BAPTISTS AND CONSCIENCE

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXXII, Issue 22259, 6 November 1935, Page 17

BAPTISTS AND CONSCIENCE

I Sir, —"W.M." has dropped his ap- I peal to history. He now calls plaintively for a return to the real issue —"whether loyalty to the Throne can go hand in hand with disloyalty," i.e., to accept my terminology and discuss my syllogism. The whole point is that we refuse to accept the terminology. The use of the word "disloyalty" is arbitrary and unwarranted. That is why the argument is centred on the question of "disloyalty." Kagawa is not disloyal to Japan because he refuses to" participate in the devilries of war. "Christian Loyalist" espouses the war of defence out of love for his neighbour. This is a highly interesting piece of mental gymnastics. The Christian is as much tne neighbour of the robber as of the robbed. I do not "pass by on the other side" when I object to an arrangementf which sends me to use poison gas and high explosives on the robber's relatives. It is high time this talk of a war of defence was dropped. There is no such thing. Three years ago Mr. Stanley Baldwin said in the House of Commons, "The only defence is in offence. Which means that you have to kill more women and children more quickly than the enemy if you Avant to save yourselves." Dr. North's timely letter 'is not to bo so lightly dismissed as your belligerent correspondents would wish. "Sane Pacifist" turns a blind eye to the dust of Roman arenas and the smoke of Neronic fires to prove from the Scripture the subordination of conscience to the will of the State. No man should be compelled to do what lie believes to be wrong. That is the principle at stake. A patriotism which demands the violation of that principle is false. Baptists have no monopoly in defence of this freedom, although history gives them every right to he identified with it. Rev. J. C. Fussell is to be complimented on his courteous letter. He expresses himself "as very anxious about the results of militant pacifism." There is a bigger danger in the feverish armaments race. The pressure will increase until an artery bursts somewhere. We are inoculating our sons with the microbes of Mars in the name of preventive medicine. The inevitable end is war and, according to Lord Halsbury, "the next war means mutual obliteration of the people." There must be other ways of proving my patriotism than that of smashing up men with whom I have no personal quarrel. Many ex-soldiers feel with Blake in "Metal Without Bars." "It was wrong, all this business of flinging the entrails out of men, of smashing up their faces, of crucifying them by sleeves and breeches on barbed wire, and perforating them with 100 holes, it was wrong to chill and stain and batter them, to deafen them till they were sneaking curs or demented heroes." Of course it's wrong. That is why T renounce war. Alexander Hodge.