Today is Reformation Sunday! Thank You Dr. Martin Luther! Michael Streich

 

 

The use of congregational singing is an often overlooked aspect of the Reformation period during the 16^th Century. Roland Bainton, is his classic biography of Martin Luther, [1] writes of “singing practices” for entire congregations as well as in Lutheran homes. Singing united people in a common cause and the lyrics served to educate. Bainton quotes a Jesuit who stated that, “the hymns of Luther killed more souls than his sermons.” The greatest of these hymns, the “battle cry” of the Reformation, is A Mighty Fortress is our God.

 

Symbols and Messages

 

Luther wrote the words to the hymn after a reflection on Psalm 46: “God is our refuge and strength.” Twice in the brief Psalm God is compared to a “stronghold.” God fights His people’s battles and, although the “nations made an uproar,” “He raised His voice, the earth melted.” Luther’s hymn, tailored to 16^th century realities, incorporates these symbols into the verses. Bainton refers to Luther’s lyrics as, “richly quarried, rugged words set to majestic tones [that] marshal the embattled host of heaven.” [2]

 

The English translation begins, “A Mighty Fortress is our God, A Bulwark never failing…” Luther’s beginning, however, is far more to the point and allows the singing peasants to identify symbols from their own 16^th Century experiences: Ein’ feste Burg ist unser Gott, Ein gute Wehr und Waffen…” Luther begins by comparing God to a fortress, but more specifically a stronghold, a “feste Burg.”

 

The term feste implies an impregnable citadel or stronghold. It brings to mind some of the inaccessible fortresses in the German hills that are often referred to as a festung. In this fashion, Luther emphasizes the absolute power of God over the invading forces, “And He must win the battle.” (End of second verse). The German here reads, “Das Feld muss er behalten.” This is a military phrase – not giving up the “battle field” to the enemy.

 

The use of the Burg is very obvious. A Burg was a fortified town. When invaders approached, the surrounding populace fled to the safety of the walls. In some cases, walled towns had various layers of walls. Residents of the Burg were called burghers. Significantly, they were free citizens of the town. Luther’s analogy is highly appropriate and Protestants, very familiar with medieval and post medieval wars, could easy understand that their God was like the most powerful of all Burgs: nothing could breach the walls.

 

Line two of the first verse is translated as, “a bulwark never failing.” Here again, Luther’s words are far more descriptive. Wehr refers to a barrage or an armed barrier. Another extended meaning in German refers to defending oneself tooth and nail. Waffen relates to weapons or arms. In essence, the Burg is a barrage and a weapon against the invader.

 

Who was the Invader?

 

Throughout the hymn, Luther identifies the invader. It is “the old foe,” the  “prince of darkness” (verse 3) at the head of a legion of devils. His forces are destroyed, however by one “little word,” in the German, “Ein Woertlein.” In contrast to elaborate ritual, the word is simple and is carried to the next verse of the song. The word is God’s truth, simple yet compelling.

 

Luther draws, perhaps, from Job in the last stanza: goods and kindred may go, even life itself, but God’s truth will remain. Luther’s German is more precise, identifying “Kind und Weib” (child and wife). While the English translates “Gut” as “goods,” the term refers more precisely to a manor or estate. Hence, the parallel with Job, who, after losing everything, blessed the name of the Lord.

 

Luther’s hymn was sung boldly as an affirmation of God’s power over forces that sought to disrupt the truth of God. Significantly, Luther wrote the hymn 1527-1529, a time of severe depression for the Reformer. It remains as one of Protestantism’s greatest anthems.

 

[1] and [2] Ronald Bainton, Here I Stand: A Life of Martin Luther, published originally in 1950. 

 

 

 Holocaust Deniers? There Can Be No Opposing Views! 

Texas Educators: Do Not Become Holocaust Deniers. Michael Streich

 

Ever since the enormity of the Holocaust became a fact after the closing days of World War II, countless books, memoirs, and pictures have decisively documented the most horrendous act of genocide in the twentieth-century. Holocaust survivors have told their stories, the disbelieving can wander the concentration camps throughout Europe – preserved to remind future generations, and hundreds of films have been produced. Yet supposedly responsible individual still, on occasion, deny the Holocaust.

 

The Problem with Holocaust Deniers

 

Anti-Semitism can be traced back in the Western tradition for centuries. The historical record is very clear on the treatment of Jews in Christian Europe. Holocaust deniers not only subvert the historical record, but they encourage continued Anti-Semitism. Far from rational, they ignore the empirical evidence, both written and physical. In the recent case of the rehabilitation of conservative Bishop Richard Williamson by Pope Benedict, the prelate publicly denied the existence of gas chambers used to exterminate millions of Jews.

 

It has been well documented that even during World War II, following the Nazi decision to implement the “Final Solution” at the 1942 Wannsee Conference, that western democracies knew what the Nazis were doing. American newspapers had carried stories of Jewish persecution since the early 1930s following Hitler’s rise to power. Even as the war was ending, heroic men like Raoul Wallenberg publicized the extent of the Holocaust to the rest of the world.

