Saints
There's a new saint in Russia, a martyr in the war with Chechnya. The New York Times had it on the front page today, and I'd do the linky thing, but I have no mad html skilz, and there you are.
I find it astonishing, though, that the icons of this martyr feature him in full fatigues, AK in hand, and, as is traditional, haloed. I am fascinated by the ability of the cult of the saints to give devout Catholic and Othodox Christians the symbols they need in the moment to encapsulate their feelings about -- well, about pretty much anything. That's why I've falling into studying it for a living. But I do have to kind of blink when the image involved is so clearly aggressive.
Let me step out of my scholarly-analytical mode, which comprehends everything because of context, and into my hippe-pacifist-religious-philosophy mode, which clings to basic concepts of human dignity, and say this: carry an AK into Chechnya for Jesus? That's some fucked up shit right there.
I do feel very sad for his mother, though. She claims his icon weeps perfume to warn her when impending travel is dangerous. It's sad that she has nothing and no one better to care for her, to protect her.
Comments
Ooooh, sorry. I forgot to mention that this was posted by me, Nubian Goddess: garrity.
No, scratch that. Saint garrity.
Posted by: garrity | November 21, 2003 3:00 PM
You can be both, you know.
We're Unitarians here.
The story: From Village Boy to Soldier, Martyr and, Many Say, Saint (reg. maybe required, don't feel like logging out to check)
Another scary quote/notion:
Fuck.
Posted by: Aaron | November 21, 2003 4:16 PM
hey...a saint with an A-K...wasn't that willem dafoe in "platoon"?
seriously...if there remains any doubt that some people think we're still fighting the crusades [people being declared saints for massacring muslims, etc. etc.] then this ought to take care of that.
the only saint i know is my hostess kd who lets me blog practically for free. i'd hate to see her with a gun. i think there'd be a lot of road rage deaths down where she lives...
Posted by: r@d@r | November 21, 2003 7:10 PM
*giggle*
I AM a Unitarian-Universalist. And we deserve all such jokes.
Yes, that was heartbreaking, too, about the loss of faith in the leadership. I wonder what sort of saints will start coming out of our conflict with Iraq. (Oh, right. Saint Private Jessica Lynch, of course.) But that's the part that fit the historic pattern, for me: saints fill the gap when other sorts of power/leadership fail.(Particularly when recourse to the actual philosophy of Jesus of Nazareth would didctate that what's happening is utterly stupid and pointless and is driven by nothing but humanity's worst traits. Can't be saying that our son's/brother's/father's death was wholly pointless, now, can we?)
Posted by: garrity | November 24, 2003 8:03 AM