Manifesto:
I Pledge Allegiance to Jesus, not the Flag
by Fred Bahnson

A quote by philosopher Alasdair MacIntyre hangs on my office door in the university where I teach which reads "Giving your life for a nation-state is like giving your life for the phone company." This quote, I think, encapsulates neatly the utter absurdity of modern war. War is absurd not in the silly sense of the word, but in the Greek-tragedian kind of absurdity when one knows that, though no good can result from a course of action, the character will do it anyway. But you could say that MacIntyre's analogy about war's absurdity works for any time in our history as creatures on this earth, not just amid the arena of smart bombs and realpolitik. Though we in America like to tell ourselves otherwise, thereby absolving ourselves of the horrors we have committed in the name of justice and freedom, there never was, nor ever will be, a "good war." As a Christian pacifist, I believe that not just modern wars, but in fact all violence, is ultimately futile. It is futile not because the changes it brings about are ineffective in the immediate sense; rather, it doesn't work because it ignores who God is. We were given a glimpse of this God when his son, an innocent Galilean carpenter, came and died on a cross in suffering weakness, never raising an arm to defend himself.

Whenever I tell people that I am a pacifist, a shrill battery of questions often follows, such as, "But what about the Nazis?" or "What if somebody was trying to kill your family?" Before I can attempt to answer to those questions, I am usually accused of being "unrealistic" and/or "irresponsible." Clearly the burden of proof rests not with the one who refuses to kill, but with the one who justifies killing. So when the whirlwind of queries whips up about why I am a pacifist, my comeback often consists of more questions, like, "What good reason does a Christian have for using violence?" or "What is to account for the fundamental disconnect between Jesus' command to "love your enemies" and the 'Christian' justification for killing enemies?" Counter-questions like these usually throws the person off kilter, for it nullifies their formulaic "situation" (i.e. a robber is about to shoot your daughter-you have a gun-what would you do?) where you are supposed to realize that violence is, regrettably, the only option available.

Once we are past those initial hurdles, the conversation usually takes a turn: I explain that my pacifism is not one based on utility (as was Gandhi's pacifism), or on utopian longings for peace (as is the pacifism of many in the current anti-war movement), or some other philosophical/ideological framework. While I do think nonviolence ultimately "works", I tell them, and while I do long for a world free of violence, my refusal to take up arms doesn't begin from those presuppositions. My shunning of violence-and my belief that nonviolence is concomitant with being a Christian-follows directly from who I take to be the only One worth dying for-the Crucified One.

These conversations have proved illuminating yet troubling, for they indicate what I believe to be deep theological misunderstandings among many Christians, especially during this time of war. The problem, it seems to me, is an eschatological one, for it hinges on the refusal to believe that God is in charge of history. As such, people ask the wrong questions, which lead to the wrong answers. In the current "War Against Terrorism", we cannot ask "what is the best way to take out Bin Laden?" or "how can I best serve my country and still remain a Christian?" Rather, if we let our lives be shaped by Biblical truth, we will discover that these questions are the wrong starting place. The questions are wrong because they a priori assume a) giving your allegiance to a government must at time supercede your allegiance to Jesus, and, b) that violence is even an option. If we forgo the situational, anthropological starting place, and begin instead by asking who God is, we proceed down a different track. The question we need to ask is, to whom do I give my allegiance-Jesus or Caesar?

And if we profess our allegiance to the Slain Lamb, we must relinquish claim to the use of any and all violence.

The New Testament witness is clear that the sword is not an option, something that Christians until the time of Constantine understood unquestioningly. Yet the temptation to use violence has been an ever-present specter in the life of the church. We are tempted at times to believe that God is no longer in control of history, and that it's up to us to take the reins and try to "make things come out right". But when we decide to align ourselves with our government and its wars, even when it supposedly fights for justice, we are saying that God is no longer ruler over our world. To do so is to subscribe to the lie that, while God used to act through Jesus, Israel, and the Prophets, it is ridiculous to think that God acts in the realm of 21st century politics.

The best way to describe this view is what pastor/activist Dale Aukerman called situational atheism-we believe Jesus died for our sins, but we don't acknowledge that his sovereignty holds sway in the "real world." What is needed, we believe, is for us to "fill in" the gaps for this clock-maker deity in order that history will turn out right. We become situational atheists when we wage war to bring peace, when call on our government to retaliate for the attacks of Sept.11th, or even when we use force to protect innocent third parties. To act in this way, we must give our allegiance to Caesar. As Aukerman writes in the aftermath of the Gulf War in Reckoning with Apocalypse: Terminal Politics and Christian Hope,

To give one's loyalty to the nation-state, especially the lone superpower, is to align oneself with that attempted dominion over history. Thus in the contemporary U.S. religious context, to align oneself with the military might and the superpower role of the nation is not only a rejection of the Lordship of Jesus in the realm of ethics. It is, still more than that, the result of the assumption that human dominion over history to make things come out right must be striven for in its U.S. guise because God's Lordship in Jesus Christ crucified and risen cannot be counted on in the current unfolding of global events."

