On Veterans and Violence

Today is Veteran’s Day.

It’s also the day that the movie The Immortals comes out.

Our culture craves the decadence of violence. Violence is celebrated and vindicated. It is the way things are done. In film, Westerns and action film genres have at times lapsed into a celebration of violence as opposed to showing the real and present darkness that invades the lives of those who are caught in the cycle of violence.

For every Saving Private Ryan or Brothers, movies that are violent but do not glorify the violence (these movies, at their best, make you abhor what war does to people), there are countless cheap thrills movies that perpetuate violence as a solution.

On Veteran’s Day, Christians should support those who have seen the horrors of combat. Throughout Church history, there has been a large contingent of Christians that are pacifist, and some that allow for just wars. It is insightful to see though, that even in a just war, if a Christian killed someone in combat or self-protection, he would have to do a lengthy penance of fasting and prayer. Killing, even when justified, even when necessary, is something that Holy Spirit has shown us to be deeply unsettling, dark and evil.

There is no violence like The Immortals. There is only violence that leads to insomnia, PTSD, broken marriages, broken families, homelessness, drug use and suicide.

On this Veteran’s Day, it is good that we look to those who have been touched by violence and offer them the healing of Christ. For he is the life and light that will bring healing and wholeness to those places of the soul that have been scarred by the horrors of violence.