THE LIGHT OF CHRISTMAS

by Jeremy Lee
For those who remember seemingly far-distant periods of genuine peace and security it is hard to look past the carnage of the moment to the real truth and light in this world. I must admit to spending more time than usual watching TV news – particularly since September 11th. One wonders ruefully whether there is anywhere on the planet not experiencing conflict. Each story seems to accentuate the ever-increasing capacity of human beings to inflict damage on each other. There is no place to hide. Move from one hideout to another on the darkest of nights and some satellite somewhere will be searching you out, like Sauron in Tolkien's "Lord of The Rings".
Bombs, so we are told, can entomb people in caves beneath the most rugged of mountain ranges.

Naked power stalks the nations of the earth, able – or seemingly able – to search out our innermost thoughts, eliminating or neutralizing dissent. It can scan our very eyes, read our facial and finger-prints, recording the personal details of every human being on earth. Its propaganda is seemingly impervious to exposure. Even Phillip Adams, one of the League's most vitriolic critics, is being dragged before the Human Rights Commission for challenging the basic US tenet, "We're on the side of truth and justice against the forces of evil." I never thought I'd say such a thing, but in this case Mr. Adams has shown courage in speaking out, and his right to free speech should be defended.

These things deserve our consideration as we approach Christmas 2001. Where does the Star that led the three wise men relate to a modern Bethlehem that has suffered the hatred of recent bombings and shellings? What place for the ox and the ass in a humble stable where a Saviour was born, Whose Advent had been predicted and longed for hundreds of years before the event? What assurance does a sleeping Babe, "away in a manger" auger for the millions of starving, the refugees, the homeless in so many countries?

It seems that many of those who will throng the "Carols by Candlelight" round the world regard the good news in much the same light as Harry Potter – a nice, comforting break from reality, almost a dream, but not really to be believed as literal. It would be nice if it was, some think, but we're grown up now, and just as we stopped believing in Santa Claus, so this material world demands that we put away the once-believed bible stories and face the world like grown-ups. We keep up the pretence, of course, for the sake of the kids, until they're old enough to work it all out for themselves.

But weren't we told we must "become as little children"? And what does that mean? Is there something children can discern that we cannot? Jesus said that we would find Him when we seek Him "with all our heart"; not our school curricula, our GDP, our "work-for-the-dole" schemes, our capital accumulation or our superannuation. The seemingly tortuous assertion that "the plight of the world is the hope of the world" might give us pause for thought this Christmas.

In human terms there is now little we can do materially to change this world. There is such a thing, in terms of human effort as "the point of no return". And we seem to have reached it. Writing of his dramatic case against Alger Hiss, the soviet agent who was within reach of the US presidency, former editor of Time, Whittaker Chambers wrote to his children,
"....Crime, violence, infamy are not tragedy. Tragedy occurs when a human soul awakes and seeks, in suffering and pain, to free itself from crime, violence, infamy, even at the cost of life. The struggle is the tragedy - not defeat or death..... this tragedy will have been for nothing unless men understand it rightly, and from it the world takes hope and heart to begin its own tragic struggle with the evil that besets it from within and from without, unless it faces the fact that the world, the whole world, is sick unto death and that, among other things, this Case has turned a finger of fierce light into the suddenly opened and reeking body of our time ...."

That was in 1952. C.H. Douglas, that profound thinker and discerner, wrote in 1924:
"....The break-up of the present financial system is certain. Nothing will stop it. .... The continuation of taxation on the present scale, together with an unsolved employment problem, is fantastic; the only point at issue in this respect is the length of time which the break-up will take, and the tribulations we have to undergo while the break-up is in progress..... There will probably come well within the lives of the present generation, a period at which the blind forces of destruction will appear to be in the ascendant ...."

Could we possibly think that this time is any other than that referred to by Douglas? Yet Douglas, who so accurately and vividly described the critical moment, was no victim of the doctrine of the inevitable. In his book Social Credit he went on to emphasize that the break-up he referred to was the gateway to opportunity. He was saying, in other words, "these things must come to pass".
He would have endorsed the follow-up, "But be not dismayed. The gates of Hell shall not prevail."

The gospel of Christ Jesus of Nazareth is as dramatic as the life He lived, in which He lashed and exposed the lie, the power-seeker, the establishment, the elite, the pharisaical nit-picker and legalist, the proud and those who robbed mens' souls, even while He healed the sick, raised the dead and took little children into His arms. His disciples thought the dream had ended when Our Lord was murdered. But in fact that seeming defeat was the key to life. So, even now, life lies ahead – the exposure of the lie, the destruction of what former acting prime minister of Canada, Paul Hellyer, describes as "the evil empire", and, in Douglas's words, "the emergence into the full light of a day of such splendour as we can at present only envisage dimly."
But you've got to be childlike to see it; and what better way of doing so than through the eyes of a Babe born in Bethlehem? He is the focal point of the joy the world needs now.

The most important group in the world is those "two or three, gathered together" who still doggedly plod on in faith.
Merry Christmas to all our readers and their families!

