VOM and Colombian Half-Truths

https://www.persecution.com/2019-03-colombia/?_source_code=EM1903CL2

The Voice of the Martyrs (VOM) can at times be excellent and their reports moving. They are to be commended for their understanding of suffering and persecution as not being incidental or occasional aspects of the Christian life, but rather essential components of our calling.

There are times when I listen to their podcast, watch videos or read their materials and I want to empty my bank account in order to help them.

And then there are the other times when their predilection for Charismatic theology comes to the fore and I reconsider. It's really a continuation of my first encounter with Richard Wurmbrand's work Tortured for Christ which I first read in the 1990's. On the one hand it was deeply moving but on the other hand the theology was such a disastrous mess it was hard to know what to think.

But there are other times VOM can be a little slippery and their reporting so erroneous as to engender some suspicion on my part. All too often their international reporting seems to echo US foreign policy and even the narratives of the State Department. I sincerely hope the organisation and its agents do not cooperate with (let alone coordinate with) elements of the US government but I wouldn't be surprised if that's the case.

With regard to Colombia their reporting represents the normal self-serving half-truths proffered by US agencies and the Establishment media.

No one disputes the FARC and the other Leftist guerilla groups have committed crimes and done horrible things. They're involved in kidnapping for ransom, drugs, murder and much else. And indeed the recent peace deal has proven quite controversial as many believe it to be little more than an amnesty for dangerous even traitorous criminals.

And yet, there's the other side to the story... the side the US Establishment and apparently VOM have chosen to conveniently ignore. It's the story of Right-wing paramilitary groups and death squads. They too are connected to the drug trade. Additionally there's the role of the US military and its contractors. Under the seemingly innocuous label of coca eradication the US has waged what can only be called a campaign of chemical (or biological) warfare. Carcinogenic defoliants and chemicals continue to ravage the countryside reminiscent of US deeds in South Vietnam... leaving a polluted devastation the country is still dealing with. Colombian spraying was finally stopped in 2015, but under current president Duque it's poised to start again sometime in 2019.

While the US has moved on from Vietnam, now almost 45 years removed, the Vietnamese still live with the war in the form of unexploded ordnance, cancer and severe birth defects.

Colombia will be no different. Even if the US were to pull out today, the effects of Plan Colombia will echo through the decades.

But there's more. Apart from the larger discussion of the drug trade and the role of the US 'War on Drugs' there are questions concerning the vast sums of narcotics money flowing into the Colombian economy, the economy of other Latin American nations and the United States itself. And hovering in the near background are not just the agents of Langley and the Pentagon but the US corporate sector. They too are involved and in some cases have their own paramilitary groups, mercenaries and agents pursuing their interests... interests which often overlap with and seem to be in coordination with US intelligence.

Clearly there are outside actors pouring fuel on the fire. In addition to Wall Street, Langley and the Pentagon, Venezuela is also involved but that too opens up a larger chapter for discussion. But at the bottom of it all are two things.... money and power. And these two are really one. They are inseparable. The Scriptures don't directly connect them in overt systematic terms but the New Testament clearly condemns the influence and dangers of both and a careful reading will help the believer to understand they go together... and thus despite the claims of today's orthodoxy, they are antithetical to the Church's mission and to individual Christian ethics.

And this brings us to the Evangelicals. While not directly involved in any of this (that I know of) they are a growing force within Latin America and are certainly plugged into the financial, political and diplomatic efforts being run out of the United States.

Though in many ways the conflict is about the power-elite capitalist class against the working poor, on another level it's safe to say that Colombia is a battlefield caught in a larger series of proxy wars. And war brings out butchery and the darkest and most depraved aspects of human nature. There's plenty of fault to go around.

Rather than echo the line of one of the major actors in this tragedy, VOM and other Christian news outlets would do better to tell the larger truth, even if it means assigning some of the blame and blood at the feet of the US Empire. The Christians in Colombia would be better served as a result as would the Church of Jesus Christ in all lands.

I appreciate much about VOM but when they only tell half-truths it makes me wonder what they're really about and who's really behind them. Is it a practical move on their part? Is this so they can keep doors open and find diplomatic support? Is this just cultural bias? Or is it something more corrupt and even sinister? I just don't know but I watch, read and listen.

In the meantime I will pray for the Church in Colombia. I will pray for fortitude, wisdom, sound doctrine and perseverance in the face of persecution. I will pray that their tormentors will cease and desist. But I will also pray that the Church won't buy into lies and become part of the larger mammon based conflict. I hope, I sincerely hope that the persecution is genuine and not merely the result of political backlash.

http://evangelicalfocus.com/blogs/4557/Colombia_Peace_process_collapsing_Christians_suffering