 

Given the mass of evidence that supports the realities of events, denying the Holocaust must stem from other motivations. For Allied leaders during the war, defeating the Nazis militarily was the top priority even when asked to bomb the concentration camp buildings used as gas chambers. Additionally, Anti-Semitism was ripe – and had been even before the outbreak of war, in Europe and the United States.

 

Toward a Greater Emphasis on Education

 

As Deborah Lipstadt writes, “the denial of the Holocaust has no more credibility than the assertion that the earthy is flat.” The Holocaust must remain an integral part of educational efforts from the elementary grades through the college years. The vast evidence, although implicating many non-Germans, rests on the singular truth that Nazi Germany with the willing assistance of its citizens perpetrated the crime known as The Holocaust. Events such as the recent fiasco over Herman Rosenblat’s Angel at the Fence in no way affects existing facts that prove the Holocaust.

 

The blue print for Holocaust can be seen in Hitler’s Mein Kampf and in the early propaganda of the rising Nazi Party in Germany. After 1933, a systematic effort, through laws and social policies, further presaged the event. Ultimately, the Final Solution put into practice what the Nazis had been saying for many years. Robert Abzug quotes Supreme Court Justice Felix Frankfurter, when shown evidence of the Warsaw Ghetto and the exterminations at Belzec, as saying, “I know that what you have to say is true, but I don’t believe it.”

 

The truth of the Holocaust can be demonstrated by all of the following:

 

Concentration camps like Dachau and Auschwitz still standing

First hand accounts from eye witnesses and survivors

Books, diaries, and memoirs

Pictures and video footage (such as at Babii Yar)

Holocaust museums and memorial exhibitions

The admission of the German people

 

Sources:

 

Robert H. Abzug, America Views the Holocaust: A Brief Documentary History (Bedford/St. Martin’s, 1999).

Deborah Lipstadt, Denying the Holocaust: The Growing Assault on Truth and Memory (The Free Press, 1993)

 

The author’s personal visits to several camps, talks with survivors, and talks with Germans living at the time.

 

 Is the Monroe Doctrine Obsolete?

American Security and the Monroe Doctrine -Michael Streich

 

 

The Roosevelt Corollary of 1904 expanded the 1823 Monroe Doctrine, proclaimed by Secretary of State John Quincy Adams in order to preserve the integrity and national security of the new United States. Although toothless in 1823, the Monroe Doctrine as it impact national security and the flow of commerce would become the indirect policy of U.S. foreign affairs throughout the 19^th Century.

 

Land Acquisition in the Name of National Security

 

The Monroe Doctrine was proclaimed the limit and curtail European interference in the Western Hemisphere. By 1900, this interference embraced European imperialism in global matters. Secretary of State John Hay published the “Open Door” notes regarding the flow of commerce in China. The United States began construction of the Panama Canal for reasons of commerce as well as national security.

 

A Central American canal was linked to American interests long before President Roosevelt made it a reality. The 1850 Clayton-Bulwer Treaty attempted to share the canal with Britain, but the issue soon became one of national security. In the late 1870’s, President Rutherford By Hayes warned that, “…The United States must exercise such control as will enable this country to protect its national interests…” Rutherford cited commercial and defense interests.

 

In 1890 Admiral Alfred Thayer Mahan published The Influence of Sea Power upon History, 1660-1782. A vocal architect of imperialism, Mahan showed the necessity of building the canal in order for the U.S. to maintain global power.

 

The Monroe Doctrine’s Lessons in the 19^th Century

 

The presence of European powers in the Western Hemisphere was always a concern. President James K. Polk threatened war with England over the Oregon Territory and then led the nation into war against Mexico, rivaling Thomas Jefferson’s land acquisitions. Southerners supported the war, fearful that growing British influence in Texas would result in the limitation of slavery in the Lone Star Republic.

 

After the Civil War, the irrepressible Secretary of State William Henry Seward lobbied Congress to purchase Alaska. After 1865, Seward took a hard line against napoleon III of France who was attempting to reestablish a French colony in Mexico.

 

Seward was an avid expansionist but it was Secretary of State James Blaine, the “plumed knight,” whose actions resulted in greater U.S. influence in the Caribbean and the Pacific.

 

By 1900, the United States had acquired Midway, Hawaii, Puerto Rico, Guam, the Philippines, and Samoa with its superb harbor at Pago Pago. Cuba, in the wake of the Spanish War, was ostensibly independent but became a sphere of influence.

 

At the 1900 Republican national convention, arch-imperialism Senator Albert Beveridge told his audience, “Think of Cuba in alliance with England or Germany or France!” Beveridge referred to these powers as rivals. Imperialism broadened the spirit of the Monroe Doctrine. Globally, the flow of commerce became intricately tied to national security in the same way President Barack Obama used the phrase to justify U.S. intervention in Libya.

 

The Roosevelt Corollary Expands the Monroe Doctrine

 

Although 19^th Century expansion was in keeping with the spirit of the Monroe Doctrine, imperialism opened the door toward a pattern of global U.S. involvement in the name of security and commerce. In 1917, the U.S. purchased the Virgin Islands from the Dutch to keep Germany from acquiring the land. Americans enjoyed their isolation but only as long as there were no European encroachments.

