The New Roman Empire
A Case Study Reflection
from a Victim People
Out of studies on the
Roman Empire in the New Testament especially the Book of Revelation, I
follow a thesis that the United States of America has become today’s New
Roman Empire.
BY BP. ERME R. CAMBA
United Church of
Christ in the Philippines
Posted by Bulatlat
When the World Alliance of Reformed
Churches (WARC) meeting in Accra defined “empire” as “the coming together
of economic, cultural, political and military power [constituting] a
system of domination led by powerful nations to protect and defend their
own interests” (Par. 11), it minced no words by mentioning the “government
of the United States of America and its allies, together with
international finance and trade institutions such as the International
Monetary Fund, the World Bank, the World Trade Organization) as the ones
using political, economic and military alliances to protect and advance
their interest of the capital owners” (Par. 13).[1]
This paper is presented from the
standpoint of a nation and people that has been a victim of the “American
Empire.” Starting with a brief historical survey as a case study of a
suffering people from the designs of today’s Sole Superpower, the study
proceeds with reflections on the Book of Revelation and on the concept of
Kingdom of God.
The Story of a People
From tribal peoples who have already been
trading with China and Southern Asian peoples, my country, the
Philippines, succumbed to Spanish colonization, following colonization of
Central and South America peoples. It remained under the Spanish Crown for
three hundred sixty years until the new American Empire took over. It
cannot be denied that both Imperial Powers came for economic interests and
used both their international political and military might for their
territorial and economic expansion. Spain came for the rich spices of the
East and America came to exploit our natural resources and dominate our
economic and political life and make our country a gateway to the riches
of China. In the process Spain divided the rich agricultural country among
its citizenry and created the haciendas that became today’s agribusiness
conglomerates. America expanded its big business conglomerates siphoning
our rich natural resources, minerals and agricultural products.[2]
Our people by degrees rose against the
onslaught of these imperial adventures. We can count some 300 revolts and
rebellions in the 360 years of Spanish rule ending in a successful
revolution ironically only to fall into the hands of a new imperial power,
the United States of America. The US fought a long war of colonial
subjugation of the Filipino people which caused the loss of some one
million lives, about 15 percent of the population of 16 million at that
time. The Filipino people’s struggle against the American Empire
continues up to the present.
In fairness to the American people, it
should be noted that there was no lack of opposition to this surging
American tendency towards empire for early on there were anti-imperialists
that championed the cause of the Filipino people. William Jennings Bryan,
the Democratic presidential nominee in 1900, articulated the
anti-imperialists stance when he declared that “imperialism had its
inspiration in the desire of the syndicates to extend their commerce by
conquest.”[3]
It is interesting to note that on the day
immediately following the mock “Battle of Manila Bay,” Bishop James Mills
Thoburn of the Methodist Episcopal Church wrote about Adm. George Dewey’s
“Jericho-like victory” as “the fulfillment of the hopes and prayers of
years” and, therefore, urged Protestant Churches in the United States “to
enter in the name of the Lord and give the people of the Philippines a
pure gospel.” Four weeks later, in the same manner, Dr. George Pentecost
reported to the U.S. Presbyterian General Assembly saying: “God has given
into our hands…the Philippine Islands… [and] by the very guns of our
battleships, summoned us to go up and posses the land.”[4]
Sensing that the Filipino people could not
be subjugated by force of arms, the imperialists, each in their own way,
brought to bear the subtle persuasive power of both culture and religion
upon the Filipino people. The people of the islands at that time did not
yet have a closely articulated religion – save for Islam in some areas in
Mindanao and in smaller pocket areas in Luzon, and were thus easily
brought into the Roman Catholic faith, and with Catholicism so much of
Spanish culture filtered into the psyche and consciousness of the new
converts to the faith. And since Crown and faith were closely knit
entities in the dispensation practiced by the colonizers, faith and
politics reinforced each other which helped in bringing the Filipinos
under Spanish control. At the end of the 19th century when the
work of the illustrados such as Rizal, Mabini, the Del Pilars and others,
exposed the hypocrisy of the Spanish friars and provoked a critical
attitude towards the Roman Catholic Church, a new generation of
politically and religiously enlightened Filipinos were ready for the
coming of the Protestant Gospel brought by the Americans.
The Americans, immediately after crushing
the Philippine war of independence, sought to create institutions that
mirrored their own – a liberal democratic politics and government,
universal education with a strong dose of American values, a civil society
based on the principles of freedom, democracy and the free market, and
imposed English as both the language of government, business and the
educational system. The Filipino people became “brown Americans.”
