CHRISTIANS AND THE WAR

New Zealand Listener, Volume 3, Issue 74, 22 November 1940, Page 11

CHRISTIANS AND THE WAR

"This is Not A Doglight Between National Imperialisms: Yt Is A Struggle Between Two Incompatible Ways Of Life"

(A talk from the BBC by the ARCHBISHOP OF YORK, the Rt. Rev. Dr

William

Temple

VERYONE recognises that the present period is one of the turning points of human history. This war is not a dogfight between national imperialisms; it is a struggle between two incompatible ways of life. Of course it is true that purely national interests are involved; it may even be true that Great Britain finally took its stand only when its own interests were obviously menaced. At first these considerations loomed so large, that they obscured from the minds of many people the questions which are really at stake. This is particularly true of some idealists on both sides of the Atlantic. We were told that we could not be really serving any sound principle because we were so immediately guided by self-interest. About this I should like to say two things, because they have a great beéaring on my main argument. First, there has been a very strong body of opinion in England which was ready to support a more disinterested policy in the whole of the last twenty years, and many have tallied to this since the War broke out. But secondly, the whole way of looking at the matter which prompts this detachment is morally unsound. If I see a house burning and know there is a child in it, I must not delay any action to save that child until I am sure that I have no desire for admiration or other reward contaminating my altruistic motives. The important matter is that the child should be ‘saved. So now, the important matter is, that freedom should be saved. Freedom and Tyranny Whatever may be said about rival imperialisms, and I will say some of this in a moment, no one acquainted with life in Great Britain and Germany during the last seven years, or with the change in the life of Czechoslovakia, Poland, Denmark, Norway, Holland, Belgium, and France, since they came under Nazi rule, can possibly doubt that this rule is a tyranny, which has extended its way by conquest, and threatens to extend it further. , Of course the war is not a conflict between pure light and unmitigated darkness, but it is a conflict between freedom and tyranny and the whole world is involved in it. If Europe as a whole passes under Nazi rule, freedom will not survive elsewhere without a fearful struggle. What is now in the balance is the future of European and American civilisation for the next long epoch of its history. If that is the fact, all questions concerning the motives of the British Government a year ago are an academic irrelevance, and convict those who raise them, of superficiality and levity of mind. They have nothing whatever to do with the crisis confronting mankind.

There is much in British history and in contemporary British life which is open to criticism from a standpoint of high idealism. We ought to be grateful to those who remind us of these things, and so keep our consciences alert. But these defects, even when they are defects in liberty itself, do not alter the fact that broadly speaking, the British flag has stood for steadily increasing liberty; and an appeal to the principle of liberty never goes unheeded in Great Britain, even when the action called for is delayed.

Misunderstanding is sometimes caused by a casual and inaccurate use of language. I have known some Englishmen misled by the common habit of describing some parts of the earth as belonging to Great Britain. No part of the earth belongs to Great Britain in the sense in which a man’s house and garden belongs to him. So far as the British Government undertakes the control and direction of, for example, some parts of Equatorial Africa, it always regards it as a Home obligation to train the indigenous peoples towards self,ygovernment as members of the family of civilised nations. Sometimes things are done under pressure of private interests which cut across this steady purpose. The British Empire shares, with other human institutions, an inability to be at all times true to its own best principles. But the principles ate accepted, the steady purpose is there, and progress in liberty and craving for the use of it, is constant, even though somewhat patchy. India as an Illustration The great Empire of India illustrates the same principle. I personally wished that we moved faster than we do. But the series of legislative acts affecting India, since the responsibility of the East India Company was transferred to the British Crown, has tended steadily in one direc-tion-the direction of advance towards self-government. I want to go faster, as I have said, but the direction in which we have moved is right from the standpoint of all who love freedom. I wish that the Act of 1935, by which the present constitution of India was established, had gone much further than it did. But even as it was, it took its place among a very few legislative acts whereby so large a concession of power has at any time been made by any ruling nation,

In the case of the Dominions, the principle of self-govern-ment receives complete expression. In no sense whatever does Canada belong to Great Britain. Equally with Great Britain it gives allegiance to the British Crown; equally with Great Britain it belongs to the British Empire. Great Britain does not possess the Dominions — it is the senior member in an equal partnership. The present neutrality of Eire and the hesitation of South Africa at the outset, whether or aot to declare war on Germany, remind us that the great part

now taken in the war by the Dominions is taken by their own free choice. The Foe of Freedom This commonwealth of nations embodying the principle of freedom, in a fellowship which Goebbels fears, is engaged in deadly conflict with a German Reich which is, at this mgment, subject to a Government and a doctrine to which the whole principle of liberty is abhorrent. I need not specify the features of the Nazi system which stamp it as the foe of freedom-the Gestapo, the concentration camps, the declared policy concerning coloured peoples. Our hostility to the Nazi regime is directed not only against its acts, but against its principles. We often fail to practice what we preach, but we can be recalled to our avowed principles. They do preach what they practise, and all appeal to them in the name of principles sacred to us is futile. " A Christian Cannot Doubt " In face of this conflict, a Christian cannot doubt or hesitate. Christianity, as is clear from the Gospel, stakes everything on human freedom. The Gospel message is clear. Man cannot save him-self-there is something that must be done for him. But neither can man be saved despite himself, and he can reject the salvation offered fo him. The Gospels show Christ everywhere paying to the free personality of men and women, a respect and trust which nothing — not even the intended treachery of Judas — could shake. Freedom is a necessary element in the foundation of a Christian civilisation, because it is the first presupposition of Christianity itself. " Not Fighting for Christianity " We are not fighting for Christianitythat must always~be both wrong and futile-but we are fighting to maintain

an order of society which gives free course to the Christian Gospel, and offers the hope of advance towards the truly Christian civilisation. Of course, the ideal properly so described can never be fully realised on earth, but it is not impossible to reach a state of affairs where Christian principles are accepted by the greater part of the population, and public opinion takes them as the standard of judgment upon policy. We have not reached that point yet, but it is clear that a Nazi victory would postpone, for'so long as it was effective, any advance towards the fulfilment of such a hope. Would it all Happen Again? At this point the question may be raised, whether a victory of Great Britain and her Allies would really open the way. Why should not this war be followed by another earthly crisis, a repetition of the years 1920 to 1939, and another outbreak of European war expanding into World War? My answer would be in three stages. First the Nazi threat-as it is not only to such liberty and justice as we hope to see, but also to that which we have already established-it is worth while to fight in order to keep the Gestapo out of Great Britain and to turn it out of France, Holland and the rest. Secondly, it is true that victory in war cannot by itself inaugurate the better time — it can only make the new dawn possible. But this it can and will do. Thirdly, we have learnt much from the experience of the last twenty years, alike from failure and from success. The League of Nations has not been a total failure. Its social services, especially on the medical side, have been invaluable, and where it failed we see the faults of the failure, and can largely avoid a repetition. Particularly, we see the impossibility of regulating the political relations of countries, while ignoring their economic relations. A New Era If we can start the work of reconstruc tion on the basis of true principles, respect for personal liberty, and co-opera-tion in establishing for the masses of the people of all countries, a secure share in the wealth now so abundantly available, we shall inaugurate a new era of fellowship and international partnership — which may well gain for mankind a future of security, peace and goodwill. This period makes that possible. Without victory there can be no such hope. Let us then make sure of victory, that we may also devote ourselves to ‘the fulfilment of that hope,