A commentary by Josias Terschüren
I congratulate the World Council of Churches (WCC) and its chairman, Heinrich Bedford-Strohm, on their recent "Declaration on Palestine and Israel." This represents a significant step forward in the struggle for the self-destructive power of the Church! No one could have accelerated the road to moral oblivion more effectively.
The Church is destroying itself. Now, of all things, anti-Zionism is supposed to help stop the Church's societal decline. And it's certainly going down well! This pandering to the spirit of the age compels the Church, which is building on sand, to jump on the latest woke trend: the anti-Semitic Palestinian cult. We've already had the image of the Christ Child on the keffiyeh; now it's merrily joining the chorus of Israel critics.
The Church willingly follows its new favorite idol, humanistic human and international law, into the abyss of modern Jew-hatred. Of course, not without hastily canonizing today's antisemitism along the way! For one thing no clergyman of rank wants to be is an antisemite. Thus, the World Council of Churches (WCC) lashes out at the Jewish state, struggling for survival, with accusations of apartheid and genocide, and, while it's at it, adopts all the demands of the antisemitic BDS movement against Israel! "Don't buy from Jews!" is once again part of Christian doctrine. The 1930s are back, this time globally! Again with the blessing of the Church.
But after the scourging, the international ecumenical movement mercifully offers a bandage: "unconditional solidarity with Jews worldwide" and a distinction between "the Jewish people, our brothers and sisters in faith, and the actions of the Israeli government." I can practically hear the sighs of relief from Jewish throats around the globe. Finally, they can breathe a sigh of relief and feel safe again: for although the Christian establishment speaks the language of its enemies, delivering them to the slaughter in the face of global Jew-hatred just like in the 1930s, it is, by its own admission, a friend! Oh, what schizophrenia! This is what the Jewish world has been waiting for! Thousands of years of torment, persecution, death, disenfranchisement, and suffering under Christian antisemitism have finally produced Christian antisemites with decency. Splinter-removing ophthalmologists with a plank in their eye! It is pure Christian love that flows from this Judas kiss of ecumenism.
Who will explain to Bedford-Strohm and his World Council of Churches that the Israeli government is not a suitable scapegoat because, despite all the discussions and demonstrations, it was democratically elected by the people and is supported by the vast majority of Israelis in its actions against Hamas and Iran? Who will explain to him that the Gaza war began because of the massacre of October 7, 2023, which the WCC conveniently omitted for the sake of clarity in its statements, and against which the Jewish state had to defend itself for its own survival? How can anyone possibly blame Israel for vigorously defending "Never again"? That is its founding purpose! Who will inform Bedford-Strohm about the fate of the Israeli hostages, for whom the Christian Church has not a single word of mercy or intercession?
At a time when Christians in Syria and Nigeria are being slaughtered en masse by Muslim fanatics, and the Church in Europe is shrinking at a record pace, the only Jewish state fighting for survival, defending the Western world and its original Judeo-Christian values against Islamic terror, is being criticized. A fight the Church hasn't even begun! This reminds me of an incident in the Bible when Samson's comrades handed the hero over to the enemy, bound and gagged, even though he was fighting for them.
The same cowardice, depravity, hypocrisy, and weakness are evident in the WCC's statement today. No, we are not anti-Semites, no, we don't want to attack the Jews ourselves, we are, of course, absolutely in solidarity while we bind them to deliver them into the hands of their enemies. Who needs enemies when they have friends like these?