U.S. President William McKinley declared
in December 1898 that the purposes of the United States in the Philippines
was to “civilize and Christianize” the Filipinos for whom Christ also
died,” with force if necessary.[5]
This was President McKinley’s policy of “Benevolent Assimilation,” part of
the “Manifest Destiny.” This made the US to appear as the savior and
protector of the Philippines. And so the Philippines has indeed become a
show case that the United States of America has attained its “manifest
destiny,” and in wider world has established the New American Empire, the
New Rome.
The American Empire: the New Rome in the
Book of Revelation?
Out of studies on the Roman Empire in the
New Testament especially the Book of Revelation, I follow a thesis that
the United States of America has become today’s New Roman Empire. I am not
the first to use the term “The New Roman Empire.” Ofelia Ortega, Dean of
the Seminary in Matanzas, Cuba also referring to the Book of Revelation
uses the term.[6]
An
article from The Guardian, September 2002 uses the
title “Hail Bush: The New Roman Empire." Also an article of Michael Lind
asks rhetorically “Is America the New Roman Empire? (www.theglobalist.com)[7]
Gordon Zerbe (“When Global Traders Ruled
the World: The Choice Between Babylon and New Jerusalem as Rival
Economies,” a Bible Study) and Richard A. Horsley (Jesus and Empire:
The Kingdom of God and the New World Disorder) made interesting
comparisons of the New Testament Roman Empire and today’s New Empire.
Zerbe wrote mainly on the Book of Revelation. Horsley, using mainly the
Gospels, wrote about Jesus and the Empire.[8]
From Republic to Empire
The Book of Revelation was written at the
height of Roman imperial expansion and power. Zerbe notes that starting
with conquest of the whole of Italy, Rome expanded to Asia Minor and Syria
and subdued its major commercial rivals, Carthage and Corinth, gaining
trade supremacy of the sea. Horsley emphasizes that Rome started as a
Roman Republic taking over the whole of Italy and built an empire around
the Mediterranean. In the same manner the American Republic started with
the take over of much of the North American Continent from the Native
Americans and other peoples. Pursuing its avowed “manifest destiny” seized
Cuba and Puerto Rico in the Caribbean and moved on the Guam, Wake Island
and the Philippines in Pacific, helped to quell the Boxer Rebellion in
China, gained control of Panama and built the canal, and finally joined
European powers to carve a worldwide empire.
Religious Manifestation
of Empire
The military commanders of Rome started to
be called Imperatur (supreme commander) then Augustus (the
“manifest one,” starting a quasi-divine title). Later on they were called
Princeps (the “first” in the senate, thus marking the start of the
empire) and finally Pontifex Maximus (supreme priest completing the
transition to the divine right of the emperor).
Has the “manifest destiny” its own
religious ramifications? Horsley strongly believes so. He says that from
the early American identity starting with the Puritans, a persecuted
people who fled like Israel to establish a new covenant society and
through their victorious Revolution, they established a sacred promised
land and proceeded to slaughter the native inhabitants of the land whom
they derisively called the heathen savages, dark-skinned servants of
Satan. With this experience an ideology was formed that “the United States
[is] the new Israel, God’s chosen people with a historic mission, as the
new Rome destined to bring civilization, law, and order to the whole
world.”[9]
All Roads Lead to Rome
But coming back to the Roman Empire, we
find that through military conquest Rome acquired land, booty, tribute and
slaves. Slaves composed about one third of Rome’s population. Rome ruled
the oikoumene or the conquered world. As a historian puts it: “they
plunder, rape, kill, and burn, and then they call it peace.” The military
conquest certainly made possible a general “peace and security” giving
relatively safe travel by road and sea. And so “all roads lead to Rome.”
There was the “Pax Romana” – it was order degreed by terror.
In today’s Empire, do we also have slaves
who also travel the roads that lead to the “New Rome”? I believe the
overseas contract workers are the modern version of slaves. There are
eight million of them from the Philippines serving the New Empire and its
collaborators. Like the slaves of Rome and the African slaves who were
taken from their homelands at the turn of last century, the modern
overseas contract workers have the same feeling of separation,
exploitation, loneliness and despair.
“All roads” (including the cyber-highway)
lead to the seat of the New Empire that proclaimed itself as the
“policeman of the world” and decides the destiny of peoples. For the
“policeman of the world” there is no problem even if half a million people
are killed in the Desert Thunderstorm and hundreds of thousands in
Afghanistan and Iraq for the sake of bringing peace! The “policeman of
the world” promises security by dividing the world as “those who are with
us and those with the terrorists.” As in the old Rome, so it is in the
American Empire – order is imposed by an iron hand.