DEFENCELESS

East Timor, the Tampa incident and Afghanistan have brought us face to face with the inadequacy of our defence system, side-lined in Budgets from 1972 onwards. The Sunday Herald Sun (25/11/01) reported:
"Australia's military chiefs have delivered a damning report on the ability of the army, navy and airforce to defend the nation. The Defence Department says that defence forces are stretched to breaking point and achieving only 25 per cent of their performance targets. Tabled in Federal Parliament, the report reveals that all services were struggling to overcome staff and equipment shortages even before Prime Minister John Howard committed troops to the war against terror and the navy to policing illegal boatpeople.

In the report, the military chiefs reveal
THE Royal Australian Airforce battled to fulfil only 80 percent of flying-hour requirements in the year to June 30.
THE army was over-stretched even before sending troops to Afghanistan.
THE Royal Australian Navy cannot provide enough ships or sailors to patrol Australia's shores ...."

The article went on to detail the embarrassing shortages and gaffes in each of the three services – manpower and equipment shortages, resulting in lack of preparedness. It added that privately, many navy officers were critical of northern surveillance, with many refugee boats easily evading detection. But of course, the Howard Government will continue resolutely ensuring that only Australia decides who lands on our shores! However, a number of foreign defence chiefs will be reading the report with interest.

RACE ROW IN BRITAIN

After past and present race riots in England, the fact that more Brits now worship in mosques than churches, the development of racial ghettoes, all of which were predicted by the late Enoch Powell to a chorus of condemnation, Britain's Home Secretary David Blunkett is now at the centre of a race row. His crime? He suggested that ethnic minority communities should abide by British "norms of acceptability" when they become citizens, including learning the English language.

According to The Australian (11/12/01): ".... Mr. Blunkett told immigrants that social cohesion was a two-way street and that those seeking to be British should take part in programs in which they are taught some English...... But MPs and immigrant groups attacked the Home Secretary and warned him against patronizing ethnic minorities with his proposals. Shahid Malik, a member of the Labour Party's national executive, condemned Mr. Blunkett's 'insensitive' comments, branding them 'sensational' and 'disturbing'...... Mr. Blunkett said ethnic minorities needed to know that Britain would not tolerate enforced marriages and genital mutilation ....."

That's it! Off with his head! Blunkett will probably be hung, drawn and quartered at Tyburn Tree – especially if it now happens to be in an Asian residential area. Britain is now belatedly discovering – as Australia is destined to do – that 'multiculturalism' is against both natural law and commonsense. A few idealists in the isolated environment at universities who have usually never had to cope with the real problems of cultural clashes, have somehow stolen and made illegal the homogeneity which is the natural order.
What a price others will have to pay for their mistakes!

THE CHALLENGE BEFORE US

In this, the last On Target for the year of 2001, it seems appropriate to restate what we are about. The words are from a statement made in On Target over 30 years ago:
"On Target, published by The Australian League of Rights, a non-party political organisation, is primarily concerned with the defence of a free society against all policies of totalitarianism, both external and internal. The League is a voluntary association of individuals working in a co-ordinated manner to defend limited constitutional government, the rights and freedoms of the individual, and the Rule of Law.
It believes systems and institutions exist to serve the individual; that Governments belong to individuals instead of individuals being regarded as the property of Governments.
The League's philosophy is the Traditional Christian philosophy. On Target is not light, escapist reading. It is concerned with truth. 'The truth shall make you free.' The journal provides a week-by-week analysis of the real meaning of the flood of 'news' which tends to suffocate and confuse us. This confusion cannot be dispersed by asking the confused to read and see even more 'news', but by the application of the spotlight of truth. The greater the darkness, the more vivid is the striking of a match.
Never before has the small analytical publication been more important. Not dependent upon advertising it can devote itself exclusively to the purpose of telling the truth."

This, the League has sought to do – and will continue to do so.

WE ARE THE WAR CRIMINALS NOW

"Everything we have believed in since the Second World War goes by the board as we pursue our own exclusive war," writes Robert Fisk © 2001 Independent Digital (UK) Ltd, November 30th, 2001:
"We are becoming war criminals in Afghanistan. The US Air Force bombs Mazar-i-Sharif for the Northern Alliance, and our heroic Afghan allies – who slaughtered 50,000 people in Kabul between 1992 and 1996 – move into the city and execute up to 300 Taliban fighters. The report is a footnote on the television satellite channels, a 'nib' in journalistic parlance.
Perfectly normal, it seems. The Afghans have a 'tradition' of revenge. So, with the strategic assistance of the USAF, a war crime is committed.

Now we have the Mazar-i-Sharif prison 'revolt', in which Taliban inmates opened fire on their Alliance jailers. US Special Forces – and, it has emerged, British troops – helped the Alliance to overcome the uprising and, sure enough, CNN tells us some prisoners were 'executed' trying to escape. It is an atrocity. British troops are now stained with war crimes.
Within days, The Independent's Justin Huggler has found more executed Taliban members in Kunduz.

