Representative Democracy in Action

Back when the Arab Spring was just beginning to realize itself and Egypt was being thrown into chaos, I worried that the Coptic Christians would be caught in the crosshairs and that they might be tempted to respond in a way unfitting of the call we have received in Christ to take up a cross for his sake. Unfortunately but unsurprisingly, I was right on both counts. I also expressed a certain uncertainty about the intrinsic value of representative democracy when compared to authoritarian regimes. Undoubtedly, three decades under Mubarak did not see the Coptic church thrive in an open environment of religious freedom, but there is perhaps a bit of nostalgia for the times when the primary complaint was the inability to get government clearance to build new churches.

An Egyptian court convicted in absentia Wednesday seven Egyptian Coptic Christians and a Florida-based American pastor, sentencing them to death on charges linked to an anti-Islam film that had sparked riots in parts of the Muslim world...Egypt's official news agency said the court found the defendants guilty of harming national unity, insulting and publicly attacking Islam and spreading false information—charges that carry the death sentence.

Chances are that none of the defendants convicted of capital "spreading false information" will ever meet with justice at the hands of the Egyptian judicial system, which may explain why the story is buried in the middle of a religion in brief article. (Although I understand that Fox is making a big deal about it, undoubtedly for all the wrong reasons.) But if anyone thinks that the fact that these eight delinquents are safe means that this verdict is a paper tiger, they're deluding themselves. Pause for a moment and consider being a Copt in Egypt and learning that at any time the accusation of something as vague as spreading false information or harming national unity might carry with it a death penalty. It should unnerve every Christian to realize that by Muslim standards the very confession that Jesus Christ is the Son of God is both the ultimate falsehood and a direct assault against Islam.

Perhaps it won't be that direct, that obvious an abuse of the law and a persecution of Christians. Perhaps it is merely the construction of a culture of fear to keep Christians in their place in a society that is deeply inimical to them. Regardless, it would appear that the will of the people truly is being enshrined in their government, and it may be a government less willing to capitulate to the pressures of the pluralistic Christian West. My hope, however, continues to be less that the church will not be persecuted (the Great Physician did not come to treat the healthy) but that it will respond to whatever persecution may come with a meekness which deserves the inheritance reserved for it.

The Ethics of Sport Hunting

Deer season is upon us, and to commemorate it, a Michigan news outlet has posed the question to a variety of clerics: in what context is hunting morally permissible? Four panelists offer responses.

The Jewish respondent concludes from a review of Genesis and the Law that the killing of animals required extraordinary justification but that God Himself has given such a justification. The only question that remains is how to treat those animals who will be killed. "It is acceptable to kill animals, but it is not acceptable to be callous toward animal life." The response is a laudable beginning, but it leaves so much of the heart of the question unexplored. What constitutes callousness? Killing for the sake of killing? Or is it only killing in an "inhumane" way? The rabbi gives no satisfactory answers.

The Muslim respondent provides a richer, fuller picture of his religion's ethical stance on hunting and on the slaughter of animals more generally. The result, somewhat unexpectedly, is a decidedly palatable set of rules governing both the ethical treatment of animals intended for slaughter and a strict utilitarian boundary for when such slaughter is appropriate. "Killing is not for sport but only for sustenance." Yet, even while his regulations for slaughter are better explained and (for my part) better received, his justification for killing to begin with leaves much to be desired. He states, rather matter-of-factly, that animals are going to die anyway, so it makes no difference whether they die of old age or by human hands. Curiously, the same premise could be applied to humanity, but even with Islam's decidedly different stance on justifiable violence relative to Christianity, sure no Muslim would want to argue that humans are going to die anyway so it doesn't matter whether we let them die of old age or kill them for utilitarian purposes. At least I hope not.

Next, a reverend gives the traditional and decidedly unsophisticated view of Christians throughout history. God said we could kill animals. Society says we can kill animals. What's the problem. I mean, in some cases, not killing animals is like disobeying Jesus. That's no good. Alright...it's a paraphrase and a parody, but it nevertheless represents the essential message. There is no consideration of the importance of the creation account or the Law in determining the ethical stance of Christians toward animals. Not even a mention of the eschatological place of the natural world in the Christian scheme. A personal inclination matched with a proof text remains the surest Christian hermeneutic.

The same, unfortunately, proved true for the equally unsatisfying response from the Christian vegetarian. He makes the highly dubious claim that God allows animals to be killed only because it is a necessity and that, since it is no longer a necessity, there is no justification for continuing to kill them even for food. Of course, he offers no support for the argument that the permission to use animals for food and clothing is need based nor does he demonstrate that something has fundamentally changed to remove that need. (Incidentally, he also makes the easily falsifiable claim that eating meat is more efficient.) Most importantly of all, however, he seems to be woefully ignorant of the historical fact that meat has only recently begun to play a significant role in the human diet. Precisely because it is such a painstaking and inefficient means of ingesting calories, meat has been a luxury in most cultures throughout human history. Slaughtering an animal and eating it was a significant event reserved for feasts and sacred occasions, a fact typified in the rituals of both Judaism and Islam. The notion that you can eat meat at every meal is a relatively modern, primarily American innovation.

Disappointingly, with the exception of the Muslim, none of the respondents deal directly with the question of the ethics of sport hunting. More disappointing still is the facile responses of both Christians--leading me to believe that some lazy journalist probably just found four clerics who had nothing better to do that day than answer the phone. No one gets to the root of what sport hunting is or why it might be ethically problematic. Hunting, neither out of necessity nor even with any intent to make reasonably full use of the kill, is violence for violence sake, a behavior which is difficult to justify from the viewpoint of any of the three major religions. It is the agonistic modern analog to the gladiatorial arena, only instead of the helpless slave being thrown to the lion for the amusement of the masses it is the helpless herbivore which is turned over to the heavily armed and merciless hunter to end its life for his amusement.

Hunters who love the taste of venison, who eat whatever they kill and kill only what they will eat, are on ethically safe ground. In more omnivorous days gone by, I have even gladly shared in their spoils. But the point at which hunting is undertaken exclusively or even primarily for the thrill of killing and pride in the trophy, it becomes the exclusive province of lovers of violence, about whom God is quite clear.

In Other News

When I went to bed last night, Barack Obama was president, Republicans controlled the House of Representatives, and Democrats controlled the Senate. When I woke up this morning, Barack Obama was president, Republicans controlled the House of Representatives, and Democrats controlled the Senate. More than a year of persistent hue and cry, an anticlimax, and now, with any luck, a swift denouement. Meanwhile, to the disinterested surprise of Americans, the rest of the world has continued to turn while they beat their heads against a political brick wall.