Economic Globalization
and Militarization of the Empire
The international trade brought riches to
Rome. Zerbe quotes a Roman writer: “The arrivals and departures of ships
never stop, so that one would express admiration not only for the harbor
but even for the sea. So everything comes together here, trade, seafaring,
farming, the scourings of the mines, all the crafts that exist and have
existed, all that is produced or grown.” (Aristides) Revelation 18:11-13
lists “cargo of gold, silver, jewels, pearls, fine linen, purple, silk and
scarlet, all kinds of scented wood, all articles of ivory, all articles of
costly wood, bronze, iron and marble, cinnamon, spice, incense, myrrh,
frankincense, wine, oil, fine flour and wheat, cattle and sheep, horses
and chariots, and slaves.”
Zerbe further explains that the
international traders are not different from today’s purveyors of economic
globalization. He notes that the satirical dirge on Babylon, the
prostitute, in Revelation Chapter 18, highlights the economic domination
of Rome. Babylon’s global traders “have enriched themselves through the
power of excess/luxury” (18:3) and they “have become powers of the earth”
(18:23). The global traders specialize in want, not on need, just like the
manufacturers of globalization products of today. The book of Revelation
highlights in the above list of goods an exploitative system that
benefited an urban elite at the expense of the majority of the populace.
“The Philippines is ours forever… a
territory belonging to the United States”
In 1900, Sen. Albert J. Beveridge
articulated such imperialist position which has become true in the decades
to come when he said: “We shall establish trading-posts throughout the
world as distributing points for American Products…We shall build a navy
to the measure of our greatness… Our institutions will follow our flag on
the wings of our commerce. And American law, American order, American
civilization and the American flag will plant themselves on shores,
hitherto bloody and benighted, but, by those agencies of God, henceforth
to be beautiful and bright.”[10]
The New Empire can easily be what was
spoken of Rome of the Book of Revelation. Consider Sen. Henry Cabot
Lodge’s letter to President McKinley in May 1898: “But the time has
come when (the home) market is not enough for our teeming industries, and
the great demand of the day as in outlet for our products. We cannot
secure that outlet from other protective countries… so our only chance is
to extend our American market by acquiring more trade territory. With our
protective wall around the Philippine Islands, its ten million inhabitants
(sic: we were about 16M), as the advance in civilization, would have to
buy our goods, and we should have so much additional market for our home
manufacturers. As a natural and logical sequence of the protective
system, we should now acquire these islands and whatever other outlying
territories seems desirable.”[11]
Or consider again the speech of Sen.
Albert J. Beveridge to the U.S. Senate, Jan. 9, 1900: “The
Philippines are ours forever, ‘territory belonging to the United States’,
as the Constitution calls them. And just beyond the Philippines are
China’s illimitable markets. We will not retreat from them either… Our
largest trade henceforth must be with Asia. The Pacific is our ocean …the
archipelago is a base for the commerce of the East. It is a base for
military and naval operations against the only powers with whom conflict
is possible; a fortress thrown up in the Pacific defending our Western
coast, commanding the waters of the Orient, and giving us a point from
which we can instantly strike and seize the possessions of any foe…”….(Cf.
Peter Hayes, Lyuba Zarsky and Walden Bello: American Lake,
Australia, Penguin, 1986) But if they did not command China, India, the
Orient, the whole Pacific for purposes of offense, defense and trade, the
Philippines are so valuable in themselves that we should hold them… a
revelation of vegetable and mineral riches…”[12]
(Underscoring added.) That was 1900.
George Kennan (1948): [Let] maintain
this position of disparity
Now consider the basic goal stated in
Policy Planning Study (PPS23), a top secret document written by George
Kennan (of the State Department Planning Staff) in 1948: We have
about 50% of the world's wealth but only 6.3% of its population.
... In this situation, we cannot fail to be the object of envy and
resentment. Our real task in the coming period is to devise a pattern
of relationships which will permit us to maintain this position of
disparity ... To do so, we will have to dispense with all
sentimentality and day-dreaming; and our attention will have to be
concentrated everywhere on our immediate national objectives. We need not
deceive ourselves that we can afford today the luxury of altruism and
world-benefaction. ... We should cease to talk about vague and ...
unreal objectives such as human rights, the raising of the living
standards, and democratization. The day is not far off when we are
going to have to deal in straight power concepts. The less we are then
hampered by idealistic slogans, the better."
[13]
(Underscoring added.)
Of course, in practice the U.S. government talks about those ‘idealistic
slogans’ in order to rationalize their actions and pacify the public.
