“WAS CHRIST NOT A COMMUNIST?”

Dear Friend

Greetings in the precious Name of our Lord and Saviour, Jesus Christ.

Thank you for your e-mail response. Certainly atrocities have been committed by adherents of virtually every ideology and religion in history. And no, we cannot blame the message itself if people’s actions are based on misinterpretations of that message.

However, when you compare, or rather contrast, Islam with Christianity one has to notice that while Jesus Christ never murdered anyone, the so-called “prophet” of Islam, Muhammad, was involved in 47 battles, mostly raids on merchant caravans. While Jesus healed the sick and raised the dead, Muhammad had hundreds of defenseless people massacred, such as over 600 Jews in Medina beheaded for simply refusing to accept him as a prophet!

Similarly, while the Lord Jesus Christ commanded His followers to love their neighbours, and even to love their enemies, Muhammad instructed his followers to kidnap and hold for ransom, enslave, cripple by cutting off hands and feet, crucify and behead his enemies.

In the first three centuries after Christ, Christianity only spread peacefully by prayer, proclamation and persuasion. However in the first three centuries of Islam, the message of Muhammad was spread by the sword with countless atrocities, massacres and putting to the sword the entire population of whole cities.

Similarly, as we look at communism we need to recognise what the actual message is. The early slogan of the Soviet Union was: “Let us drive out the capitalists from the earth and God from Heaven.”

Vladimir Lenin declared: “Atheism is the natural and inseparable part of communism.”

Lenin also said: “We must hate. Hatred is the basis of communism.”

Karl Marx wrote: “The hellish vapours rise and fill the brain, till I go mad and my heart is utterly changed. See this sword? The prince of darkness sold it to me.”

“I wish to avenge myself against the one who rules above.” Said Karl Marx.

Che Guevez wrote: “Hatred is an element of the struggle. A relentless hatred of the enemy…transforming him into an effective, violent and selective, cold-blooded killing machine. A people without hatred cannot vanquish a brutal enemy.”

As one Marxist newspaper declared: “We do not fight against believers and not even clergymen. We fight against God to snatch believers from Him.”

So, not only have those who advocate communism committed the greatest atrocities, in terms of scope and intensity, accumulating over 160 million corpses just in the 20 th century alone, but it has been done in response to the central messages of communism, not in spite of them.

When a Christian murders the innocent, he proves himself not to be a Christian at all, and violates the express Commandments and example of Jesus Christ. However when a Muslim or a Marxist kill in the name of their ideology, then they are being consistent with both the teachings and examples of their founders.

Should you be interested in me sending you some copies of studies written on these matters, please do let me know your postal address.

May the Lord continue to lead you into all Truth.

Yours for Faith and Freedom

Dr Peter Hammond

Director

THE LETTER RESPONDED TO:

Hello

I'm just writing to address a few points made in your article "COMMUNIST CHALLENGE COUNTERED". I'm not sure how long ago it was written, but after reading it I felt like I had to send an email.

First of all, communism has yet to ever been established by any government. Many have tried, but pressure from capitalist states (mainly the United States of America) have made it impossible. Communist government's that have persecuted Christians have simply misinterpreted the manifesto. Marx recognized that the Eastern Orthodox Church in Russia was the main source of oppression to the common man in Russia. Its power and wealth needed to be redistributed just as the wealth of the Bourgeoisie needed redistribution.

Christ wanted people to act on their own will and live communally. The bible teaches us that we have free will, none would dispute that. However mainstream Christian political organizations seem to forget this regarding other matters. They use the bible to tell homosexuals that they cannot get married and also to tell women that they cannot get abortions. The bible teaches us that these things are wrong and so we seek to make legislation against them. The bible also teaches us that gluttony is wrong and that if we eat while one person starves we are guilty of murder. Why can't Christian groups be lobbying for legislation to correct these issues?

Lastly, calling the communal living of the early church "temporary" is crazy. Christ taught a message that consisted only of love. The early church followed this example and came to the only conclusion they could. Communal living. How can we call ourselves loving as we stuff our faces with McDonalds while 30,000 children starve every single day. If the early church was ever short on food, they would all fast until there was enough for everyone. What happened to practices like these? What happened to the love Christ commanded we all have? I'm tired of being called a "dirty commie" when I speak of the redistribution of wealth. Christ commanded us to sell everything we have to follow him. Cold War propaganda has made Communism into an evil thing and many Americans simply accept that without ever reading the manifesto. Has the author who wrote this article ever read the manifesto?

This email turned out a bit more long winded than I wanted it to. Maybe I'm beating a dead horse. I really just want Christians to reconsider the idea of love and ask themselves if they or their government stands up to this idea.

Thanks for reading and God Bless,