00:00Welcome to Presbyter Chat, the authority of pre-Nicene Christian news, history and analysis.
00:05Hosted by Presbyter Darren Kalama of the Marcionite Church.
00:13Thanks for joining us.
00:14In this episode, we're talking about something that's never happened before in the modern era.
00:20A Christian church issuing formal, legal guidance to its members on how to refuse participation in a war.
00:28Not because all war is wrong, but because the war is being blessed by the wrong God.
00:35We're going to walk through the church's recent statement,
00:40Ostrotepsia, that's Greek for military exemption,
00:44in the academic paper just published in the Journal of Pre-Nicene Christian Studies.
00:49We're going to look at the Pentagon prayer service that triggered all of this,
00:53the legal distinction between conscientious objection and religious accommodation,
01:00and what Marcionite Christians are being asked to do.
01:04And if you're new to Marcionite theology, don't worry, we'll start at the beginning.
01:09But before we dive in, I want to note that the legal and theological arguments that we're discussing
01:16are laid out in detail in a peer-reviewed academic paper just published in the Journal of Pre-Nicene Christian
01:23Studies,
01:24Volume 2, Issue 4, in April of this year.
01:28The author is A.W. Mitchell, and the paper is titled
01:31Religious Accommodation for Marcionite Christians in the 2026 Iran War,
01:38Theology, Law, and the Rejection of Yahweh-Blessed Conflict.
01:42It's available open access, and we'll link to it in the show notes.
01:47Now, let's go ahead and get started.
01:49The controversy began on March 25th of 2026, just this year.
01:54The U.S. Secretary of War, Pete Hegseth, led a Christian worship service at the Pentagon.
02:01It was live-streamed.
02:03Military personnel attended.
02:05And the Secretary prayed, out loud, on official government property for, and I quote,
02:12overwhelming violence against America's enemies.
02:16He quoted Psalm 18, quote-unquote,
02:24Now, for most Christians, that might sound like a perfectly normal thing to pray.
02:30But for Marcionite Christians, it was something else entirely.
02:35It had crossed a red line.
02:37In fact, the very next day, the Marcionite church issued a formal statement.
02:42Its title was,
02:44And its message was blunt.
02:46When the Secretary invokes God by citing violent Torah scriptures to bless the destruction of enemies,
02:54he is invoking Yahweh, not the Father of Jesus.
02:58For a Marcionite to participate in a war so blessed is to commit an act of false worship, unquote.
03:06Now, what exactly do they mean by all that?
03:09To understand why, you have to understand the core of Marcionite theology.
03:14You see, the Marcionite church preserves the original Christian canon, the Evangelion.
03:21It's a single gospel.
03:23They also have the Apostolicon, the original ten epistles of Paul, with prologues.
03:30Now, together, they're called the very first Bible.
03:33It was compiled in 144 AD, long before the Catholic Church's version of their Latin Vulgate,
03:41which they finally published in 382 AD.
03:45Now, here's the key.
03:46Marcionites teach that God was unknown before being revealed by Jesus Christ.
03:53Nobody had met him.
03:54God, our Father, is not the deity of the Torah.
03:58You see, that deity, Yahweh, is a lesser being, a Bronze Age war god.
04:05And his worship includes blood sacrifice, genocide, the killing of women and infants,
04:11holy war, and retributive violence.
04:14But don't take my word for it.
04:16It's literally right in your own Bible.
04:19Let's listen to the contrast.
04:20From the Evangelion, Jesus commands,
04:24Love your enemies, do good to them which hate you.
04:27And the Son of Man came not to destroy men's lives, but to save them.
04:32And from the Apostolicon, the epistles of Paul, he writes,
04:36Do not be overcome by evil, but overcome evil with good.
04:41Now, let's compare that to the Psalms scripture that Hegseth quoted.
04:51You see, for a Marcionite, those are not the same God.
04:56They are opposites.
04:58And when the government holds an official service in praise to Yahweh,
05:03quoting Yahweh's own scriptures,
05:05It is a de facto endorsing of a specific deity.
05:10A deity that Marcionites have rejected is a false deity.
05:14A false god.
05:16Now, some of you may be thinking,
05:18These Marcionites, they're just making mountains out of molehills.
05:21But let's look at it a little more carefully.
05:23I'm going to read to you something directly from the Torah.
05:26From the words attributed to Yahweh Himself.
05:29In Ezekiel, chapter 9, verse 6, Yahweh commands His worshippers,
05:36Slay utterly old and young, both maids and little children and women.