Maintain 100,000 troops in Asia (1995
East Asian Strategic Report)
Consider also the 1995 East Asian
Strategic Report of the U.S. Defense Department showing the furtherance of
the US economic interest in Mindanao and Southeast Asian region and
furtherance of the US geo-political interest in the Asia-Pacific region
today: [This report] reaffirms our commitment to maintain a stable
forward presence in the region, at th-e existing level of about 100,000
troops, for the foreseeable future ... for maintaining forward deployment
of U.S. Forces and access and basing rights for U.S. and allied forces. If
the American presence is Asia were removed, our ability to affect the
course of event would be constrained, our market and our interests would
be jeopardized.[14]
Creation and Maintenance of Full Spectrum
Dominance
The “Joint Vision 2020”
To maintain and expand U.S. power, a
policy of “Full Spectrum Dominance” is envisioned. Conceptualized in 1997
as Joint Vision 2010, the “Joint Vision 2020” was issued May 30, 2000 by
the US Department of Defense. Full Spectrum Dominance is defined as
“the defeat of any adversary or control of any situation across the full
range of military operation….
The overall goal of the
transformation described in this document is the creation of a force that
is dominant across the full spectrum of military operations – persuasive
in peace, decisive in war, preeminent in any form of conflict."
This includes Star Wars style
“dominating space dimension of military operation to protect US interests
and investments.…to control the space medium to ensure US dominance on
future battlefields”
[15]
Can you remember the use of satellites in the Operation Desert Storm?
Bush “Strike First” Policy
Again to insure such dominance, the Bush
Administration instituted a “strike first policy” (National Security
Strategy published in September 2002. Again listen to this: "our
military must ... dissuade future military competition; deter threats
against U.S. interests, allies, and friends; and decisively defeat any
adversary if deterrence fails. ... the United States will require bases
and stations within and beyond Western Europe and Northeast Asia, as well
as temporary access arrangements for the long-distance deployment of U.S.
forces. ... Our forces will be strong enough to dissuade potential
adversaries from pursuing a military build-up in hopes of surpassing, or
equaling, the power of the United States. ... America will act against
such emerging threats before they are fully formed. ... We must deter and
defend against the threat before it is unleashed. ... We cannot let our
enemies strike first…. To forestall or prevent such hostile acts by our
adversaries, the United States will, if necessary, act preemptively. ...
Policies that further strengthen market incentives and market institutions
are relevant for all economies—industrialized countries, emerging markets,
and the developing world. ... Improving stability in emerging markets is
also key ... Our long-term objective should be a world in which all
countries have investment-grade credit ratings that allow them access to
international capital markets and to invest in their future. ... Free
markets and free trade are key priorities of our national security
strategy."[16]
[Underscoring added])
Pax Romana
It is interesting that the document
“Rebuilding America’s Defenses” (RAD) published in September 2003 by
conservative think tank that included Dick Cheney and Paul Wolfowitz
called “Project for a New American Century” speaks of Pax Americana this
way:
"At present the United States faces no
global rival. America's grand strategy should aim to preserve and extend
this advantageous position as far into the future as possible."
It further claimed that: "The United States has an unprecedented
strategic opportunity. It faces no immediate great-power challenge; it is
blessed with wealthy, powerful and democratic allies in every part of the
world; it is in the midst of the longest economic expansion in its
history; and its political and economic principles are almost universally
embraced. At no time in history has the international security order been
as conducive to American interests and ideals. The challenge for the
coming century is to preserve and enhance this 'American peace.”[17]
(Underscoring added.)
This document acknowledges its debt to an
earlier document “Defense Planning Guidance for Fiscal Years 1994-1999
drafted by Paul Wolfowitz in 1992, in relation to the new situation after
the fall of the Soviet Union, saying:
"Our first objective is to prevent
the re-emergence of a new rival, either on the territory of the former
Soviet Union or elsewhere, that poses a threat on the order of that posed
formerly by the Soviet Union. This is a dominant consideration underlying
the new regional defense strategy and requires that we endeavor to prevent
any hostile power from dominating a region whose resources would, under
consolidated control, be sufficient to generate global power. ... we must
account sufficiently for the interests of the advanced industrial nations
to discourage them from challenging our leadership or seeking to overturn
the established political and economic order. ... we must maintain the
mechanisms for deterring potential competitors from even aspiring to a
larger regional or global role. ... Our strategy must now refocus on
precluding the emergence of any potential future global competitor. ...
In the Middle East and Southwest Asia, our overall objective is to remain
the predominant outside power in the region and preserve U.S. and Western
access to the region's oil.
[18]
(Underscoring added.)
Should we still wonder why the U.S. had to
invade Iraq, the second biggest oil-producing country, against the will of
the United Nations (UN)?
Needed “a new Pearl Harbor”
At the time of the above writing many
Americans were not yet sure how to act in the new post-USSR world and were
not yet willing to pursue this aggressive policy so the implementation had
been delayed. But eight years later RAD stated there was now a need for a
“new Pearl Harbor” to pursue such aggressiveness: "New Circumstances
make us think that the report might have a more receptive audience now
than in recent years" but that, "the process of transformation,
even if it brings revolutionary [sic] change, is likely to be a
long one, absent some catastrophic and catalyzing event like a new Pearl
Harbor."[19]
(Underscoring added.)
