The LORD of Hypocrisy
Common sense says murdering and stealing from our neighbors is seriously detrimental to the stability of society. But as Christians are apt to say, “the LORD’s ways are not our ways” and this is evident in the following instructions:
“As you approach a town to attack it, first offer its people terms for peace. If they accept your terms and open the gates to you, then all the people inside will serve you in forced labor. But if they refuse to make peace and prepare to fight, you must attack the town. When the LORD your God hands it over to you, kill every man in the town. But you may keep for yourselves all the women, children, livestock, and other plunder. You may enjoy the spoils of your enemies that the LORD your God has given you.”
Following these instructions, the Israelites, with the help of the LORD who fought beside them, crushed the Hagrites and they took 2,000 donkeys, 50,000 camels, 250,000 sheep and 100,000 people for themselves. When the LORD had his people slaughter the Midianites they made off with 61,000 donkeys, 72,000 cattle, 675,000 sheep and goats, and 32,000 virgins (one is left to imagine how the faithful determined virginity). And then there was the 200,000 women and children taken from the people of Judea along with large amounts of loot. These are but three of dozens of such holy crime sprees boasted of in the good book.
If we tally the carnage from just these, we have a staggering sum of over a million animals pillaged, over a quarter of a million people enslaved and countless more butchered. Only the LORD knows how many young girls had their innocence stolen by “godly” men with blood-stained hands. And all this thievery and murder was commanded and aided by the LORD of Hypocrisy who so famously said, “Do not steal” and “Do not commit murder.”
Dt 20:10-14, 1 Ch 5:21, Nu 31:32-35, 2 Ch 28:8
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“As you approach a town to attack it, first offer its people terms for peace. If they accept your terms and open the gates to you, then all the people inside will serve you in forced labor. But if they refuse to make peace and prepare to fight, you must attack the town. When the LORD your God hands it over to you, kill every man in the town. But you may keep for yourselves all the women, children, livestock, and other plunder. You may enjoy the spoils of your enemies that the LORD your God has given you.”
I KNEW this sounded familiar. It's what happened when the Europeans colonized the Aboriginal/First Nations people of North America. I was always aware that colonization was horrific and unconscionable, but I didn't realize before that it was biblical.
Here is a bit more history of how these biblical horrors were used to justify slaughter and enslavement of others:
Jesuit Theologian, Writer, and Cardinal, Martin Fernandez de Encisco, 1542-1621, declared “The king has every right to send his men to the Indies to demand their territory from these idolaters because he had received it from the pope. If the Indians refuse, he may quite legally fight them, kill them, and enslave them, just as Joshua enslaved the inhabitants of the country of Canaan.”
Dr. Justo L. González, adjunct professor of theology at Columbia Theological Seminary and a member of the editorial advisory board of Christian History, described the Christian conquest of the new world as “one of the bleakest times in the history of Christianity.” In his book The Story of Christianity, 1985, González writes “In the name of Christ, thousands were slaughtered, millions enslaved, entire civilizations wiped out. When the first Europeans settled in Hispaniola, there were some 100,000 native inhabitants on the island. Half a century later, there were scarcely 500. In Mexico, in seventy-five years the population declined from more than 23 million to 1.4 million; in Peru, in fifty years, from 9 million to 1.3 million. Military conquest, new diseases, wanton slaughter, forced labor, poor nutrition, and mass suicides contributed to these gruesome statistics. Behind all of it, as ultimate justification for the enterprise, stood the name of Christ. In the name of Christ, natives were dispossessed of their lands by means of the Requerimiento. This document informed the native owners and rulers of these lands that Christ’s vicar on earth had granted these lands to the crown of Castile. They could accept and submit to this, or be declared rebel subjects and destroyed by force of arms.”
Incredible stats on that. I have spent most of the last 15 years of my life trying to help First Nation people overcome the devastation of colonization. Most guilty were the residential schools run by Anglicans and Catholics (funded by federal govt). The reason? They needed to be evangelized; so they would no longer be "heathen" and would go to heaven. Here's how they accomplished that (the love of jesus warms my heart when I hear these stories)
1. They would kidnap children from their homes and families; or they would force parents to give up their children under threat.
2. Children's hair were cut and they were prohibited from speaking their native languages. If they did, they would be beaten, slapped, ears pulled (I have a friend who has a constant ringing in her ears from having her ears yanked so many times).
2. They sexually abused many, many children. Stories are still coming out about the incredibly high numbers of abuse at the hands of priests and nuns.
3. They used teh children as slave labour; often these "schools" were barely schools at all but rather child labour camps.
4. There was virtually no medical care. When a child got sick they would try to hide it because sick children were "taken away" and never came back. Again, I have friends who witnessed these things.
