A question has been raised, particularly in comments on a post of mine (which has now sunk below the “Recent Posts” horizon), as to whether Timothy McVeigh can properly be characterized as a Christian. A few quotes have been offered in which he describes himself as Agnostic. The original post posed as a repartee to Newt Gingrich’s latest cutesy twitters, “We can ban a mosque at ground zero, when we ban churches in Oklahoma City.”
Is it either fair or accurate to describe Timothy McVeigh as a “Christian”? This is not a question to be answered by cherry picking from a few casual web sites. It is either a matter for library research, or at the least, Google Books previews from actual pages of published work. I’m not going to spend a lot of time on it, we’re all just indulging in debates after all, not setting policy or writing authoritative reference works.
I found a brief hint in The Evil 100, by Martin Gilman Wolcott, p. 111:
McVeigh’s motive in carrying out the Oklahoma City bombing was to send the federal government a message, a warning that they should be — and will be — held accountable for “fascist” (McVeigh’s words) acts such as the conflagrations at Waco and Ruby Ridge, and the Constitution-attacking efforts to impose gun control on American citizens.
Both the residents of Ruby Ridge and the Davidian compound in Waco are some sort of would-be Christian, perhaps not what any of us would choose for ourselves as true Christianity, but they manage to find a Biblical basis for what they offer the world.
One could counter that relying on this connection, to call McVeigh a Christian, is Christianity by association, not by direct profession of faith. But when we get to the point of apocalyptic violence in the name of religion, neither a personal relationship with Jesus, nor submission to the will of God, are really the essential point. It is the rationale the terrorist wraps around themselves that is at issue.
I also consulted Terror in the mind of God: the global rise of religious violence by Mark Juergensmeyer. A section beginning on page 30 is perhaps unfair in linking Eric Rudolph, definitely a “Christian” terrorist, and Timothy McVeigh. But the following several pages establish pretty clearly McVeigh’s roots and inspiration in the Christian Identity movement, which is based on racial supremacy and Biblical law – at least as they manage to read Biblical law. McVeigh had plenty of association with Elohim City, and was a devoted exponent of the Turner Diaries.
William Pierce, the author of the Turner Diaries, provides for me an amusing counterpoint to the association of intellectualism with liberalism. The man had a Ph.D in physics and taught college courses in Oregon. (Two thirds of Hitler’s SS had Ph.D’s also). For liberals who think education insures liberal thinking, or “conservatives” who think pointy heads are all liberals, take a look at Pierce.
Of most relevance though, see page 32, is that Pierce advocated apocalyptic violence to overturn “the mindset of dictatorial secularism that had been imposed on American society as the result of an elaborate conspiracy orchestrated by Jews and liberals hell-bent on depriving Christian society of its freedom and its spiritual moorings.” Many Identity groups live in theocratic societies.
So, while those who wish to deny it can make a plausible case that McVeigh is an agnostic, this is not far different from various Muslims denying that Osama bin Laden is a true Muslim. If McVeigh’s act of terror had actually motivated an effective uprising, a series of continuous disruptive terrorist campaigns, they would have arisen in the name of some twisted theory of Aryan Christianity.
It is to the credit of Christianity in America that even the violent apocalyptic groups realized they were NOT going to mobilize resistance through such acts, which revulsed rather than inspired even those individuals who held some sympathy for their ideology. If any distinction can be drawn between Oklahoma City and the World Trade Center, it is that there were SOME Muslims, somewhere in the word, who found some inspiration in the vulnerability of America to asymmetrical attack.
Juergensmeyer freely admits (page xii) that “Perhaps it is not fair to label Osama bin Laden a Muslim terrorist or to characterize Timothy McVeigh a Christian one – as if they were violent because of their Islamic and quasi-Christian beliefes.” Virtually every major religion has served as a resource for violent actors. But he notes, accurately I think, that “Behind convicted bomber Timothy McVeigh and Buford Furrow, the alleged attacker of a Jewish day care center, was a subculture of militant Christian groups that extends throughout the United States.” (p. 11)
So I say again, we can ban a mosque at ground zero when we ban churches in Oklahoma City. No, Christian churches in Oklahoma City did not inspire, rejoice in, or approve of, what McVeigh did. But, neither did the originators of Cordoba House collude with al Qaeda. So let’s back off this hysterical puffed up hot air balloon, and get on with the serious business of real problems confronting our nation.
As the issue of the Ground Zero Mosque has persisted two additional thoughts have occurred to me.
One is that the near-decade period of time NYC has procrastinated without unequivocally establishing a defining memorial to 9/11 with an attendant and unequivocal perimeter defining everything within as hallowed ground that cannot be transgressed by anyone for anything in any fashion has resulted in the appearance of the Ground Zero Mosque protesters belatedly engaging in dog-in-the-manger behavior.