And sure enough, 9/11 provided the new
Pearl Harbor which shifted the spectrum towards the hawkish end by
reducing domestic opposition to expansionism and providing a potent
pretext for imperialism.
The “Threat of God
Example”
To maintain the American Empire it is
necessary to combat what is called the
“threat of Good Example.” If a part of the
empire breaks off and prospers it could serve as an inspiration for other
regions, leading to the loss of large areas of the Empire.
An example is the presidency of Salvador
Allende, a Democratic Socialist who won the presidential election in Chile
in 1970. Allende increased civil liberties, nationalized many companies,
instituted programs of agrarian reform and increased spending on housing,
education, sanitation and health. In his first year, unemployment dropped
to 4.8 percent from its previous 8.4 percent, inflation dropped 12.7
percent and worker income rose by 50 percent. The net effect of Allende’s
policies was to redistribute income towards poorer groups and to move
Chile in the direction of economic independence. The U.S. did not like
this and placed sanctions on Chile, hurting the economy. The Central
Intelligence Agency (CIA) funded opposition groups and promoted
instability within Chile. On Sept. 11, 1973 the CIA launched a coup that
deposed Allende and installed a military dictatorship under Gen. Augusto
Pinochet who slaughtered thousands of dissidents, reversed Allende’s
reforms and implemented an extreme neo-liberal capitalist economic
program.[20]
Chile had to be destroyed. It was a “good example.”
The same was true with the Sandinistas
overthrowing the Somozas in the 1970s. The social reforms did not do well
with the U.S. and so the U.S. funded the terrorist Contras to wage a
brutal war against the Sandinistas destroying whatever social improvements
and eventually the Nicaraguans allowed the U.S. puppets to once again take
over the country.[21]
Nicaragua could well just not affect
the US economy but it has to be destroyed or else its success can become
an inspiration to other countries.
Client States:
To keep the Empire intact, it must
maintain “Client States.” A Client State is one that is dominated and
controlled by the imperialist governments. It is dependent on the
economic and military support of a more powerful country. Other names of
these states are “satellite states”; “puppet government”; “vassal state.”
The Roman Empire relied strongly on client states. It maintained Jewish
kings such as the Herodians, for example.
Isn’t the Philippines under the present
government or previous governments, a client state of the New Roman
Empire?
Mechanisms of Control
The “Anatomy of the American Empire”
describes in summary way examples of mechanism of dominance. We can only
list them with our limited time. For example: (1) Military Intervention,
(2) Proxy Forces, (3) Enforcer States, (4) The CIA, (5) Foreign Aid, (6)
Coup d ’etats, (7) Sanctions, and (8) Subverting Elections. It is also
interesting to note that the “Anatomy of the American” lists down the
expansion of the American Empire towards areas of world domination.
Starting with the (1) American Homeland as a base, it moves on to (2).
Latin America, (3) East Asia, (4) Europe, (5) Africa, (6) Oceania, and (7)
Central Asia.[22]
Let me now go back to some more major
issues in the New Roman Empire as compared to the Old Roman Empire.
Brutality of the Empire
Rome’s brutal conquest and the exaction of
high tribute payment destroyed local economies. The acquisitions were
maintained by terror mechanism of “crucifixion (10,000 in Judea alone from
year 63-70), imprisonments and exiles, one of whom was the writer of the
book of Revelation. Even Roman historians describe some of their generals
and emperors as “bloodthirsty.”
Consider the Philippine-American War that
lasted from 1899 to 1913. In this longest war in U.S. history, the
Philippines lost over 1 million people, 15 percent of its population. The
My Lai massacre during the Vietnam war pales when compared in the massacre
of the people of Samar Island in the Philippines where 600,000 Filipinos
were slaughtered from the American general’s command “to render Samar a
wilderness.” The order was to kill everyone who can carry guns: “The more
you kill and burn, the more it will please me,” the commander said.
Whether the U.S. Marines were only acting on impulse to avenge the death
of their compatriot, the Hiditha massacre in Iraq is merely a rehearsal of
the logic of empire now pursued by the USA.
Escape Goats of the
Empire
In the time of Nero, the Christians were
made escape goats of Nero’s crime, and many were killed. No wonder the
book of Revelation speaks of Rome as the Beast, a Red Dragon, with aliases
of “Accuser, Deceiver, Devil, Satan, Ancient Serpent.” Rome is compared
to doomed Babylon, the prostitute, clothed in purple and scarlet and
adorned with gold, jewels, and pearls (17:3-6) and depicted for (1) its
lavish wealth and craving for consumption; (2) its arrogance; and (3)
political oppression and economic exploitation, including its brutal
military conquests and the destruction of the earth itself.[23]
Who are now the escape goats who can be
blamed of the “un-peace situation” in the world? I happened to be
watching CNN when the 9/ll attack happened. I certainly was shocked
watching the twin tower collapse. But I was dismayed when immediately, the
American authorities, without the benefit of verifying facts, named the
Muslim terrorists as the perpetrators of the crime. Nero had the
Christians to blame, the American Empire has the “terrorists” to blame and
they reserve the right to define who the “terrorists” are. Bush
immediately pronounced Saddam Hussein as one of the authors of 9/11 though
to this day there has never been any evidence to support it. In a larger
front, Muslims are the escape goats to cover for America’s desire for
global domination.
