Do Peaceniks Really Believe “Peace Is Patriotic”
In a New Oxford Note in our March issue, we commented in passing on the “Support Our Troops” decals and bumper strips. Among the peaceniks, we’ve seen “Peace Is Patriotic” bumper strips, even placards planted in front yards. But what does it mean? The conjunction of “patriotic” with “peace” sounds like a disconnect.
“Patriotic” means love of one’s country. Does loving one’s country mean one loves one’s country because it is peaceful? That’s quite a stretch. A patriot is above all one who will defend his country from an aggressor nation. If anything, to be patriotic is about war (a just war, we hope), not about peace. In the movie The Patriot, starring Mel Gibson, about the American Revolution, Gibson was initially unwilling to fight the British. But when he saw the brutality of the British, he fought, and he fought bravely. Gibson was a patriot, and the movie was aptly named The Patriot.
You May Also Enjoy
Social Justice Fallacies by Thomas Sowell... Coached by Josemaría Escrivá: Lessons in Discipleship by Fr. John Henry Hanson, O. Praem.
Sr. Elizabeth Johnson warns that if we take literally the "naming" of God in the "image of powerful men," we turn God into an "idol."
The issue is not the legitimacy of psychology or psychiatry; rather, the issue is the moral and cultural vacuum in our society that those disciplines have been allowed to fill.