Modern Crucifixion: American Empire and the War on Terror

_{Image © Austin Cline
Original Poster: Wikipedia
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It’s disturbing enough to ponder the extent to which the American government has authorized and defended certain practices, such as torture and secret prisons, which are characteristic of fascist, authoritarian, and totalitarian political systems. Even worse, though, is the extent to which self-proclaimed defenders of traditional Christian morality have been willing to either openly support or at least turn a blind eye to these practices. People who spend a lot of time crying out that America is a Christian Nation are spending little if any time proclaiming that torture and secret prisons are incompatible with Christian morality.

This is not to say that Christian Nationalists are silent about American politics and culture: on the contrary, they have a long litany of complaints about all manner of things which they insist are contrary to God’s will and America’s status as a Christian nation. Foremost among these are typically abortion, acceptance of homosexuality, gay marriage, and the secularization of public institutions. A great deal of time, effort, and money are invested into combatting these problems on the premise that they are incompatible with Christianity and a Christian nation.

For some strange reason, though, these same ostentatiously devout Christians have not invested similar amounts of time, effort, and money to combat things like poverty, homelessness, or the lack of educational opportunities which plague so many Americans. Other Christians have certainly been involved in those issues and these same Christians have also protested the American government’s recent foray into a world of torture, secret prisons, and domestic spying which is usually only inhabited by brutal dictators.

The Christian Nationalists, though, are nowhere to be seen. It would appear that they think America can be a Christian nation if it tolerates torture and secret prisons, but not if it tolerates abortion and homosexuality. The latter may be abominations to God, but the former are legitimate instruments of national security. If America is a Christian nation, people may be inclined to regard the cross as its symbol, but perhaps the original Latin Cross is the wrong one to choose. Christians treat the cross as an innocuous symbol of Christianity when in fact it is better regarded as a symbol of human brutality and death which Jesus is supposed to help people overcome.

The cross was one of the cruelest and most brutal forms of executions of the ancient world. Christians believe that God was brutalized and executed with one. Christians also believe that humans are created in the image of God, such that whatever we do to each other we are effectively doing to God. Actually putting God incarnate on the cross was a way for God to demonstrate this in an immediate and visceral manner, rather than as an abstract or esoteric idea. Christianity teaches that when the Romans crucified Jesus they crucified God, just as when we harm others in our everyday lives we are harming God.

The Roman or Latin Cross has largely lost this impact, though. People no longer associate it directly with human brutality and cruelty as they once must have. The Nazi Swastika, however, still conveys such things. If America is going to endorse brutality, torture, secret prison, military tribunals, and more, then perhaps swastika is the appropriate cross to use in order to properly communicate that. Liberal Christians might argue, with some justification, that any time people try to use the cross for partisan political purposes it will necessarily become bent and twisted anyway.

This image is based on a Spanish Revolution poster depicting an anonymous man tied to a swastika; Christ’s head is my own addition as is all the text. Knowledgeable observers will notice the similarity to two of John Heartfield’s works: “Christ Suffers Under the Swastika,” 1933, and “As in the Middle Ages...So in the Third Reich,” 1934. The references are deliberate and why I chose the original poster as the basis for my own image.

You can see many more posters I’ve created in this gallery on my site: Christian Right Propaganda Posters