So if you were so inclined and you decided you wanted to search for people who talk about how nationalism is terrible you’d have a pretty easy time doing it. Just spend a bit of time searching for terms like “Christian Nationalism,” “White Nationalism,” if you pay attention to conversations about nationalism and border-policy, if you look at the general antiwestern trends in colleges and in major media among both the intellectual and pseudo-intellectual elite, you would find that “Nationalism” is a boogeyman.
And perhaps the strongest arguments that demonstrate this antinationalist trend is the change in education. In 1987 Jesse Jackson had people protesting Stanford chanting (and you know it’s a good argument if people are chanting) “Hey Hey, Ho Ho, Wester Civ has got to go!” Jackson argued that the focus on Western Civ, was racist. Nevermind that the University system was born in the great Cathedral Universities of medieval Europe. Nevermind that Stanford University was founded by Leland Stanford who was as pro-Western as one can get. Nevermind that Western ideals and values are what shaped and created this nation. Nevermind that it is Western Civilization that allows protesters to protest. Nevermind all that. Jackson thought that Western Civ had too many dead white guys and therefore it was bad.
That trend has continued unabated. It has continued and grown to such ludicrous levels that even logic and rationality are racist white-supremacy.
It seems like everything is white-supremacy. Everything is racist. All of this is bad. BLM the organization said that things like heteronormativity and the nuclear family were racist and needed to go. And make no mistake I’m not confusing the issue by fusing and conflating “racist,” and “nationalist.” That’s not me doing that—that’s all the people protesting westernism. That’s not me. I don’t oppose nationalism, per se.
But make no mistake, lots of people think that borders are racist; they think that White Nationalism is racist. They think that Christian Nationalism is racist. They think that German Nationalism is racist. And while you will find plenty of “explainer” articles about how not ALL Nationalism is racist, they will almost always make sure to denounce that nasty White Nationalism.
And it must be said that much of this trend is, in fact, a trend. It isn’t so much a single article or policy position, but it’s just the air we breathe and the water we drink. We have a Zeitgeist and being in the Zeitgeist means embracing multiculturalism, rejecting ethnic nationalism, applauding secularism, and opposing fundamentalism.
And yet.
And yet.
And yet there are some forms of monocultural, ethnic nationalist, religious fundamentalism that the meaning-makers in our society want us to support.
They want us to support Palestinian ethno-fascist, monocultural, Islamic nation-state. And when I say fascist I mean fascist. I mean fascist in the way Benito Mussolini meant fascism: anti-democratic, nationalism, where all is subordinated to a powerful central state.
You see pro-Hamas marches on college campuses. You see professors at major universities saying vile things about the Jewish people and promoting an actual terrorist organization. University professors openly praise Hamas. So, some major donors to Penn and Harvard who don’t like Universities supporting terrorist groups pulled their funding. And you know who the bad guys are in this story? Ya know who the real villain of the piece is? Yep, you guessed it, the people who are pulling their donations to the Universities who won’t require that their professors not openly support genocidal terror regimes.
And not only that, but these people who are supporters of the genocidal terror regime also call Israel a fascist state. Israel. Not Hamas. Hamas isn’t fascist. Not the group that minimizes individuality, controls all money and resources, actively seeks an ethno-state, commits aggressive atrocities against a peaceful neighbor. No, not them. Israel.
And this is the great irony. If you walked up to most of these people who “stand with Palestine” who aren’t Muslims, the people who are secular progressives—I’m talking about the Queers for Palestine people, I’m talking about people waving the Trans flag at pro-Hamas rallies—these are the people I’m talking about; if you walk up to one of those people and you ask them about ethno-states and nationalism and fascism I’m guessing they’d be against all of it. America can’t enforce the Southern border because that’s racist. They would say we have to be multicultural because cultural colonialism is racist and bad. They would say that religious fundamentalism is an active evil that needs to be eradicated.
And if you were to ask these people why they then promote an aggressive, fascistic, religious-fundamentalist, monocultural, colonialist, nationalist, ethnostate I’m not sure they would have a reply. Hamas is everything progressives are supposed to hate.