Copts have just selected a new pope at one of the most critical junctures in modern Coptic history. The new leader, Pope Theodoros II, has rejected the political activism of his predecessor and is encouraging the church to follow his lead:

“The most important thing is for the church to go back and live consistently within the spiritual boundaries because this is its main work, spiritual work,” the bishop said, and he promised to begin a process of “rearranging the house from the inside” and “pushing new blood” after his installation later this month as Pope Tawadros II. Interviewed on Coptic television recently, he struck a new tone by including as his priorities “living with our brothers, the Muslims” and “the responsibility of preserving our shared life.”

“Integrating in the society is a fundamental scriptural Christian trait,” Bishop Tawadros said then. “This integration is a must — moderate constructive integration,” he added. “All of us, as Egyptians, have to participate.”

This seems to be fine by the ruling Muslim Brotherhood who have encouraged the new primate "to “support the Islamic Shariaa,” to “let go of the seculars”, and to “revoke the Church’s political role.”"

In other parts of the Muslim world, Christians are facing more direct challenges from the government. Christians in Malaysia are being "converted" to Islam without their consent on government roles simply because of their names.

Bumiputra Christians in Sabah continue to be “converted to Islam” by the National Registration Department (NRD) simply because they have “bin” and “binti” in their names. Sabah churches are seeking urgent solutions to the crisis but none seems to be in sight, Bob Teoh writes in My Sinchew.

The NRD has made it clear it would continue to list Bumiputera Christians in Sabah as Muslims as long as they are known by bin or binti. It would also not rectify past entry errors by way of changing the religion listing back to Christianity in the identity cards (MyKad) of those affected. The NRD would only act upon an order by a Syariah High Court to determine whether those Bumiputera Christians whom it had listed as Muslims are not Muslims indeed.

The implications of this are far ranging--not least because these "Muslims" are not legally allowed to marry the Christians in their own community--and the hurdles the government has thrown up to rectify the error are numerous. What makes this more serious than a minor bureaucratic foul-up, however, is that perennial problem of apostasy in Islam. There is no permissible way to cease to be a Muslim, a conundrum which has found itself institutionalized in the racial-religious identity cards of Malaysia.

The Church of the Holy Sepulchre, sitting on the supposed burial site of Jesus, is the site of yet more controversy, this time over the more mundane matter of an unpaid water bill. The hub for Christian pilgrimage insists that it has never paid water bills as part of an unstated agreement with the utility company. Hagihon, the water company, is no longer content to receive nothing for something and has frozen the church's assests until the $2.3 million in back bills is paid.

"We trust God and hope that people will help us," [the General Secretary of the Patriarchate, Archbishop of Constantina Aristarchos] said, adding that the Patriarchate has sent letters to Israeli President Shimon Peres and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

Tension in the Christian world comes home with still more revelations from the Orthodox Church in America. After much publicity and dutiful investigation, church officials have released their findings about the suspended bishop accused of sexual misconduct:

Text messages and emails sent by the bishop of the Orthodox Church in America’s Diocese of the Midwest did constitute sexual misconduct, according to a letter posted to the church’s website Sunday...

“I wish that I could convince all of you what I am certain of in my heart — that conscious motives behind my interaction with this woman were not impure,” [the accused bishop] Matthias wrote. “But, I know that only active, demonstrated repentance — confession of my sins, pursuit of the means of changing, and a resulting change in conduct — will be convincing.”

Unlike the Catholic stereotype of furtive reshuffling, the OCA has embraced a more public but no less Christian program of rehabilitation and penance. Matthias will ask forgiveness from the victim directly, be admitted to a residential therapeutic program, and submit to a “focused period of time under the guidance of a peer bishop to examine, articulate and provide concrete direction in managing the expectations and accompanying spiritual, emotional and interpersonal challenges of exercising the office of the bishop.”

And more besides. If only we had directed that one billion dollars to affecting actual change in the world. But, as always, where our treasure is indicates where our heart is. Money is always hard to find except when it comes to war and politics. If that doesn't indicate their affinity, perhaps nothing will.

In Other News

Lest we allow things to remain too lighthearted, it is important to remember that beyond the amusements of international interspecies intercourse or the remarkably more absurd character of American politics, there is real news going on which ought to affect all of us. For my part, I was troubled by the attack yesterday in Beirut, with its religious undercurrent hovering just below the surface. More disturbing still, however, is the revelation out of Kenya that Muslim groups appear to be converting Christians for the purpose of bombing churches:

Al Shabab, a militant Islamist group with ties to Al Qaeda, is no longer relying on its traditional base of Somali or Swahili Muslims. Instead, the group is recruiting a new multi-ethnic band of recruits, many of whom are former Christians, making it more difficult to identify would be attackers.

“It is the recent coverts who [are] being used to bomb churches. It is not members of the Somali, Boran, or Swahili communities, which have many Muslims, but the other tribes which have been known to follow Christianity, like the Luo, Kikuyu, or Luhya,” says Rev. Wellington Mutiso, the head of Evangelical Alliance of Kenya.

...Analysts say the problem originates with the chronic poverty that faces many young, well-educated, and talented Kenyans. Emmanuel Kisiangani, a senior researcher with the Institute for Security Studies (ISS) in Nairobi, says that poor Kenyan youth are being lured into Al Shabab because of the promise of an income...

Enabling Kenyan youth to deal with poverty, “uprootedness,” and youth disfranchisement could help keep them from turning to extremism, says Nyabera. He says if Christian churches practiced what they preached a bit more, that would also help.

This final observation bears consideration.

Rethinking the Turks and Recommending Casale

Giancarlo Casale’s recent work, The Ottoman Age of Exploration, is an innovative attempt to rewrite not only Ottoman history but also the broader understanding of the Age of Exploration, what constituted it and who its participants were. Taking the sixteenth century as his subject, Casale explores Ottoman activities in the Indian Ocean, drawing compelling parallels between the way Ottomans conceived of and executed this unprecedented expansion and the way historians traditionally conceive of the European histories of early exploration. Ultimately, Casale asks the question “Did the Ottomans participate in the Age of Exploration?” and answers boldly that they did.

Proceeding chronologically, Casale begins with what he considers to be the inaugural event in the Ottoman Age of Exploration, the conquest of Egypt by Selim the Grim, whom Casale creatively renames Selim the Navigator in a nod to his European counterparts. From there, Casale inducts the reader into a fascinating story of intellectual awakening, world war, political infighting, the construction of a worldwide “soft empire,” and the loosing of an army of merchants into the Indian Ocean. Casale makes the most of already compelling subject matter, colorfully populating this world with sultans, queens, scholars, pirates, cannibals, spies, and at least one morbidly obese octogenarian admiral apparently too ugly and pugnacious to be omitted.

