KO:I served twenty years in the military through three wars. You are going to tell me that I "accommodate" the enemy? Shame on you.
I appreciate and respect your service.
I currently have relatives and friends whose sons are in the service. One of those fine young men goes on 6 month deployments and is not allowed to say where or what he is doing. You can only guess at the risks he faces.
How you can perceive I'm denigrating any of our military is by skipping the entire post and seeing where I forgot to put the C indicating the church. It must be that the point really hit home. What have we seen from your churches regarding the WOT? The EOC hasn't said much, but they never do and they seem to be in agreement with the RCC. What have we seen from the RCC?
Did the Pope kiss the Koran before or after the war started?
Did the RCC take the position that this might not be a just war?
Did the RCC declare that muslims worship the same God as Christians?
Did the EOC express any outrage at these things?
Or maybe we decided to side with their enemies, and get involved in their local dispute, instead of minding our own business.
This is so silly it's hard to even respond to. Flying planes into the Twin Towers, bombing our ships, bombing our embassies killing our citizens changes this from any local dispute. If you can't see this, it's time to clean your glasses.
Are you going to call Gen Wesley Clark and tell him he is "accommodating" the enemy too because he is opposed to our senseless war in Iraq?
Yes!
You are shutting people up for speaking their mind because you disagree with their opinion.
How exactly is this happening? You seem to be able to speak just fine. It may not make any sense except on a DU thread, but nobody is stopping you from saying it.
Unfortunately, multidimensional weltanschauun is alien to so many one-dimentional individuals whose see only one side of the moon and therefore have nothing to compare it to.
Is this why American Exceptionalism is put down? Is this why those Protestant ancestors who created this country are mocked. Is it to hard to look at history objectively and acknowledge that the "Presbyterian Revolution" brought freedom to the world that never existed before?
Don't tell me shame on you. Look in the mirror and thank GOD that He choose to place us in a country that has the ability to do good in the world.
He is not necessarily facing risks. Six month deployments may or may not be risky. It's routine in peacetime and in wartime. He can't tell you where he is going because there is no need to know. Classified information is shared on the need-to-know-basis only.
Just because I may have been on the same base with him, or even in the same command, doesn't mean he would tell me where he was going unless my job required me to know that.
The EO does not accept +Augustine's "just war" theory, never have and never will, even though ti is actually quite reasonable (only as a last resort, never preemptive, and only in defense). The RCCs stick to +Augustine's definition. The Orthodox Church never endorsed any war, although it offers prayers and blessings to solider who are about to face possible death going into combat. That was the prevailing attitude of the early Church, based on Gospels.
The Protestants use the expanded Reformed definition developed in the 17th century onward by various authors, which is more like the OT fundamentalist approach (somewhat based on the "natural law") that the Reformed share with their Israeli friends and Muslim counterparts, namely "I am only doing what God wants me to do." The OT and the Koran are full of such self-rigtheous examples.
I have no clue when he did it. But I recently saw President Bush and Saudi King, whose country has been supporting and financing Palestinian Entefada against Israeli occupation, as two buddies. Apparently, any lack of democracy, freedom of speech, or any rights for women, do not seem to upset our close friendship with the Wahabbi Saudi fundamentalists. I guess all "friendships" have a "price."
We have no problems supporting those who support and finance those who bomb Israeli pizza parlors, as long as they let us drive our SUVs for a nominal price of oil.
But of course, some people who want to monopolize what is American patriotism will not mention greed and business interests that often hurt our national interests.
Let's look at the open-border policy the current Administration has tolerated. We currently have an estimated 13 million illegal aliens. We have no way of knowing how many of these people are criminals, foreign agents, terrorist fifth column, how many of them carry dangerous diseases (they didn't check in with our Health department or get necessary immunizations), genetic diseases, etc.
Our newly emerged Republican front runner form Arizona is actually on record favoring amnesty for these illegal hordes, yet he is willing to commit our troops to Iraq fior 50 years in necessary to fight terrorists before they can enter the US! Well, out of those 13 million, chances are they are already in the US! while we are figthing them "over there."
You do the math. Say that, being very, very conservative, out of the 13 million, only one percent are foreign agents and Al-Caida operatives, and 99% are just "regular" illegals who pose no threat. That makes an army of 130,000 potential enemy combatants within our borders! Talk about a Trojan Horse!
And what has our Administration done to prevent that? Zero, zilch, nothing, nada. You know why? Because it's good for business. It makes business owners happy. They get cheap labor; who cares that greed and catering to greed jeopardizes our security and the health of our citizens!
Good old capitalism at work. It knows no boundaries. As long as it can make profit, it's good.
But, there are laws passed by the Congress that provide for stiff penalties for employers who hire illegals. Trouble is, no one is enforcing the law. We could rid this country of all illegals if we started to penalize the business that hire illegals. You cut out the demands and the supply stops. once they couldn't work they would go back to where they came from all on their own. Imagine that!
No walls needed, no need to National Guards, no need for more border agents, hi-tech cameras, vercroweded administrations and jails.
We would have 13 million fewer people using gas-guzzling cars and therefore greater supply and lower gas prices. And, more importantly we could concentrate on those who contine to cross into our country illegally or who, despite inability to work decided to remain. In both cases, we could assume that they are here for sinister reasons and not simply job-hunting, and we could hunt them down mercilessly.
But our Administration made sure little old ladies are prodded and poked at airports in order to prevent potential terrorists from entering the country! Why would terrorists try to come in through the airports when our southern border under this Administration and all previous Administrations is wide open!?
In your idealistic weltanschauung you simply don't see the sad realities that are actually making us less safe and more vulnerable, and our efforts overseas counterproductive. I have always maintained that as much as capitalism doesn't want educated consumers, democracies don't want educated voters. They want gullible consumers and gullible voters. And that's what we have, in my opinion.
Consumerism did. Not "Presbyterian Revolution." Profit motive. Love of money. Attachment to the world. Love of the world. All the things the NT speaks against. The EOC is concerned with the world to come. Our spiritual state.
It doesn't seem to place too much emphasis on the here and now. We are not building a kingdom of God on this earth. Judaism teaches that but we don't. Our goal as EOP Christians is to imitate Christ in our daily life, following the examples of His own life revealed in the Gospels.
That encompasses both giving thanks to God for his abundant blessings and making sure they are not squandered on sinful things.