The other is that, if one tried to imagine how Osama bin-Laden’s ghandist nephew, Eddie bin-Laden, might proceed as an agent provocateur in his own right to further his uncle’s mission of creating overreaching anti-Muslim backlash in order to incite a war against Islam, it would be difficult to describe how he might proceed more effectively than by doing exactly as Imam Feisal Abdul Rauf is doing, capitalizing on his unarguably legal rights in the face of explicit requests by U.S. leaders (Patterson, Reid) to compromise with a location elsewhere obviating any controversy.
This classic double-bind the U.S. finds itself in vis-a-vis the Ground Zero Mosque – Rauf may proceed truly and unequivocally as purely as the driven Sufi snow himself while simultaneously performing for any others who may capitalize on his efforts as no less a deliberate Eddie bin-Laden with respect to the actual effects he generates than if that had actually been his one and only true intent- is another defining aspect of our increasing passive-aggressive current and future global warfare paradigms. Our good Steve follows COIN as the paradigm of the modern warfighter over and against past models, but COIN and other forms of nation-building have already revealed themselves as tarbabies of a clearly now “last war” paradigm – serving in their own rights as the provocative-as-desired anchors of any passive-aggressive martial interest to come along to capitalize on them.
Current and future warfare will be described and defined by just these types of ambivalent, double-bind, passive-aggressive faits accompli, accomplished as much with or entirely with the enthusiastic cooperation of the target nation, perhaps equally as often and as much indistinguishable in the eyes of the target nation as its own national desires.
H. M. Stuart
Alexandria
I tend to focus on the use of abstracts to analyze individuals. My ubiquitous reaction, bluntly stated, is “So, you can in hindisight read [McVeigh's] mind and assert that his Christian identity was a primary motivation?”
I observe without intending criticism that people look for stability in chaos, especially when that chaos takes the form of personal catastrophe. They grasp at explanations without acknowledging their own knee-jerk tendencies (motivated by their emotional responses to catastrophe, something one can view sympathetically from even the most minimal compassion).
I’ll only note in passing that these responses then drive blanket assumptions and conclusions about identity groups. We often note the flawed logic of that in our discussions at the personal level. I submit that we can do that at the abstract level as well, with similar constructive results.
Again, it takes a lot of time to try to obscure the most obvious. Timothy McVeigh in his own words claimed he was an agnostic. He explained that his attack on the Okhlahoma building was an attack against oppressive government. He never claimed he acted in the name of Jesus – and this man wrote pages and pages of political proclamations and diatribes.
Osama ben Laden is a self-proclaimed moslem, he stated that his war against US and infidels is jihad, and is done in the name of Allah and Mohammed. The 9/11 terrorists were radicalized, and later found refuge and support in the mosques – religious moslem institutions.
It takes a lot of verbal virtuosity to ignore the obvious differences between the two – but then what wouldn’t one do to promote her ideals?
BTW, I’ve never heard conservatives saying that all pointy heads are necessarily liberal. Surely, if one is teaching “Gay, Lesbian and bi-sexual motives in African-American literature” – then she is very likely to be a liberal – just like most people who majored in social soft “sciences”. But someone with a PhD in hard sciences or engineering is not a typical liberal – to put it mildly. In fact, I would be suprised if there is a stereotype that all engineers or all mathematicians and physicysts are liberal – it’s so contrary to real life.
Siarlys,
Don’t you think that’s a little convoluted to try and link Chritianity to McVeigh, Ruby Ridge and even Waco? (I will never consider David Koresh a Christian.) Hitler was born a Catholic, but as he grew up, he had no interest in it. I mean you could take every maladjusted, asocial criminal in the West and try to find a link to Christianity because it has been the dominant religion. On the oither hand, was david Berkowitz a Jewish terrorist?
No question, McVeigh committed an act of terror. Five people were killed in the Oklahoma City DEA office that day, so I as a retired DEA agent who remembers that day, would never downplay his act. There is no link between what McVeigh did and Christianity. In the same vein, there is no way you can claim that millions of Christians or Jews are on the warpath. Millions of Muslims are-and proudly declaring their religion as the motivation. Small minority? Sure. But in a religion of 1.2 billion adherents, that a lot of people we need to be on guard against.
As it happens, I just read a great commentary in The Economist (a magazine I subscribe to at a reduced rate in spite of my distaste for its thoughtless worship of free markets and implicit tendency to reduce wage laborers into ciphers to be moved wherever some corporation finds them useful), on this very subject.
http://www.economist.com/node/16743239?story_id=16743239
Highlights:
Something about America – the fact that it is a nation of immigrants, perhaps, or its greater religiosity, or the separation of church and state, or the opportunities to rise – still seems to make it an easier place than Europe for Muslims to feel accepted and at home.
It was in part to preserve this feeling that George Bush repeated like a scratched gramaphone record that Americans were at war with the terrorists who had attacked them on 9/11, not at war with Islam.