Casale’s decision to rename Selim the Grim and to title his inaugural chapter “Selim the Navigator” is but the opening salvo in an unrelenting effort to unseat entrenched notions about Ottoman history, an effort which proves immensely fruitful. Casale, in clearing initial objections to an Ottoman Age of Exploration, discards the traditional question “Why didn’t the Ottomans explore the Americas” and asks instead “Why should they?” Pointing out that the Europeans only undertook New World exploration in an attempt to access the Indies, Casale legitimatizes Ottoman apathy about the Americas. After all, with Egypt conquered, they had access to the most direct route between the Mediterranean and India. Similarly, Casale goes on to directly challenge notions of the Ottomans as an exclusively land-based empire, of presumed state disinterest in sponsoring commercial activity, of extra-regional politics as an exclusively European concern, and of Islamic nations as intellectually indistinct and interchangeable. The result is a startlingly fresh picture of the Ottoman Empire as a Mediterranean state much like any other, one which realized he tremendous political and economic advantages of control in the Indian Ocean and worked out the means of achieving that control in ways not entirely unfamiliar to the student of European exploration.

Throughout the narrative, Casale attempts to highlight four key themes which he considers to be both commonly agreed upon as characteristic of the Age of Exploration for European powers and particularly relevant to the characteristics of the Ottoman participation in this period. He first notes the relative conceptual and geographical isolation of explorers prior to their initial voyages of discovery. With the onset of these voyages, Casale then notes the development of a new political ideology in the exploring nation that offers a new conception of sovereignty. For the actualization of this new ideology, he points to the importance of new technologies particularly military and transportation technologies. Finally, Casale sees during the Age of Exploration an expansion of intellectual activity facilitated by new information streaming in from abroad.

As Casale weaves these themes into his narrative, not all appear equally convincing. Certainly, the author proves near definitively that the Ottomans were no more connected to the Indian Ocean than their European counterparts prior to the conquest of Egypt and offers a withering indictment of those who baselessly attempt to collapse the Turkish worldview into the Arabic based simply on a common religion. In the same way, Casale gives an impressive catalogue of new and forward thinking texts—travel narratives, geographies, histories, and maps—produced by the Ottomans, most written and disseminated in spite of the absence of a printing press.

On the other hand, the development of a new political ideology and the employment of new technology present less straightforward pictures. The place of advanced weaponry has a direct parallel to European history, particularly as a commodity for export and as a tool for necessary cementing overseas relationships, but Casale admits that the Ottomans did not make the transition to large sailing vessels that Europeans did. Instead he proposes that they adapted traditional technologies to new uses, but these adaptations seem less novel than Casale would have the reader believe, consisting largely of exploiting the traditional advantages of shallow-bottomed, oared ships: the ability to travel into the wind and escape into shallow waters. Similarly, the suggestion that the “Universal Caliphate” and its ideology of extra-political sovereignty represented something new is belied by Casale’s regular reference to the longstanding Islamic conception of umma. This invites questions about whether what was actually new was the political ideology or the Ottomans ability to actualize it on a global scale.

These and other problems arise in part from Casale’s decision to structure his work as a chronological narrative, specifically rejecting the notion that it might be comparative. While this undoubtedly enhances the readability of the work and lays the necessary historical groundwork for later studies, it leaves the reader with a host of unanswered questions. What are the essential features, as distinct from the incidental manifestations that characterize the Age of Exploration? Why did Ottoman notions of control and empire differ so dramatically from the Portuguese? The questions could be multiplied and, perhaps, could have been addressed had the author elected to structure the book as a comparative study or, at the very least, used the four themes rather than time as the primary organizing principle.

Nevertheless, these questions are as much a testament to the work’s heuristic value as to any structural defect. In The Ottoman Age of Exploration, Casale invites the historian and the reader into a reconceived world of the sixteenth century Indian Ocean, one which has been methodically researched and persuasively reconstructed. The result is thoroughly compelling work which challenges the traditional thinking of historians and will hopefully usher in a new paradigm for investigating both the Ottomans and the broader Age of Exploration. A riveting collection of true stories that would put Hollywood epics to shame, this extremely accessible book has my unqualified recommendation for even the general public.

The Wisdom of Mark Noll

I had some familiarity with the first edition of Religion and American Politics, a volume of essays edited and introduced by Mark Noll. I enjoyed the apology for the continued scholarly interest in the interplay between American religious and political life. Yet, as Noll points out in his introduction to the second edition, such an apology has become unnecessary in the years since the book's initial publication. Americans are not thoroughly aware of the substantial, if not dominant, role of religion in American politics. In an effort to reorient the book, Noll suggests that a new argument must be made to the American people:

[Contemporary Americans need] to incorporate a little bit of historical distance when tempted to extremes of approbation, condemnation, or bewilderment in the face of current events. The religious-political agitations of the recent past are, in fact, far from novel. Beginning with the Civil Rights movement of the 1950s and 1960s and going on to the rise of politically conservative evangelical Protestantism, American politics has returned to the normative situation that prevailed for most of American history...

Against the fuller sweep of American history, the political-religious interactions of the last few decades represent no new thing. From arguments over religious freedom during the Constitutional Convention and antebellum sectional division accompanied by learned public debates from Scripture about the morality of slavery, through religion-infused experiences on the home front and with armies during the Civil War, and imposition of racial segregation after the end of Reconstruction, the rise of populism, the national campaign for prohibition, and the arguments used for entrance into World War I (and against entering that war), to the presidential election of 1928, when the Catholic faith of Democratic candidate Al Smith loomed large, religion was an ever-present if also constantly evolving fixture in American politics.

Attention to this wider history shows, for instance, that religious vitriol was spread around more widely during the Thomas Jefferson-John Adams presidential race of 1800 than with Bush versus Kerry in 2004; that public debate over the morality of slavery reached a depth of intensity beyond what has been experienced in debates over, first, African-American civil rights and then abortion and gay marriage; and that Jews and Catholics experienced levels of discrimination into the twentieth century that far exceed discrimination against Muslims that has been documented for the early twenty-first century.

Noll's purpose is obviously not to trivialize the seriousness of modern religiously infused debates, particularly not, for example, civil rights or religious discrimination. His is simply a plea to contextualize these discussions historically and to resist the urge to particularize the modern mindset. Americans are, unfortunately and by no means uniquely, a people who delight in bringing their religion to bear on statecraft.

Religious Freedom, American Style

Here is a wonderful example of American religious freedom in action, in ways which don't center on ancillary disputes with theoretical Christians fringes and which present a direct and powerful contrast between the way Americans and Europeans treat the "eccentricities" of religious minorities:

California employers face new restrictions against shunting Sikh and Muslim workers out of public view for wearing turbans, beards and hijabs, under a bill signed Saturday by Gov. Jerry Brown.

The measure could affect workplaces from Disneyland to San Quentin Prison.

"This bill, AB 1964, makes it very clear that wearing any type of religious clothing or hairstyle, particularly such as Sikhs do … is protected by law and nobody can discriminate against you because of that," Brown told some 400 Sikhs and supporters at a rally of the North American Punjabi Assn. on the steps of the Capitol. Brown also signed SB 1540, which requires the state Board of Education to consider a new history framework for schools that the governor said will include "the role and contributions of the Sikh community in California."