 

The Roosevelt and later Lodge Corollaries addressed debt by Central and South American countries. Potential European intervention in Venezuela and the Dominican Republic over debts forced the U.S. to intervene, although some observers found it immoral and many still do.

 

The Monroe Doctrine is not obsolete. The thesis behind the proclamation is still used on a global scale to protect the flow of commerce and national security. Expansionism, whether labeled manifest destiny or imperialism, was the product of this spirit.

 

Sources;

 

Albert J. Beveridge, “The Star of Empire,” The Meaning of theTimes And Other Speeches (The Bobbs-Merrill Company, 1968)

Albert Weinberg, Manifest Destiny (Johns Hopkins University Press)

Warren Zimmermann, First Great Triumph: How Five Americans Made Their Country a World Power (Farrar, Strauss and Giroux, 2002)

 

 Hyde Amendment Abortion Red Line in Congress

Michael Streich

 

Congressman Henry Hyde severed his Illinois district from 1975 until his death in 2007. Hyde was known as a conservative Republican, leading efforts to impeach President Bill Clinton in 1998. It was Hyde who carried the Article of Impeachment from the House to the U.S. Senate chamber. Henry Hyde, however, will best be remembered for his unrelenting fight to limit federal funding of abortion, accomplished through the 1976 Hyde Amendment.

 

Scope of the Hyde Amendment

 

Since 1976, Hyde Amendment language has been incorporated into every annual appropriations legislation. That language stipulated that, “…none of the funds in any trust fund to which funds are appropriated under this Act, shall be expended for any abortion.” Consistently, the only exemption made by the act concerned the life of the mother. Since 1993, however, Congress added sections governing cases of rape and incest. Hyde opposed such exemptions, claiming that women would lie about their sexual histories in order to secure abortions.

 

The focus of the Hyde Amendment involved federal Medicaid reimbursements to the various states. In 1980, the U.S. Supreme Court upheld the constitutionality of the Amendment in the case Harris v McRae, maintaining that withholding reimbursement funds to states that permitted abortions under Medicaid was a legal federal prerogative.

 

Responding to the Roe v Wade Decision

 

The Hyde Amendment represented the first major legislative effort on the part of the Congress to roll back the effects of the 1973 Roe v Wade landmark Supreme Court decision that overturned state laws banning abortion. Hyde was a Roman Catholic who campaigned on a Pro Life mandate to overturn Roe and, barring that, limit the practice of abortion however possible.

 

The Roe decision galvanized public opinion, inaugurating abortion politics as a national debate. Groups such as the National Right to Life targeted liberal members of Congress that favored the Pro Choice stance. Abortion became the political litmus test used to elect public servants in local, state, and federal elections. Members of the judiciary upholding Roe in subsequent abortion cases were labeled as “activist judges.” Abortion politics continues in the 21^st Century in American elections.

 

Opposition to the Hyde Amendment

 

The Hyde Amendment was severely criticized by women’s organizations and abortion rights groups like the National Abortion Federation. Hyde became the object of intense opposition, notably after it was disclosed that he had been involved in an extra-marital affair. In 1993, Congresswoman Cynthia A. McKinney angrily stated that the Hyde Amendment unfairly punished poor black women, during a U.S. House debate on the reauthorization of the measure.

 

In March 2010, Congress passed the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, referred to by opponents as “Obamacare.” Health care reform, resulting from a reconciliation bill crafted in a Congressional Conference Committee, was ambiguous regarding Hyde Amendment language. In order to secure the votes necessary to pass the legislation, President Barack Obama signed an executive order (number 13535) which stated that, “The Act maintains current Hyde Amendment restrictions to the newly created health insurances exchanges.”

 

Since the passage of health care reform, many states, struggling with large budget shortfalls, have assailed abortion and birth control beyond the prohibitions of the Hyde Amendment, denying state funds, for example, to Planned Parenthood. In North Carolina, the state legislature enacted a law in the spring 2011 session putting limitations on abortion practices. According to the Guttmacher Institute (August 1, 2011), 39 states currently prohibit abortions.

 

The Hyde Amendment, however, was the first significant attempt to limit abortion in the United States. Although exceptions were added, the language has not changed and is still in force today.

 

References:

 

“An Overview of Abortion Laws,” Guttmacher Institute, August 1, 2011

Bernstein, Dennis and Leslie Kean. Henry Hyde’s Moral Universe. Monroe, ME: Common Courage, 1999

Bonner, Lynn. “In policy shift, N.C. considers limits on abortion,” Charlotte Observer, May 11, 2011.

Executive Order 13535 of March 24, 2010. Federal Register, Vol. 75, No. 59

Luker, Kristin. Abortion & the Politics of Motherhood. Berkely: University of California Press, 1984

U.S. House Congressional Record, June 24, 1999, p. H4858

U.S. House Congressional Record, November 7, 2009, p. H12921

[copyright owned by Michael Streich; any reproductions in any format require written permission]