Christianity Now and After
I
THOUGH a number of widely read books attest the serious concern in wartime England with the rôle of Christianity, I have come across no real attempt to assess either the effects of war on Christianity or the effects of Christianity on war. This omission is very remarkable when we recall the vast amount of evidence that goes to show that more and more people are asking themselves whether the clue to a better post-war world may not, after all, lie in a return to the traditional moral values taught and inspired by the Christian Church. One wonders, in fact, whether the omission is not deliberate — whether it may not be the result of an instinctive conspiracy not to put this ‘last hope’ to the test during the period of crisis, for fear that it will not survive a candid examination under these conditions. Let it remain, as it were, in cold storage during this long and perilous journey, and let it be exposed to the light of day when conditions suit it better. Meanwhile we shall be content to have it at the back of our minds, glancing at it occasionally for comfort, appealing to it when convenient, and reserving it as a possible solution to the troubles that war will leave in its wake.
It is hardly necessary to point out that this method of envisaging Christianity in its relation to contemporary problems damns Christianity and damns us. It is like a drunkard who resolves to give up drink, not immediately, but in three months’ time. His resolution is bogus, and so is he. However hopeful his moral sentiments may seem to himself, he will remain a drunkard for life. If there is anything at all behind this renewed interest in Christianity, it must be acted upon at once, whatever the consequences — and the first step is to examine in all candor just what is the worth of Christianity today and in relation to the supreme crisis of the day.
During the first two years of the war the stage was set for the entry of Christianity as one of the chief actors in the struggle. There was well-nigh universal agreement that Naziism was essentially anti-Christian — and if certain people might try to argue that Fascist totalitarianism in its reaction against the anarchy and materialism of democracy possessed a certain Christian flavor, Hitler obliged by vigorously persecuting the Church. To make assurance in this matter doubly sure, Hitler obliged still further by making a pact with Bolshevism, the self-avowed archenemy of all Christianity. And the first country to be savagely destroyed was Catholic Poland, the spoils being divided between the Nazis and the Bolsheviks. It was true that, despite this almost classically clear-cut setting of the scene, the nations failed to range themselves into logical groups. Plutocratic England and anticlerical France — to describe them at their worst — found themselves the champions of Christ, while Catholic countries like Italy, Spain, Hungary, and Ireland retired behind the backdrop to make ‘noises off’ in support, it too often seemed, of the Nazis and Bolsheviks. However, one could scarcely expect that after generations of secularism the nations could suddenly stage a pukka crusade; and inevitably nationalist, political, and economic rivalries, rather than Christian ideals, dictated the actual parts to be played. The point, however, was that everything seemed to conspire to provide an underlying motif or plot in terms of Christianity versus antiChristianity.
Moreover, as the action of the war proceeded, it might be expected that the Christian weakness of the protagonists of Christianity would prove to be their strength. Was it not in fact clear that the Nazis and the Bolsheviks, whatever their other faults, possessed a ready battle-cry? Here were the champions of the new order, the knights of the oppressed nations and peoples ensnared by the hollow and hypocritical promises of liberty, the forgers of that super, truly popular, modern State, embodying at once the latest achievements of technique and the Marxist claim for universal social and economic security. What had Britain and France to offer in place of this? They could only drag up the old, long-corrupted baits that had done service during the last war and given Europe an era of anarchy and poverty. Why, they hardly had the courage to mouth the rotten formulæ of ‘war to end war,’ ‘the rights of small nations,’ ‘war to safeguard democracy’! In this war against the enemies of Christianity, which was being fought without any solidly constructive and positive ideal, surely the way lay open for the adoption of the counter-ideal, the ideal of Christianity itself! Never were the conditions for religious conversion made so seemingly simple.
And if there was any doubt about the next step, that doubt could be very speedily settled, for the first figure of the Christian world, three months after the outbreak of war, gave the world five peace points, and these inevitably embodied in a more Christian language the essential cause of England and France at war with Naziism and Bolshevism.
