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I got distracted during LotR: The Return of the King as I suddenly realized its most literal interpretation has been adopted by the neoconservative hijackers of democracy in our country:

“We declare that all of them are evildoers, and we, blameless keepers of the flame, bearers of the light, are exercising our duty and divine calling in wiping them out. See? — it’s eagles that defeat the Nazgul. See? — those Arab-looking riders of the oliphaunts are evil. See? — the ‘Men of the West’ are the last hope for the world. What we have here is an allegory for America.”

I’m not a Tolkien scholar, but I don’t think literal interpretations suit his work or convey his intent. And I doubt that Peter Jackson, a New Zealander, aimed to craft a pro-America masterpiece.

As my distraction lengthened, I finally found a trace of empathy for those who think this way. If someone truly believes violence can be redemptive in this physical world, as many do, then a literal interpretation of LotR affirms present U.S. foreign policy.

Unfortunately for Christians who believe in this myth of redemptive violence^†, Jesus emphatically does not. According to him, nonretaliatory love is what redeems, violence never does. A literal interpretation of LotR — and by extension, of U.S. action in the world under the Bush administration — cannot be made to square with following Jesus.

Now where the lessons of LotR swell into truth is on the spiritual level. We are to resist evil. We are to be warriors against darkness just as imaged in the film. But against spirits and dominions and powers only, not against people. According to Jesus, we are to care for everyone the Father cares for, even the “ungrateful and the selfish and wicked” that the Father is “kind and charitable and good” to (Luke 6:27-36, AMP).

None of us are wholly good and the “enemy” is not wholly evil. The potential for — and reality of — evildoing lies in all of us. We must recognize this in ourselves. We must see the deception and greed and injustice and retribution that inhabit us in our prosecution of this war on terror. And we must repent. Our leaders must repent. To do otherwise is to bring down judgment on ourselves.

The truth is this: God has never appointed us policemen of this world. What he appoints us to be [is] its stewards and its servants. If Jesus is right, our present tack of meeting violence with violence will never work. If Jesus is right, meeting people’s needs from out of our abundance will.

I know several Bush supporters who are determined to see George as Aragorn, rightly enthroned as king who beats back the hordes of darkness. I think this is purest fantasy. At best our president is Boromir — not a king but a steward, one who despite possible good qualities is unable to resist the Ring of Power. And it is driving / has driven him mad. At worst I see George & Co. as Ringwraiths, wreaking division and death and destruction upon the world, once men but now made hollow where their souls once were, long ago sold for the Power of a Ring.

(I use “we,” “us,” and “our” as shorthand for my U.S.-oriented point of view. I use “Bush” as shorthand for the multiple [Bush-]like-minded persons and powers inhabiting our government.)

[Denethor was the last ruling Steward of Gondor, father of Boromir and Faramir. He was subject to depression and denial, maladies I recognize in myself and the Christian Right, more or less respectively. I’m pretty sure we both can be healed. Eventually.]

2003-12-31 update:
Charles Sebold, someone I’ve enjoyed virtually knowing for some years now, observes in his review of the first LotR movie something that (as long as I’m trying to be generous) sets me thinking George may be more analogous to Tolkien’s — not the movie’s — Saruman:

Saruman [in the movie] is so one-dimensional that it will make the purist cry. Tolkien’s Saruman is the victim of good intentions, overestimation of his own abilities, and a subtle corruption of power that extends over time — he is never really the ally of Sauron.

Regardless of intent and nature of alliance, I note that the devastation wrought is the same.

^†Interesting related reading:

• Martin Hattersley: The Myth of Redemptive Violence

• Walter Wink: Myth of Redemptive Violence

• Walter Wink: Babylon Revisited: How Violent Myths Resurface Today

• Gutless Pacifist: Redemptive Violence for a Just War

• First Congregational Church (UCC), Closter, NJ:
  The Civic Religion of Redemptive Violence
  The Ring of Tolkien: The Magnification of Power by Technology

• National Catholic Reporter: Candy ain’t dandy in this classroom

Guardian UK: Oliver Burkeman interviews Paul Krugman: ‘Paul Krugman is a mild-mannered university economist. He is also a NY Times columnist and President Bush’s most scathing critic. Hence the death threats.’

