I have come to understand this as one of the "biggies" as far as spiritual learning goes in this time and place. I suppose the first obstacle is accepting that nationalism and globalism are both evil. But it doesn't end there. Understanding that both are evil does not kill the temptation to choose the lesser evil. Some arguments I keep encountering are,
"Well, sure, but you have to choose something and do something political! You can't just sit there and be Christian and pretend this does not affect you! You might not involve yourself with politics, but politics is certainly involving itself with you..." And so on.
The hardest part is realizing that we will never find what we are looking for in politics today, to say nothing of what we need. Hardest because this immediately forces us to look elsewhere -- and as far as I can tell, most Christians in the West believe there is nowhere else to look. Hence, they keep participating in politics because to do otherwise is to be "defeatist" or "quietist."
Avoiding politics in this time and place is not a passive stance; it is the most active stance Christians can take!
As a side note, I'd like to add that I have spent nearly ten years living in Hungary, a country that secular and Christian nationalists often praise for being a role model and for being on the right side. Well, my lived experience here tells me otherwise.
Frank - Maybe Hungary might approximate to "secular totalitarianism using Christianized language and excuses."
Of course, rejecting politics is indeed only a first step; because that is a means to the end of taking direct personal spiritual action. Which is something we ought to do, rather than advertise.
But, to return to another old theme; I think it is easy to underestimate the spiritual importance of understanding, of knowing inwardly what is going-on spiritually, behind the public rhetoric.
I think that genuine understanding in a single person (if it can be achieved, and that is seldom easy) has an immediate beneficial spiritual effect in some *general* way -- plus it opens further down-stream positive possibilities of benefit.
2 March 2024 at 17:15
cecil1 said...
Rejecting all politics sure sounds like: 'let society or anyone do whatever they want to you.
They can run roughshod over everything you love, you build, you cherish.'
Its a fallen world. This is what they would do. Is it not??
Don't misunderstand, I despise politics, hate it, its almost zero content, zero soul. You may not be interested in politics, you may reject it. But that doesn't mean it isn't VERY interested in you--endlessly and ever escalating.
Would you not defend yourself -- and even more your loved ones, against its evils and deprecations??? When they're at your door the options become limited--isn't it even immoral to encourage such a point to be reached??
As a direct and personal example-- I have a relative who lost their child from ignoring 'the politics' for some 20 years. They still ignore it. It was a major contributor to their child's death. That reality is not unique for millions-whether they are conscious of it or not. Its not unique, just as with all such things, uniquely devastating.
“The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing.”
Do you agree with that?? Is this not what blindness to politics entails?
See to me that's the hard question that can't be put aside. I don't pretend to know the full answer either.
c1 - There are a lot of assumptions behind your comment that I regard as untrue - I think there is a conflation of specific politics (voting, parties, the bureaucracy of government etc) with generic social discourse.
Anyway; maybe it is clearer what I mean by an analogy that engaging in politics 2024 is like being asked to support as a positive preference - i.e. support in your inner self, support with your attention and thinking - either Stalin or Hitler; either the communist party of the USSR or the NSDAP.
What people actually Do in terms of their actions is secondary to the spiritual war (because actions can easily be monitored and compelled): what matters primarily is what we do spiritually; and the problem with politics is that it dominates the spiritual - so that (for example) mainstream church Christianity simply follows the core priorities of mainstream politics; and people care more deeply about, are more motivated by, politics than Christianity.
@A-G - Universalism (at least the way it is usually expressed) is a denial of free agency, and ignores ordinary human experience where plenty of people (probably a majority in the West, now that fear of hell is gone) explicitly reject resurrection and Heaven.
3 March 2024 at 20:47
At present, it seems that there are no primarily Christian nations in the world.(With the probable exception of the Fire Nation - but none in The West) Therefore - all nationalism is evil: as are all secular polities. In other words, the only good nationalism is one that is secondary to Christianity. Which means that the nationalism must function within Christian priorities and a Christian framework. In other words, to be good, nationalism must be part of a Christian theocracy. Yet, I believe that a Christian theocracy is not desirable in the West (as well as being in practice almost-certainly impossible). This undesirability/ impossibility of Western theocracy is for reasons I have discussed ad nauseam on this blog, to do with the changed nature of Western Consciousness - that is changed motivations, a changed mode of thinking, a changed relationship to divine reality etc. Western people don't want it, cannot be made to want it, will not choose it, and would not tolerate it if it were imposed. So that the result of trying to impose theocracy would not be a Christian society, but merely secular totalitarianism using Christianized language and excuses. In the Western World now, the nationalists are would-be totalitarian bureaucrats, exponents of Ahrimanic evil (whether they espouse "Christian values, or not). The nationalists oppose the globalists who are Sorathic agents of spitefully destructive evil. And that is the choice within the political arena. A choice between variants of the dominant globalist destroyers, or a backlash of nationalist totalitarians: there are no Good choices available. Disillusion is not wisdom; because dis-illusion (as the name implies) is a double-negative - not a positive - value; and Good comes only from a positive affiliation to God and divine creation. At present I perceive increasing numbers of disillusioned totalitarian bureaucrats among the national leadership class - people who have noticed that their worked-for totalitarian New World Order is being destroyed by strategic chaos imposed by the dominating multi-national globalists. So we are getting (and indeed have been getting, since around the millennium) some of the more intelligent and insightful adherents of totalitarian-Ahrimanic evil embracing a nationalist agenda to some extent. Putting themselves forward as a "common sense" alternative to literally-insane inversion of the Sorathic globalists. But nationalism is evil. Historically, nationalism arose after the decline of Christianity: nationalism was the ideological basis of the first truly secular states. What the globalists call the "far Right" - or populist Right, often tacitly supported by a majority of Western population - are actually "local totalitarians": those who want to have what they regard as a strong, productive, efficient nation - more like the Western societies of the middle 20th century. This agenda would entail some sensible and common sense controlled and reduced immigration, a degree of meritocracy (instead of "inclusion" or "equality"), a protected and planned economy, coherent laws, effective military and police etc. Sounds great, you say? Not so. From where we are now; such a society is not just impossible, but would anyway be evil - because inevitably totalitarian. It would not have Christian foundations, would not be organized in accordance with God's will and divine creation, nor would it be Christianly motivated. Therefore what we would actually getwould be a version of "the Great Reset" - but on a national basis; and without the self-destroying elements such as "sustainability", antiracism, and the rest. At best and temporarily, such a society would assert justifications that are this-worldly, and utilitarian. But since such abstractions are both humanly-feeble and irredeemably subjective - very soon selfish, short-termist corruption among the leadership class would inevitably take-over. (Which is why They are keen on the idea!) What I am saying is that "nationalism" is a delusion or a deception for The West, arising only as a consequence of in-fighting among the demon-serving ruling class. Serious Christians should be wary of falling into the trap of supporting nationalism - since it will inevitably be unmasked as local totalitarianism - hence intrinsically evil.
