A WORD TO CONSCIENTIOUS OBJECTORS.

Manawatu Herald, Volume XXXVIII, Issue 1592, 27 July 1916, Page 3

A WORD TO CONSCIENTIOUS OBJECTORS.

(From “A Grand Fleet Chaplain’s Notebook,” in AA'esiminster Gazette.) Our uncompromising Number One would have it that they were all mealy - mouthed, white-liver-ed swabs. Schooley, more discriminating, stood out for the Moral Courage theory: to face public obloquy argued the highest kind of bravery —and so on. The First Lieutenant waved this aside with contempt. “Find me,” he said, “a single one of ’em who is simply longing to fight, but doesn’t on account of his principles, and I’ll begin to believe in them; at present, their opinions square a dashed sight too well with their inclinations.” “But it’s absurd to deny that many of them are utterly sincere,” retorted the Naval Instructor.

“So is every self-opinionated blighter that walks this earth! What you call their Moral Courage is nothing more than just abysmal conceit! They thoroughly enjoy making martyrs of themselves, so there’s nothing in that —just as there’s nothing particularly brave about the fighting man who by nature revels in a good scrap. No; these puffed-up cranks won’t be content to abide by the decisions of their betters —no excitement or self-glorification in that. They prefer to take their own lino, and everybody else is wrong!” Schooley thought this unfair, and said so. Minorities, he argued, were not always in the wrong; these people based their case upon Christianity, and it was notorious that the Christian Church, now as at the beginning, was always a discredited minority. Christ and His disciples made themselves thoroughly unpopular by running counter to all the received opinions of respectability. “Oh,” exclaimed Number One, “it you’re going to take the argument of Christianity, it’s no use ray going on! Especially as the Padre here will chip in to back you up.” “Nothing of the sort,” said I, “I

don’t back him up at all!” Incredulous and enquiring looks from both.

“I don’t say that they are not sincere or not brave,” I explained; “they may be both these things; but what I do most emphatically state is that your Conscientious Objectors—so far as their objections are concerned —are certainly not Christians.” “But surely these are their ideals —please don’t take them for my oAvn altogether,” argued Schooley: “Christianity aims at breaking doAA'n all barriers of race and nationality. There is neither Jcav nor Gentile —Avhy -not say neither British nor German? All are meant to be one brotherhood. I read the other day of a magistrate at an Exemption Tribunal avlio sneered finely at an appellant avlio said that England was not his country, and he was only passing through it on his Avay home to Heaven; but the man avus only paraphrasing such phrases as Strangers and Pilgrims, and Here avo ha Am no continuing city, but avc seek one to come. Christ deliberately staled that His was not an earthly kingdom; evil Avas not to be resisted; blows, theft, and oppression Avere to bo accepted, even gladly accepted. You cannot imagine Christ countenancing lighting and bloodshed. He refused aid for Himself, and gave the final proof of His belief in the principles of passive non-resistance by alloAving His persecutors to kill Him. And no one can deny that if avo Avere all to folloAv His example there could never be any war. If we were all Conscientious Objectors to bloodshed not a man Avould consent to carrv a rifle —and the Avorld Avould be at peace. This avus Avhat Christ aimed at;not violent coercion—His was the gentler Avay; He would dravv men with cords of a man, Avith bonds of love.”

“But don’t forget tire other cords,” I said, “the small ones.” “I don’t quite folloAv,” said Schooley. “You mean ” “I moan He made a scourge of small cords and drove them all out of the temple. Brutal violence, Avasn’t it? Remember, small cords sting hard. Your Christian exquisite, had he been present, would probably have accused Him of profaning the Temple. 0, my dear friend, he Avould have said, how bewtifull is Peace! What is peace? Is it toe beat, is it toe whip, is it toe scourge Avith small cords'? Schooley, Fve no patience Avith your one-sided travesty of Christianity! It seems to me just as had, in the opposite direction as the doctrine of those German divines Avho preach the blessed gospel of bloodshed. Christ was froAvned upon in His day for being too thorough-going; I iavc ho doubt that-if He Avere to reappear He AA r ould be Dented Avith great suspicion by manv who Avould consider Him not thorough-going enough. To say that we ought to refrain from all resistance to evil Is only a parody of Avhat Christ taught. Hon-resistance to wrongdoing very often means acquiescence in it. It is all very well to

turn your check to the smiter; but if you see a. bully ill-treating a little child you are not called upon to grip the child’s head and turn his other cheek.

“You say that if everyone wore to refuse to bear arms there woidd he an end of warfare. AVhy not complete your truism, and say that if every were kind, unselfish, content od —in short, Christianlike, there would be no need for a call to arms? A man ought logically to Conscientiously Object, not to Warfare itself, but to those private and national habits of greed, jealousy, and malice that finally result in warfare as either their consequence or their cure; just as it is more reasonable to disapprove of burglary than of a policeman, of a plague than if its resultant furuncles. The real trouble is that a vei’y largo number of people deliberately reject the formula of living which Christ enunciated, and in some cases a whole nation does so. Then comes AVar, which is never anything else but a struggle between Eight and AVrong. You always find, on one side, the money-hangers and dove-sellers; and on the other the Man with the scourge of small cords. So I say (hat to refuse to wield this scourge in flaying greed and thievery, in cleansing the Temple of God from pollution, may bo Conscientious, but certainly isn’t Christian —unless Christ was no Christian.”

“Then you are on my side,” said the First Lieutenant, greatly surprised.

“On the side of .the angels,” I answered and tried not to make the Avords sound so priggish as they look Avhen Avritten.