The Rockford Register Star reported earlier this week — Speaker disrupts RC graduation, via AlterNet — that invited speaker Chris Hedges was booed off the stage for giving an antiwar speech at the Rockford College graduation (speech text).

Look, Chris is a Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist whose most recent book is War Is a Force That Gives Us Meaning. The book is about exploding the false myth of heroic war, written by a journalist who’s been immersed in the blood and guts of war around the world for many years. (I’m reading it now.) What the hell else did they expect him to talk about?

“War in the end is always about betrayal. Betrayal of the young by the old, of soldiers by politicians and idealists by cynics,” Hedges said in lecture fashion as jeers and “God Bless Americas” could be heard in the background.

Observation #1: People who won’t learn the lessons of history aren’t well educated, no matter how many years they’ve spent in college.

Observation #2: People who say “God bless America” as they jeer what is essentially the New Testament message of peace discredit themselves. And they discredit God in the eyes of others by misusing his name in a prideful way. In this context it’s like saying to God, “Bless us because we think we deserve it — even though we won’t heed your message, we won’t try to love our neighbors as ourselves, and we won’t tolerate anyone who reminds us otherwise.”

We in the United States have let nationalism get out of control; we’ve made it our golden calf. At the feet of this nationalism we’ve put our treasure, and our hearts also. Bloodlust and sanctimoniousness, mingled together. This isn’t like us. Why are we doing it?

We … can … do … better … than … this.

Today I see a follow-up interview with Chris, The Silencing of Dissent on Graduation Day. Unlike me, Chris speaks with courage, understanding — and yes, compassion — in the face of this sputtering crowd who (ironically) makes his case for him:

You know, as I looked out on the crowd, that is exactly what my book is about. It is about the suspension of individual conscience, and probably consciousness, for the contagion of the crowd for that euphoria that comes with patriotism. The tragedy is that — and I’ve seen it in conflict after conflict or society after society that plunges into war — with that kind of rabid nationalism comes racism and intolerance and a dehumanization of the other. It’s an emotional response. People find a kind of ecstasy, a kind of belonging, a kind of obliteration of their alienation in that patriotic fervor that always does come in war time.  …

People chanted the kind of cliches and aphorisms and jingoes that are handed to you by the state. “God Bless America” or people were chanting “send him to France” — this kind of stuff and that kind of contagion leads ultimately to tyranny, it’s very dangerous and it has to be stopped.

I’ve seen it in effect and take over countries. But of course, it breaks my heart when I see it in my country. That’s essentially what I was looking at was in some ways a mirror of what I was trying to speak about. I think I managed to touch upon it somewhat when I talked upon this notion of comradeship as a suppression of self awareness and self-possession to sort of follow along, locked in the embrace of a nation, or of a group, or of a national group unthinkingly, blindly.

I will never give up on us, but God, I’ve come close.

2003-05-27 update: See also Steve Gilliard’s thoughtful review of Hedges’ book as it relates to Al Qaeda.

Steve Gilliard: “Our inability to respond to Al Qaeda in a meaningful way comes from this impulse to bolster the state in time of war, to embrace the myths of heroic violence.”

A friend recently noted the U.S. MOAB bomb test — “the biggest conventional bomb in the military’s arsenal … privately known in military circles as ‘the mother of all bombs’” — and concludes its use in Iraq demonstrates U.S. moral superiority over “the terrorists.”

Setting aside for a moment Iraq’s unproven involvement with “the terrorists,” which, unless we’ve abandoned the principle of “innocent until proven guilty,” translates to Iraq’s noninvolvement with “the terrorists,” how can unleashing large-scale destruction there in any way demonstrate our moral superiority?

Never underestimate the power of supernatural evil to deceive.

In attempting a response, I came close to what grieves me so deeply about the kind of witness statements like my friend’s communicate. I wrote:

I don’t mind that you support war in Iraq, although I feel sad that you do.

I don’t mind that you confess you’re a Christian, especially one who’s done [sacrificing outreach] things I admire.

But you can’t do both. You have to choose.

If you try to do both, your integrity is breached, because, God knows, the two are mutually exclusive. If you try to do both, you become a stumbling block to Christians and non-Christians alike.

Then I think I hit the bullseye of what grieves me.

Where we are now is embroiled in an obsession, deceived by calculated use of God language, and we’ve turned a blind eye. Awake! If we don’t work diligently to obey Jesus, if we rationalize our way out of his command to love God and love neighbor, if we accede to the myth of redemptive violence instead of redemptive grace, we are not worthy of his name.

