Armistice & nationalism...

​ French President Emmanuel Macron delivers a speech during a commemoration ceremony for Armistice Day, 100 years after the end of the First World War at the Arc de Triomphe, in Paris, Nov. 11, 2018.

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Patriotism is the exact opposite of nationalism: Nationalism is a betrayal of patriotism. In saying 'our interests first, whatever happens to the others,' you erase the most precious thing a nation can have, that which makes it live, that which causes it to be great and that which is most important: its moral values...

I know, the old demons are resurging, ready to finish off their work of chaos and death. New ideologies manipulate religions, push a contagious obscurantism. Sometimes, history threatens to retake its tragic course and threaten our heritage of peace that we believed we had definitively settled with our ancestors' blood.
EXCERPTS from Macron's Speech

Thank you, Mr. Macron. Words such as these are consistent with an overriding world view that I have embraced since my 20’s.

I wrote an ESSAY on the topic of nationalism nearly 30 years ago from my vantage point as an expatriate and Christian pastor/missionary. It feels equally apropos today. The escalation of hate speech emanating from white supremacists and anti-Semites is one more affirmation that two world wars did not obliterate the roots of war.​

True Christianity is bigger than nationhood. No kingdom will outlast God’s kingdom. God’s kingdom work embraces the whole of humanity. Ours is a ministry of reconciliation through the shed blood of our Savior. He gave his life for the world (Jn 3:16…  κόσμος kosmos). So should we. Let's not get caught up in things that are less. 
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"And in the days of those kings the God of heaven will set up a kingdom that shall never be destroyed, nor shall the kingdom be left to another people. It shall break in pieces all these kingdoms and bring them to an end, and it shall stand forever,"  (Daniel 2:44)

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