This is hardly rocket science. America is plainly safer if its Muslims feel part of “us” and not, like Mohammed Sidique Khan, part of “them.” And that means reminding Americans of the difference – a real one, by the way, not one fabricated for the purposes of political correctness – between Islam, a religion with a billion adherents, and al-Qaeda, a terrorist outfit that claims to speak in Islam’s name but has absolutely no right or mandate to do so.
Why would any responsible American politician want to erase that vital distinction? Good question. Ask Sarah Palin, or New Gingrich, or the many others who have lately clambered aboard the offensive campaign to stop Cordoba House.
To Mr. Gingrich, it seems, an American Muslim is a Muslim first and an American second. Al-Qaeda would doubtless concur.
@ Siarlys Jenkins,
“between Islam, a religion with a billion adherents, and al-Qaeda, a terrorist outfit that claims to speak in Islam’s name but has absolutely no right or mandate to do so.”
Why do you, and people like you always paint a picture of Islam “the peaceful religion” and Al Qaeda “the one bad organization”? How many Islamic terrorist groups do you think there are? Just one? Here are a few more you forgot to mention,
Abu Sayyaf, Philippines
Al-Aqsa Martyrs’ Brigades, Gaza Strip and West Bank
Al-Gama’a al-Islamiyya, Egypt (also known as The Islamic Group)
Al-Qaeda, worldwide
Al-Shabaab, Somalia
Ansar al-Islam, Iraq
Armed Islamic Group (GIA), Algeria
Jamaat Ansar al-Sunna, Iraq
East Turkestan Islamic Movement (ETIM), China
Egyptian Islamic Jihad, Egypt
Great Eastern Islamic Raiders’ Front (IBDA-C), Turkey
Hamas, Gaza Strip and West Bank
Harkat-ul-Mujahideen al-Alami, Pakistan
Hezbollah, Lebanon
Islamic Movement of Central Asia, Central Asia
Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan, Uzbekistan
Jaish-e-Mohammed, Pakistan and Kashmir
Jemaah Islamiyah, Indonesia
Lashkar-e-Taiba, Pakistan and Kashmir
Lashkar-e-Jhangvi, Pakistan
Moro Islamic Liberation Front, Philippines
Moroccan Islamic Combatant Group, Morocco and Europe
Palestinian Islamic Jihad, Gaza Strip and West Bank
Tawhid and Jihad (Al-Qaeda in the Land between the Two Rivers), Iraq
If Bin Laden is not following Islamic tradition and Quranic doctrine can you explain these verses for me?
Ibn Ishaq: 327 – “Allah said, ‘A prophet must slaughter before collecting captives. A slaughtered enemy is driven from the land. Muhammad, you craved the desires of this world, its goods and the ransom captives would bring. But Allah desires killing them to manifest the religion.’”
Tabari 9:69 “Killing Unbelievers is a small matter to us” The words of Muhammad, prophet of Islam.
Tabari 7:97 The morning after the murder of Ashraf, the Prophet declared, “Kill any Jew who falls under your power.”
Ibn Ishaq: 992 – “Fight everyone in the way of Allah and kill those who disbelieve in Allah.”
Muslim (20:4696) – “the Messenger of Allah (may peace be upon him) said: ‘One who died but did not fight in the way of Allah nor did he express any desire (or determination) for Jihid died the death of a hypocrite.’”
Muslim (20:4645) – “…He (the Messenger of Allah) did that and said: There is another act which elevates the position of a man in Paradise to a grade one hundred (higher), and the elevation between one grade and the other is equal to the height of the heaven from the earth. He (Abu Sa’id) said: What is that act? He replied: Jihad in the way of Allah! Jihad in the way of Allah!”
Muslim (1:33) – the Messenger of Allah said: I have been commanded to fight against people till they testify that there is no god but Allah, that Muhammad is the messenger of Allah
Bukhari (52:220) – Allah’s Apostle said… ‘I have been made victorious with terror’
Bukhari (52:177) – Allah’s Apostle said, “The Hour will not be established until you fight with the Jews, and the stone behind which a Jew will be hiding will say. “O Muslim! There is a Jew hiding behind me, so kill him.”
Quran (9:14) – “Fight them, Allah will punish them by your hands and bring them to disgrace…”
Quran (9:5) – “So when the sacred months have passed away, then slay the idolaters wherever you find them, and take them captives and besiege them and lie in wait for them in every ambush
Quran (8:12) – “I will cast terror into the hearts of those who disbelieve. Therefore strike off their heads and strike off every fingertip of them”
Quran (5:33) – “The punishment of those who wage war against Allah and His messenger and strive to make mischief in the land is only this, that they should be murdered
I think it is you that doesn’t understand Islam, Bin Laden is doing exactly what his allah tells him to do.
[...] the federal building in Oklahoma City where he was considered a ‘model Christian’”; cf. , as groups that “can be placed under the category of far-right-wing terrorism” that [...]
William Pierce was explicitly atheistic in the most common meaning of the word, and is more well known for his attacks on Christianity than for his supportive statements about it.
This article is full of anti-contextual cherry picking at its worst.