As a high school teacher, sometimes I have to find drastic ways to keep sleep-deprived students awake (not to mention interested!). Last week I went a little further than usual. I stood in front of the class with a wicked grin, took out my pen, held it up, set it on a desk gently, got down on my knees carefully, and began to offer the black ballpoint my earnest and sincere worship.

“Oh baal point,” I intoned. “You alone are worthy. Oh mighty pen of power, you alone give meaning! You alone, my god, my being, my baal point god!”

My students think I’m crazy (maybe they are right) and didn’t know whether to laugh or run. Most sat stunned and confused, silent.

“I will give my life for you, my baaled god!” I shouted. “I will give it all, all I have, all I am, to hold you close, to hold and have you forever!”

The silence deepened, but confusion gave way to wonder, to curiosity: what was Mr. Wildermuth trying to say, what was he trying to do?

“I will never be parted from you!” I screamed, looking around, daring someone to touch my pen-god. The closest student took my dare, reaching out to grab the pen away from me.

“STOP!” I roared, standing, grabbing the desk, pushing it over, enraged at the god-thief. He dropped the pen. I took it back with a growl, glared at the room of wide-eyed faces, held the pen close, then whispered to my god, “I will die for you.” I looked at the student who grabbed my pen. “I will kill for you.”

I put away my pen, picked up the toppled desk, took out a dollar bill, placed it on a desk, and then repeated what I had done before - intoning, bowing, worshiping, adoring my new god.

“I will do anything for you,” I told the dollar. “I will die for you.” I looked into the eyes of my students. “I will kill for you.”

They got it.

———-

False gods - idols - don’t come as statues of gold and silver anymore. Idols don’t reside in temples with incense and pagan worship. Now they occupy the realm of ideas and hearts. They come in the form of numbers in our bank account. They come in the feelings that make us forget about life, death, existence, meaning. They come in songs and flags. They come to replace God. They come relentlessly, and they always bring with them death, bloodshed, violence. Ultimately, all violence is a form of idolatry, violence is the fruit of faithlessness. When men kill, they never kill for God. They kill for their false gods - their idols.

Five years ago, as I sought discharge from the Army as a conscientious objector, it was common for me to receive this question: “if someone was about to kill and rape your wife, and you could only stop them by killing them, what would you do?’ My reply was often, “what wife?” But today, newly married and deeply in love, I find this question more relevant. What would I do, if someone threatened my wife, and I could only stop them by killing them?

In the Army, through Ranger training and West Point’s indoctrination, I learned a lot about killing. Killing isn’t about how strong or fast or smart you are. Killing is about will. Do you have the will to kill, to defeat your enemy at all costs, to destroy them with a ruthless and single-hearted purpose? General Patton had that purpose. Rommel the ‘desert fox’ had it. Ulysses S. Grant had it. Sherman had it. Caesar and Alexander had it. They all had the will to destroy, and when the other side hesitated out of fear or doubt, they killed, and ‘conquered.’

What would I do, if someone threatened my wife, and I could only stop them by killing them?

———-

We were walking back to our home in Washington D.C.’s Columbia Heights area - a relatively safe place until 2 or 3 in the morning. It was 4 am. The streets were empty. We’d had a nice time at our friend’s house, but had stayed up a little too late, so I wasn’t thinking clearly, wasn’t perceptive about our surroundings. We took a shortcut down a road with dim lighting. We walked past an alley. I barely glanced at it. A few steps. A sound. I look behind us, and see them. I see the gleam of a blade. I hear the demand. Angela, my wife, pulls at my arm, tries to run, but they are too fast, they grab us. A blade’s put to my throat! She’s being pulled away, toward an alley. They are laughing. She’s almost gone, he’s laughing, her screams muffled, “help!” she shouts.

“Angela!” I shout. “I love you!”

She is the center of my life! She is my meaning, my purpose, my existence!

I would die for her.

I would kill for her.

I hear another muffled shout, I feel the blade, and then, fury builds, pounding, growing, screaming to break free from a pacifism that would let my wife die.