II
And now when we look back on all this from the viewpoint of today, we rub our eyes and wonder whether it was all a mirage. For if we try to reckon up what came out of it, we find that the result amounts to almost nothing. France was soon defeated, and, disgusted with the past, the majority of Frenchmen tried to erect a new and Christian order on the ruins of the old disorder. Britain stood up and has lived, we can soberly hope, to turn the tables on the Nazis. But is this courage and tenacity Christian in inspiration?
On the Christian front certain interesting events have taken place. Newspapers of repute, for example, have been awakened to the fact that thousands of English children evacuated from the towns to the countryside have never even heard the name of Christ, save as a swearword, and as a consequence there exists some public opinion in favor of enforcing a basic religious education in the state schools. New youth movements, designed to create a better national morale, occasionally recall that there must be some connection between such a morale and Christian values. The different religious denominations have found it possible to work together in support of ten points, five of which are the Pope’s peace points, the other five embodying social reforms over the signatures of Cardinal Hinsley, the two Anglican Archbishops, and the Moderator of the Free Churches. Cardinal Hinsley himself, because of the forthrightness of his denunciations of Nazi tyranny and persecution, enjoys a national status unprecedented in the case of a Catholic prelate since before the Reformation. Finally, the presence in London of representatives of overrun Catholic countries, like Poland, Belgium, and Luxemburg, maintains a valuable contact with Catholic forces on the Continent.
Taken together, all this is not really very impressive, and its influence on the mind of government and people is not important. Moreover, such influence as it may have had has been considerably weakened since the Nazi invasion of Soviet Russia, the magnetic pole of Moscow proving itself in a few hours to be infinitely more potent than that of the Vatican (handicapped by being enclosed within Italy) or of Canterbury.
It is surely very extraordinary— and very suggestive — that, despite the remarkably favorable stage-setting for a serious turning again to Christianity in a nation of perturbed and questioning people, so very little apparently has come of it. Docs this mean that Christianity is really dead in England? And, if so, what consequences must we expect?
I think we must all, whatever our personal convictions, understand that this is a very important question. In England, as in America, there obviously survives an extremely strong conviction that a people must have spiritual roots if it is to survive. Indeed it can be argued that the world disorder which followed the last war has been challenged in the name of spiritual values. Fascism, Naziism, and Bolshevism have made their differing appeals in the name of the spirit, and in return they have enjoyed the quasi-religious fanatical devotion of millions. In one respect their spiritual claim is quite bogus in that opponents have been crushed with ruthless cruelty. In other words, the masters have determined the quality and limits of the spirit they wished to evoke, and their reason was certainly not spiritual. But it is wrong to describe as bogus a great many of the ideals which have been propagated among the Italian, German, and Russian peoples. The national revival and reordering of Italy is not a bogus ideal, nor is the German claim to an honorable place among the nations, and still less is the social aspiration of the new Russia. These ideals are not in themselves bad or artificial; what is wrong with them is their disorder in relation to other equally important ideals which together and in harmony form an ideology worthy of the human beings living in society. And what is worse about them is that the goodness in them has been deliberately exploited by evil.
In England and America a far more perfect harmony of ideals survives, but we, on our side, lack the fervor and spiritual conviction which have been generated — so largely artificially — in the dictator countries. We are in the position of men who have had their spiritual crises long ago, who once fought hard to win a higher way of life, who have won, but who now take the victory for granted and find that it does not afford all the satisfaction which they once expected of it. Such men, moreover, are apt to be extremely complacent. They do not realize that times and fashions change and that younger men may consider what they have achieved to be but the starting point for another struggle to find a better harmony between themselves and the world they are in.
The middle-aged who direct our fortunes in England and America tend to drift between habit-generated conviction about the spiritual value of democratic institutions and a pricking of conscience as to whether these institutions are capable of giving men what they need in the world as it is shaping today. Such a state of mind is not one that evokes confidence or enthusiasm, though it is perfectly capable — as we have seen in this country — of stoutly defending the past against the crudity and barbarity of those who set out to destroy the old world. But even if this defense proves wholly successful, the real struggle will be just beginning, not only because the war will have destroyed the old world, but also because new and living convictions must replace the temporary and negative convictions of war if a new world is to be built. It is obvious, if we look back, that even twenty years ago the victors were without a sufficiently strong spiritual conviction about a program derived from the past. The new world was utterly unable to withstand the new men who were in revolt against the post-war settlement.
