of Israel in Genesis 15:18 and in Genesis 17:8. In this, God ensured that the nation-state of Israel had applied to it the first and most important aspect of its existence; borders. Encroachments upon these boundaries were to be met with hostility. God commanded the Israelites to protect their borders and boundaries, and they were given total and unilateral control of those boundaries. Rather than causing conflict with neighboring nations, the borders clearly delineated property lines, defusing potential conflicts and better enabling the Israelites to govern their affairs in accordance with their Covenant with Yahweh.
God invented the border wall. There is an entire book of the Bible devoted to the building of a border wall. Nehemiah 1:1-7:3 explains God commanding the construction of a wall around Jerusalem to protect its strategic interests and prevent foreign invasion. There is nothing unethical, unbiblical, or sinful, about protecting national sovereign borders. And by the way, that border wall was well-armed.
When the United States lets in more than one million immigrants a year to attain Citizenship and nearly that many more to work and attend our educational institutions, it clearly does not exhibit institutionalized bigotry toward the foreigner. A nation that lets in two million foreigners a year does not suffer from xenophobia. That is not systemic racism; it is a systemic kindness. That the United States has border crossings where anyone can seek legal asylum through an open and forthright and generous asylum policy, it makes it all the more criminal to instead choose to sneak across the border criminally. That parents aren’t separated from their children by death as America protects its sovereign borders by force (which is its right) is a testimony of America’s shining generosity. Any other nation in virtually any other part of the world would fire upon those invading their sovereign borders. Instead, America applies the rule of law while feeding them, clothing them, providing them due process, and putting them in a detained “time-out” until they can be returned to their home of origin.
THE BIBLE CALLS FOR BOMBS AND BULLETS
No, I’m not suggesting the Bible mentions either bombs or bullets. The Bible mentions swords and spears. The General Equity of those moral principles found in the Old Testament “positive commands” (meaning specific commands given to specific people), however, undergird and support the appropriate use of violence to dispel invading forces from sovereign nations. And the appropriate use of violence for invading forces into sovereign nations is, biblically, the application of deadly weapons. In today’s terms, these include bombs and bullets.Just as Jerusalem’s border wall was being built in Nehemiah’s day by laborers working with one hand and carrying a spear in another, it is appropriate to prepare and utilize weapons for national defense. Although some would argue that Jerusalem was not a nation-state and therefore the comparison does not apply, it was – for all intents and purposes – a city-state, which is a fair equivalent. It was the state. It had a boundary. The boundary needed a wall. And, the wall needed to be protected by the use of deadly force. God did not only allow for this provision, but it was commanded by the prophet of God.
From that day on, half of my servants worked on construction, and half held the spears, shields, bows, and coats of mail. And the leaders stood behind the whole house of Judah, who were building on the wall. Those who carried burdens were loaded in such a way that each labored on the work with one hand and held his weapon with the other. – Nehemiah 4:16-17
Some might take exception with the parallel between the invading hordes of Nehemiah’s day and those traveling to our southern border on the grounds that the former was an army and the latter includes suckling babes and women. I take exception with their naivety. Artaxerxes, King of Persia, released the Jewish exiles to rebuild Jerusalem not because it was being invaded by armies (Jerusalem had already been conquered by the Persians), but because it was being settled by foreigners who had no rightful claim to the homes, orchards, vineyards, and infrastructure built by the Jews. Nehemiah’s invading hordes included the Samaritans, Ammonites, and Philistines, all of which were neighboring nations to Jerusalem who felt entitled to the greener grass on the other side of where Jerusalem’s border fence once stood. Surely a comparison is fitting to those coming from Central America and Mexico across our borders, many of whom are (as our Social Justice Warrior friends remind us) just “looking for better opportunities.” Families surely would have been in tow among these people-groups as well. Furthermore, it should be pointed out as a matter of fact that the so-called “migrant caravan” approaching our border consists of more than three-quarters of adult men. There is zero doubt that the invading nations upon Nehemiah’s Jerusalem contained considerably more women and infants than the mob approaching Texas.
The story of Old Testament Israel and Judah after the settling of the Hebrews in Canaan is little more than a history of its constant invasion by foreigners (redemptively, it’s about Christ, of course). The Book of Judges, in particular, focuses on the motif of foreign invasion. In each of these cases, even when the invasion of their sovereign borders was punishment dispensed by God, the Israelites were commanded and commended for picking up arms to annihilate their enemies. Gideon fought back the Midianites. Deborah fought Sisera of Canaan. Samson fought the Philistines. At no point was Israel commanded to stand-down and surrender their land or property in the name of misplaced kindness.