Some Theological Affirmations on Empire
Given the above case study and analysis of
the Empire, I submit five theological concepts: (1) Idolatry of the
Empire; (2) The Human as Image of God, (3) Stewardship of Creation (4) the
Kingdom of God and (5) Shalom.
1.
Idolatry of the Empire
We said earlier there was a gradual
transition of military titles from Imperatur (supreme commander) to
Augustus (the “manifest one, a quasi-divine title”) to Princeps
(the “first” in the senate, marking the start of the empire) and finally
Pontifex Maximus (supreme priest completing transition to the
divine right of the emperor). The Emperor arrogates upon himself the power
of life and death over all peoples and territories of the known world and
claimed the honor and glory of divinity and demands the subjects to bow
before him and his images. The local kings and priests were co-opted to be
the implementors of the will of Rome. Any opposition faces retribution and
annihilation. To the early Christians this was pure and simple idolatry.
An idol, according to Paul Tillich, is the
granting of ultimate loyalty and devotion to something that is not
absolute. The First Commandment says: “You shall not have any other god
before me.” The emperor has become a god. The early Christians were
persecuted because they refused to attribute divinity to the emperor. Only
Jesus the Messiah was given the glory and honor that belongs to God.
Is the American hegemony a revival of the
Holy Roman Empire? “Those who are not with us are terrorists and deserved
to be annihilated.” In the Philippines the political leadership has
become the Herodians implementing the “imperial order” of the New Roman
Empire in its declaration of an “all out war” against the “terrorists.”
2.
Human Beings as the
“image of God”: The New Roman Empire has no respect of the “image of God”
The Christian Faith affirms that human
beings, male and female, are created in the image of God. The human being
is a bearer of the imago dei. This imago dei is not an
animal to be domesticated or vegetables to be raised and sold. The
imago dei is not a thing to be manipulated or destroyed. The imago
dei is to be provided with the right to life with dignity in a free
and just society; life in all its fullness. The imago dei must be
accorded with due respect and protection.
Brutality in the continuing expansion of
the Empire shows that the Empire has no respect for the human being. In
military parlance civilians, unarmed old people, women and children killed
in military campaigns are “collateral damage.” In such cases human beings
have no value except when they bring profit to the Empire. This is why we
have the massacres in the Philippines’ Samar Island, in Vietnam’s My Lai
and Iraq’s Hiditha (cf. Time Magazine, 2006) in addition to
half a million “collateral damage” in the indiscriminate bombings in the
Desert Thunderstorm.
The use of religion and education to
manipulate people into conforming to the culture of the Empire such as
creating the Filipino “Spanish Catholics” and “brown Americans” is a
violation of the image of God.
In the economy of the New Empire with its
free market neo-liberal ideology persons do not matter. The goal is
profit, therefore, everything and everyone has a price.
In Hebrew/Semitic thought, the “image of
God” includes the idea of the body as part of the whole person and is
necessary to complete the human being. In this sense the image of God is
expressed in concrete and bodily terms. As such the human being has
physical needs such as food, shelter, clothing and intellectual
development. Deprivation of these physical needs constitutes a violation
of the image of God. In the Empire even so-called aid has become a means
of domination and deprivation.
In this connection the New Empire must
prophetically be confronted with the vision of Isaiah where there will be
no more “infant who will live but a few days, or an old man who does not
fill out his days (Isaiah 65:20). [People] “will not build houses and
another inhabit; they shall not plant vineyard and another eat.” (. 22)
[but] “they will build houses and inhabit them; and they shall plant
vineyard and eat their fruit.” (vs.21). The prophets condemn those who
“sell the innocent for silver” and the “destitute for a pair of shoes”
(Amos 2:6-7) and those who “join house to house, who add field to field
(Isaiah 5:8). In the Philippines, the economic conglomerates through
their local and national minions are notoriously “adding house to house
and field to field.”
The biblical goal is not the maximization
of the freedom to seek individual benefits, corporate profits or national
advantage in the international market. Emil Brunner once said: “The
primary purpose of economics willed by God is to minister to human needs,
service to life. This implies that the economic order is a means and not
an end…(I)t is the duty of each individual… and of the community as such,
to see to it that the economic order is not allowed to make itself
absolute, or to lose its purpose of service to humanity.”
