Discussion Group Report

What makes Christians so bloodthirsty? Kurt Vonnegut, Honorary President of the American Humanist Association and author, says it is the doctrine, Love Thy Neighbor. Here is his statement excerpted from a speech he gave to the Unitarian Universalist General Assembly in Rochester, New York, in 1986:

"I listen to the ethical pronouncements of the leaders of the so-called religious revival going on in this country, including those of our President (Ronald Reagan,) and am able to distill only two firm commandments from them: Stop thinking, and obey. Only a person who has given up on the power of reason to improve life here on Earth, or a soldier in Basic Training could accept either commandment gladly.

"I was an infantry Private during World War II and fought against the Germans in Europe. They had crosses on their flags and uniforms and all over their killing machines, just like the soldiers of the first Christian Emperor Constantine. And they lost, of course, which has to be acknowledged as quite a setback for Christianity.

"I will tell you what my theory is: The Christian preachers exhort their listeners to love one another and to love their neighbors, and so on. Love is simply too strong a word to be of much use in ordinary day-to-day relationships. Love is for Romeo and Juliet.

"I'm to love my neighbor? How can I do that when I'm not even speaking to my wife and kids today? My wife said to me the other day, after a knock-down-drag-out fight about interior decoration, "I don't love you any more." And I said to her, "So what else is new?" She really didn't love me then, which was perfectly normal. She will love me some other time--I think, I hope. It's possible.

"If she had wanted to terminate the marriage, she would have had to say, "I don't respect you anymore." Now that would be terminal.

"One of the many unnecessary catastrophes going on right now, along with the religious revival and plutonium, is all the people who are getting divorced because they don't love each other any more. That is like trading in a car when the ashtrays are full. When you don't respect your mate any more--that's when the transmission is shot and there's a crack in the engine block.

"I like to think that Jesus said in Aramaic, "Ye shall respect one another." That would be a sign to me that he really wanted to help us here on Earth, and not just in the afterlife. Then again, he had no way of knowing what ludicrously high standards Hollywood was going to set for love. How many people resemble Paul Newman or Meryl Streep?

"And look at the spectrum of emotions we think of automatically when we hear the word love. If you can't love your neighbor, then you can at least like him. If you can't like him, you can at least not give a damn about him. If you can't ignore him, then you have to hate him, right? You've exhausted all the other possibilities. That's a quick trip to hate, isn't it? And it starts with love.

There are all these people who have been told to do their best at loving. They fail, most of them. And when they fail to love, day after day, year in and year out, come one, come all, the logic of the language leads them to the seemingly inevitable conclusion that they must hate instead. The step beyond hating, of course, is killing in imaginary self-defense.

"Respect does not imply a spectrum of alternatives, some of them very dangerous. Respect is like a light switch. It is either on or off. And if we are no longer able to respect someone, we don't feel like killing that person. Our response is restrained. We simply want to make him feel like something the cat drug in.

"So there you have my scheme for making Christianity, which has killed so many people so horribly, a little less homicidal: substituting the word `respect'' for the word `love.'

"I have little hope that my simple reform will attract any appreciable support during my lifetime, anyway, or in the lifetimes of my children. The Christian quick trip from love to hate and murder is our principal entertainment.

"In America it takes the form of the cowboy story. A goodhearted, innocent young man rides into town, with friendly intentions toward one and all. Never mind that he happens to be wearing a Colt .44 on either hip. The last thing he wants is trouble. But before he knows it, this loving man is face to face with another man, who is so unlovable that he has absolutely no choice but to shoot him. Christianity fails again

"Very early British versions are tales of the quests of the Christian knights of King Arthur's Camelot. Like Hermann Goering, they have crosses all over them. They ride out into the countryside to help the weak, an admirably Christian activity. They are certainly not looking for trouble. Never mind that they are iron Christmas trees decorated with the latest in weaponry. And before they know it, they are face to face with other knights so unlovable that they have absolutely no choice but to chop them up as though they were sides of beef in a butcher shop. Christianity fails again."