Unfortunately, California has also proved its ongoing and incomprehensible commitment to reduce the history classroom to an instrument for producing political capital.

Nigeria: Problems and Solutions

Government officials are also servants of God aren't they? Well, they should be. Because in this modern world, they hold the key to making life a bit more enjoyable for God's people. They share budgets, they are the ones who have seized the public space.

So begins Tope Fasau's plea for state solutions to the ongoing religious strife in Nigeria. As the title of his article, not to mention his opening salvo, suggests, Fasau's solutions revolve around the need for the government to more fully regulate the religious experience in Nigeria. He calls for all religious groups to be forcibly registered with the state. He suggests that they should be understood, for political purposes, as charities and evaluated on the basis of how charitable their distribution of funds is. He wants all ministers to be on set salaries, subject to audit by the national government. He believes the government should outlaw the use of incendiary rhetoric in the public sphere, removing posters that show ministers in camo or using "crusade" language. He even wants to eliminate certain forms of public preaching in an effort to reduce "the angst in people."

For Americans, most if not all of this suggestions will seem repugnant. As we continue to be embroiled by our own apparently critical religious "conflicts," the possibility that the state might force all religious societies to register, might abridge their ability to express their beliefs when, how, and where they want, and might take a very direct and invasive interest in how their money is spent is unthinkable. It would be shocking if Fasau's suggestions carried much more currency with the native populations he is hoping to sway. Certainly, one cannot expect Boko Haram or its substantial constituency to submit to these kinds of measures, not in the midst of their own very violent, very public crusade. Nigerian Christians, in all likelihood, will be equally unwilling to throw open their doors for a government to "regulate" them who has thus far proved incapable even of protecting them. To all of these objections, I add my own negative evaluation of Fasau's logic.

Most people see their government officials - president, governors, local government chairmens, councilors - more than they see their pastors or Imams. So, we ought to redefine the linkage between God and man, and that linkage should necessarily include our government officials. Perhaps that will scare them into doing the right thing. For as it is, many of them profess God, but act as if they think God is dead.

It is hard to be too dismissive of this reasoning if only because it has dominated Christian thinking in the post-Constantinian West and Islam throughout it history. At the same time, it is impossible not to highlight the total and incontrovertible failure of this kind of thinking. In both Islam and Christianity, the more definitively the government has functioned as a "linkage" between God and humanity, the more we all have cause to make apologies for the excesses of our faithful leaders. A beloved history professor from my undergraduate days imparted to me this wisdom, shared here before, "When the church and the state get into bed together, it is the church who plays the whore." The force of this aphorism lies in its simplicity and obvious truth, a truth which has played out at every level of history to the great detriment of human society everywhere.

For Fasau's argument, the same logic might be expressed differently: when the church and state are merged, it is the church who has cause to fear. Fasau wants religious believers to apply pressure on their leaders to "do the right thing" by appeals to their place as a link between God and man. Yet, this very linkage has been the means through which the state has oppressed people throughout history. The analogy between "pastors or imams" and "presidents and governors" ought to frighten more than it inspires, as it extends the reach of the state beyond merely the body into the very soul of the believer.

What's more, far from being a perversion of what he wants, such an extension and potential oppression accord exactly with what Fasau is proposing. The pressure to "do the right thing" has as its ideal result a crackdown on the uninhibited expression of religion. "Extreme" manifestations of religion, to be sure, but a crackdown nonetheless. It is precisely so that religious groups will begin to fear the state that Fasau wants Christians and Muslims to join together to invest sacred significance in the work of government officials. I believe that Christians everywhere and faithful Muslims with them want to see an end to Boko Haram. It is equally clear, and forcefully stated, that faithful Christians and Muslims everywhere want no more retaliatory violence from Christians. But even Fasau cannot leave the implications of his argument implicit, looking forward to a time when the government will "curb the noise pollution caused by Mosques and Churches" by doing away with the public morning call to prayer and Christian midnight vigils.

Boko Haram is extreme. Christian retaliation is extreme. Inconveniently timed prayers are extreme? Christians and Muslims should be careful to remember that, in the ideal world of theory, states exist for their citizens. In the gritty world of reality, they exist for self-propagation. In either case, their quest is for stability not truth, their defense is of borders not of "rights," and they are guardians of wealth not of faith. Fasau may be right, and they may "hold the key to making life a bit more enjoyable for God's people." But I suspect even Nigerian Muslims and Christians can come together and agree that, for God's people, there are higher priorities at stake.

The Church in Nigeria "Strikes" Back

We have been following very closely the religious strife in Nigeria. (N.B., this is real religious strife, not "Obama is making me give condoms to nuns" or "My coach made me eat a pre-game meal in a church.") Initially, there were reports of retaliatory violence on the part of Christians in response to frequent, lethal assaults by Boko Haram. Thank God, the Christian Association of Nigeria has issued the following statement:

We will not encourage our people to carry arms against anybody whatsoever the situation may be. For those that are behind Boko Haram, you come to us with AK47, bombs, charms and other dangerous weapons, but we come to you in the name of God.

I want to assure Christians in Nigeria that Christ has always been with his people. He will never give victory to those persecuting Christians and the Church. Whoever is trying to exterminate Christians and Christianity from Nigeria is neither pleasing God nor his people.

The Great Foreskin Debate Continues

I honestly felt remiss in delaying so long sharing this, because I noticed it right when it happened. The German government, clearly responding directly to pressure from me personally, responded to the court ruling made several weeks ago now which declared religious circumcision illegal:

Germany's foreign minister on Sunday offered assurances that Germany protects religious traditions after a court ruled that circumcising young boys on religious grounds amounts to bodily harm even if parents consent...

Foreign Minister Guido Westerwelle said that a legal debate "must not lead to doubts arising internationally about religious tolerance in Germany."

"The free exercise of religion is protected in Germany. That includes religious traditions," Westerwelle said in a statement. "All our partners in the world should know that."

That's good to hear, Guido, but even weeks later, it would appear that many are unsatisfied with these kinds of toothless assurances. So frightening is the stance of the German government--apparently, just one of many European abridgments of religious freedoms--that the Germans have driven together Jews and Muslims for a common purpose:

In a joint statement from Brussels earlier this week, a group of rabbis, imams and others said that they consider the ruling against circumcision ‘‘an affront on our basic religious and human rights.’’

...The German ambassador to Israel told lawmakers in Jerusalem on Monday that the government was looking into whether laws needed to be changed.

‘‘For us the deadline is not tomorrow, but yesterday,’’ Goldschmidt said of possible changes to the law. In the meantime, however, ‘‘we say to the Jewish community ... keep performing the brit milah, and have no fear.’’

Unfortunately, it may be difficult for the Jewish community to heed this call, since "the president of the German Medical Association this week recommended that doctors cease performing circumcisions for religious reasons until the law can be clarified."

