History knows two kinds of war, generally: those that are declared, with formal commencements, formalities, and peace treaties; and those that begin from a host of various grievances or jealousies, have hazy – usually multiple – flash-points, and drag on, and on, spreading misery and atrocities over civilian populations no less than enemy forces. Both sorts of war can change the course of history to equal degrees.
The United States – the West; the Christian church – is engaged in the second form of these wars. We are not facing it. We are IN it. And we have been for some time. That the “enemy” can be defined of several ways does not diminish the fact that there is one war. And it is not new, although our dim-witted realization, as awakening from a dream, might be new.
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