[24]
And so the economic globalization of the Empire deserves God’s judgment.
3.
Stewardship of God’s Creation: The New Empire does not care about
Creation
Corollary to destruction of the image of
God is the destruction of Creation. In the Empire, global economy works in
a more sophisticated way of extracting wealth from the dominated countries
through the exploitation of natural and human resources. Such exploitation
has no respect for the environment, God’s Creation. With all the concerns
expressed in preserving the environment in world conferences, the New
Roman Empire has no qualms about its refusal to sign the Kyoto Protocol.
The WARC in the Accra Statement
summarizes: “We have heard that creation continues to groan, in bondage,
waiting for its liberation (Romans 8:22). We are challenged by the cries
of the people who suffer and by the wounded-ness of creation itself. We
see a dramatic convergence between the suffering of the people and the
damage done to the rest of creation” (Par. No. 5). The Empire and its
unholy alliances are under judgment for the destruction of God’s Creation.
4. The Kingdom of God: Judgment to the
Empire
According to Mark, Jesus’ original
proclamation was: “The Kingdom of God is at hand; repent, and believe in
the Gospel!” What Jesus did was to confront the kingdom of this world with
all its corruption, hypocrisy, injustice and evil with the Kingdom of
God. What Jesus did was to shake the foundations of the world’s
socio-economic and political-military arrangements with the Kingdom of God
that was breaking in. The Kingdom of God makes demands to do what is
righteous and expose what is false and unjust. The Kingdom of God demands
to love the neighbor particularly those who are suffering and are being
crushed by the evil powers in our time. And so in every proclamation of
the Gospel, the idols of our time must be named and exorcised. Just as in
the Book of Revelation, the Beast, a Red Dragon whose aliases include
Accuser, Deceiver, Devil, Satan, Ancient Serpent, Babylon the prostitute,
and all the alliances of the perpetrators of injustice be exposed and
subverted; the judging power of the Kingdom of God must be brought to
bear, before something new can take root and arise in all human relations.[25]
The New Roman Empire must learn that no
empire in history stayed forever and therefore should heed the warning in
the Book of Revelation.
“Fallen,
fallen is Babylon the great!” (18:2)
“Alas! Alas! Thou great
city, thou mighty city, Babylon!
In one hour has thy judgment come” (18:10)
“Alas! Alas! For the great city that was clothe with fine linen,
in purple and scarlet,
bedecked with jewels, and with pearl!
In one hour all
these wealth has been laid to waste.” (18:16-17)
Alas! Alas! For the
great city where all who had ships at sea
grew rich by her wealth!
In one hour she has been laid to waste. (18:19)
Concluding Words: The New Jerusalem.
However, it is not all dark and hopeless
for humankind and God’s Creation, for the book of Revelation speaks of
another City. When Babylon is finally destroyed, the New Jerusalem will
come down out of heaven from God (21:2, 10). The New Jerusalem locates
itself on earth. The image is a commentary on the Lord’s Prayer: “Your
Kingdom come on earth as it is in heaven.” Revelation says the final hope
for Christians is not to leave this earth. Rather the hope that energizes
Christians is God’s renewing of our earthly home; the ultimate goal is to
participate in and to work with God’s renewal of the universe – a renewal
pictured as a merging of earth and heaven where all brokenness is overcome
and leads to a consummation of God’s purpose for the whole creation. The
New Jerusalem is a picture of the coming “reign of God,” in which God’s
people are promised a “share” or an “inheritance” (21:7; 22:19). The New
Jerusalem is an “international city” in which all nations “walk by the
light” of God’s glory and of the Lamb (21:24) radiating from the throne of
God, a metaphor of committing themselves to the ways of God.
In contrast to Babylon, the New Jerusalem
provides a “river of the water of life” and a “tree of life” (Rev.
22:1-2). Dr. Zerbe explains: The “tree of life” which straddles the river,
can produce “fruit” each month, indicating that it is a tropical city! It
provides both sustenance and medicine for all the nations: its “leaves”
are for the “healing of the nations.” The water, the fruit, and the
medicinal leaves are freely accessible to all, and from a renewable (and
unlimited) resource. Thus there is clean water, food security and
accessible health care, both for the city and for the whole world. The
Good News is to proclaim the New Jerusalem where God dwells and where God
“wipes every tear from [people’s] eyes and [where] death will be no
more.”
Perhaps an apt concluding word for a
changed world in contrast to the Empire is the Biblical vision of Shalom.