Today, as then, there survives in England and America a genuine conviction about the desirability and indeed the necessity of maintaining what we call the decencies of civilized life, — what President Roosevelt has called the four freedoms, — but already we have long passed the stage when there exists an equal conviction that our democratic institutions, as they stand, can be counted upon to defend these freedoms. In other words, the mere negative ideal of destroying a barbaric enemy and of maintaining the decencies of our civilization may suffice to keep resistance going until the Nazis are defeated, but we cannot count on our present spiritual convictions to see us through in the giant work of rebuilding once the war is over. Somehow or other we must see new visions and kindle new inspirations. Can we afford to wait until the end of the war before we concern ourselves seriously with this?
III
I noted at the beginning that the relations between Christianity and the war had not been studied, even though popular books examining the worth of Christianity in relation to the times had been written. The reason for this is fairly clear. The fact is that a country at war against a detested and morally despised opponent does not need the support of a constructive and complex ideal like Christianity, but it does subconsciously remain concerned with what is to happen after the war; and with this worry at the back of its mind it is interested in examining the merits of the various solutions that may be offered.
Naturally enough, countries with a Christian heritage will not fail in wartime to invoke God and Christianity in support of their cause, and this has been done frequently enough by England at war. Even der Führer does not forget at solemn moments to refer to the Deity. But there are very strong reasons for leaving it at that. For, the moment we begin to inquire seriously what Christianity demands of a nation at war, we begin to receive awkward answers. At the very start there may be a scruple as to whether Christ ianity and modern war are in any way compatible. And even if the arguments of the Christian pacifist can be answered, they may well leave, as it were, a taste in the mouth. At any rate they may serve to weaken somewhat the strong foundation of spiritual conviction upon which a popular struggle must be based.
It soon becomes clear that the Christian ideal, of its nature, is universal. A particular country may embody that ideal, but only if it is ready in the long run to sacrifice its particularist claims to the wider claims of a universal faith; and this goes against the instinctive feelings of a great people fighting for their lives, more especially if the war be protracted and morale need to be keyed up. There is no getting away from the truth that a faithful Christian community must always sow the seeds of division within an empire, and the division will grow in importance precisely in those times of spiritual and moral strain which a long war evokes. Hitler’s persecution of Christianity can be largely understood as an expression of his insistence upon complete unity of conviction to carry through his revolution and his war.
Lastly, the Christian ideal involves the acceptance and practice of a moral code, even in the methods of warfare, which may at times amount to a positive weakening of the war effort. And the more seriously Christianity is taken, the more awkward the code. Even though a nation may sincerely start out with the intention of fighting cleanly, the met hods of the enemy may force it to retaliate in kind. Yet for Christianity two wrongs can never make a right. Moreover this Christian moderation tends to clash more and more with the instincts of a people at war, for these inevitably degenerate into hatred, cruelty, deceit — and even at home the nervous excitement caused by war lets loose passions which are certainly incompatible with the profession of crusader.
Indeed a modern total war gives rise to a very paradoxical state of affairs. We find in England — and doubtless to some extent in Germany as well — that a people gives of its very best. The bravery, patience, charity, endurance, which civilians as well as soldiers manifest in war are truly extraordinary, and we can say that national morale — in the best sense of the word — is far superior to what it was in the bad old days of peace. Yet this outburst of rare virtue is admittedly and openly in support of passionate and destructive ends which, however broadly justifiable in terms of patriotism and self-defense, would revolt men in time of peace. Thus the very people who deny themselves most for the good of their country and neighbors are capable of harboring sentiments of such cruelty, and of telling such lies, that they could not recognize themselves in more normal times. In fact we must admit that there is considerable resemblance between a peaceable and democratic people at war and the fanatics who martyr themselves in the service of the revolutionary dictators who cause war.
To expect, therefore, that a true Christian ideal can be pursued by a people fighting in a cause however just, and even on a stage set for a crusade against antichrist, is to expect a very great deal. And we need not be surprised to find that, while the word ‘Christianity’ may be freely invoked, there will be little evidence of the reality and little disposition to study the reality while the struggle lasts.