05:42Now, remember, He's not talking about enemies in battle, not soldiers.
05:47Old men, young men, maids, little children, women, slay them utterly.
05:54And this is not a metaphor.
05:56This is not taken out of context.
05:58This is Yahweh commanding the wholesale slaughter of non-combatants.
06:03Infants included.
06:05Of course, there's dozens more examples of this.
06:08Like in Exodus, Yahweh hardens the Pharaoh's heart
06:12and then kills every firstborn son in Egypt.
06:15From the firstborn of the prisoner in the dungeon
06:18to the firstborn of the cattle.
06:21In Deuteronomy, Yahweh commands the Israelites
06:24to, quote unquote, leave nothing that breathes.
06:27Men, women, children, even the animals.
06:31Think about this.
06:32Has anything changed in 2,000 years?
06:35When we look around, watch the news, it sure doesn't look like it.
06:39And as a quick aside, when somebody says they believe in God
06:43or wants you to do something in the name of God,
06:46make sure you tell them to name the God.
06:50Don't be a victim to subtle linguistic shell games and acrobatics.
06:55Now let's go ahead and contrast the prescribed words and deeds of Yahweh
07:00with the Father of Jesus, God our Father.
07:04When James and John wanted to call down fire from heaven
07:07to destroy a Samaritan village,
07:10Jesus rebuked them and said,
07:12You see, the Son of Man came not to destroy men's lives,
07:16but to save them.
07:17You see, the Father does not command the slaughter of infants.
07:22He does not harden the hearts so that he can punish the innocent.
07:27He does not tell anyone to leave nothing that breathes.
07:31I mean, that's just sick.
07:33Now, for a Mercianite Christian,
07:35these are not two sides of the same God.
07:37They are two different gods.
07:40Or rather, more specifically and more importantly,
07:43one is God,
07:45the other is a carnal deity of unknown origin.
07:48One commands the killing of children,
07:51the other commands,
07:52love your enemies.
07:53And simply put,
07:55that is why,
07:56when the Secretary of War stands at the Pentagon
07:58and prays to the God of Psalm 18,
08:02the God who pursues enemies until they are consumed,
08:05he is not praying to the Father of Jesus.
08:08He's praying to Yahweh.
08:10And for a Mercianite to participate in a war
08:13blessed by that God,
08:15by that deity,
08:17would be to bow to a deity
08:19who orders the slaughter of the innocents.
08:22Bottom line,
08:23that is not a religious objection to a policy.
08:26That is the rejection of idolatry.
08:30So looking ahead,
08:31why can't Mercianite service members
08:33just file as conscientious objectors?
08:36Well, that's because under U.S. law,
08:39under the Selective Service Act
08:41and the Supreme Court's Gillette decision,
08:43that requires opposition to war in any form.
08:48And the Mercianite church does not teach that.
08:50It actually permits defensive homeland war,
08:54fighting on your own land to protect the innocent.
08:57In fact, the Apostle Paul himself wrote that
09:00governing authorities bear the sword
09:03for the punishment of evil.
09:05So a Mercianite who says,
09:07I oppose all war,
09:08would be lying about their own church's doctrine.
09:11They cannot do this filing.
09:13However,
09:14the church also teaches that this war,
09:16and any war officially consecrated
09:19by the name of Yahweh through Torah scriptures,
09:22falls outside permissible participation.
09:25And that means it's not a conscientious objector claim.
09:29It's a religious accommodation claim
09:32under the Religious Freedom Restoration Act, RFRA,
09:37which was signed into law in 1993.
09:40Long story short,
09:41RFRA says the government cannot substantially burden
09:45a person's exercise of religion
09:48unless it has a compelling interest
09:50and uses the least restrictive means.
09:53Now, here's the Mercianite argument.
09:56First, sincerely held belief.
09:59The distinction between God our Father and Yahweh
10:02is a core tenet,
10:03grounded in the church's canon.
10:06Second, substantial burden.
10:08Being ordered to fight in a war
10:10that the government has publicly consecrated to Yahweh,
10:13quoting his scriptures,
10:15forces a Mercianite to engage in an act of worship
10:18that their religion de facto defines as idolatry.
10:23Number three, least restrictive means.
10:26The government could simply reassign the service member,
10:30grant alternative service,
10:31or grant a stay,
10:32move them over to a non-combat role.
10:35You see, it already accommodates religious expression.