“Angela!” I shout, ignoring the blade’s growing pressure, ignoring the bleeding.

I will kill for her.

I twisted, let the blade slip past my neck, grabbed his forearm, pulled it forward and down, and smashed my palm through the man’s elbow, pushing splintered bone through skin, kicking his leg out, bringing the heel into his face, stomping, crushing, stomping, again, again, crushing his neck.

I crouched, grabbed the blade, and ran into the black silent alley.

She was laying there, still, on her back, alone, silent.

“Angela!?”

She didn’t move.

I flung myself down, rage and anguish burning my heart. Was I too late? I touched her gently, adoringly. She wasn’t moving. “Angela?” I whispered.

I had hesitated. I had . . . failed.

“Nate?” she whispered, turning over, crying silently, shivering. She reached out for me, hugging me tightly.

“Thank God,” she said.

“Thank god!” I echoed, hugging her closer, feeling one again. But my heart still raced. Where was the other? “Where is he?” I asked, getting up.

“He only wanted the money,” she said. “I gave him everything, and then he pushed me down and ran.”

My heart couldn’t stop pounding. I felt my hands shaking, felt hatred growing.

“What happened?” she asked.

I didn’t answer, couldn’t.

“What happened?’ she repeated.

I looked back out the alley, nodding at the figure crumpled upon the ground. She looked out and her eyes widened. The dark heap wasn’t moving, wasn’t moaning, was silent, and I was sure - dead. Later, when the sirens and lights and questions had ceased, the images would remain with me - images of a puffed up baby-face, a crushed neck, blood soaked eyes, not of a killer, not of a man. Images of a 16-year-old, a drunk child, dead. Images that haunt me.

———-

I would die for her?

I would kill for her?

Only in an imaginary answer to an imaginary question, where I ask myself - what would I do if I were willing to kill for my wife? What would I do if my wife were the most important thing in my life, more important than the Gospel, more important than Jesus Christ, God the Father, God the Holy Spirit? What would I do if my wife were my god, my idol - that which I loved most.

I would do anything.

But it goes deeper. I would do more than kill, if I had to. I would maim. I would torture. I would massacre. I would nuke. I would wage unending horrors against any who stood in my way. And then, when all was dead, even my beloved, I would put the last bullet in the last man living - myself.

What happens when my idol is my country? What happens when my idol is my affluent way of life? What happens when my idol is my self?

We will do whatever our false god asks us to do, we will serve our false god with all our heart, all our mind, all our soul, and all our strength. Every idol demands a different service, demanding different forms of worship and praise. But mostly, they demand our protection, they demand that we sacrifice ourselves and others to keep them alive. For idols cannot live without us, their creators. Idols always die, and when they do, they do not rise again. In vain do we sacrifice for idols. In vain do we die for idols! But more to the point - in vain do we kill. No matter how much we sacrifice, no matter how many we kill, our idols will die. And with them, their false promise of life and love.

But not so with the true God, Christ, the only savior of the world. His promises are not broken by death, but rather, are sealed by death. The resurrection of the Son of God offers us a hope that no man-made idol can ever offer. While idols demand sacrifice and bloodshed, while idols demand wars and death, while idols demand that we kill, Christ demands the opposite. Christ demands that we die, that we sacrifice everything, following him to the cross.

———-

I put a cross on the desk, and bowed down before it, worshiping the God nailed to it, whispering, “I love you. I will follow you wherever you go. I will die for you. I will kill for you.”

In return, I heard something new, something I had not heard from the idols.

“No greater love is this - than in laying down your life.”

“I will,” I replied. “I will die for you. I will kill for you.”

In return, I heard something new, something I had not heard from idols.

“He who would save his life would lose it!”

“I will lose my life,” I replied. “I will die for you. I will kill for you.”

In return, I heard something new, something I had not heard from idols.

“I give you a new commandment. Love one another as I have loved you.”

“I will lose my life,” I replied. “I will die for you. I will kill . . .”

Interrupting, the true God shouted, “All who take the sword will die by the sword!”