Holy Uncircumcised Penises, Batman!

Germany has become the first country (to my knowledge) to outlaw religious circumcision. While many countries have made cosmetic circumcision of children illegal, a court in Germany now says that religion is no longer a valid excuse:

Circumcising young boys on religious grounds amounts to grievous bodily harm, a German court ruled Tuesday in a landmark decision that the Jewish community said trampled on parents' religious rights.

The regional court in Cologne, western Germany, ruled that the "fundamental right of the child to bodily integrity outweighed the fundamental rights of the parents", a judgement that is expected to set a legal precedent.

"The religious freedom of the parents and their right to educate their child would not be unacceptably compromised, if they were obliged to wait until the child could himself decide to be circumcised," the court added.

The fact that roughly one in every three males born into the world is circumcised in a practice which has been carried out continuously since the dawn of recorded history didn't seem to bother the German judiciary. After all, we are entering a brave new world, one that can put behind it the ways of life in the backwoods parts of the world where circumcision is still prevalent: Africa, the Middle East, Southeast Asia, Israel, Canada, the United States, and Australia. Thankfully, we have Germany to lead the way, standing on the cutting edge of oppressing Jews for nearly a century now. (I'm sorry. It was just too easy.)

This, it would appear, is what societies get when law and ethics become reducible to questions of conflicting theoretical rights. Being neither a Muslim nor a Jew and living in a country which permits circumcision with broad latitude, I don't really have a dog in this fight, except for my ideological consternation when I see courts ruling in favor of self-determination for infants. Because a baby has a right to a foreskin, a right which supersedes a mandate from G-d or Allah. That works if you're a secular court in Germany because you can touch a foreskin and you can't touch God, but that logic won't fly with the billions of unenlightened people in the world who think that the commands of their respective deities hold real weight.

The idea of self-determination for infants is, pragmatically, nonsensical. We recognize that infants require guidance and support in every area of life but at the same time pretend that parents ought to be raising them in a political, ideological, and religious void. Says the court: "The body of the child is irreparably and permanently changed by a circumcision. This change contravenes the interests of the child to decide later on his religious beliefs." Ignore for a moment the fact that the absence of a foreskin does not actually prevent little Fritz von Spielberg from growing up to be good secular humanist like every other European millennial and imagine what this self-deluded ideology of neutral child-rearing and apotheosis of choice looks like in practice. In the words of Stephen Prothero, "This is foolhardy, not unlike saying that you will not read anything to your daughter because you don’t want to enslave her to any one language."

It is the right, or more precisely the duty, of every parent to raise each child in the way the parent believes is best for its health and safety temporal and eternal. Democrats can raise little Democrats. Republicans can raise little Republicans. Sooner fans can raise little Sooner fans, and the children of Longhorn fans will continue to thumb their noses at them every fall at the state fair. More importantly, Christians can raise little Christians and would be rather perturbed to find a court somewhere ruling that baptism prior to eighteen "contravenes the interests of the child to decide later on his religious beliefs."

And Jews and Muslims ought to be able to raise their children up in the way they should go. That includes performing the defining and foundational right, at least in Judaism, on their children. Unfortunately, the Germans don't seem to agree, and who better than the German courts to decide for Jews and Muslims what unacceptably compromises their religious beliefs.

Meanwhile, in Africa

There have been plenty of well-documented reasons to temper global enthusiasm about the Arab Spring, and the precarious state of the Egyptian church is high among them. Now, with a recently resigned member of the Muslim Brotherhood as Egypt's first freely elected president in modern history, Coptic Christians react:

"Between ourselves (as Christians) we say we are for (Morsi's opponent Ahmed) Shafiq, but we cannot mention this publicly," said Father Yu'annis, a priest of the Coptic Orthodox Church in Upper Egypt. "But as a church we say — and believe — that we will accept who God gives us and work for the good of Egypt. Many people are afraid now and are thinking of emigrating. But Egypt is a country of rumors, and if not for these we would all be fine."

Meanwhile, the religious strife in Nigeria only seems to be getting worse, with whole states going into lockdown and Christians staying locked safely in their homes on Sunday mornings.

Worried by the threat by Boko Haram to make June the bloodiest in the history of its attacks, most Christians Sunday stayed away from churches in the Northern parts of the country, especially in Kaduna, Kano, Jos and many other cities.

In recent weeks, Christians have been serially attacked in their churches during worship services by the Islamic insurgents, Boko Haram. In Kaduna State, for instance, three churches-two in Kaduna and one in Zaria - were bombed penultimate Sunday, resulting in the death of 92 people in the tit-for-tat reprisals between Muslims and Christians, a situation that has resulted in a lockdown in the state. Prior to the Kaduna suicide bombings, churches in Bauchi and Jos were attacked for two consecutive Sundays in a row.

In several churches in Abuja yesterday, worshippers were few and visibly jittery owing to the threat by Boko Haram to start a religious conflagration.

Anthonia Eke, who spoke to Reuters, said she is trusting God to end an Islamist insurgency in Northern Nigeria but won't be praying in church any more, after a string of bombs at Sunday services. "We are still traumatised over the attacks and have no intention to attend church service until total peace and normalcy are restored," Eke said in Kano. "God understands our situation here so we have decided to pray at home. Only he can end this pain."

In case you weren't paying attention yet...

The bombing by a Muslim faction in Nigeria of a church not long ago was overshadowed, understandably, by the disastrous plane crash in Lagos. Unfortunately, the plane crash was an isolated accident. The anti-Christian violence in Nigeria continues:

It was another bloody Sunday yesterday. No fewer than seven persons died — many were injured — in attacks on two churches during service...

In Jos, the Plateau State capital, yesterday’s suicide attack was the third on worshippers since January.

The second attack was at the Church of the Brethren in Nigeria in Biu, 180 kilometres to Maiduguri, the Borno State capital...

Over 50 worshippers have been killed in the three attacks on churches so far.

Source said the original target of the suicide bombers was ECWA Church located about 50 meters away from CCCG, but there was a security check point before their target. The bombers diverted the explosives to the CCCG Church. The explosives, apparently, was timed.

The church building came down on about 200 worshippers.

The Nation article reports that no one had yet taken responsibility for the bombings, but later reports have attributed these once again to the terrorist Muslim group Boko Haram. The most disturbing part, as far as I'm concerned, is the response of certain Christian youths who met violence with violence by assaulting a group of Muslims. Among other things, the church in Nigeria needs prayers for resolve to meet persecution in the spirit of Christian love.

The Lord's Church in Nigeria

Though overshadowed, perhaps rightly, by the considerably more lethal plane crash, Christians should also be aware that on the same Sunday a suicide bomber attacked a church in the Nigerian city of Bauchi resulting in the death of twenty of the congregants and the injury of forty five others. Nigeria is a Christian majority nation, though only just with Muslims making up most of the remainder of the population. In the North, where Bauchi is located, the population is almost exclusively Muslim, and Boko Haram--the Islamic group responsible for the Christmas Day bombings in Nigeria--have claimed responsibility for the bombing. There were, allegedly, three other assaults planned for the same day, but they were intercepted.

