Those Evil Christian Terrorists

We all saw on the news recently how a single Christian male terrorist bombed a building in Oslo, Norway to cause a distraction and then drove to an island hosting a large campground meeting and attempted to kill everyone there.  He seems to have been fairly successful with a total death toll of 76 from both incidents.  76 random youths who will never see their next birthday or watch another sunset.

And for what?

This time we hear his plan was to start the revolution to eject Muslims from his society.  Apparently those filthy Muslims are eroding the Christian way of life where a man can kill his fellow countrymen with impunity.  Imagine what Norway would be like under Muslim rule!    No longer can a right-thinking man dress as a policeman and murder dozens of people in cold blood.  It’s the end of civilisation as we know it!

The most curious thing is how much he resembles the group that he hates the most.  So we have an individual who believes he is fighting a righteous war for God, to bring everyone to the truth of Christianity and the way to do that is to kill innocent civilians in a random and haphazard way.  Sounds like the kind of suicide bomber we’ve got used to hearing about for decades.  However, he doesn’t see himself that way at all…..and there are some differences.

Firstly, the bomb was mostly a distraction to keep the police busy.  His plan was not to go up in flames as a martyr, he planned to live as a figurehead for the cause.

Secondly, he went further than your average suicide bomber by engaging in the massacre shooting – his main event.  He actually disguised himself as a police officer, which allowed him to carry the firearms he needed onto the island.  This requires a lot more dedication to the cause of murder.  Setting off a bomb is over in an instant.  Loading, aiming and squeezing the trigger to take another life is very different.  That requires a special devotion to your cause.  I wonder if the Jihadists will take this as a call for them to improve their game from simple bombings?

Finally, and perhaps most telling, his targets were not Muslims.  He killed Christian youths who belong to the Norwegian political party that he sees as responsible for the influx of those damn foreigners.  So where Muslim Jihadists take the fight to the enemy, this guy takes the fight to other Christians.  So he’s smart enough to avoid detection before committing this atrocious act, but not smart enough to actually think through what the hell he’s doing.

I suppose in his mind he was the instigator and the perpetrator, so if he died, there’d be nobody to explain the righteous glory of his actions.  Although he did make sure to send his manifesto to a large group of people just before starting his holy war.  His Jihad.  There, I said it.

So he’s just like the Jihadists he fears and hates, only dumber.

Why dumber?  So who is he going to ignite with the fury of religious revolution?  The majority of people in any western country just aren’t interested in this kind of nonsense.  They watch it on films, they read about it on the news and then settle down to watch TV with some beer or hot chocolate, while wondering if the weather’s nice tomorrow or their footy team will win on the weekend.  They have jobs and some security, they’ve bought into society and society rewards them with 100 TV channels, internet access and a safe life.  A safe life far from the terrorist madness at the far-flung ends of the earth.

Well, it was safe.  You thought your children would be especially safe at the official camping event.  You’d think the only thing to worry about was wild animals or accidents.  It’s safe here in your own country, far from the madness of those crazy Jihadists.  Then, in one news report, that comfort zone is torn away.  Torn away by a white, Christian, Norwegian man.  Not some Arab-looking guy screaming threats at you.  Not even a Muslim threatening your way of life.  A white Christian who thinks there’s too many foreigners, too many Muslims in your country.  But why is he killing Christians?  It doesn’t make sense.

Hell, you even thought there were too many foreigners a few times when you bumped into them at the supermarket.  But this terrorist could be me, or my neighbour, or someone I know.  I dont want to kill anyone, I just want to enjoy my life in safety.  And I will never support anyone who thinks killing our children is a good idea.

Are the masses really going to be ignited to begin a religious, racial revolution?  I think they would be better advised to try to protect themselves from future crazy Christian terrorists.  But will they?

Already the distancing has begun.  I think the fear that it could be anyone you know makes you want to blame something else.  You’ve lost that clear line of ‘Us’ and ‘Them’.  It wasn’t that he was a militant Christian reading and sinking into the right wing, mass media hype about Muslims.  It wasn’t that he had access to those firearms and the police uniform.  It wasn’t that he planned the attack for years, telling himself he was a soldier of the lord, believing he was doing God’s work.

He played violent videogames.  He watched violent TV shows.  That must be it.  He must have had a bad childhood.  He must be addicted to drugs.  If only he had turned to Christ in his hour of need…..oh hang on…if only he hadn’t watched those music videos with almost naked women.

There’s no way a Christian would do something that blatantly evil.  Am I right?

I can almost see the back slapping right wing Christians finding ways to pin this on their current program to ban something else.  The hypocrisy they show is phenomenal.  Making excuses for this vicious massacre whilst at the same time being horrified that Muslims still live their lives unoppressed.  As a matter of historical fact, Christians have been responsible for some of the most horrific massacres in the history of the world.  And yet, the distancing is in place.  ‘That wasn’t my church’, ‘that was bad men at the time acting against the church’…..’We’re not as bad as those evil Muslims’.

The reality is humans are more the same the world over than they are different.  On a daily basis, everyone has the same needs.  Everyone has hopes and dreams.  Everyone wants to live well and to provide a better life for their loved ones.

It just feels wrong when those hopes and dreams turn into a design for unrepentant mass murder.  Both the Bible and Koran agree on that point; Murder is wrong.

So why do these stupid humans keep doing it in the name of a God who has so clearly told them not to?  …and then, worse, the same people rationalise it, justify it and defend it?

This Norwegian man is completely unrepentant.  He thinks he is a figurehead, leading the cause.

He’s just another citizen of a wealthy country with too much time and money.  If only he had spent both positively.  Imagine if the headline was “Norwegian man spends nine years developing a permanent solution to provide free education for the world’s children”.

Wouldn’t that have been a better day?