Freethought-Now

It’s hard not to cheer when anyone, even indirectly, takes to task Christian nationalist and “War Secretary” Pete Hegseth over his call to Americans to pray “every day on bended knee … in the name of Jesus Christ” to support President Trump’s reckless war of choice against Iran.

But it sticks in my craw that Pope Leo XIV’s recent statements ostensibly criticizing Hegseth actually whitewash the bloody history of the Roman Catholic Church. During Leo’s Palm Sunday Mass, he warned not to invoke Jesus in battle, contending that Jesus “does not listen to the prayers of those who wage war, but rejects them.” The pope didn’t mention Hegseth by name, but he has earlier criticized the Iran war. During a later Mass on April 2, Leo claimed Christianity has been “distorted by a desire for domination entirely foreign to the way of Jesus Christ” and that “God has given us an example — not of how to dominate, but of how to liberate; not of how to destroy life but of how to give it.”

Has Christianity been distorted? Does “God” reject domination and destruction in favor of liberation and life? Did Jesus eschew the sword? Does the Jesus embraced by Christians really reject those who wage war? And if so, why then isn’t Leo also condemning the Catholic Church’s centuries-long Crusades, Inquisitions, wars, pogroms and Christian imperialism “in the name of Jesus Christ”? What about the Church’s 15th-century Doctrine of Discovery, based on papal decrees, justifying the right of Europeans to conquer, forcibly convert, commit genocide against and steal the lands of “heathen” peoples in the Americas? (For a succinct recap of the violent history of Catholicism, I recommend this Christopher Hitchens debate on “Is the Catholic Church a force for good?” Hitch starts at about 8 minutes.)

The Old Testament God is uncontestably a god of war and destruction, as Exodus 15:3 even says outright: “The Lord is a man of war: the Lord is his name.” FFRF Co-President Dan Barker has written an entire book, “GOD: The Most Unpleasant Character in All Fiction,” to fully document the monstrous words and actions attributed to the biblical deity. To cite just a few of the hundreds of examples of the biblical deity’s warrior mentality: Yahweh says to Moses: “Take all the heads of the people, and hang them up before the Lord against the sun.” (Numbers 25:4). “And the Lord our God delivered him before us; and . . . we took all his cities at that time, and utterly destroyed the men, and the women, and the little ones, of every city, we left none to remain” (Deuteronomy 2:32–34). Here’s that delightful pro-life verse: “Happy shall he be, that taketh and dasheth thy little ones against the stones” (Psalm 137:9). But don’t take my word for the Old Testament deity’s character — FFRF has created a fun, interactive website, “The Unpleasant God Companion,” where you can read many such bible verses for yourself.

Most modern Christians are nicer than the biblical deity and appear to believe they only need to pay attention to the New Testament and the words of “Gentle Jesus.” OK, let’s humor them and play that game. Did Jesus distance himself from the Old Testament’s god of war? Not so much: “If you have seen me, you have seen the father” (John 14:9). “I and the father are one” (John 10:30). Trying to divorce Jesus from Jehovah is quite the parlor trick, since Christian trinity doctrine insists they are one and the same.

The most famous utterance of Jesus uniting himself with the teachings of the Old Testament is this verse: “For verily I say unto you, Till heaven and earth pass, one jot or one tittle shall in no wise pass from the law, till all be fulfilled” (Matthew 5:18).

Read that verse in context: “Think not that I am come to destroy the law, or the prophets: I am not come to destroy, but to fulfill. For verily I say unto you, Till heaven and earth pass, one jot or one tittle shall in no wise pass from the law, till all be fulfilled. Whosoever therefore shall break one of these least commandments, and shall teach men so, he shall be called the least in the kingdom of heaven: but whosoever shall do and teach them, the same shall be called great in the kingdom of heaven. For I say unto you, That except your righteousness shall exceed the righteousness of the scribes and Pharisees, ye shall in no case enter into the kingdom of heaven” (Matthew 5:17–20).

But wait! In the very same chapter of Matthew, verse 48, Jesus goes on to repudiate the Old Testament’s “eye for an eye and tooth for a tooth” laws, advising to turn the other cheek. In Matthew 5:43, he continues in this vein: “You have heard that it was said, ‘You shall love your neighbor and hate your enemy.’ But I say to you, Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you.”