Perhaps more disturbing than the attack itself is the accusation by the local chapter of the Christian Association of Nigeria that not all of the deaths were the direct result of the explosion:

At a press conference in Bauchi, the state’s chairman of CAN, Rev. Lawi Pokti, alleged: “Twenty Christians and a Muslim have been confirmed dead. Twelve died from the bomb blast while eight were shot dead by the military personnel drafted to the scene to maintain law and order.”

Pokti, accompanied by CAN executives, condemned the bombing and described it as evil, dastardly and satanic.

According to him, “though CAN appreciates the state government’s efforts in responding quickly to the attack and attending to the injured victims by taking them to hospital, we condemn in strong terms the extra-judicial killing and injuring of the unarmed and aggrieved relations of the victims of the bomb blast.”

He added: “Women and children have sustained various degrees of injuries from the military bullets. As far as the civilised world is concerned, we see this as an extra judicial killing.”

Officials are denying any involvement in any of the injuries, going so far as to say, "no soldier or policeman fired at any person," but the nature of the relationship between separatist Islamic groups and the government of northern states at least makes the CAN's accusation possible if never conclusively demonstrable. Regardless, it is important that Christians worldwide, but particularly in the West where complacency is so easy a temptation, remain mindful of the ongoing suffering of the Lord's church throughout the world and lend our eager and familiar support to them in whatever ways we can.

Who Owns Jerusalem, Historically?

I believe very strongly that the artificial drawing of new national lines by benignly disinterested world powers is idiotic. A popular form of postbellum recreation for Western countries during the colonial period on through the early twentieth century, the foolhardy attempt to make new countries has led to countless wars in Europe, Africa, the Middle East, and Asia. Of all the manifest stupidity that has been splattered across the pages of history, there has been no more boneheaded move on the part of the wise world rulers than the creation of an independent Israel in 1948. Recognizing this is, of course, not the same as suggesting that the state of Israel, now in existence, should be as blithely destroyed or that the Palestinian people have a right to any or all of the land that was given to the Jews after World War II. It is, primarily, a historical observation, a looking back into time and performing the academic equivalent of a facepalm in view of our forefathers shortsightedness and naivete.

Unfortunately, however, the ability of so many to distinguish between historical and political realities has apparently been stunted by decades of war and rhetoric that grasps hopelessly at historical straws to justify political actions. Consider this passing, and thoroughly unnecessary, aside in Seyyed Hossein Nasr's brief introduction to (and apology for) Islamic civilization, Islam:

But [Arabs] remain of central importance in the ​ummah​ because of their historical role in the Islamic world...and the significance for all Muslims of the sacred sites of Islam that lie within the Arab world, especially Saudi Arabia, and old Jerusalem, which was historically in Palestine but has been occupied by Israel since 1967.

Subtle, Nasr. Not to mention irrelevant to your point, which was, ostensibly, to explain the ongoing significance of the Middle East and Arabs to the global Muslim community. Most unfortunate of all, however, when evaluating a work of supposed history, is the ease with which Nasr states as a matter of incontestable fact that "historically" Jerusalem has been in Palestine. Perhaps in the primary sense of the term Palestine prior to 1988 as a geographical determination, Jerusalem has always been in Palestine and, of course, still is. As for who has controlled Jerusalem, I would hope that Nasr--as with every thoughtful intelligent person with access to Wikipedia--would realize that if anyone can ever be said to have owned it, then just about everyone can be said to have owned it. So, in the interest of injecting some much needed history in to the question of who "historically" Jerusalem belonged to, let's construct a timeline beginning with David, the first Israelite who "occupied" the city:

• ca. 1000 BC - David seizes Jerusalem
• 586 BC - After more than four centuries of Israelite occupation, Jerusalem falls into the hands of the Babylonians
• 539 BC - Cyrus the Great and his Medo-Persians take control of all Babylonian holdings, soon after allowing the exiled Israelites to repatriate and be ruled, alternatively, by Israelite governors and Israelite theocrats
• 332 BC - Alexander conquers and the region is held by his Ptolemaic successors
• 198 BC - The rival Hellenistic Seleucids take control of the region
• 167 BC - The Israelites resume autonomous control after the Maccabean Revolt
• 63 BC - Pompey captures Jerusalem for Rome
• AD 614-629 - Jerusalem is briefly in the hands of the Sassanid Persians before returning to the Romans (now known to history as Byzantines)
• AD 637 - Jerusalem is captured by the Rashidun Caliphate, representing the first time in more than one thousand years that Jerusalem was under the control of non-Jewish Semites (e.g. Arabs)
• AD 1099 - The First Crusade results in the establishment of the Kingdom of Jerusalem
• AD 1187 - Saladin takes Jerusalem back for the Ayyubids
• AD 1229 - Frederick II treats to return control of most of Jerusalem to the Kingdom of Jerusalem
• AD 1244 - Mercenary Turkic Khwarezmians take Jerusalem and raze it to near total destruction
• AD 1247 - The Ayyubids resume control of Jerusalem
• AD 1250 - The Mamluks overthrow the Ayyubids, thus inheriting Jerusalem
• AD 1517 - The Ottomon Turks take control
• AD 1917 - The British win control of Jerusalem as part of World War I and are entrusted with its care
• AD 1948 - The State of Israel declares independence and begins the process of occupying of Jerusalem

Was that easy enough to follow? If not, realize that the above is the condensed and sanitized version. It omits the centuries of infighting between various Arab states, a number of momentarily successful Jewish revolts, the constant battling between Persian and Egyptian Muslim groups, and so on. The result ought to be a humble refusal to say that anyone has a legitimate historical claim to Jerusalem. The Jews are in the wonderful position, historically, of being the first and last group to hold it (unless there are some Jebusites who protest), but that reality is historically incidental. If people really want to give Jerusalem back to its previous owner, then pass it back to the British. After all, they won it fair and square the way territorial lines used to be drawn. Of course, the problem there is that the British don't want it. We could go back another generation and give it to the Turks, ethnically and geographically distinct from the Palestinians with their "historical" claim to the territory, who ruled it before the British in the form of Ottomans and Mamluks. Of course, Turkey has enough problems of it's own without adopting Levantine ones. One of those problems happens to be a restless Kurdish population. Turkey might consider signing over their rights to Jerusalem to the Kurds who ruled it before the Turks did in the form of the Ayyubid Caliphate.

