“But the world had never before known a godlessness as organized, militarized, and tenaciously malevolent as that practiced by Marxism. Within the philosophical system of Marx and Lenin, and at the heart of their psychology, hatred of God is the principal driving force, more fundamental than all their political and economic pretensions. Militant atheism is not merely incidental or marginal to Communist policy; it is not a side effect, but the central pivot. To achieve its diabolical ends. Communism needs to control a population devoid of religious and national feeling, and this entails the destruction of faith and nationhood. Communists proclaim both of these objectives openly, and just as openly go about carrying them out.”
Harvard Address
The Soviet Union was the first propositional nation of the 20th century and its chief proposition that was required of all men to believe was, “There is no God,” and its second was like unto it, “There is no nationality.” The Communists denied race. They denied ethnicity. They denied religion. The new Soviet Man had allegiance only to the Soviet State and its propositions. There were no Estonians … No Ukrainians, No Georgians, No Muslims, No Christians … only the Soviet Comrade existed. Above the Soviets “was only sky … and no religion to.”
A propositional nation, is, by definition a slave colony because if it is required of you to believe the propositions of the said propositional nation you are no longer free to have loyalties that are contrary to the propositions to which your primary allegiance belongs. A propositional nation is a slave colony because in a propositional nation you are not allowed to have any loyalties higher than the state. Whatever propositions the state advances, even if they are propositions that are counter to your religious convictions about the nature of Marriage (Obergefell vs. Hodges anyone?) –as just one example — you as the slave are obligated to embrace those state-sanctioned propositions or risk not being thought of as a member of the propositional nation. If your loyalties to your family, or your place, or your faith are higher than your loyalties to the propositions that make up the propositional nation then you are for all intents and purposes outside the law. In a propositional nation, one is a slave to the propositions that the state seeks to advance or one is for all intents and purposes an outlaw.
Solzhenitsyn wrote about the phenomenon of the “non-person.” These were the people who dared disagree with the Soviet propositions. They were also the people who were sent off to the Gulag Archipelago. Only once one was in the Gulag did the idea of identity by propositions waned;
“Before the camps, I regarded the existence of nationality as something that shouldn’t be noticed—nationality did not really exist, only humanity. But in the camps one learns: if you belong to a successful nation you are protected and you survive. If you are part of universal humanity—too bad for you.”
This teaches us to beware anyone who comes to you insisting either explicitly or implicitly that a chief truth — a chief proposition — about Christianity that must be believed by all Christians everywhere is that for the Christians all their previous identities of race, family, and national religion disappear once they are converted. This is just Communism going under the brand of Christianity.
When the neo-cons and their barely educated clergy corps in America blather about this being a propositional nation, just keep in mind that they are serving up the same dish as Lenin, Trotsky, and Stalin. Next remember that the propositions, and their interpretations of them, are exactly contrary to Biblical Christianity.
I love that quote by Solzhenitsyn. Stuart DiNenno used it to great effect in his video on “Unfaithful Shepherds in Today’s Churches” – Christianity Applied.