This on irresponsible pacifism:
“Pope warns escalating Iran conflict could tip Middle East into ‘irreparable abyss’”
https://www.foxnews.com/live-news/israel-us-continue-strikes-iran-after-khamenei-death
“Pope Leo XIV warned Sunday that U.S.-Israel airstrikes on Iran risk plunging the Middle East into an ‘irreparable abyss,’ urging leaders to halt a dangerous spiral of violence…
“Speaking at the Angelus, the pontiff expressed “deep concern” over recent developments and called on nations to choose dialogue over war.
“’Stability and peace are not built with mutual threats, nor with weapons, which sow destruction, pain, and death, but only through a reasonable, authentic, and responsible dialogue,’ the pope said, according to Vatican News.
“’Faced with the possibility of a tragedy of enormous proportions,’ he added, ‘I address to the parties involved a heartfelt appeal to assume the moral responsibility to stop the spiral of violence before it becomes an irreparable abyss!’…
“The pope reinforced his warning in a two-part message posted Sunday morning on X.
“’I am following with deep concern what is happening in the Middle East and in Iran during this tumultuous time,’ he wrote.”
This is what Secretary of War Pete Hegseth called “destructive pacifism”. It doesn’t work and is irresponsibly dangerous. When you are dealing with enemies who are committed to your extermination you can’t ultimately have “reasonable, responsible” dialogue with such people. They are too often just insidiously using such discussions as delay tactics to re-arm themselves for further assault on your very existence. Just as Hamas used previous ceasefire agreements over the years before Oct. 7 to stockpile more weapons and build more tunnels while neglecting to improve the lives of Gazan civilians.
But of course, engage dialogue and negotiation as much as possible to explore possible resolution of conflict through that approach. But where that fails, then…
You are obligated to protect your people, unfortunately even with force, against those dogmatically committed to the extermination of differing others. This leaves Israel, for example, with no choice but to eliminate Hamas and similar enemies. If you could capture/incarcerate and thereby restrain them, that would be better. But if that is too dangerous to do then you have to shoot and bomb from a safe distance. But you are obligated to eventually fulfill your number one priority as a government to protect your citizens from harm.
The same applies to China and Russia, also committed to overthrow western liberal democracy and subjugate the entire world to their totalitarian collectivism. Yes, dialogue in the interim but prepare for the forceful defense of freedom if that will eventually become necessary. You cannot compromise with people committed to your destruction and the destruction of liberal democracies.
The Pope is recommending an irresponsible pacifism in the face of such evil committed to violent destruction and extermination of dissenting others. The ignorance in such recommendations is baffling. The lack of common-sense is stunning.
How about some courage and steel spine in the face of totalitarian bullying. Feel the joy of millions of Iranians today as hope springs forth again with the prospect of freedom. They have suffered 47 years of hell under the outcomes of “reasonable and responsible” dialogue and delay from others who neglected the obligation to protect the innocent.
A rehash of a previous post:
Preface note: Confronting again the tribalism, domination, and retaliatory destruction impulses in all of us, the real battle of life that should primarily take place inside each one of us against the real enemy in life- i.e. our common, shared animal inheritance of anti-human drives. Keep this in mind as we engage public battles to responsibly stop violence and protect the freedoms and rights of all, to end and eliminate crusades of tribal domination and destruction, whether the crusades of theocratic or secular/ideological collectivism, both intent on overthrowing liberal democracy.
The point here? The current use of force to stop a dangerous threat from a theocratic crusade (i.e. Iranian), is a use of force that is undeniably necessary when diplomacy fails. But a caution- We face the natural tendency to retreat into tribalism and conclude that our side is acting without any culpability, as purely “righteous” against undeniable “evil” (the common deformity of the “Hero’s Quest”). (Culpability- “guilt, blame, fault, responsibility, accountability, liability, answerability, etc.”)
In the midst of intensely aroused emotions at watching the joy of millions liberated from tyranny we forget that what has motivated the evil that the West is trying to defeat is an evil that is motivated by the very ideas/themes/beliefs that the religion of the Iranian theocrats inherited from Christianity. That is a hard one for many Westerners to admit to. But the evidence is overwhelming. Grok details it in the link below.
Here is the context that I am setting to make this point. In terms of ultimate culpability, Judaism and Christianity are both involved, across the longer-term history, for promoting the core ideas and beliefs, notably the core theology, that incites the “evil” that we rightly condemn in today’s violent Islamic theocracy crusades.
I guess my point has to do with cautioning against the tendency to view our opponents in these battles as irredeemable enemies to be hated and rightfully exterminated from the face of the planet for what they have done over past decades, when (and this has to do with maintaining our own humanity during these conflicts) they are still family even they been seriously misled by bad ideas. And where have these bad ideas ultimately come from? This is the point on our own culpability in these endless eruptions of tribal violence, hatred of the offending others, and resort to retaliatory violence to defeat and destroy.