The United States of America is a Republic and union of 50 states that collectively and federally have a sovereign border. Our nation is autonomous and autocratic, under no binding international law. There is no ruler, power or authority over the United States other than the Lordship of Jesus Christ, which he enjoys over all the Earth. Our nation has a right to sovereignly declare our boundaries and borders and to protect them. Our nation-state must protect these boundaries and borders in order to protect the people therein and, even more importantly, the liberty of said people. To argue that the United States doesn’t have the right to defend our borders or that it’s somehow not right (in other words, immoral) to defend our borders, have taken away very little from the divinely orchestrated and infallibly preserved history of Israel.
GENERAL EQUITY, APPLIED
Here, Social Justice Warriors with a semester or two of seminary may cry out with an obnoxious and ill-disguised arrogance, “But the United States is not Israel!” No kidding, Sherlock. I’m a Reformed Christian, which means (in part) that I believe Israel to have been a typology of the Christian Church, and not typological of a future geopolitical nation-state. Dispensationalists would likewise acknowledge that the United States, very clearly, is not Israel. The principle at play here, however, is a term from the Westminster Confession known as General Equity. As the divines explained it, which they did in particular as it functions regarding the Civil Code of Israel, the General Equity is that which is “moral and universal” found within those positive commands. In other words, although details change (like exchanging swords and spears for bombs and bullets), the moral principles undergirding those details do not change.Others might insist that the coming of the New Covenant somehow changes the General Equity principle of protecting a nation’s borders. This logic does not follow. The installation of the New Covenant – as spoken of in Jeremiah 31 – brought a Covenant of Grace into time and space to redeem believing mankind by grace through faith in Christ. The New Covenant does not change moral principles. Reformed believers in particular, who should already believe that the Moral Law is immutable, must grasp this basic concept. It has always been wrong to steal. And while everything you currently own may in some way be the consequence of “hook and crook” by someone from whom you received it, it does not justify taking what belongs to another man currently. Those who seek to invade a nation for the purpose of consuming its resources, contrary to their national law, are thieves. Biblical principles have always upheld the use of force to protect property.
What the New Covenant did not change is Biblical ethics. We (that is, Reformed believers) would strongly resist the notion that Jesus gave new law in the Sermon on the Mount and his various discourses. We would argue that the newness of his commands are found in the motivation for our following them, chiefly resting in his divine example. Loving your neighbor, for example, is a citation of Old Testament law (Leviticus 19:9-18) and was not unique to the Sermon on the Mount. The defense of Israel’s sovereign border was not antithetical to loving neighbor, and neither is protecting America’s sovereign border. In relationship to this debate, it should best be understood that proper love between neighbors (which is a command given to individuals and not nation-states) is best preserved by the maintenance of good fences. As the old adage among the ranch communities here in Montana goes, “Good fences make good neighbors.”
BEING KIND TO THE ALIEN AND SOJOURNER
Of course, the various Scriptural admonitions of kindness to the alien are brought out frequently by opponents of the rule of law, often by those with little to no understanding of Biblical law. Nonetheless, the frequency with which these commands are repeated and the level of ignorance among those who often repeat them do not negate their surety and soundness in our modern age. What are these commands, exactly?We are commanded not to exploit the sojourner traveling through our territories (Exodus 22:21, Leviticus 19:33; by the way, this would apply to using illegal aliens as a cheap labor force, as many proponents of illegal immigration do). We should provide a level of charity for the sojourner and destitute (Leviticus 19:10). Even those who are not Citizens, if they are residents, should be treated with a degree of legal rights (Ezekiel 47:22). Various admonitions of this variety appear throughout the Old Testament. Simply put, God does not want anyone abused or mistreated.
Does this then mean that invading caravans of illegal immigrants must be treated as the “alien and sojourner”? Absolutely not. Invading forces are not lawful aliens and sojourners, and should be treated as enemies rather than as neighbors.
Ezekiel 47:22 informs us of this common sense division.
You shall allot it as an inheritance for yourselves and for the sojourners who reside among you and have had children among you. They shall be to you as native-born children of Israel. With you they shall be allotted an inheritance among the tribes of Israel.
