Key EU buildings are based on the Tower of Babel. The Euro features a glorified image of the Beast of Revelations. Nazi's planned the EU in 1942. And pro-EU Christians have committed 'spiritual treason against almighty God and his kingdom'.
These suggestions are made in a leaflet shared at the UKIP party conference by a group within the party called Christian Soldiers – a name that will spark the same levels of 'Oh, good' in Christians as the name Islamic State must create in Muslims. As in - not 'good' at all.
The leaflet, which says that the EU's 'central aim' is to 'abolish our Christian nation state, our nationhood and the ancient Laws & Freedoms bestowed on us by God,' was called 'bizarre' by the Independent, and 'completely bats***' by Buzzfeed's political editor Jim Waterson. Many thoughtful Christians from across the political spectrum will no doubt agree, but this is a mistake. Christian Soldiers are not insane, they are just wrong. And tempting (sorely tempting) as it is to mock them, that's probably not the best thing we can do.
This is not because laughing at those with whom we disagree is always pointless, as some are fond of saying. Satire and comedy have the power, like music and popular culture, to have an impact on society. Ask anyone from the Je Suis Charlie liberals to the conservatives picketing the latest blasphemous film/musical/book/toy to irritate them.
But laughing at Christian Soldiers and calling them crazy ultimately does a disservice to the Church as a whole. And, far more important: it isn't true.
The reason we call them crazy, why we snigger at their leaflets and feel the urge to mock rather than correct is not just because they are wrong, which of course they are. It's because they believe differently. We think of them as simple and a little stupid and credulous and, yes, crazy, because they believe how Christians have for thousands of years believed: with an assumption that the supernatural is real.
They have not learned the sophisticated ways of explaining away the devil and miracles and prophecy that predicts as well as speaks truth to power, poor dears. They cling to the 'super' in superstition and have not managed to become what we are: so much cleverer than the vast majority of Christians who have ever lived. Too clever to see worldly struggles as having spiritual roots. Too clever to see Scripture as beyond time. Too clever to believe in any sin but impoliteness. In this way, Christian Soldiers are like the World Church, who we are so fond of pretending to respect for their depth of faith.
And whether this rather extreme caricature is entirely true or only partly, that's fine. These are perfectly legitimate positions to hold and call yourself a Christian. But to judge others (actively or by implication) for letting the existence of God and the importance of his Son point them to a faith that believes in mystery and the supernatural is not only arrogant, it's stupid hard to defend, rationally. We accept an invisible deity who saves us but draw the line at his knowing the future? Why? It's an acceptable position, but not so unassailable as to justify belittling those without faith enough to effectively remove Deus from the machina.
If the progressive Church is to avoid abandoning the believers in signs and wonders to the clutches of fear-mongers and bigots, we are going to have to give up of this particular arrogance, which is, at its heart, more aesthetic for most of us than theological. It's a question of tactics as much as respect. We don't have to believe how they do. And we certainly don't have to pretend they are right. Because they are not.
The EU is not a Nazi conspiracy, run by Satanists trying to destroy Britain and therefore Christianity. Everybody knows it's a shill for banks. Or something.
It's flawed, anyway, and has done harm as well as good. We can debate that. We can also debate, if we have a mind to, which earthly kingdom truly seems more likely to be represented by the great Beast, the antichrist, the dragon. Smart money, one would think, would be on the richest, the most warlike, the ones with histories of slaves. But that is just a thought. Up for debate.
What is not debatable, I think, is that God's kingdom is not of this world, that the kind of patriotism that sees the betrayal of a human country as a betrayal of the Lord is almost certainly sin, most likely idolatry, and requires repentance.
That's a word I want to hear applied to Christian Soldiers. Not ROFL - rolling on floor laughing - or ridiculous, but Repent. Let's try speaking each other's language, but let's not give up on using it to say some things are just wrong.
