The American Spectator

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The Cross Still Stands

By H.W. Crocker, III on 7.30.07 @ 12:05AM

(Page 2 of 2)

But much though they dominate the story, Nazis, fascists, and Communists are not the whole of Burleigh's tale. There is an invigorating section on Cold War church politics in the West, a welcome reminder of when three German-speaking, and veteran anti-fascist Catholics -- Konrad Adenauer, Alcide de Gasperi, and Robert Schuman -- reconstructed Continental Europe on lines that rejected "alien" Prussianism (which was now locked up in Communist East Germany, incorporating, as Adenauer pointed out, the historically least Christianized areas) and the "oriental" Kremlin.

Adenauer, de Gasperi, and Schuman were not only ardent Catholics but profoundly pro-American, to the disgust of the European Left (and the disgust of some Protestants, including leftist pastors like Karl Barth and Martin Niemoeller, who disliked both their religion and their pro-Americanism).

But the Catholic Church wholeheartedly supported this pro-American tilt, as well as endorsing German rearmament, military conscription (with one Cardinal stating that "conscientious objection to military service is not compatible with Christian teaching"), and deployment of nuclear weapons to counter to the Soviet threat. The Europe the Church supported in the 1950s is the Europe George W. Bush no doubt wishes he had today.

BURLEIGH CLOSES HIS BOOK with the radical Muslim death cult that now threatens the West, and ties that threat to Britain's experience with the IRA (the Troubles are given their chapter as well). As he writes,

We are horribly wrong in imagining that Northern Ireland is some atavistic throwback to the religious wars of the sixteenth or seventeenth centuries. Its model of the state surrendering "communities" to the tender mercies of their so-called leaders may presage the future, except it will involve minorities who worship another God. The gloomy spires of Fermanagh and Tyrone will continue to haunt us...but they may well be outnumbered by the gleaming domes of Europe's proliferating mosques, in areas from which the state has quietly retreated.

From all the wreckage, Burleigh emerges a cautious optimist. The West remains at war with itself, with secularists apparently still keener on attacking Christianity than facing up to the threat of militant Islam. Nevertheless, many politicians -- and certainly many Europeans -- are alive to the threat, and so in particular, notes Burleigh, is the Catholic Church, the faith (honored or not) of the majority of Europeans.

Burleigh, a Briton, does not end on this note, but I will because it is addressed to us: "Those Americans who disparage what they see as an emerging 'Eurabia' might bear a thought for the many Europeans who not only dread that prospect but are doing their best to avert it, sometimes risking their lives." We can hope that Burleigh's book, published to high praise in England, is a sign of Europe's looming recovery.

Letter to the Editor

topics:
Religion, Catholicism, Islam, Protestantism, Law, Military, Russia, Communism, Fascism, Nuclear Weapons