Here is the context: First, I asked Google AI…
“After the 2014 ISIS drive to establish the Islamic caliphate, a military man said that you can defeat such eruptions of violence with military force, but you have not ultimately defeated them because they will only continue to erupt again and again. You have to go after the ideology driving them.”
AI Overview responded:
“The statement you are referring to was made by Major General Michael K. Nagata, who was a special operations commander for U.S. Central Command.
“In late December 2014, he confessed to a group in Washington: “We do not understand the movement [ISIS], and until we do, we are not going to defeat it”.
“Regarding the group’s ideology, he specifically said:
“’We have not defeated the idea. We do not even understand the idea’.
“This quote highlights the widely recognized challenge among military and policy experts that the fight against ISIS involves not just military action to reclaim territory, but also a complex, long-term effort to counter the radical ideology and narrative that drives the group and inspires recruits globally.”
As General Nagata said- “We did not defeat the idea.”
And as I stated below the “idea” was not even confronted. And what has been the result? Endless resurgences of the same old crusades, both secular/ideological and religious/theocratic. All committed to the destruction of what they claim is “evil/satanic liberal democracy”.
“At the core of the complex of apocalyptic millennial ideas is the theology, an image of God buttressed with related bad ideas that are detailed on lists here. The central “idea” to be defeated that General Nagata needed to make clear is the theology of a God framed with the features of tribalism, domination, and justice/salvation through retaliatory destruction. This God is at the center of the crusades of “salvation through destruction”. The theology- i.e. God- is the central motivating and validating Ideal/Idea.” (End of repost quotes)
The mental block to confronting the bad theology, and other ideas that are major influences inciting and validating violence and war, is to recognize/realize that our own revered religion of Christianity is actually the historical source of the core themes of apocalyptic millennialism. Our Christian God has spawned and validated these other subsequent variants- i.e. Islam, Marxist collectivism, including the modern varieties of neo-collectivism. All offspring of the same mother.
Christ-ianity (entirely opposite to Jesus-ianity) is the root source of the themes that make up the “idea” that General Nagata was referring to. So, contrary to what General Nagata said, we do know the idea and what it consists of because good historians have traced the detailed evidence of “the idea” driving mass-death crusades both secular/ideological, as well as the theocratic crusades like ISIS.
Note the continued refusal to acknowledge the element of theology in the varied news reports on the current assault on the Iranian regime, reports that refer to what drives the Iranian theocracy crusade as “ideology”. While such elements may also be involved, the contemporary theocracy crusade has always been very much about theology wrapped in the apocalyptic millennial complex of themes, also understood as “salvation through violent destruction of differing others”.
Theology has to be confronted as the central mental deformity in the “idea” that General Nagata referred to if you really want to ensure ongoing progress in our overall grand exodus from our animal past and toward full liberation into a truly human future. This grand exodus is repeatedly hindered, blocked, even derailed by assaults on liberal democracy because we leave the “idea” protected under the sacred. And from that protected position the idea then continues to emote its destructive influence on human psychology, deforming human personality and inciting wider-scale violent destruction toward others.
Note: While China does not have a clear theological element (it “secularized” that feature in related elements), it shares the other main features of apocalyptic millennial crusades. Along with Russian collectivism and Iranian theocracy, it shares belief in a worsening world leading to cataclysmic ending, a belief in all humanity as flawed, and with Iran and Russia, it views itself in a righteous war against the decaying influence of liberal democracy, and it promises salvation through destruction. These points are made clear in Grok’s presentation in the link below (i.e. “From 50,000 feet up they all look the same”).
Now to this…
Cloaking of evil as good, exposing the archetypes/ideas undergirding and validating evil, Wendell Krossa
“From 50,000 feet up they all look the same”, Bob Brinsmead, Posted on February 12, 2026 by Wendell Krossa
http://www.wendellkrossa.com/?p=15027#more-15027
Note in the above link where Grok outlines the influence of the complex of bad religious ideas driving Chinese and Russian collectivism today, that the very same complex also continues to drive the Islamic theocracy crusade (i.e. via Iran, Muslim Brotherhood, Hamas, ISIS, Al Qaeda, Hezbollah, etc.).
The stunning thing to get from Grok’s comparison of the above movements is that all are motivated, guided, and validated in their push for totalitarian control worldwide by the same basic common themes. All are committed to war against the individual freedom and rights of liberal democracies, all motivated by what are at core “profoundly religious ideas/ideals”.