So at a certain point you have to wonder why the people who constantly wail and moan and whinge about Christian Nationalism are so enthusiastic about Islamic Nationalism? At a certain point you have to wonder why the people who hate Christian fundamentalism so much are completely fine with Islamic fundamentalism. You have to wonder at a certain point why there are so many internal incoherencies and inconsistencies among so many when it comes to the Palestinian issue.
Why is it that “silence is violence” but BLM Chicago posted a picture of a paraglider with a Palestinian flag and the caption “I STAND WITH PALESTINE.” So, silence is violence, but it’s OK to celebrate the rape and kidnapping of women, the murder of babies, torturing and burning of families, beheadings, corpse desecration, theft, and hostage-taking. Are these NOT violence? Or is some violence OK? And if some violence is OK, then which violence and by what standard do you make that determination?
Again, to say that there’s a Ven-diagram overlap between Palestine-support and moral depravity is like saying salt is salty. You can’t support Hamas and not be depraved. Oh sure, you can want all people to live in peace and prosperity—including Palestinians, I know I do. But that desire for human flourishing does not negate the right for Jews to flourish! Let me say it again so that I cannot be misunderstood. If you support Hamas, you are morally depraved. There was once a time when I thought that those who supported Hamas may simply be confused about the issues, or needed to learn some geopolitics, or had believed lies. But that’s not an excuse anymore. We witnessed genocidal murder. This genocidal murder was carried out by an ethno-fascist, religious-fundamentalist, colonialist, nationalist, terror-state. There is no getting around that. There is no washing away what happened. You can either denounce Hamas full-stop or you can be morally depraved. There is no third way. You’re either pro-rape or against it. There’s no moderating position on rape. Tell me, when is rape OK? Under what circumstances? If she’s a dirty Jew whore? Is it OK then? If not then when?
When is it ok to kill babies? There’s no moderating position. It’s either OK or it isn’t. It’s either OK to take hostages or it isn’t. It’s either OK to spit on kidnapped children or it isn’t. It’s either OK to behead people or it isn’t.
There is no moral ambiguity. And the people telling you that there’s moral ambiguity, the people engaged in whataboutism are liars and morally depraved.
Lemme say it again, lest I be misunderstood. I want the Palestinian people to live in peace and prosperity. But that desire does no override Israel’s right, need, and duty to protect itself, recover hostages, and destroy Hamas.
Let me give an example about why the whataboutism is so morally idiotic. Imagine two families at a restaurant: Bill’s family and Steve’s family. And in the middle of the meal Bill stands up, walks over to Steve’s table, pulls a gun and starts shooting Steve’s kids. And drags Steve’s daughter Stephanie, kicking and screaming back to his table where Bill’s oldest son Willy holds her down and violates her. Then when Steve starts shooting back, Bill not only continues to shoot at Steve’s kids but Bill grabs his own wife Wilhelmina and uses her as a meat-shield. Bill, standing behind his wife Wilhelmina, while his son Will is violating Stephanie, keeps shooting at Steve’s children. In the midst of the shootout, Wilhelmina, Bill’s wife, gets shot and Bill begins sobbing uncontrollable, weeping, and decrying the horrific violence of Steve, WHILE HE KEEPS SHOOTING AND HIS SON KEEP RAPING.
Now, imagine further some of the people sitting in that restaurant. Is there anyone in their right mind who would side with Bill? Anyone? Would anyone not see Steve and his family as the victims? Obviously, anyone who didn’t actively hate Steve would side with Steve. The only way you could possibly side with Bill is if you hated Steve.
This analogy is pretty on-the-nose, I get it, but so is rape, torture, murder, and baby-beheading. I think those are a bit on the nose, too.
But let me ask a question. Let’s consider again the Bill and Steve restaurant shootout. Let’s assume that the fight between these two was not new. OK. Let’s say that Bill had grievances, real or imagined, against Steve. Let’s even say that Bill had legitimate grievances. We’re just make-believing here, you don’t have to agree with whether or not Bill had legitimate grievances, this is a hypothetical. Even if he DID, how could those grievances POSSIBLY justify his behavior?
Obviously, they couldn’t. And this is obvious. And if you say, “Well, Luke some people don’t think it’s obvious.” I say, “It is because God says it is.” Paul tells us in Romans 1 that the moral order is known. People know what Hamas did is evil and despicable. But they suppress the truth in ungodliness. They know the truth, but they suppress it.