Defending the faith while promoting aggressive war is playing “soul jeopardy” in the gravest way, for who can say how many turn away from the Lord in grief or revulsion as a result? Repentance, as John the Baptist was fond of shouting, is still the surest way out of that jeopardy.

“What do you want me to do for you?” Jesus asked him. The blind man said, “Rabbi, I want to see” (Mark 10:51).

Note to self:
Never underestimate God’s supernatural power to redeem.

2003-03-16 update: I was asked to clarify what I meant in saying supporting war and confessing Christianity are “mutually exclusive” above. Here’s my attempted clarification:

The mutual exclusivity (adjusting my original wording a bit) is between supporting war and obeying Jesus. There is no overlap between the two. Arguing against this implies either (1) ignorance of the gospels or (2) lying to oneself.

Now it’s equally true that for many of us it is difficult unto death to obey Jesus fully. If we’re unable to obey — in this case, if we choose to disobey him by supporting war — we have to at least have the integrity to say “I know your words, Lord, and I know I am disobeying you; forgive me, for I cannot see how to reconcile your command to love my enemies with the world situation before me.”

If, however, we lack the integrity to recognize our disobedience and instead attempt to march to war “in Jesus’ name” — in direct defiance of his words to us, and in effect attributing our disobedience to him — then he will say to us:

“If anyone is ashamed of me and my words in this adulterous and sinful generation, the Son of Man will be ashamed of him when he comes in his Father’s glory with the holy angels” (Mark 8:38, today’s lectionary reading, interestingly enough).

Lord knows I don’t have all the answers. This exchange is just what’s been — and is being — deeply impressed upon my soul as true. I cannot be silent.

(See also Peter Storey, For Christians, every war is a civil war.)

This Washington Post opinion piece by Fritz Ritsch, Of God, and Man, in the Oval Office [relinked, WaPo article no longer available] superbly captures the theological state of affairs motivating the current U.S. presidency. Striking excerpts, italics mine:

Contrary to popular opinion, the religion that [Bush’s religious supporters espouse] is Triumphalism, not Christianity. Theirs is a zealous form of nationalism, baptized with Christian language. The German theologian Dietrich Bonhoeffer, who was martyred by the Nazis, foresaw the rise of a similar view in his country, which he labeled “joyous secularism.” Joyous secularists, said Bonhoeffer, are Christians who view the role of government as helping God to establish the Kingdom of God on Earth. He viewed this as human arrogance and a denial of God’s sovereignty …

The president confidently … asserts a worldview that most Christian denominations reject outright as heresy: the myth of redemptive violence, which posits a war between good and evil, with God on the side of good and Satan on the side of evil and the battle lines pretty clearly drawn. …

In contrast, the Judeo-Christian worldview is that of redemption. Redemption starts from the assumption that all of humanity is flawed and must approach God with humility. No good person is totally good, and no evil person is irredeemable. God’s purpose is to redeem all people. Good and evil, while critical, become secondary to redemption. …

Despite our secularism, the United States has rarely been so publicly and politically “Christian” as it is today. Or perhaps it is because of our secularism. We can no longer tell good theology from bad. …

With the political emergence of joyous secularism, the churches are challenged to preach an alternative message: grace, hope and redemption — the truth of Biblical faith. This is both our pastoral and our political responsibility.

Thank you, thank you, Pastor Ritsch. You write what my heart knows but my mind finds difficult to articulate.

2003-03-04 update: Dr. Ritsch made this point that Biblical faith is about redemptive grace, not the falsehood of redemptive violence, even in the immediate aftermath of 9/11 in his Sept. 16, 2001 sermon:

[The 9/11 terrorists consider themselves] in the war of good versus evil, and [that] they are on the side of good.

This is always the key message of Fundamentalism. Christian Fundamentalists believe the same thing: this is a war of good against evil, and we’re good.

It is not the message of the Bible. It is not the message of the Christian story.

Our message, instead, is the story of redemption.

Announcing this prophetic insight to persons who do not yet see it can be very difficult, and requires much courage. But announcing it, speaking it forth, is absolutely necessary. I feel it as a fire in my bones. Bravo.

Later … See also Auntie Propaganda.