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Benevolent Dictator

// February 27th, 2008 // Comments Off // General

If the dictator is perfectly benevolent and infinitely wise, then dictatorship is to be preferred over democracy.

If the dictator rules in a laissez-faire fashion regarding his subjects’ free moral agency, no one would rebel against him; there would be no motive for revolutionary regime change.

If the dictator had omnipotent power, but only ever chose to use it to empower his subjects to pursue their own passions, loves, and happiness, guiding and guarding them from all dangers without and within, then democracy would be a ridiculous suggestion.

This type of dictatorship describes the political reality described in the biblical pre-fall and post-millennium universe. Here in the present, inside this brief window of time, within the sin vaccination probationary era, there exist a few God-friendly governments. This writer would identify them as democratic republics with strong socialist sympathies. Examples would include the post WWII, pre-Reagan United States of America, and many of the current members of the European Union, notably Norway, France, and Sweden. These nations are God-friendly because they have made the sincere attempt to maintain for their society the values of religious liberty and social justice.
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The Worship of Power

// October 14th, 2006 // Comments Off // General

From Adventist Peace Messenger:

Dietrich Bonhoeffer on 2 Corinthians 12:9:

Christianity stands or falls with its revolutionary protest against violence, arbitrariness and pride of power and with its plea for the weak. Christians are doing too little to make these points clear rather than too much. Christendom adjusts itself far too easily to the worship of power. Christians should give more offense, shock the world far more, than they are doing now. Christians should take a stronger stand in favor of the weak rather than considering first the possible right of the strong.

Brian McLaren comments on his recent travels:

In each country, I heard Christian leaders – Evangelicals, Pentecostals, Traditional Protestants, and Roman Catholics – express amazement and dismay at the relative silence of the church in the USA. They see us, by and large, as a prime example of Bonhoeffer’s lament about Christendom “adjusting itself far too easily to the worship of power.” We are giving offense, but sadly, the wrong kind. For example, they hear frequent defenses by Christians in the USA – not of the weak and poor, but of the strong and powerful. About torture and violence, about “pride of power,” they hear too little protest from too few of us. They know we are against terrorism, but they don’t know if we are against American empire and domination.