The above link offers the most thorough presentation (and probably the only such presentation on the planet) of the common complex of ideas/themes shaping the collectivism of China and Russia along with the theocracy of Islamic nations like Iran.
As Grok says, the framework of themes in Iranian Islam “is inherently theological, with Allah as the supreme deity enforcing justice through apocalyptic events” (a similar theological version is behind Russian collectivism). The full complex of the bad ideas list supports the central theology that operates all through these religious and secular crusades.
Many still refuse to recognize the profoundly religious nature of these major crusades against liberal democracy. Richard Landes, for one, has detailed the Western refusal to admit the Christian nature of the core belief systems involved. Until that recognition is made, we will not defeat properly and thoroughly these destructive ideas driving so much violence and war in our world.
Note, in Grok’s detailed presentation of the bad ideas list, how all three major assaults on liberal democracy (i.e. Chinese, Russian, Iranian) cloak their drive for power and domination as righteous battle against the evil of liberal democracy.
(Insert: I make no detailed defense in this immediate context of liberal democracy as the best approach for organizing human societies that promotes the most good for all people. I have listed repeatedly elsewhere on this site the principles, systems of law, and representative institutions of liberal democracy that protect the rights and freedoms of every person, equally. We have constructed no better system for protecting and promoting the highest good of every human than liberal democracy.)
The following comment continues with Grok’s presentation of how the tyrannies of the Chinese and Russian collectivist crusades, along with the Iranian theocracy crusade, all “cloak evil as good”.
They frame their movements in terms of a deformed version of the hero’s quest that validates themselves as heroic warriors for good against an evil that must be defeated and eliminated in order to attain some utopian vision of a restored paradise that has been ruined by liberal democracy.
A further insert note– Collectivism always ends in totalitarianism. How so?
In China’s collectivism the Confucian element orients that collectivist crusade to affirmation of “harmony under authority”. China’s collectivism responds to things like the loss of a better past with reclamation of that loss through authoritarianism, authoritarian domination necessary to correct human flaws, to purify information flows to people. The Chinese totalitarianism is motivated by the belief that authoritarianism promotes stability that is superior to the chaos of decadent democracies, and it thereby restores cosmic harmony. I am repeating points made by Grok in the link above.
Russian collectivism more directly views authoritarianism as “spiritually and culturally superior to liberal democracy”. Russian collectivist elites believe it is necessary to restore lost glory and reclaim moral purity, to save souls and the nation, and to avert the end of civilization due to liberalism.
Islam more directly, according to Grok, seeks domination to correct the corruption of life without Islamic governance, and to hasten the end and establish a caliphate as the best governance approach, to purge the evil of unbelievers and establish utopian peace under Allah’s law.
And much more detail on this from Grok in the link above.
Facing the element of “insidiousness: “underhandedness, slyness, craftiness, guile, duplicity, treacherousness, and furtiveness.”
“Insidious” may not be the correct description of what is going on here with these crusades that embrace apocalyptic millennial frameworks of themes. Rather than motivation that is intentional and consciously informed, most subsequent apocalyptic millennial crusades across history more mindlessly just take up ideas/themes without consideration of their ultimate origin in past religious traditions.
Whatever the motivation or intention, or state of understanding, the themes of apocalyptic millennialism, or salvation through violent destruction, have long been cloaked in religion as good, as divine. This makes it more difficult to confront and correct such ideas due to many hesitant to commit “blasphemy, heresy”, fearful of challenging the long dominant understanding of deity.
Nonetheless, whether intentional or due to ignorance, what we are facing in the “idea” Nagata referred to is the same old “Evil cloaked as good, as God,” and thereby validating and presenting a horrifically deformed version of good, of God. This is the grand mental deformity that our world religions have promoted over the millennia that has now morphed into secular ideological crusades against liberal democracy in the modern era.
The project and argument of this site: While many just shut down in defensive reaction and refuse to probe further into the religious origins of the “idea”, we have to confront and defeat it properly if we are to thoroughly, and for the long-term future, resolve the problems of violence and war in our societies due to endless eruptions from collectivist and theocratic crusades to assault and overthrow liberal democracy.
Defeating the “idea” starts with the recognition that, above all other sources, Paul’s Christ myth and Christian religion are most responsible for embracing, embodying, and promoting the complex of bad ideas that has shaped all subsequent theologies, belief systems, and meta-narratives across western civilization, narratives that have also shaped Eastern traditions and ideologies such as Chinese Marxism.
And yes, as Grok does well, the themes of apocalyptic millennialism in Paul’s Christ myth trace back even further to Zoroastrianism and more primitive mythologies. Note also the points on the contributions of Judaism and Hellenism to Paul’s Christology.
More to come….
jsy0n6