Customer Reviews

Saying Yes and Saying No: On Rendering to God and Caesar

5 star:		(1)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

Cognitive dissonance occurs when two belief systems within one person run into conflict. Thus we find that by our Faith we cannot kill, and yet our national leaders use every strategem to urge us to questionable and total war. A most timely examination of this phenomenon may be studied in the recent work by the Reverend Father Andrew Greeley entitled: A Stupid, Unjust, and Criminal War: Iraq, 2001-2007. This present work, written by the late and Rev. Robert McAfee Brown twenty two years ago in the context of another stupid, unjust and criminal war (some say prelude and practice to our present crisis), lays out the Christian theological basis and delineation of the obligations of our Faith to resist war and to work courageously and prophetically for Peace. We need now in this Lenten season to re-examine this excellent treatise, which continues to challenge us today, as strongly as ever does the United States Conference of Catholic Bishop's Challenge of Peace: God's Promise and Our Response a Pastoral Letter on War and Peace (Publication / Office of Publishing and Promotion Services, U).

We cannot serve two masters. We will love the one and despise the other. Which one will you love? Read this book and ruminate it. Pray carefully with it and come to the solution of your spiritual and cognitive dissonance. The Rev. McAfee Brown wisely presents the evidence and carefully challenges us to resolve our internal contradictions as an element of our life long and total conversion to the Faith in Jesus Christ. We can find few better Lenten retreats at this time in our history and in our lives than this.

This is the fourth book I've read by Robert McAfee Brown. I've already ordered a fifth. Brown is a theologian who writes not for other theologians but for the interested Christian reader. His theologizing is quite practical. This book is a good example of that as he discusses what of the Christian's allegiance belongs to God and what belongs to the State. This is an issue that most American Christians seem all to willing to take a pass on. After all, if ours is a Christian nation what contradiction can there possibly be? Well, take up and read. I never had the opportunity to meet the author, who is now deceased, but I've grown to respect him even if I do not agree at all points. If it is possible for integrity to filter through ink on paper Brown's certainly does.

I have found this book to be a challenging read. It was not the difficulty of the reading, but the moral challenges it brings. I felt the book presented far too many moral issues that are at hand. The book dealt with war, the death penalty, gun control and abortion, as well as many other ideas. I have been forced to re-examine some of my personal views after reading this book.
The book vehemently opposes war. I have to wonder if, at times, this isn't a necessary evil. My guess is that Brown would have suggested passive resistance to Hitler in World War II. I simply have a hard time coming to Brown's conclusion. In the Old Testament of the Bible, God sanctioned War at times. In my understanding of the parable, the turning of weapons into plowshares was meant for the millennium. It is not meant for the current dispensation that mankind is in. We are told in the Bible that there will be wars and rumors of wars until the body of Christ is taken into heaven. I find Brown's comment of trying to bring about his own personal millennium to be extremely arrogant. While war is a terrible thing, I feel we are expressly told that this will happen.
Brown is opposed to guns and believes in gun control. I have to agree that guns in the wrong hands can be used for evil. Is a gun in itself truly evil? I cannot ask the police to go against criminals without appropriate protection. I cannot go as far as to believe that all violence will magically cease without guns. To assume without guns our society will be safe and violence free is to have an overly optimistic view.
I cannot agree with his statement that breaking laws is always appropriate to save human life. To agree to this statement blindly is to become a zealot, and lose good judgment. With this statement members of the anti-abortion movement are perfectly justified in bombing clinics, and the occasional murder of doctors and other medical professionals. Out right murder is never justifiable.
I feel this book is extremely thought provoking. It is radical enough to have created a large discomfort level in my personal belief system. I feel Brown's points are often well made, and thankfully peppered with fact. I feel that too many concepts were approached for me on a personal level. Each chapter presented a different moral dilemma. His writing style attempted to sensationalize points rather than investigate them in a logical manner. I can truly say this is a book that I will always remember.