Non-Citizen permanent residents in Israel (Gentiles who lived within its sovereign borders) were not allowed to purchase land except through a temporary lease that would be ended or renewed at the Year of Jubilee every seven years (Leviticus 19:34). This would ensure that Israelite Citizens maintained control over their land. However, apparently a large number of non-Citizens had accrued by Ezekiel’s day, and they had proven their faithfulness and obedience to Israel, despite not belonging to the Covenant with Yahweh. While foreigners could not have land-rights, their children born within Israel’s sovereign borders could have land-rights.
In Old Testament Israel, distinctions were made between foreign invaders, temporary residents (sojourners), and permanent non-Citizen residents (“foreigners” or “aliens”). Foreign invaders were to be killed, travelers were to be treated hospitably, and resident non-Citizens were to be given property rights. While leftist religious leaders may make a case from Ezekiel 47:22 that the 14th Amendment, which according to the Supreme Court (their judicial opinion and legal precedent is often rightly challenged on this point) gives Citizenship to the children of immigrants and such is Biblical and ethical, it cannot be done without making special note that Biblical law differentiates between kinds and types of aliens. The distinction between an illegal alien (an invader), a temporary resident, and a legal permanent resident is unnecessarily blurred by the religious left, who have proven to have very little regard for a thoughtful analysis of Biblical ethics.
APPLYING BIBLICAL ETHICS TO THE MIGRANT CARAVAN
Seven-thousand active-duty troops are heading to the Mexican border to protect American lives and property from approximately seven-thousand foreign invaders (mostly adult men) who are intent on disobeying our laws and disrespecting our national sovereignty. A careful analysis of Christian ethics indicates that it is the full prerogative of our military to use deadly force after giving them every possible warning that a step across our border will be their first step into the world to come. (source, source)
One of the major points of Calvinism, and something many Calvinists are uncomfortable discussing, is its embrace of divine fatalism, that things happen because, in some form, God deems them to happen. This is different from the Catholic view, which says that God allows evil because man possesses free will and so he must be allowed to choose right and wrong, and thus God, being that He is Love (1 John 4:8) asks man to freely choose right but also is allowed to choose that which is wrong. In the Calvinist view, because God, for however the particular individual chooses to define it for their sect, deems for actions to follow as they do be they good or evil because it was ordained so by God, one is forced to admit that at some level, God pre-selects those who are saved and those who are damned. This is but a spiritual form of Darwinism, for just as Darwin taught that the fittest of species are chosen by nature through their adaptations and thus are allowed to live while the rest perish, the Calvinist holds that God acts in place of “nature” and chooses His “elect” and ordains their actions so to ensure their salvation while the rest of humanity he guides to perdition.
In other words, the only difference between Calvinism and Darwinism is in the application. For Calvin, it is to the soul, while for Darwin, it is to the body. Both believe that “might makes right” and is shown through eliminating the “weak” or “undesirable.
The god of Calvinism is very similar in that way to the god of Islam, for it is well-established in Islam that Allah “does what he wills”, and when one examines it, Allah’s will is tied to nothing more than his will itself and so is able to explain how Allah can commit both good and evil. However, it is the same problem that Calvin has, because one is forced to admit that Allah pre-ordains men’s actions and the saved are saved because in the words of the Koran:
Say, “With Allah is the far-reaching argument. If He had willed, He would have guided you all.” (Koran 6:149)
As Walid wrote in 2014:
It is no wonder why Islam is the Mother of Harlots which combines all heresies and cults into one world religion. It has elements of Christianity, which woos westerners by saying they love Jesus. It also has elements of Judaism which woos Jews and is anti-Trinitarian which woos oneness Christian cults. It is iconoclast which woos many Evangelicals and it has Al-Qada Wal-Qadar (pre-destination) which woos Calvinists. It also has pagan elements from Zoroastrianism and Buddhism. It is perfectly packaged to truly be a one world religion. (source)
Calvinist philosophy is but another way of justifying domination, specifically that of the “weak” over the “strong” in the same way that not just darwinism for nature, but what nationalism is in a political sense. While it is good to seek the best for one’s nation, the idea of nationalism is that some nations are inherently better and as such are “chosen” over other nations, and that they must dominate the weak and have a right to do what they want to with them. This is to be distinguished from a relationship between parties that while one dominates, the two serve each other in ways unique to their particular charisms. For example, when the Spanish took control over the Americas, they brought the Catholic Faith and saved the souls of the native peoples, and also built great cities and laid infrastructure that is still in use today. The native peoples were rescued from the yoke of paganism, and under their new Spanish overlords benefited from the intellectual and material contributions of the Spanish. This is not to say that things were perfect with the Spanish and that problems did not happen, nor is it to say that such is not common to any other example of such throughout history regardless of place or time. The point is that there is a difference between a master-servant relationship where there is a level of mutual respect and care for the other party in a clear way, and one where either one or both of the parties (but often the dominant party) seeks to enslave and abuse the weaker one and cares nothing for the effects of his particular actions.