If we read the Bible not as a book of rules or a road map to heaven, but rather as the unfolding history of God's saving acts towards humanity, we see that the person and work of Jesus is the key to understanding how we are to live. Jesus calls us to love our enemies, not "bomb them back to the stone age." The command to love our enemies is not, as theologian Reinhold Niebuhr thought, an unrealistic, utopian dream, an ideal given to make us realize our sinful inadequacy and our need for grace. Rather, love of enemies is at the very core of how God met evil on a cross and conquered it, and is at the heart of how we must live as disciples. This is why Paul calls the cross a skandalon, a stumbling block to those who don't believe. It is a scandal because, according to worldly wisdom, the cross is "unrealistic" and "irresponsible." ('it is powerless'; 'it gets you killed').

As we are tempted with patriotic indignation at the attacks of Sept.11th , we need only read Romans 5:10 to regain our humility and realize just who "the enemy" is. Paul tells us, "For while we were enemies, we were reconciled to God by the death of his Son." Until Jesus' death and resurrection, all were God's enemies. The cross is the means God used to show us how he treated his enemies-he died for them. Therefore, Jesus' call to love our enemies is not a side issue; it is not quaint advice to be followed in interpersonal relationships and ignored in the realm of "politics", for the distinction between a personal and a social ethic is not one that Jesus made. Enemy love is "realism" in its ultimate sense-that of participating in God's way of redemption. In the words of theologian John Howard Yoder, "people who bear crosses work with the grain of the universe."

How are we then to act during this time of war? Knowing that Raison d'Etat-the "Right of the State" to use violence-is Caesar's operative framework, we must acknowledge that we are not called to take part in such violence, but are called instead to be salt and light to a world constantly at war with itself. If we refuse to pull a trigger or support those who do, here are several ways we can live out our faith:

1. We can pray. We can start by asking God's forgiveness for our complicity in a government that uses terrorism, that is, it intentionally targets innocent civilians to achieve its political aims. We should acknowledge that we too benefit from the American Way of Life that is so self-righteously defended, and acknowledge that we have not taken sufficient steps to renounce aspects of that way of life that keep us from working more faithfully for Christ's Kingdom. We should pray for the souls of American leaders for the idolatry that they are committing by asking God to bless their violent policies. We should pray for our enemies, for those who were behind the Sept.11th attacks.

2. We should take American flags out of our churches. The flag is a symbol of competing allegiance, and has no place in the Lord's sanctuary next to his cross, which is our only symbol of allegiance. Just as the Confederate flag represents too much oppression for African-Americans to fly it above state court-houses, so Christians should view the American flag as too much a symbol of violence to hang it in our churches.

3. We should challenge America's leaders to pursue peace with justice. We must turn away from the Pax Americana, which to paraphrase Dostoevsky's Ivan Karamazov, is a peace "manured on the edifice of suffering children." This is not the kind of peace that accepts the deaths of innocent lives and says-as did former Secretary of State Madeleine Albright when asked what she thought about the deaths of 500,000 Iraqi children-"we think the price is worth it." We should voice our indignation when Bush and his warmongers openly pray to God before slaughtering and starving innocent Afghan Muslims. We should say to Bush: "if you choose to bomb and starve Afghans, you can't do it in the name of the God revealed in Jesus Christ, and you won't have our support when you do it."

4. We should not let our language be co-opted by official rhetoric. We should refuse to use benign and euphemistic terms when referring to war. For instance, instead of "collateral damage", we should say "murder". Instead of "Operation Enduring Freedom", we should say "State-sponsored terrorism."

Finally, let us give thanks that we are released from having to give our lives for a nation-state, a phone company, or whatever else comes along. But more importantly let us pray that God spurs us into action, that he will give us the courage to throw ourselves into the fray of voices crying out for revenge in order to show the world that there is One who wants to release us all from the downward spiral of violence. Thanks be to God that he has given us a calling that is truly one worth dying for. Lord, let our lives be worthy of that calling.

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Fred Bahnson (ffbahnson@hotmail.com) is a recent graduate of Duke Divinity School, and currently teaches ethics at Appalachian State University in Boone, NC.