With that little tidbit, I’m closing this thread. It’s been memorable, folks.

Inside every rebel there’s a dictator waiting to get out. Political litmus tests for Church participation are despicably evil, unless they’re your litmus tests.

Teenager: I can’t believe my parents make me sit through 3 hours of church. It’s torture!

YM Leader: Uh no, that isn’t torture. And I think it’s great than your parents do that.

Teenager: What? You support torture! That’s it, you aren’t qualified to be my YM Leader anymore! Where’s the Bishop? I bet you support surface mining too…

“What do you know about the Mormons? Would you like to know more?”

“I like your Christ, I do not like your Christians. Your Christians are so unlike your Christ.”

Why would one even want to have someone like that in one’s home? Much of this discussion is unfathomable to me. I feel like an alien trying to understand some weird planet I’m visiting, where it appears familiar at first but with further examination I find that society is turned upside down. I must be less Mormon than I thought.

Oh, are you referring to the article linked to in the left-hand sidebar?

The Weekly Standard just published a response from 7 Iraq Veterans to the opinion piece of the 7 Iraq Veterans that you have seen fit to link in the left-hand sidebar. (The NY Times declined to publish the response).

Any chance you’ll provide a link to the opinion of these veterans as well?

http://www.weeklystandard.com/Content/Public/Articles/000/000/014/006bzlfl.asp

Note that the temple cleansing event is cited other places in the Gospels, not just in John. The other citations don’t even mention the scourge.

I think it is grasping at straws for you and others to believe this episode establishes that during His mortality Jesus Christ advocated violence. Everything in the scriptures about his morality flies in the face of it. He was active, not passive; but violent? No way! Not in my estimation.

I hope I would feel repentant if I acted as a guest at His house like that and He came through cleansing it. Do I think of Him as violent? Do I consider His actions Western-styled vigilante justice—as you say? No. And I don’t think the bulk of those who read the New Testament see it that way either. I am surprised you do. But I could be wrong. Maybe people see the Savior as Jack Bauer-like. I don’t, and that’s certainly not the Savior I think is worthy of emulation.

I don’t know what you mean by “pacifist,” and I’m not going to speak for Jesus (haven’t I said this recently). I think Jesus would love it if we all lived in peace and harmony. He probably wouldn’t mind if we all sat in a huge circle and sang “Cumbayah” either. At least, so long as we did so because we made the choices to make it so, not because we were forced to.

But he also understands that we don’t live like that, and I don’t know exactly what he might expect of any given individual directly involved in an armed conflict at any given moment. Thank God I haven’t been in the situation to have him tell me for my own benefit.

226 — This is an event supporting Godwin’s Law (there being a very thin line between fascists and Nazis, if any line exists at all).

Snipers and soldiers are not inherently torturers. Neither, I would hold, is anyone using coerced interrogation techniques necessarily a torturer. The devil in each of these instances will be in the details, and far too many soldiers and interrogators have been torturers. The realities of the missions of snipers can be less palatable than the missions of other soldiers to some, in ways that remind me (and, apparently some others) of the unpalatable aspects of the missions of interrogators. That doesn’t equate them nor compare them.

But let’s remember that Steve said that this thread was not intended to be about torture, nor about the war in Iraq.

As an officer, the son of an infantry officer, and the brother of a veteran, I find it intolerable when you equate soldiers with torturers. I doubt that you can cite a pacifist philosopher who says anything of the sort. Frankly, I do not believe that you know many soldiers or pacifists. If you did you would reconsider your irresponsible and insulting remarks.

I can point you to some people, however, who agree with you and have little use for distinctions between torturers and soldiers. In that view, success is a function of cruelty. These people are not called pacifists but fascists. When you argue that a sniper and a torturer are ethically equivalent then you need to be aware that you are subscribing to a fascist mindset.

The problem with torture is that it undermines the foundation of our civilization and paradoxically realizes the intent of our enemies. While some soldiers have been known to cross that line that need not be the case. Snipers are not torturers. Neither are soldiers.

WE, typically pacifists are against violence to settle disputes. I think using a whip to drive out people you disagree with religiously is pretty violent. Don’t get me wrong, I don’t mind it. But it’s kind of western styled vigilante justice, isn’t it? How would you feel if someone did that to you?