It is why Jesus washed the feet of his disciples. God is powerful over all, and Jesus is God, yet in His power He loves man so much that He serves him in even the humblest of ways. Likewise, man is called to do the same for God, to love and serve Him, and this is to be applied to one’s fellow man. It does not mean to abuse oneself, but rather to act in the example given by God for what true power is. This same reason is also why Jesus was crucified, because the Pharisees and Sadducees believed they were righteous by their mere existence and as such were “superior” to other men and could do what they willed, and out of their love of race and nation they chose to murder God than to humble themselves to His teaching. It is why St. John the Baptist warned them:
When he saw many of the Pharisees and Sadducees coming to his baptism, he said to them, “You brood of vipers! Who warned you to flee from the coming wrath? Produce good fruit as evidence of your repentance. And do not presume to say to yourselves, ‘We have Abraham as our father.’ For I tell you, God can raise up children to Abraham from these stones. Even now the ax lies at the root of the trees. Therefore every tree that does not bear good fruit will be cut down and thrown into the fire. I am baptizing you with water, for repentance, but the one who is coming after me is mightier than I. I am not worthy to carry his sandals. He will baptize you with the holy Spirit and fire. His winnowing fan is in his hand. He will clear his threshing floor and gather his wheat into his barn, but the chaff he will burn with unquenchable fire.” (Matthew 3:7-12)
Therefore, as the parallels are clear based on the philosophical similarities, it is not an exaggeration to suggest that the Pharisees and Sadducees were the darwinists, nationalists, or perhaps otherwise Calvinists, of ancient Judea.
As it has been noted, nationalism is a problem that has constantly needed to be addressed in Christian history. While this issue arose commonly throughout the ancient world and continues to be the unsolvable problem of the Eastern Orthodox churches, in modern times this can be seen through the Protestant Revolution, which was not so much about religion and faith as it was about politics and power in which various men, whose lust for power was insatiable and their greed unquenchable, saw the Catholic Church as the major obstacle to their ends. At the same time, as we and others have pointed out such as Peter Wiener in his groundbreaking work, Martin Luther: Hitler’s Spiritual Ancestor, that National Socialism can trace its beginnings to the nationalism which pervades Martin Luther’s philosophy and religious ideas, as he wanted a theology that allowed for creating a ‘German god for a German people’ in order to justify ideas about Germanic ‘greatness’ over and to the derogation of non-Germanic peoples, namely the Slavs.
Luther’s Revolutionary ideas about nationalism and religion naturally pervaded all of the Protestant movement and took various forms not the same as but at their root connected to the same origins. In the case of the revolution in England, Wales, and Scotland, this manifested in the brutal and systematic persecutions of all people connected to the Catholic Church to the point that Catholicism was, save for a few crypto-Catholics and immigrants from Ireland, wiped out from Albion through forced conversion, expulsions, or extermination. This attitude did not die with one generation, but traveled to America and simply perpetuated itself through the descendants of the settlers that manifested through mainstream religious sects (such as the Episcopalians and later, Baptists) and cults (like the Puritans, Shakers, Mormons, and many more). Just like with the Protestant Revolution on the continent, the ideas which came from Europe to America simply re-manifested the old evil under new forms, one of which was in the form of the anti-immigrant laws.
Nationalism never died, for it is a virus of the mind and soul, and just as viruses mutate, it changes to adapt to its new and attempted host where it is.
In the gardening world, there are things called “multi-graft” trees. These are trees onto which multiple different fruits have been grafted, and so one can harvest multiple types of fruit, such as oranges, apples, and lemons, all from the same plant. This is the same relationship between Calvinism, Darwinism, and Nationalism, because all of them are grafted onto the same philosophical mindset but manifested through different expressions. Calvinism is a spiritual expression, Darwinism is a naturalistic expression, and Nationalism is a political expression, but all flow from the same philosophy of “might makes right,” where the “strong” survive and the “weak” are purged in the name of “purifying” the religion, race, or party. It is the mantra of every tyrant throughout history and every dictatorship who denied the humanity of one’s fellow man.