The 1991 Statement of the National of Churches in the Philippines (NCCP)
puts is this way:
“Shalom is a state of well-being and
wholeness of life that embraces harmony with one’s neighbors and social
relations, with nature and creation, and with one’s self. Its attainment
involves a transformation of economic, social and political life so that
these begin to embody justice and righteousness, of our relations with
nature, and with the whole creation so that these begin to embody care and
respect for God’s purposes for them, and for ourselves so that we embody
in our lives righteousness, love and human compassion.”
Posted by Bulatlat
(This is an updated paper presented to the
19th Assembly of the Ecumenical Bishops Forum, Tagaytay City,
Nov. 27-28, 2006 from the original paper presented to the “Consultation on
Theological Reflection on Global Empire Today” of the World Alliance of
Reformed Churches, Manila, July 13-15, 2006. Bishop Erme R. Camba is a
former General Secretary of the United Church of Christ in the Philippines
and former Dean of the Silliman University Divinity School, Dumaguete City.)
Endnotes
[1]
The Accra Confession: Covenanting for Justice and the Economy and the
Earth,” WARC 24th General Assembly, July 30-Aug. 13, 2004
[2]
Renato Constantino, The Philippines: A Past Revisited, QC,
Philippines, Renato Constantino, 1975.
[3]
Daniel B. Schirmer, Republic or Empire: American Resistance to the
Philippine War, Cambridge, Massachussetts, Schenkmann Publishing
Company, 1972, p. 205
[4]
T. Valentino Sitoy, Jr: Several Springs, One Stream: The United Church
of Christ in the Philippines, Vol. 1, UCCP, 1992, p. 10.
[5]
Mariano C. Apilado, Revolutionary Spirituality: A Study of the
Protestant Role in the American Colonial Rule of the Philippines,
1898-1928, p.29; Cf. Oscar S. Suarez, Protestantism and
Authoritarian Politics: The Politics of Repression and the Future of
Ecumenical Witness in the Philippines, Chapter 2.
[6]
Ofelia Ortega, “Where the Empire Lies, People Suffer, They Are Exploited
and Life Becomes Death,” A paper presented in the “Consultation on
Theological Reflection on Global Empire Today” of the World Alliance of
Reformed Churches, Manila, July 13-15, 2006.
[7]
The Guardian,
http://www.smh.com.au/articles/2002/o9/19/1032054915705.html
[8]
Richard A. Horsley, Jesus and Empire: The Kingdom of God and the New
World Disorder, Minneapolis, Fortress Press, 2003; Gordon Zerbe, “When
Global Traders Ruled the World: The Choice Between Babylon and New
Jerusalem as Rival Economies,” a Bible Study presented to the UCCP
National Council, Oct. 24, 2002.
[9]
Horseley, p. 137
[10]
Quoted by Horsley, p. 140, from from Anders Stephanson, Manifest
Destiny: American Expansion and the Empire of the Right, N.Y., Hill
and Wang, 1995.
[11]
Unpublished paper by Capt. Danilo P. Vizmanos, PN (Ret), “Critical
Questions about U.S. Military in Mindanao”, issued Jan., 2002.
[12]
Ibid.
[13]
“Anatomy of the American Empire” p.2,
http://question-everything.mahost.org/Socio-Politics/American_Empire,html.
[14]
Vizmanos, “Critical Questions…”, Ibid
[15]
“Joint Vision 2020,” http://www.dtic.mil/jointvision2020.doc
[16]
“Anatomy of the American Empire,” ibid, p. 3
[17]
Ibid, p. 4
[18]
Ibid.
[19]
Ibid.
[20]
“Anatomy of the American Empire”, Ibid, p.4 refers to Benjamin Keen and
Mark Wasserman, A Short History of Latin America, Houghton Mifflin
Company, 1984, pp. 334-341; Cf. Ewin Martinez, “History of Chile under
Salvador Allende and the Popular Unity, http.//en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chile_under_Allende
[21]
Anatomy of the American Empire, Ibid., p. 5 refers to William Blum,
Killing Hope: US Milirary and CIA Interventions Since World War 2,
Common Courage Press, 2003, p. 290-305.
[22]
“Anatomy of the American Empire”, ibid, p. 11-22.
[23]
Zerbe
[24]
Emil Brunner, The Divine Imperative, London:Lutterworth, 19,37, p.
402.
[25]
This summary is borrowed from Dr. Levi V. Oracion, visiting professor at
Silliman University. See his exposition on “A New Millenium:
Confronting New Idols in our Times, Intensifying Our Prophetic Witness,”
Report of the 39th Church Workers Convocation, Silliman
University Divinity School, Dumaguete City, Philippines, August 29-31,
2000, p.16; Cf. Zerbe
BACK TO
TOP ■
PRINTER-FRIENDLY VERSION ■
COMMENT
© 2006 Bulatlat
■
Alipato Media Center
Permission is granted to reprint or redistribute this article, provided
its author/s and Bulatlat are properly credited and notified.