“I will lose my life,” I replied, “I will kill . . . ”

Interrupting, the true God shouted, “I have given you a model to follow!”

“I will lose my life,” I replied, “I will kill . . . ”

But God did not speak again. He bled. His blood spoke: “love your enemies, do good to those who hate you . . . conquer evil with good.”

“But . . . we will lose our lives,” I replied. “We will . . . we will . . . what will we do?”

———-

How does the true God defeat evil? The Universal Holy Church of Jesus Christ - the Catholic Church, proclaims that only love can defeat evil. Pope Benedict XVI tells us that God has a “new way of conquering”, that God “does not oppose violence with a stronger violence.” Instead, “He opposes violence precisely with the contrary: with love to the end, his cross.” Though idols laugh at the cross, though idols call it folly and futile, Christians see the “nonviolence of the cross” as “God’s humble way of overcoming.” With the cross, with nonviolence, Christ “puts a limit to violence,” showing us the “the true way of overcoming evil, of overcoming violence.” For the idolatrous who disregard the power of nonviolent love of enemy, Pope Benedict simply reminds us of the obvious: “we must trust this divine way of overcoming.”

There is hope upon the cross, and nowhere else.

Upon the cross, a revolution begins! Upon the cross, we see the incarnation of Christ’s greatest teaching, we witness the master stroke of God’s greatest warrior, we see: sacrificial love of enemy. Pope Benedict reminds us that “the Lord conquered on the cross”, that “loving the enemy is the nucleus of the ‘Christian revolution,’” that loving our enemies “is rightly considered the magna carta of Christian nonviolence.” Moreover, nonviolence “does not consist in surrendering to evil . . . but in responding to evil with good and thus breaking the chain of injustice.”

The second Vatican Council “praise(s) those who renounce the use of violence in the vindication of their rights,” foreseeing that they will “vanquish sin by a union of love, they will vanquish violence,” and within that victory of nonviolence, they will forge a world where “‘nation shall not lift up sword against nation, neither shall they learn war any more.’” Echoing the council’s trust in the cross, Pope John Paul II calls upon the faithful to embrace another way of fighting evil, asking, yearning, demanding that we “learn to fight for justice without violence”.

“War is an abomination,” St. John Chrysostom declares. It sets brother against brother in the desperate hope that mutual bloodshed will forge peace. But in light of two world-shattering wars and the growing threat of nuclear holocaust, our modern bishops and popes have discovered what Christ said so long ago - that those who live by the sword will die by the sword, that “the way of violence cannot obtain true justice,” that war cannot forge peace. As a Marine once said, “killing for peace is like fucking for virginity.” It is obscene, inhuman, bringing a curse of injustice upon ourselves and the world.

“Nonviolent means of resistance to evil deserve much more study and consideration than they have thus far received,” our bishops teach. I have spent eight years, half as a soldier, half as a Catholic, discerning the Christian way of defeating evil, of fighting injustice, of defending my wife against rape and murder. It is time we took the cross seriously. It is time to put down our swords and rifles, and to fight for justice without killing one another.

———-

We were walking back to our home in Washington D.C.’s Columbia Heights area - a relatively safe place until 1 or 2 in the morning. It was just 1 am. The streets were nearly empty. We’d had a nice time at our friend’s house, where we’d seen the movie Bella and talked late into the night about friendship, family, and life. Feeling excited as we took a shortcut, I let the beauty of the night, of God’s miraculous creation, fill my heart. I held my wife’s hand, not talking, just praying without words, cultivating love with our smiling eyes. That’s when I saw the two men lingering at the end of the alley. They were looking at us. As we passed, I nodded to them, and silently blessed them. But something felt wrong. Tingles ran across my skin. It didn’t feel right. I gripped Angela’s arm tighter as I began to take longer quicker steps.

“Hey!” a voice growled from behind.

Angela looked at me. I wanted to keep walking. This wasn’t right. But she stopped, turning around.

