Get Some...
Posted on 10/06/2015 7:29:09 PM PDT by markomalley
The Orthodox Christian Church, which is reclaiming its traditional role in post-Soviet Russia, has described its government’s fight against the Islamic State and other jihadi groups in Syria as a “holy war.”
According to Vsevolod Chaplin, head of the Church’s Public Affairs Department,
The fight with terrorism is a holy battle and today our country is perhaps the most active force in the world fighting it. The Russian Federation has made a responsible decision on the use of armed forces to defend the People of Syria from the sorrows caused by the arbitrariness of terrorists. Christians are suffering in the region with the kidnapping of clerics and the destruction of churches. Muslims are suffering no less.
This is not a pretext to justify intervention in Syria. For years, Russia’s Orthodox leaders have been voicing their concern for persecuted Christians. Back in February 2012, the Russian church described to Vladimir Putin the horrific treatment Christians are experiencing around the world, especially under Islam:
The head of External Church Relations, Metropolitan Illarion, said that every five minutes one Christian was dying for his or her faith in some part of the world, specifying that he was talking about such countries as Iraq, Egypt, Pakistan and India. The cleric asked Putin to make the protection of Christians one of the foreign policy directions in future.
“This is how it will be, have no doubt,” Putin answered.
Compare and contrast Putin’s terse response with U.S. President Obama, who denies the connection between Islamic teachings and violence; whose policies habitually empower Christian-persecuting Islamists; who prevents Christian representatives from testifying against their tormentors; and who even throws escaped Christian refugees back to the lions, while accepting tens of thousands of Muslim migrants.
Even Russian Patriarch Kirill once wrote an impassioned letter to Obama, imploring him to stop empowering the murderers of Christians. That the patriarch said “I am deeply convinced that the countries which belong to the Christian civilization bear a special responsibility for the fate of Christians in the Middle East” must have only ensured that the letter ended up in the Oval Office’s trash can.
Of course, Russian’s concern for Christian minorities will be cynically dismissed by the major talking heads on both sides. While such dismissals once resonated with Americans, they are becoming less persuasive to those paying attention, as explained in “Putin’s Crusade—Is Russia the Last Defender of the Christian Faith?”
For those of us who grew up in America being told that the godless communist atheists in Russia were our enemies, the idea that America might give up on God and Christianity while Russia embraces religion might once have been difficult to accept. But by 2015, the everyday signs in America show a growing contempt for Christianity, under the first president whose very claims of being a Christian are questionable. The exact opposite trend is happening for Russia and its leaders—a return to Christian roots.
Indeed, growing numbers of Americans who have no special love for Russia or Orthodoxy—from billionaire capitalist Donald Trump to evangelical Christians—are being won over by Putin’s frank talk and actions.
How can they not? After one of his speeches praising the West’s Christian heritage—a thing few American politicians dare do—Putin concluded with something which must surely resonate with millions of traditional Americans: “We must protect Russia from that which has destroyed American society”—a reference to the anti-Christian liberalism and licentiousness that has run amok in the West.
Even the Rev. Franklin Graham’s response to Russia’s military intervention in Syria seems uncharacteristically positive, coming as it is from the head of the Billy Graham Evangelistic Association, which for decades spoke against the godless Soviets: “What Russia is doing may save the lives of Christians in the Middle East…. You understand that the Syrian government … have protected Christians, they have protected minorities from the Islamists.”
Should U.S supported jihadis (“rebels”) succeed in toppling the government of Syria, Graham correctly predicts that there will be “a bloodbath of Christians”:
There would be tens of thousands of Christians murdered and slaughtered and on top of that, you would have hundreds of thousands of more refugees pouring into Europe. So Russia right now, I see their presence as helping to save the lives of Christians.
Incidentally, it is an established fact that the “good rebels”—or “moderates”—are persecuting Christians no less than the Islamic State.
When asked why the Obama administration is so callous towards the plight of persecuted Christians, Graham, somewhat echoing Putin, said Obama was more invested in promoting the homosexual agenda than he is in protecting Christians:
I’m not here to bash the gays and lesbians and they certainly have rights and I understand all of that, but this administration has been more focused on that agenda than anything else. As a result, the Middle East is burning and you have more refugees moving today since World War II. It could have been prevented.
Indeed, at day’s end, it is not Russian claims of waging a holy war to save Christians from the sword of jihad that deserves to be cynically dismissed, but rather every claim the Obama administration makes to justify its support for the opposition in Syria (most of which is not even Syrian).
There are no “moderate rebels,” only committed jihadis eager to install Islamic law, which is the antithesis of everything the West once held precious. If the “evil dictator” Assad kills people in the context of war, the “rebels” torture, maim, enslave, rape, behead, and crucify people solely because they are Christian.
How does that make them preferable to Assad?
Moreover, based on established precedent—look to Iraq and Libya, the other countries U.S. leadership helped “liberate”—the outcome of ousting the secular strongman of Syria will be more atrocities, more Christian persecution, more rapes and enslavement, more bombed churches and destroyed antiquities, and more terrorism, including in the West, despite John Kerry’s absurd assurances of a “pluralistic” Syria once Assad is gone.
Once again, then, the U.S. finds itself on the side of Islamic terrorists, who always reserve their best for America. The Saudis—the head of the Jihadi Snake which U.S. presidents are wont to kiss and bow to—are already screaming bloody murder and calling for an increased jihad in Syria in response to Russia’s holy war.
Will Obama and the MSM comply, including through an increased propaganda campaign? Top Islamic clerics like Yusuf al-Qaradawi—who once slipped on live television by calling on the Obama administration to wage “jihad for Allah” against Assad—seem to think so. Already the U.S. “welcomes” the new cruel joke that Saudi Arabia—one of the absolute worst human rights violators—will head a U.N. human rights panel.
At day’s end and all Realpolitik aside, there is no denying reality: what the United States and its Western allies have wrought in the Middle East—culminating with the rise of a bloodthirsty caliphate and the worst atrocities of the 21st century—is as unholy as Russia’s resolve to fight it is holy.
As far as I can determine, only the Russian Orthodox Church has provided any support for Syrian Christians as they were being slaughtered, kidnapped and enslaved by the same rebels that the US is training and equiping to fight Assad. If I am wrong please let me know.
Get Some...
I’ve always respected him more than 0bama.
Indonesian Obama, McCain, Clinton, Boehner and McConnell
have made America the butt of jokes, and
the enabler of slavery, crucifixion, and genocide.
A country that’s divided
Surely will not stand
My past erased, no more disgrace
No foolish, naive stand
The end is near, it’s crystal clear
Part of the master plan
Don’t look now to Israel
It might be your homeland...
Read and learn my friend.
Right on the money.
See post #30.
GMTA
See post #30.
GMTA
Is water wet?
Not only are the Russians doing the right thing, they’re the only country in the world prepared to stand up and confess that they are a Christian nation. I know the KGB took over the ROC, but lately I’m starting to wonder if the Church didn’t take over THEM. Doubtful, but a nice thought, and a perfect example of the Lord working in mysterious ways his wonders to perform.
Now that’s funny.
Putin needs to grow a ‘stache.
LOL
The Russian Orthodox Church and Islam serve the same master, and it isn’t Jesus Christ. Putin is fighting for a higher position in the kingdom of darkness.
WE have been the JV team in Syria, and Russia is showing us how the pros do it. Assad, monster that he is, did afford protection for Christians. Who would step up in his place? Even the so-called "moderates" would create a Christian bloodbath in Syria. Obama would love this. We should thank God that there is still one nation that is openly committed to defending Christian ideals sans shame.
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