In truth, a historical evaluation of who has ruled Jerusalem throughout its history shows both Jews and Arabs (which most modern, self-identifying Palestinians are) are both in the ethnic minorities. Turks, Persians, Greeks, and Romans occupied it with at least equal frequency. In fact, in the above timeline, Jews and Arabs each have only about four centuries each in the form of the Davidic and Rashidun dynasties respectively. If either party wants to make a historical argument on the grounds of frequency of occupation or proximity to the present, they will find other groups with stronger cases based on the offered criteria.

What's truly important to remember, however, is that deciding national lines on the basis of historical arguments is a modern novelty, not to mention a modern fantasy. It's lucky for Americans that people who owned our land one thousand years ago (which was the last time an Arab empire ruled over Jerusalem) can't just demand to have it back. For millennia, borders have been determined in the same bloody way. It's awful, it's immoral, but it's effective. Moreover, it is precisely what we are seeing played out in the modern Israeli-Palestinian conflict. UN resolutions and negotiated borders cave under the tantalizing prospect of land won a the expense of life. What will ultimately decided the conflict--if we can pretend, after seeing the above timeline, that the conflict will ever be ultimately resolved this side of the eschaton--will be who ends up with the biggest guns in the best positions when everyone gets bored of fighting. War and politics are a nasty business (perhaps the same nasty business variously named). Let's try not to sully the noble discipline of history by impressing it into their service armed conflict.

Pray for the Church in Syria

Making all the necessary allowances for skepticism considering the source, there are ongoing reports from Syria that the anti-government revolutionaries are taking every opportunity to seize property from and execute Syrian Christians. At the very least, this sort of behavior is consistent with the general trend in the much lauded march toward free and democratic societies in the Middle East.

Armed Islamist rebel groups in Syria supported by the Obama administration and Western governments seeking to oust “President” Bashir al-Assad are engaged in “ethnic cleansing” of Christians, according to news reports and human rights organizations. And as the conflict escalates, the persecution of the once-protected Christian minority is growing as well.

The Syrian Orthodox Church, which represents over half of Syrian Christians, issued a statement saying revolutionary fighters had expelled some 50,000 Christians from the embattled city of Homs. That figure is estimated to account for about 90 percent of the Christian community there. Hundreds more — including women and children — were slaughtered, according to charitable organizations operating in the area.

The Orthodox Church referred to the persecution as the "ongoing ethnic cleansing of Christians" by Muslim militants linked to al Qaeda. According to its report, the so-called “Brigade Faruq” is largely to blame, with Islamic extremists going door to door and forcing followers of Christ to leave without even collecting their belongings. Their property is then stolen by rebels as "war-booty from the Christians."

...

"Christians are being forced to flee the city to the safety of government-controlled areas,” noted a spokesman for the Christian relief agency Barnabas Fund, which reported that over 200 Christians had been murdered by insurgents. “Muslim rebel fighters and their families are taking over their homes."

Invade Iran (et al) for Christ!

When will the West act against persecution of Christians in the Middle East? That is the question posed in a recent Fox News article. The specific catalyst for the call to arms is the impending execution of Youcef Nadarkhani for his failure "to renounce his Christian beliefs and recognize the prophet Mohammed as God’s messenger." Through the course of the article, however, the writer rattles off a laundry list of Muslim offenses against Christianity: attacks on Coptic Christians in Egypt and their subsequent mass exodus, the targeting of Lebanese Christians by Syrians, not to mention the targeting of Syrian Christians by Syrians, the abuse of Christians in Saudi Arabia, Christians living in peril in the Gaza strip, and the hordes of Christian refugees that have come out of Iraq. The author seems to be peculiarly focused on the Middle East, apparently unconcerned by Muslim persecution of Christians in southeast Asia (for example) or state persecution of them in China. Nevertheless, the problem is real and one that warrants appropriate Christian attention.

Yet, if the question is when will the West "exert their muscle to help them," I hope the answer is never. Why should they? After all, the governments of the US and Europe are not Christian governments. The very fact that they would be enticed to display their coercive powers to end persecution is a testament to that. There is a fairly clear image in the Scriptures and throughout Christian history about how Christians respond to persecution. Stephen, James, Peter, Paul, Polycarp, Justin, Perpetua, Felicitas, and so many more all provide stories of heroism in the face of state or religious tyranny that have a distinctly Christian flavor. They all draw their inspiration, curiously enough, from a prototypical martyr: Christ. His declaration from the cross was not "when will someone have the courage to stand up on my behalf" but "Father, forgive them for they know not what they do." His vision of the Christian community was never "they will fight for my life" but, in direct contradiction to this, "they do not fight, because my kingdom is not of this world." And the proposition that "Christian nations" might withdraw humanitarian aid from countries who persecute Christians seems strangely at odds with the command "love your enemy and pray for those who persecute you."

There was a time when we realized that "the blood of the martyrs is the seed of the church." Centuries of sloth and spiritual atrophy have caused us to begin to labor under the delusion that all people should and do have the right to the free exercise of religion. It's a nice vision of the world, but it is nonetheless a fantasy. It is time to regain something of the courage of Tertullian, so that we can once again declare that "you can't just exterminate us; the more you kill the more we are" (though my preference has always been for Justin Martyr's phrasing, "You can kill us, but you can't hurt us"). We should take up the morbid jeer of Polycarp, "Death to the atheists" (with all it's ironic, near suicidal resignation). Most of all though, we need to remember that Paul taught us that if our enemy is hungry we should feed him, if he is thirsty we should give him something to drink. Finally, we must always cling to what Peter told his suffering flock: the appropriate response to persecution is neither muscle flexing nor victimization but triumph. "For to this you have been called, because Christ also suffered for you, leaving you an example, so that you might follow in his steps. He committed no sin, neither was deceit found in his mouth. When he was reviled, he did not revile in return; when he suffered, he did not threaten, but continued entrusting himself to him who judges justly."

Christ's Church in Nigeria

In case you have not already heard, while most of the world was celebrating Christ's birth (or Santa's materialistic bacchanalia), Christians in Nigeria were being slaughtered by an Islamic organization attempting to establish an Islamic theocracy. Some three dozen were killed and many more injured in coordinated attacks. This is the second time in as many years when Christians have been targeted while celebrating the Nativity. While Muslims worldwide have condemned the attacks and insisted the attackers are not "true Muslims," Boko Haram, the responsible group, has proudly taken credit for the murders:

After the bombings, a Boko Haram spokesman using the nom de guerre Abul-Qaqa claimed responsibility for the attacks in an interview with The Daily Trust, the newspaper of record across Nigeria's Muslim north. The sect has used the newspaper in the past to communicate with public.

"There will never be peace until our demands are met," the newspaper quoted the spokesman as saying. "We want all our brothers who have been incarcerated to be released; we want full implementation of the Sharia system and we want democracy and the constitution to be suspended."

Boko Haram has carried out increasingly sophisticated and bloody attacks in its campaign to implement strict Shariah law across Nigeria. The group, whose name means "Western education is sacrilege" in the local Hausa language, is responsible for at least 504 killings this year alone, according to an Associated Press count.

