The Orthodox and Catholic Christian patriarchs of Syria have made a plea to Western countries and their citizens, especially to their fellow Christians in the West. This statement, follows on similar pleas over the years by Christians, including Orthodox and Catholic bishops, from various countries in Southwest Asia, a region which we Westerners, especially Americans, have turned into a suburb of Hell. The latest plea centers on the particular problems of Christians and other minorities at risk from the overthrow of governments which protect all these minorities from the head-chopping, liver-eating allies of the US and the UK and other western countries. Usually, when the US government and its European lapdogs get involved in a region, ancient Christian communities will disappear and individual Christians will be killed or enslaved or otherwise badly hurt; similar statements hold for Alawites, Kurds and Druse and other minorities.
I first learned of this recent plea from the blog post, Here’s What Syrian Christian Leaders Think of their Western Saviours, a log well worth following by anyone concerned with the internal or external problems of modern Christianity.
The actual plea by Syrian Orthodox Patriarchs is found at A Statement Issued by the Patriarchates of Antioch and all the East for the Greek Orthodox, Syrian Orthodox, and Greek-Melkite Catholic. It’s on the website of Syrian Orthodox Patriarch of Antioch. I’ll provide just a short quote from that statement:
This brutal aggression [the recent missile attack by the United States, the United Kingdom, and France] is a clear violation of the international laws and the UN Charter, because it is an unjustified assault on a sovereign country, member of the UN. It causes us great pain that this assault comes from powerful countries to which Syria did not cause any harm in any way.
The Western countries bomb countries which are not doing anything against the West, the Western countries train and arm ISIS and Al-Qaeda terrorists, they steal the natural resources of Syria and Iraq and Libya and others.
The Orthodox and Catholic patriarchs of Antioch are are crying for some respect for the sovereignty of Syria, for some peace and respect for the lives of Syrian peoples. They would like Western countries, most recently the United States, United Kingdom, and France to cease regarding Syria and other countries as means to the prosperity of those who, rather than working as most of us do, would rather steal, send armies into action, smuggle drugs and arms, train terrorists. These are men who seize or inherit power and, being incapable of doing something useful, wage war against the powerless who happen to live on or near reservoirs of petroleum or natural gas, near key transportation routes which can be profitably controlled by unscrupulous men.
Christians in the United States, the United Kingdom, France and non-Christians as well better realize they have a leadership made of those men described by Lord Acton in these quotes:
And remember, where you have a concentration of power in a few hands, all too frequently men with the mentality of gangsters get control. History has proven that. [From BrainyQuote.]
Power tends to corrupt and absolute power corrupts absolutely. [From BrainyQuote.]
These men are now turning against the American people—see my recent post: Dualism: Why Are Conspiracies So Prominent in American Political Discourse?. This essay was an update of similar analyses I’d published in past years, an update motivated by a reading of a book about two brothers who definitely had the mentality of gangsters: Stephen Kinzer’s The Brothers: John Foster Dulles, Allen Dulles, and Their Secret World War.
Modern day Christians of the West seem hardly to have the historical or other knowledge to recognize such gangsters though they dominate the West—not in the way of a great conspiracy organized by B-school brain-trusts but in the way of a disordered nation or even civilization which has become the battleground of gangsters who fight each other; sometimes combine to exploit the decent, law-abiding citizens, and often engage in wars against other countries or civilizations.
I’ll make a point in closing: we should also consider our duties to the American soldiers who have suffered physically and mentally and in damage to their moral characters as a result of all the criminal Kinetic military action[s] in which they were inserted. We don’t do our duty to these young men, and some young women as well—itself a matter of moral shame, by holding parades and picnics. We do our duty as voters by learning enough to know the location of these countries our leaders wish to invade, what their history is—including, if applicable, their recent decades or centuries of exploitation by Western countries. We do our further duty by identifying trusted commentators or by perhaps reading serious history books by well-regarded historians, including some retired diplomats and military officers—colonels are generally more to be trusted than generals. Most people can, and should, take shortcuts by finding friends or neighbors who have some `bookish’ talents and have taken the trouble to read a little about Syria and Iran and Iraq and the crimes we and the British and the French have been committing against them for at least a century and a half. And we reach a mature level of doing our duty by asking good questions about any proposed “kinetic military action” and forcing a serious and honest public debate. We become wise old men and wise old women by finding replacements for those senators and representatives and presidents who don’t measure up to the questions or don’t live up to any promises they make, maybe showing themselves to be ignorant or simply giving signs they have weak moral character or even the mentality of gangsters.