Against this background the actual degree of Christian thinking in this country during this war may appear more impressive. For — leaving out of account the war itself and its conduct — there has been a good deal of searching of heart on the part of the Churches themselves and on the part of the people. Compared with the last war, the Churches have more stoutly insisted that the first war settlement must be just, but, in the main, Christian thinking has centred round the social question. I think that there are very few thinking people in England today who would call themselves Christian who are not determined that Christianity must lead and everywhere support a radical political and social policy calculated to give social security to every person in the kingdom who is willing to pull his weight with society. Indeed the conviction is widespread that any attempt to preach Christ and the Christian way of life in divorce from reforms calculated to give all men the chance to be men is little short of hypocrisy. Though there are still far too few Christian preachers and writers intelligent or active-minded enough to understand the imperative need for dragging Christianity out of the old social and class ruts, or to translate the teaching of the Gospels into words and ideas that the ordinary person today will understand and apply to his own circumstances, the progress made has not been unimpressive. Though the complaint is made that the churches, especially the Anglican, are still empty, the war has offered exceptional opportunities for contact between clergy with spirit and initiative and the people, notably in the shelters and among the forces.
IV
All this, however, can only be said to touch the fringe of the real problem as many people are seeing it: the problem of inspiring the nation again with a vision clear enough and a spirit strong enough to enable it to base the post-war reconstruction on a foundation in harmony with the Christian heritage of free institutions, yet in keeping with the technique and knowledge of the present day as well as the new social aspirations to which the dissemination of that knowledge has given rise. And this question becomes all the more important in that the future fate of all Europe must be closely bound up with the lead that a militarily victorious Britain will have to give. For if, so it is argued, Christianity cannot provide the required inspiration, Communism will carry the masses off their feet.
This may seem a fantastic alternative, and so it is if we give to Communism its usual meaning. There is, for example, very little danger of England going ‘Bolshie,’ more especially after a victory. But if we try to face the problem of post-war England and post-war Europe we may be forced to acknowledge the existence of a danger that can well go by the convenient name of Communistic. I mean that the political and economic problems which the war must leave in its train are such that only virtually totalitarian methods can hope to solve them. It is, of course, futile to prophesy what shape the new Europe will take, how the frontiers will run, what sort of autonomy will be left to different countries; but it does seem clear that the problems, if anarchy is to be avoided, will have to be treated as a whole and that order will have to be imposed by strong force in the face of much hostility. If this can be done, presumably in the name of England, America, and Russia, the new — and interim — order will have to translate itself into a living system, spontaneously backed by the people.
Will it translate itself in time into free institutions, suited to the new needs, or will it translate itself into a despotic order backed by materialist-minded masses trained to support a super Machine State which claims to create for all a pagan paradise on earth according to the latest prescriptions of scientists, technicians, and popular publicists? That is the sort of Communist or Left totalitarian danger one can reasonably foresee. And we must honestly admit that such constructive spiritual forces — apart from the war itself — as tend to make themselves manifest and heard today would seem to lead to some such end. It is true that, apart from a handful of actual Communists, those who have the ear of the public believe themselves to be advocating a new order that will be free and fundamentally democratic, but this of course was also the claim of the earlier Marxists. Not only in their increasingly fervent admiration of Soviet Russia (whose despotism and past policies, internal and external, they wholly overlook), but also in their advocacy of efficiency, ease, comfort and leisure for all, and ever-greater responsibility resting on the State, they in fact pursue a definite totalitarian path. And if the picture they draw sounds extremely attractive, it is because they are always taking for granted a post-war world of plenty. When we begin more soberly to measure up the ways they advocate against a post-war world filled with political and ideological jealousies and for years at least economically impoverished, we see plenty of force and despotism, but very little in the way of that wealth and comfort and ease upon which they would base the future freedoms.