"Nationalism versus Globalism? Merely totalitarianism versus chaotic evil"
6 Comments -
I have come to understand this as one of the "biggies" as far as spiritual learning goes in this time and place. I suppose the first obstacle is accepting that nationalism and globalism are both evil. But it doesn't end there. Understanding that both are evil does not kill the temptation to choose the lesser evil. Some arguments I keep encountering are,
"Well, sure, but you have to choose something and do something political! You can't just sit there and be Christian and pretend this does not affect you! You might not involve yourself with politics, but politics is certainly involving itself with you..." And so on.
The hardest part is realizing that we will never find what we are looking for in politics today, to say nothing of what we need. Hardest because this immediately forces us to look elsewhere -- and as far as I can tell, most Christians in the West believe there is nowhere else to look. Hence, they keep participating in politics because to do otherwise is to be "defeatist" or "quietist."
Avoiding politics in this time and place is not a passive stance; it is the most active stance Christians can take!
As a side note, I'd like to add that I have spent nearly ten years living in Hungary, a country that secular and Christian nationalists often praise for being a role model and for being on the right side. Well, my lived experience here tells me otherwise.
2 March 2024 at 14:44
Frank - Maybe Hungary might approximate to "secular totalitarianism using Christianized language and excuses."
Of course, rejecting politics is indeed only a first step; because that is a means to the end of taking direct personal spiritual action. Which is something we ought to do, rather than advertise.
But, to return to another old theme; I think it is easy to underestimate the spiritual importance of understanding, of knowing inwardly what is going-on spiritually, behind the public rhetoric.
I think that genuine understanding in a single person (if it can be achieved, and that is seldom easy) has an immediate beneficial spiritual effect in some *general* way -- plus it opens further down-stream positive possibilities of benefit.
2 March 2024 at 17:15
Rejecting all politics sure sounds like: 'let society or anyone do whatever they want to you.
They can run roughshod over everything you love, you build, you cherish.'
Its a fallen world. This is what they would do. Is it not??
Don't misunderstand, I despise politics, hate it, its almost zero content, zero soul.
You may not be interested in politics, you may reject it. But that doesn't mean it isn't VERY interested in you--endlessly and ever escalating.
Would you not defend yourself -- and even more your loved ones, against its evils and deprecations??? When they're at your door the options become limited--isn't it even immoral to encourage such a point to be reached??
As a direct and personal example-- I have a relative who lost their child from ignoring 'the politics' for some 20 years. They still ignore it. It was a major contributor to their child's death. That reality is not unique for millions-whether they are conscious of it or not. Its not unique, just as with all such things, uniquely devastating.
“The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing.”
Do you agree with that?? Is this not what blindness to politics entails?
See to me that's the hard question that can't be put aside. I don't pretend to know the full answer either.
Just asking.
3 March 2024 at 04:37
c1 - There are a lot of assumptions behind your comment that I regard as untrue - I think there is a conflation of specific politics (voting, parties, the bureaucracy of government etc) with generic social discourse.
Anyway; maybe it is clearer what I mean by an analogy that engaging in politics 2024 is like being asked to support as a positive preference - i.e. support in your inner self, support with your attention and thinking - either Stalin or Hitler; either the communist party of the USSR or the NSDAP.
What people actually Do in terms of their actions is secondary to the spiritual war (because actions can easily be monitored and compelled): what matters primarily is what we do spiritually; and the problem with politics is that it dominates the spiritual - so that (for example) mainstream church Christianity simply follows the core priorities of mainstream politics; and people care more deeply about, are more motivated by, politics than Christianity.
3 March 2024 at 07:41
Christian universalism appears to be what got us here.
3 March 2024 at 19:48
@A-G - Universalism (at least the way it is usually expressed) is a denial of free agency, and ignores ordinary human experience where plenty of people (probably a majority in the West, now that fear of hell is gone) explicitly reject resurrection and Heaven.
3 March 2024 at 20:47