5. They would deliberately infect children with diseases such as TB and smallpox, sometimes using infected blankets;
6. The children were starved; there was never enough food.
7. Children were taught to turn on each other and become "tattle tales". I'm reminded of Jews in the Holocaust; neighbor turned against neighbor because, even though they were all "slaves", a favored slave may not be beaten.
8. They were told that they were sinful and that their parents and entire communities were going to burn in hell because they were not christians.
9. They were prohibited from practicing any of their cultural and spiritual beliefs that had kept them well and happy for centuries; these practices were now "of the devil".
Many, many aboriginal people from my province went to residential school. And the damage is incalculable. It seems to me that the alcoholism rate is about 80% in northern communities; massive addictions to gasoline, crack, meth, or anything else they can use to medicate their pain; domestic violence is so common it's hardly noticed; illnesses such as TB, cancer, diabetes, and HIV/AIDS are at many times higher rates; it seems like most of the next generation is Fetal Alcohol, which means they will probably either end up dead, in prison, or on the streets (because they cannot understand cause and effect they tend to become addicts and often criminals). And this is all because the Europeans wanted to civilize and evangelize. The weird thing is that many aboriginal people are now christian. I think it's because their lives are so hellish that they have to believe there is something better after death. It's hard for me to understand how they can accept a belief that destroyed them.
Anyway, I have been involved in law (I was a lawyer specializing in First Nation issue); became a tutor for adult Aboriginal women wanting to go to university; then became an advocate for aboriginal people with HIV/AIDS; and now I'm in economic development for Aboriginal people. I'm all over the place trying to find creative ways to help. But I'm reminded on a daily basis of the incredible damage that christian dogma causes.
Heartbreaking. And absolutely maddening.
But what wonderful work you do! I am sure it must be emotionally draining but it must also be very satisfying to be doing something that really makes the world a better place--thank you!
Do you see any signs of progress, of hope? Sounds like for the most part they are caught in a vicious cycle.
I honestly don't know if things are improving. It seems like there is increased awareness of the issues; many aboriginal people are no longer content to be treated like they have been. But it's hard to separate cause and effect in order to maximize help. For example, on reserves (we don't call them "reservations" here in canada) unemployment is about 85%. Yes - 85% of people on reserves do NOT have jobs. There are no jobs. They were put on these tiny postage stamps of land without any marketable resources, natural or human. There is some mining and logging in northern Manitoba, but guess what? Aboriginal people do not get any of it. All owned by white European companies. These companies then pollute the water and destroy the ecosystem so that they can no longer be self-supporting through hunting and fishing. So many people in the north are on welfare. There are some signs of progress; for me, maybe the most important thing is education. I don't feel like I have really accomplished much in my work with Aboriginal people, but I am proud of the fact that I tutored 25 people (almost all women with adult children, many who had been on welfare) through social work and nursing school. These people are now professionals (making way more money than me!!!) Education and knowledge leads to awareness and empowerment. As I grow myself, I start to realize how much of the problem is "poverty of soul". Despair, addictions, violence, child suicides, unemployment, and illness haev been a way of life for generations now. How do you come out of that with any hope? And without hope, why even bother to make things better? This is the biggest roadblock.
I became involved in advocacy for HIV/AIDS among aboriginal people because a close friend of mine (who is aboriginal) had 4 people in her family with the disease. One brother died in 1992; at the funeral, another brother told the family he was HIV positive. In 2000, her only child, a daughter, disclosed she was HIV positive also. Her son-in-law died of AIDS in November 2007. The discrimination and homophobia are rampant in northern regions; in my view it's largely because they are very religious communities. Where there is religion, there is lip-service to equality but generally speaking there is bigotry. We have a hard time convincing parents that condoms should be distributed because these religious parents believe that this is condoning sex. What they don't understand is that rates of HIV among aboriginal people in isolated communities are more than quadruple the national rate; and that their children are getting drunk and having sex with multiple partners at parties. It is so frustrating dealing with this. And then, without the "hope", people are not motivated to bother with a condom. So our motto was "Hope Is Vital" (HIV). We couldn't get funding for our non-profit on HIV/AIDS, so I had to quit and get a "real" job. My current job in economic development (starting & growing businesses for Aboriginal people) is over March 31, 2009 - our funding was cut. So it's back to pounding the pavement after that!
Anyway, this was rather longwinded...seems like there's so much to say. Thanks for asking/listening!
Thanks for sharing all that, Janet. So very sad. Again, I commend you for your work in trying to right so many wrongs. Interesting coincidence — I had lunch with a longtime minister just the other day who spoke of bringing the gospel to the troubled native Americans. He didn’t seem to have any idea that the descending spiral these people find themselves in can be traced back to his god, holy book and missionaries.
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