What is the alternative? Between the two wars there were various attempts in Europe to organize up-to-date régimes in harmony with the natural genius of the people and closely associated with their best religious traditions. Perhaps at this date one may safely mention Portugal as an example. To mention Italy in its earlier days of Fascism, or Austria under Dollfuss and Schuschnigg, or Nationalist Spain, is enough to damn one in the eyes of most Anglo-Saxon publicists and not a few Christians. Nor do I wish to write an apologia for political experiments, all of which have fallen very far short of the hope that could once have been sincerely placed in them. My point is rather that serious efforts were made to counter the extremes of totalitarianism, whether of the Left or the Right, by returning to a political order suited to the people rather than to the abstract political theories of the liberal philosophers of the laissez-faire world of yesterday; and in each case it was fully realized that the only hope lay in renewing the traditional religious inspiration of the people in question.
Any brand of totalitarianism is wholly unsuited to an Anglo-Saxon people, and a Left totalitarianism would have to be very well disguised. The lesson to be learned from the Continental experiments is not that we should imitate their particular authoritarianism, but rather that we should reframe our own democratic institutions (perhaps along the line of true democratic corporatism) by seeking to relate them far more directly to those Christian principles of the responsibility and freedom of the person in a technical age which were the inspiration of the earlier democracy and which suited from the beginning the natural political genius of the AngloSaxon people. This means that the first care of the new society must be to safeguard the spiritual and material conditions under which alone full human responsibility can be exercised. It must be a positive democracy truly ‘for the people,’not, as in the past, a negative democracy for the benefit of those who are slick enough to take selfish advantage of democratic institutions. And this will be utterly impossible until the people realize once again where their true good lies, and once again recover a deep and passionate spiritual conviction that human welfare can only be secured if man and society are ordered in accordance with that Divine design, the guiding lines of which are made clear in the Christian dogma and moral teaching that man is made in the image of the Incarnate God.
Is there any practical hope that this can be achieved? The only possible sincere answer is that there appears at present to be very little hope. Despite occasional exceptional appearances, there can be no doubt that wrar is bad for Christianity. While a certain lip-service is paid to useful Christian values, we are forced to agree to a kind of moratorium on practical Christian behavior, and the noble virtues that are displayed in wartime have a very different inspiration. After the war Christianity will have to pay for this, for the world, sickened by war, will straightway turn round and accuse Christians of lack of courage in not having opposed war according to their best principles. This makes a poor beginning for a Christian renaissance.
As against this, one must reckon the increasing sense of perplexity in the minds of many who wonder whether a world reduced to such barbarism can ever have been on the right path. This causes renewed interest in Christianity, and it may cause also a serious inquiry, on the part of Christians as well as nonChristians, about the true spiritual state of Christianity itself. And in this lies the best — I should say, the one — hope for the future. If Christians themselves have the courage and intelligence to examine their own consciences as they seek to solve the perplexities of a world at war, there remains a chance that Christian truth and Christian values may play an effective part in the building of the post-war world.
On the whole it seems to me that there is some evidence of this in England at war today. If Christianity, faced by the appalling dilemma of an apparently just and even holy war, seems to allow a suspension of its traditional teaching, Christianity is also asking itself how far it is responsible for the present chaos, and it is endeavoring to help a perplexed people by offering a more clearcut and practical vision of a possible Christian order based upon a purer spiritual inspiration.
Alas, this is but a breath of light wind against a relentless tide. Yet it may be that all that we, whether Christians or not, hold dearest in our Western civilization depends upon this breath becoming a strong wind — ‘a sound from heaven, as of a mighty wind coming, and it filled the whole house where they were sitting,’as the Scriptures relate of the first Pentecost. Luckily perhaps (in view of the little available of Christian regeneration), the spirit of God and the spirit of Christianity is not amenable to measurement. In the long run Christianity produces its effects on the world, not through study and talk and good resolutions, but through reborn souls. It is this individual person and that individual person who must be converted to a higher and deeper way of life, not Man in the abstract, nor even the Nation. Christ Himself changed the current of history, and a single Saint Francis profoundly affected the ways of men. And no one can foretell the possible effects on the post-war world of what may be going on, unseen and unheard, in the hearts of many who perceive — and surely never with greater evidence — the vanity of the structures which contemporary man has tried to erect in worship of himself.