Last updated on June 18th, 2023 at 05:30 pm
“The blood of the martyrs is the seed of the Church,” declared the great Christian theologian Tertullian in the third century A.D. Indeed, as the Roman Empire made more martyrs of Christians who refused to denounce their Faith, the ranks of the Church increased exponentially. How could this happen? When someone is willing to suffer death rather than renounce something he believes in, it encourages onlookers to further investigate what the dying man believes in. If the man was following a lie, why were the authorities so harshly punishing him? And who would be willing to die for a lie anyway? Maybe these Christians are on to something… Indeed, it was the witness of the martyrs that helped make the great second century apologist Justin Martyr, among other people, a Christian.
What was true for the Church during the days of the Roman Empire can also be true for those of us battling the Woke Empire of today. The purveyors of political correctness and wokeness today demand the blood of anyone who diverges even the smallest amount from their false doctrines. Why? Because they know at heart their ideology is a house of cards that will come tumbling down if any amount of truth is allowed to be spoken in the public square. Their ideology simply cannot stand up to the witness of truth.
Indeed, we in the West today are living in a time reminiscent of life under communism in Eastern Europe during the last century, where the government and its allies in business, the media, trade associations, and academia would harshly punish you for any word of truth that contradicted the official government line. If you dared to defend the truth and oppose the lies of the communist regimes, you could be fired from your job, denied promotions, arrested, jailed, and forced to undergo “re-education training,” among other things.
How does that treatment differ from what happens today if you dare to speak the truth and oppose the lies of the radical LGBT movement, the radical environmental movement, or any other radical movement supported by woke idealogues? Take a look at just two recent cases. First, consider President Trump. Because he dares to speak the truth, President Trump has been indicted by both a corrupt city prosecutor and a corrupt U.S. Department of Justice, been the subject of other frivolous government investigations and lawsuits, been banned on social media, and had his branded merchandise removed from stores, among other things Second, consider Toronto Blue Jays pitcher Anthony Bass. After Bass re-posted a video supporting the boycotts of Target and Bud Light for their advocacy of the radical LGBT agenda and the corruption of children, the left immediately came after him. They forced Bass to issue a groveling apology and to undergo “sensitivity training.” And even after doing these things the woke Toronto Blue Jays still fired him.
In his book Live Not by Lies, Rod Dreher says that Christians and other people who refuse to accept the lies of the left can learn much from the Eastern European dissidents of fifty years ago who opposed communism. First, these dissidents steadfastly adhered to the truth; they knew that both sanity and Western Civilization depended on it. Second, and just as important, they were willing to suffer the consequences for telling the truth. And by doing these two things, these East European dissidents were able to bring down the Soviet Evil Empire in 1989-91, something no one thought possible just a few years before. Dreher says that we need to do the same today; that is, be fearless in telling and living the truth and then be willing to suffer for it. And as the number of martyrs who are punished for the truth piles up, our ranks will exponentially grow and we could topple the Woke Evil Empire of today.
The truth is attractive and nothing forces people to confront it as powerfully as the witness of martyrs. So let’s sing hymns before the approach of the woke lions, knowing that in the end our witness to the truth will win over the West. Stand firm men and women of the West! Victory will be ours if only we have the courage….
Image: The Christian Martyrs’ Last Prayer, by Jean-Léon Gérôme (1883)