Now in response to the other points in the article about self-defense, it is common knowledge that the Bible is filled with passages about self-defense. To argue that the Bible is “against” the use of force is itself a heresy, as has been consistently articulated by the Church councils building upon that which is already in Sacred Scripture and the corpus of Sacred Tradition. It is also the reason why Ted wrote Christianity Is At War, which was to give a detailed analysis of this and its practice throughout history, demonstrating that it is normal and good.
However, the discussion of war in Christian history is always viewed through its theological application of the struggle between truth and evil, which is bound to no nation, people, or race. Indeed, all men are sons of Ham, Shem, and Japheth, and God did not come into the world in order to save one son and leave the others behind. He came for all three. God is no respecter of persons in either His mercy or His justice, for while Ham, Shem, and Japheth all possess different charisms that make up the diversity of the human race, all are bound by the same moral law and to use their abilities and weaknesses to help themselves and each other.
It is fine and good to loves one’s family, the place where one was born and grew up in, or a particular culture. Indeed, it would be unnatural if one did not. However, one absolutely must not elevate one’s nation, people, or race over those of another people in so far as their dignity is concerned. To illustrate this point, consider a man New York and a man living in the jungles of Brazil. There are distinct cultural, ethnic, linguistic, perception, and even temperament differences. Indeed, as far as technology and material possessions are concerned, the man from New York far surpasses the Brazilian tribesman. However, as far as their dignity is concerned, both are equal in their nature as men in the eyes of God, both are bound by the same moral expectations, and both must care for each other in so far as they are able to given their particular stations in life. Neither the man from New York or the man from the Brazilian tribe can look at each other and say “I have a right to mistreat you because I am better than you because you were born there and I was born here,” and certainly none can say to the other “I am better than you because I was pre-selected by nature/predestined in accordance with Calvin’s teaching/some other similar idea to be better than you,” or if one takes the nationalist tone, to say “I have a right to take up arms against the other because I am of the inherently better group and you are of an inherently inferior group.”
There are many people who are upset about this “migrant caravan,” never minding that such caravans have been arriving each year for almost two decades.
As it has been noted, the US Border Patrol stops one person on average every 75 seconds. They are very good at the work they do. Likewise, the existence of the “caravan,” given the strictness of Mexican law and the fact that such a “caravan” is no match for the might of the US government, raises more questions than it answers.
There is absolutely no “proof” that the migrants are doing anything other than following legal procedures, which is to go to the nearest border and apply for asylum because that is what asylum seekers have to do under US law.
Likewise, I have noted how the US military is preparing not for a conflict with the “migrants”, but with US militias going to the border in the name of “protecting America from invaders.”
“Pastor” JD Hall’s calls to commit the wholesale murder of hundreds of people based on nonexistent “evidence”, and in combination with his assertions of defending the “White Anglo-Saxon Protestant America” is nothing less than supporting race-based violence using the Bible as his “justification.”
However, it should not be a surprise, for if Darwinism, Nationalism, and Calvinism all draw from the same plant, then it is natural that one should flow from the other.
This kind of vitriolic racism with a pseudo-Christian coating is most likely not different than what the “reformers” were preaching to the common people in Europe during the 16th century that culminated in the Thirty Years War and brought about the complete destruction of the continent, a massive loss of faith, a rise of atheism, and the death of Christendom.
What crime have these “migrants” committed, other than seeking to flee the hellhole which they live in and has been pointed out in previous stories, was allowed to reach such abysmal conditions due in large part to US national policy and are following US policy for asylum seekers in doing so?
In the Bible, there are four sins that cry out to heaven for vengeance- the willful murder of the innocent, the sin of sodom, the oppression of the widow and orphan, and the deprivation of the working man of his justly earned wages.
Indeed, the one who wrote this based on the theology and message cannot be simply a “good Christian” who wants to “protect America” because the message is inherently contradictory. Rather, his call to the willful murder of what are largely innocent people in combination with the embrace of the inherently darwinistic beliefs of the heretic John Calvin and the clear racial undertones of the article can only show his mindset to be that of a spiritual sodomite who is making the same error of those who murdered Christ in the same racial and nationalistic hatred with a theological covering wrapped over it.