Which Jesus do we believe? The one who clearly says you won’t go to heaven unless you uphold Mosaic law or the one who appears to say just love your neighbor?

Similarly, in the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus is famously quoted saying, “Blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall be called sons of God” (Matthew 5:9). But by the next chapter, Jesus contradicts himself, yet again. Chapter 10 begins with Jesus casting out “unclean spirits” from his 12 disciples — not exactly giving him credibility to 21st-century minds — then instructing them to go out and preach that “the kingdom of heaven is at hand.” Jesus, a narcissist and paranoid, petulantly commands: “Whosoever shall deny me before men, him will I also deny before my Father which is in heaven. Think not that I am come to send peace on Earth: I came not to send peace, but a sword. For I am come to set a man at variance against his father, and the daughter against her mother, and the daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law” (Matthew 10: 32-38).

(Please remember that one of the 12 tattoos sported on Pete Hegseth’s overexposed body depicts a cross with a sword inside it, a direct reference to this verse, Matthew 10:34. And speaking about the Catholic Church’s unacknowledged history of launching wars in the name of Jesus, Hegseth also sports a large Jerusalem cross on his right pectoral. His bicep touts the battle cry of the First Crusade, “Deus Vult,” meaning “God wills it.”)

Matthew 10:34 is not the only reference to taking up swords. There’s Jesus’ bizarre advice in Luke 22:36: “If you don’t have a sword, sell your cloak and buy one.” Not exactly worthy of a Nobel Peace Prize. Yet the pope, in his April 2 homily, quotes a discrepant verse from Matthew 26:52: “Put your sword back into its place, for all who take the sword will perish by the sword.”

Which verse do we follow? Obviously, whichever verse the quoter opportunistically cares to, because the massively contradictory bible can be used to theologically justify almost anything. As FFRF’s “The Born Again Skeptic Guide to the Bible” author Ruth Green observed, the danger in venerating a so-called holy book based on blind authority is that it is a “behavioral grab-bag.”

The New Testament verse most beloved of Christian nationalists and “spiritual warriors” is the frightening, primitive Ephesians 6:11: “Put on the whole armor of God, that you may be able to stand against the schemes of the devil.” Not exactly reason-based advice we would wish to adopt as official policy in the United States, Hegseth’s intentions notwithstanding.

Yet Hegseth, U.S. Ambassador to Israel Mike Huckabee and other “End Time” zealots find justification for Middle Eastern conflagrations as fulfillment of prophecy in the very same book the pope claims repudiates such a reading. Hegseth and the pope (officially deemed the “Vicar of Christ on Earth” by his church) share the same hubris in claiming to speak for Jesus and in Leo’s case, to even know whose prayers Jesus would answer. They are two sides of the same coin, hollowly arguing from religious authority, and claiming public policy must follow their interpretations of discrepant teachings.

The Apostle Paul commanded Christians to agree on all things (1 Corinthians 1:10). The fact that these two Peters (the so-called successor of Saint Peter and Peter Hegseth) cannot agree on how to interpret scripture proves that the bible is a worthless, dangerous guide to public policy and a threat to global ethics. Judicious decisions should be based on human morality, not on a baffling, bellicose Bronze Age book. Whenever anyone insists they know what their god wants, watch out!

While appreciative of anyone speaking out against Trump’s imprudent, harmful and risky war, I’ll pay more deference to Leo’s pronouncements of peace when he ends the Vatican’s global war on the right to safe and legal abortion, contraception, marriage equality and LGBTQ+ rights.

Physician heal thyself (Luke 4:23).

ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Annie Laurie Gaylor is co-president of the Freedom From Religion Foundation. She co-founded FFRF in 1976 as a college student with her mother Anne Nicol Gaylor. She served as the editor of FFRF’s newspaper, Freethought Today, from 1985-2009. She became FFRF co-president with Dan Barker in 2004. Annie Laurie has authored three books for FFRF: Woe to Women: The Bible Tells Me So; Betrayal of Trust: Clergy Abuse of Children; and Women Without Superstition: “No Gods – No Masters,” the first anthology of women freethinkers.

Disclaimer: The views in this column are of the author and do not necessarily reflect those of the Freedom From Religion Foundation.

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