“Got any money?” one asked. They looked dirty, unsteady on their feet. But these weren’t homeless men, they weren’t panhandling. This was different, dangerous. Angela could sense it. Her hand grasped mine harder. Another blessing came into my heart: “God, please bless them, and grant us courage.”

“Hi friends,” I said, blurting out the first thing that came into my head, forcing my voice to sound confident and friendly. I didn’t feel calm.

“We need some money,” the other man said. But was it a man? I couldn’t be sure. He slurred his speech, making it hard to understand. Angela squeezed my hand harder. “What are you doing?” her heartbeat asked through our interconnected hands.

“Money?” I asked. “I’m not sure . . . ” I began to lose confidence, losing my nerve. Suddenly a gleam shined from his hands. He had a blade. The hoods flew off, and suddenly everything goes into slow-motion: Angela grabs my arm, turns, the blade flourishes and advances, but halts, then hands come, pushing, shoving, tugging, Angela’s hands are gone, a dark shape separating us, something sharp is under my chin, an enraged alcohol-laced breath floods my face. And I am afraid, but a calm comes, a prayer begins without my beginning it.

“Our Father,” I whisper. I can hear Angela’s voice from the alley, can see her white coat at its edge.

“Who art in heaven,” I continue.

“Shud fuck up, mudderfucker,” the drunk voice in my face shouts slowly, then looks over at his shoulder to his other friend. What’s happening to Angela? What’s happening, God?

“Hallowed be thy name,” I say, louder. The man, no . . . now I can see him . . . the boy, only a teenager, looks at me, furious but confused.

“Thy kingdom come,” I continue, staring into the boy’s bloodshot eyes. The boy presses the knife harder against my chin. I can feel it bleeding.

“Shut’a FUCK up!”

“Thy will be DONE,” I say, lifting my head back, listening now to Angela’s muffled shouts. I feel something moving in me. God’s will be done. God wills his children to live. God wills us to protect one another. God does not will us to sit back and die. No. We carry this cross! We move!

“On earth!” I shout, moving, shocked to find myself moving - my legs are moving. The boy is moving with me. My mouth keeps praying, my heart keeps pounding, my mind filled with God’s presence.

“AS IT IS IN HEAVEN!,” I shout, pushing aside the boy’s knife, running, praying.

“DELIVER US,” I scream as I enter the alley, enraged at evil, at the darkness, at Satan working to destroy me, my wife, these boys. But where are they? They are gone, both of them. Where? Snatched by God? My imagination? I run into the alley, shouting with my being my prayer to God, to be delivered “FROM EVIL!”

Angela is there, sitting on the ground. Her eyes are bruised, her nose bleeding.

“Angela?” I pant. “Are you okay?”

She’s crying, laughing, hugging me, yes, she’s okay, he ran away, he heard me, he saw his friend, he . . .

“No!” she shouts, pointing behind me. I turn, see metal, hear something loud, blank out, blackness hits me, everything stops . . .

“Fuck you,” I hear, a boy’s whisper through tears. “Fuck you, and fuck God.”

Angela is crying. Something warm is running through me. I’m on the ground, staring up at her. But I can see stars for the first time. And I see the boy. I see him walking away, smoke coming from him, demons playing upon him, trying to tear him apart. But something has changed. The gun, he’s dropped. He begins to pray. Forgive him . . .

“For the Kingdom,” she whispers, we whisper.

“The Power,” to die

“The Glory,” to live

“Are yours, now and forever.” Amen. And I die.

Angela lives. And for one 16 year-old boy, life changes forever.

———-

While some would mistake love of enemies for inaction, our bishops teach us that “nonviolence is not passive about injustice and the defense of the rights of others. It ought not be confused with popular notions of nonresisting pacifism . . . (it) is not the way of the weak, the cowardly, or the impatient.” Rather, as our Pope explains, “nonviolence . . . belongs to the heart of the Gospel,” a Gospel that saves! In every great struggle, there will always be blood shed. But the question remains: whose blood? How far are you willing to go to defend those you love most?

The answer to that question depends exactly upon whom you love most.