10:39Did we not just hear that prayer service?
10:42And if they can do that,
10:43they can accommodate refusal.
10:45Now let's look at where the rubber meets the road.
10:48The church has prepared templates for members,
10:52parishioners, other Christians to file these requests.
10:56And that academic paper that we talked about earlier,
10:59just published,
11:00lays out the legal and theological case in detail.
11:04If you're a Mercianite Christian in the U.S. military,
11:07or a selective service registrant who might be drafted,
11:11or might feel a draft coming on,
11:13here's what the church advises.
11:16Number one,
11:17do not file a conscientious objector claim.
11:20It does not fit your beliefs
11:22and could expose you to legal risk.
11:25Number two,
11:26file a religious accommodation request under RFRA.
11:30Use the templates provided by the church.
11:33Include a reference to the Pentagon prayer service
11:36as evidence that the government has consecrated this war
11:40in the name of Yahweh, the Bronze Age war god.
11:43Three,
11:44request a stay of deployment
11:46while your request is being processed.
11:50This is important.
11:51Under military regulations,
11:53a pending accommodation request
11:55generally stays any action
11:58that would violate the requested accommodation.
12:01Number four,
12:02contact the church for a support letter.
12:05They will verify your membership
12:07and provide a letter that you can attach to your request.
12:11And for those of you who are not yet in the military
12:14but are registered with a selective service,
12:16if a draft is reinstated,
12:18the church will provide a similar statement for you
12:21to submit to your local draft board.
12:24And if you think that you can ignore the registration,
12:28think again.
12:28Beginning this December,
12:30you will automatically be registered with a selective service
12:34whether you want to or not.
12:35They already know who you are.
12:38And at this point,
12:39it might be time to carefully
12:42consider the claims made by some
12:44that the U.S. government has been
12:46more or less hijacked by a foreign power,
12:49that America has become a
12:51far-flung suburb of Tel Aviv
12:54masquerading as a country.
12:56Have you seen anything come out of this White House
12:58that would counter those claims?
13:00Most people say no.
13:02And in fact, what we are seeing from them
13:04is the exact opposite.
13:06And if it has been hijacked at the highest levels,
13:10there will be no peace
13:11until all of Israel's enemies are destroyed
13:14and their lands occupied,
13:17or as they put it,
13:19consumed.
13:20And what does that mean for us?
13:22That means U.S. boots on the ground.
13:25Not if, when.
13:26How the justification is narrated,
13:29whether through a false flag event
13:32or simply by executive order,
13:34is irrelevant.
13:34It's going to happen.
13:36The bottom line is that this isn't about pacifism.
13:39It's about idolatry.
13:41It's about an unholy war
13:43featuring you
13:44as the sacrifice on the altar.
13:47The Church isn't trying to abolish
13:50military chaplaincy
13:51or all religious expression
13:53in the armed forces.
13:54What the Church is saying
13:56is that when the government
13:57takes sides in a war between gods,
14:00when it officially invokes
14:02Yahweh and his scriptures
14:04to bless violence,
14:05it has crossed a constitutional line.
14:09And for a Marcionite Christian,
14:11crossing that line
14:12means being forced to bow
14:13to a false god.
14:15And again, that's why the Church
14:17issued that ostratesia.
14:19That's why the academic paper was written.
14:22And that's why, in the coming weeks,
14:24you're going to hear about
14:25Marcionite service members
14:27filling out those accommodation requests.
14:30And you also might possibly be hearing,
14:32this is the word around the campfire,
14:35possibly be hearing about a Church lawsuit
14:38against the government.
14:39And as the academic paper concludes,
14:42and I quote,
14:42This case opens a new frontier
14:45in religious accommodation law,
14:47the right to refuse participation in a war
14:50not because all war is wrong,
14:52but because the specific religious framing
14:55of the war,
14:56through the invocation of Yahweh's scriptures,
14:59conflicts with the worshiper's definition of God.
15:03Unquote.
15:04That's the heart of it.
15:05If you're a Marcionite Christian
15:07in the military or a registrant,
15:09visit marcionitechurch.org
15:11forward slash
15:12military dash exemption
15:16uppercase M
15:17uppercase E
15:18military dash exemption.
15:21May our Father's Holy Spirit
15:23find and guide you
15:24in these confusing times
15:25and lift the veil
15:26from your hearts and minds.
15:28I'm Darren Kalam,
15:29and we'll see you next time
15:30on Presbyter Chat.
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