“There will never be peace on this earth so long as we have this book [the Quran]...it's a violent and cursed book.” — Sir William Gladstone
We have been reminded, relentlessly I might add, that Islam is a religion of peace and to borrow the words of Shakespeare, "The lady doth protest too much, methinks." If it were truly a religion of peace, it would not need a marketing campaign to convince you otherwise. "But it has been unfairly portrayed and that is why we must fight back against this slander." That would be true if it were slander. The only reason that kind of PR is necessary is because it has earned a reputation of being violent and aggressive fair and square. Their own marketing has often involved suicide bombers. So, history takes the witness stand and testifies that Islam is not a religion of peace.
That said, Christianity is not exactly pacifistic either. Nor should it be. There will be violence. That is inescapable. The enmity inserted into the story by the grace of God in the beginning after the Fall of man guarantees it. The question is not "will there be tension and scrapes and head bonks and imposition?", the question is "what will be imposed upon whom and how will it be done... in what ways will the pressure be applied?"
Christendom is inevitable, but it is not indiscriminate. It has much to say about how it must spread and more to our point here, how it must not be spread... which is to say, there are ways of trying to promote Christendom that don't, even when it "wins." There is a winning that is losing. But that is a uniquely Christian ethic. Jihad does not hold the same moral tenet. Neither does socialism or its big, nastier brother Communism. Winning is what matters to them. Social Darwinism is a Thunderdome approach to the survival of the fittest. It is chasing down the weak and forcing them to fight in order to demonstrate your superiority. But that is not how Christendom advances. It cannot win that way.
That said Christendom really is concerned with winning. The old maxim that "if you aren't cheating, you ain't tryin'" does not apply to Christendom. Cheating would be a sign that Christendom had given up and fallen in line with the rest of the tinpot philosophies of the world. There is a Christ-like way to love your enemy while still defeating him. Jesus is sitting at the right hand of the Father as He destroys all of His enemies, but as we observe, this is not an "no holds barred" genocide of the unregenerate. He is patient and kind with those who hate Him. Some of those flipping middle fingers at Heaven today will be folding those same fingers in prayer tomorrow. That is the way of Christ. His kingdom will come and His will shall be done on earth as it is in Heaven. But the middle fingers will not be tolerated forever. Do not mistake God's patience with weakness. Do not confuse His long fuse with a lack of resolve. Jesus is coming back and Hell is coming with Him.
As long as Islam persists, there will be warfare. But the Quran is a cooked book. It is not long for this world, even if it feels like it's been too long already. But do not grow weary. Stay the course. Finish the race set before and fight to the final round. As long as sin and error pine away, discipline and instruction will be painful, but later it will yield the peaceful fruit of righteousness to those who have been trained by it.
So, it turns out that fighting the good fight will require some fighting. No shocked face needed.
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