And frankly, I’m largely unconcerned with the proximate cause of their truth-suppression. I really am not all that exorcised if it’s CRT or Critical Theory or plain Antisemitism or Anti-Westernism. It’s not really all that important because those are merely the pretexts that wicked people use to justify their wickedness. It is not enough to debunk the lies people bury the truth in—those who hate truth will either continue to be deluded or they’ll find new lies.
If a person wants to believe a lie, they will, and they will find a lie that suits them and allows them to do what they want to do. I think Antisemitism is bad, and I think Antiwesternism is bad, and I think CRT and Critical Theory are bad. But they are not the root cause. They are not the final cause, they are merely the formal cause. At the final and deepest level of analysis, people support Hamas because they hate Christ.
Full stop.
I will not qualify or hedge that argument. Let me walk you through the logic. And this is ‘bout to get technical, so strap on your reasoning skis and let’s slide into careful thinking.
So, follow my logic here, and this is my premise. I will give you a premise and then a conclusion.
1) Hamas committed rape, murder, kidnapping, torture, corpse-mutilation, theft, including the beheading of babies.
2) Those things Hamas did in (1) are evil.
3) The truth of (2)—that what Hamas did (1) is evil—is self-evident.
4) The self-evident nature of the evil of (1)—Hamas’ actions—is validated by Paul’s explanation about the truths of God being suppressed in unrighteousness by the wicked.
5) Those who reject self-evident moral truths are not unaware of the truths but suppress them in ungodliness, specifically validated by Romans 1:32, that says, “Although they know God’s righteous decree that those who do such things deserve death, they not only continue to do these very things but also approve of those who practice them.”
6) People who suppress the truth of God in unrighteousness do so out of unbelief as evidence by Romans 2:5–16.
7) People live in unbelief because they hate Jesus: see Matthew 5; Matthew 6:24; John 3:20; John 7:7; John 15; James 4:4; and more other passages than we have time for.
Thus, my premise is: Because we know that those who support Hamas are supporting manifest and self-evident evil, it is clear that those who support or refuse to denounce Hamas are suppressing the truth of God in unrighteousness, and that suppression of truth in unrighteousness comes through unbelief and unbelief is motivated by hating Christ;
And now the conclusion that follows the premise: Therefore, those who support Hamas hate Christ.
And you say, “well, Luke that’s a pretty strong line to draw.”
Yep.
You say, “but Luke, I know someone who supports Hamas and they’re a Christian.”
I don’t believe you.
I don’t believe that a person who is born again and who has the Spirit of God dwelling in them can support the rape, murder, kidnapping, torture, mutilation, and baby-killing of Hamas. I don’t believe you. You tell me you’re a Christian and support Hamas; I don’t believe you.
You say, “but Luke that’s a slippery slope, pretty soon you’ll say that anyone who disagrees with you on any moral issue is an unbeliever.”
Well, if a person is going to justify the things that Paul lists as evidence of moral depravity in Romans, then sure, I’ll say that person is an unbeliever. If you justify any of the following, you heard it here first, Luke says, “on the authority of the Book of Romans, that you’re not a Christian.” Here’s the list:
Furthermore, just as they did not think it worthwhile to retain the knowledge of God, so God gave them over to a depraved mind, so that they do what ought not to be done. They have become filled with every kind of wickedness, evil, greed and depravity. They are full of envy, murder, strife, deceit and malice. They are gossips, slanderers, God-haters, insolent, arrogant and boastful; they invent ways of doing evil; they disobey their parents; they have no understanding, no fidelity, no love, no mercy.
OK, if that list describes the things you promote and believe are good, then yep I say you’re not a Christian. And if that offends you, I don’t really care. Because I’m not very much interested in currying favor with depraved, greedy, murderous, slanderous, arrogant, God-haters. If the things listed above are things you’re on board with then I don’t think you’re a Christian and I don’t care if it offends you.
Brothers and sisters, be sober and vigilant. Don’t let yourselves be deceived. This is not a complex issue requiring n degrees of nuance. We can have moral-clarity—indeed, God demands it. And I think Christians have it. Now what we need is moral courage. We need to speak the truth as it is to men as they are and let God handle the results.