Last year, a series of Christmas Eve bombings in Jos claimed by the militants left at least 32 dead and 74 wounded. The group also claimed responsibility for the Aug. 26 bombing of the United Nations headquarters in Nigeria's capital Abuja that killed 24 people and wounded 116 others.

In other news, analogous incidents of coordinated Christian bombings of mosques appear to be non-existent.

On Christ and Jain

Jain has always fascinated me, no doubt in large part because of the peculiar intensity with which its practitioners pursue its principles. Islam, for example, has won my admiration for the popular level of its devotion. While in Christianity, we must constantly hear sermons about the value of daily prayer, the Muslim knows instinctively to pray no less than five times a day. Jain takes this kind of meticulous devotion to another level, with serious practitioners being so committed to total non-violence that they wear masks to keep from inhaling tiny organisms and sweep the ground in front of them wherever they go in order to brush aside unsuspecting insects. Even the Jain laity take strict vows of vegetarianism as part of a broader programme of non-violence. It is precisely this mixture of definite belief and assiduous application that has made Jain one of the smallest and yet one of the most influential world religions, relative to its size.

It is this fascination with Jain which recently led me to undertake studies in a reader of world religions and to listen to a series of lectures on Eastern religions by Stephen Prothero (who, unfortunately, elected to skip Jain altogether). Over the coming weeks, I would like to share some of the insights into Jain that these very cursory studies have brought, particularly those musings which may help challenge and deepen Christian faith and which might enlighten the curious outsider looking at Jain.

Wives Who Have Sex with their Husbands Spark Controversy

The Obedient Wives Club, a conservative Islamic group in Malaysia, has made a radical connection between happy marriages and sexual willingness that has militant feminists, frigid atheists, and sexual extortionists in a tizzy.

I realize that the above sentence is quite obviously latent with bias and more than subtly reveals my stance, if not on the issue itself, at least on the response it has received globally. But how else can you react when such sage wisdom as "happiness starts in the bedroom" that has been whispered from mother to daughter on wedding days throughout centuries is represented like this to the world:

It turns out, the secret to a happy union is to let your husband have sex with you whenever he wants. If your marriage is sad or fraught with strife, simply f*** your way out. How novel. And if you refuse, you are literally causing war to happen...Men are the stronger sex, unless a woman makes them act in a bad way. The only way to assure that a man will not, say, get mad and invade Poland one day, is to make sure you're giving him whatever he wants. Like a two year old.

I would like to read what the group actually believes in their own words, but unfortunately I do not read Malay. As it stands, the rest of the English-speaking world and I are forced to try to reconstruct what is actually being said from sources that are less than comprehensive (not to mention less than sympathetic). Consequently, I am reluctant to pretend to speak on behalf of the position advocated by the Obedient Wives Club. It is, however, frustrating to see something which seems so obvious and, for that matter, consonant with the Christian religion maligned so superficially. (Interestingly, several of the article I am reading which trash this idea gladly admit that it is prevalent in American and Christian society as well.)

What is interesting in this, as in many displays of feminist outrage, is the outright hypocrisy of it. The Obedient Wives Club is a club for women, started and run by women. No one is trying to compel women to join or to abide by these principles. These women are exercising the freedom that so many feminists claim that they are trying to achieve for women. Of course, what is really meant is not freedom to accept the view of yourself and your gender that you have concluded accords with reality. What is really won is the freedom to be coerced into an image of "liberated" gender or to be ridiculed and marginalized for holding antiquated and dangerous beliefs. The Washington Post article linked above notes that politicians are dismissing the group as "medieval." Another source calls it slavery. The Malay Mail has an article subtitled: "Obedient Wives' mission 'narrow-minded', 'degrading.'" Still another article from the same source says the views of the group are tantamount to advocating rape and is shamed that it is women promoting this view:

If a wife doesn’t want sex and it is forced upon her, isn’t that rape by law? If a wife doesn’t want to engage in certain “whore-like” sex situations, isn’t that forced sex?

I put it that the club which has the gall to typecast a good wife as one who is a good sex worker to her husband is promoting predatory sex.

Sadly, it is women who are behind this rapacious move to prey on innocent wives.

How can a wife who chooses to be sexually available to her husband be raped during the act of consensual sex? It seems entirely beyond all these outrage commentators that a woman's sexual disposition toward her own husband is entirely her choice. In fact, that very position seems to be the kind of thing you would expect these controversialists to advocate. It galls them, however, that a woman might willingly elect to submit herself to her husband, even and especially sexually.

Never mind, of course, that the fundamental premise behind the group's message is sound. A husband who finds himself sexually gratified at home is less likely to seek sexual gratification elsewhere. This does not, as so many have accused, necessarily shift culpability for infidelity and divorce onto the wife. This misconception comes from an inability, when it suits people's agendas, to separate culpability from causality (a subject which I will treat at greater length soon). If a husband is a lecher, that is no one's fault but his own. In marriage, however, the "modern woman" (and for that matter, the modern man) would do well to realize that if you test anyone's fidelity you are inviting a disappointing result. The best kind of husband will always resist temptation, but at the same time the best kind of wife will always try to minimize the temptations her husband encounters. My wife trusts me, but she still wouldn't send me into a strip club to ask for directions.

From a Christian perspective, it is important to remember that the virtue of submission and sexual availability are biblical concepts. Paul encourages sexual openness, if you will, without regard to gender because he realized in the first century what people are scandalized by in the twenty-first century: sexual activity encourages sexual fidelity. The idea of domestic submission is even more pervasive, appearing in multiple letters by multiple authors. We can debate the meaning of submission (and it deserves attention), but it is critical to remember two facts which I suspect are beyond dispute. First, the locus of control is always in the hands of the submitting party. The wife is always encouraged to submit; the husband is never told to compel submission. Submission in the biblical picture is the supreme act of freedom, the willful act of self-sacrifice that typifies the highest form of love. It is this fact which throws light on the not-so-subtle hypocrisy of outraged feminists who want to "liberate" women into a no less rigid gender structure than the one they are "rescued" from. Second, whatever we may conclude about the actual ethical implications of "submission" in a marriage, service is a profound Christian virtue. It is depicted throughout the New Testament in acts which range from the giving of a meager sum of money to the death of Christ on the cross. We sing "make me a servant" and read about Jesus washing the disciples feet, but when it comes to our rights we are unwilling to put those principles into action.

I do not know anything about the Obedient Wives Club except what I can read in the rather slanted reporting of the media, but I can say as a Christian that I do not feel any sense of outrage that women have freely elected to follow the conviction that their faith commends domestic submission. I am certainly not at all bothered by the suggestion that a wife who will sexually gratify her husband is less likely to have a husband that strays. Marriages would be better with a lot less rights and a lot more service. Women who can stand up for their convictions in the face of worldwide rebuke deserve the praise of feminists not their scorn.