The Americans have even less excuse for this massacre. For the US Secretary of Defence, Donald Rumsfeld, stated quite specifically during the siege of the city that US air raids on the Taliban defenders would stop 'if the Northern Alliance requested it'. Leaving aside the revelation that the thugs and murderers of the Northern Alliance were now acting as air controllers to the USAF in its battle with the thugs and murderers of the Taliban, Mr. Rumsfeld's incriminating remark places Washington in the witness box of any war-crimes trial over Kunduz. The US were acting in full military co-operation with the Northern Alliance militia. (emphasis added...ed)

Most television journalists, to their shame, have shown little or no interest in these disgraceful crimes. Cosying up to the Northern Alliance, chatting to the American troops, most have done little more than mention the war crimes against prisoners in the midst of their reports. What on earth has gone wrong with our moral compass since September 11th?

Perhaps I can suggest an answer.
After both the First and Second World Wars, we – the 'West' – grew a forest of legislation to prevent further war crimes. The very first Anglo-French-Russian attempt to formulate such laws was provoked by the Armenian Holocaust at the hands of the Turks in 1915; The Entente said it would hold personally responsible "all members of the (Turkish) Ottoman government and those of their agents who are implicated in such massacres".
After the Jewish Holocaust and the collapse of Germany in 1945, article 6 (C) of the Nuremberg Charter and the Preamble of the UN Convention on genocide referred to "crimes against humanity". Each new post-1945 war produced a raft of legislation and the creation of evermore human rights groups to lobby the world on liberal, humanistic Western values.

Over the past 50 years, we sat on our moral pedestal and lectured the Chinese and the Soviets, the Arabs and the Africans, about human rights. We pronounced on the human-rights crimes of Bosnians and Croatians and Serbs. We put many of them in the dock, just as we did the Nazis at Nuremberg. Thousands of dossiers were produced, describing – in nauseous detail – the secret courts and death squads and torture and extra judicial executions carried out by rogue states and pathological dictators. Quite right too.

A pseudo trial and a firing squad
Yet suddenly, after September 11th, we went mad. We bombed Afghan villages into rubble, along with their inhabitants – blaming the insane Taliban and Osama bin Laden for our slaughter – and now we have allowed our gruesome militia allies to execute their prisoners. President George Bush has signed into law a set of secret military courts to try and then liquidate anyone believed to be a "terrorist murderer" in the eyes of America's awesomely inefficient intelligence services.
And make no mistake about it, we are talking here about legally sanctioned American government death squads. (emphasis added...ed) They have been created, of course, so that Osama bin Laden and his men should they be caught rather than killed, will have no public defence; just a pseudo trial and a firing squad.

It's quite clear what has happened. When people with yellow or black or brownish skin, with Communist or Islamic or Nationalist credentials, murder their prisoners or carpet bomb villages to kill their enemies or set up death squad courts, they must be condemned by the United States, the European Union, the United Nations and the 'civilised' world. We are the masters of human rights, the Liberals, the great and good who can preach to the impoverished masses. But when our people are murdered – when our glittering buildings are destroyed – then we tear up every piece of human rights legislation, send off the B-52s in the direction of the impoverished masses and set out to murder our enemies.

Winston Churchill took the Bush view of his enemies. In 1945, he preferred the straightforward execution of the Nazi leadership. Yet despite the fact that Hitler's monsters were responsible for at least 50 million deaths – 10,000 times greater than the victims of September 11th – the Nazi murderers were given a trial at Nuremberg because US President Truman made a remarkable decision. "Undiscriminating executions or punishments," he said, "without definite findings of guilt fairly arrived at, would not fit easily on the American conscience or be remembered by our children with pride."
(Were the 'findings of guilt fairly arrived at' at Nuremberg? People need to read David Irving's or Douglas Reed's accounts, and other books on the subject, then make up their own minds on that score....ed. Send for a catalogue from a League book service.)

Continuing Robert Fisk
"No one should be surprised that Mr. Bush – a small-time Texas Governor-Executioner – should fail to understand the morality of a statesman in the Whitehouse. What is so shocking is that the Blairs, Schröders, Chiracs and all the television boys should have remained so gutlessly silent in the face of the Afghan executions and East European-style legislation sanctified since September 11th.

There are ghostly shadows around to remind us of the consequences of state murder. In France, a general goes on trial after admitting to torture and murder in the 1954-62 Algerian war, because he referred to his deeds as "justifiable acts of duty performed without pleasure or remorse". And in Brussels, a judge will decide if the Israeli Prime Minister, Arial Sharon, can be prosecuted for his "personal responsibility" for the 1982 massacre in Sabra and Chatila.
Yes, I know the Taliban were a cruel bunch of bastards. They committed most of their massacres outside Mazar-i-Sharif in the late 1990s. They executed women in the Kabul football stadium. And yes, let's remember that September 11th was a crime against humanity.

Brutal, cynical, 'Great War for Civilisation'
But I have a problem with all this. George Bush says that, "you are either for us or against us," in the war for civilisation against evil. Well, I'm sure not for bin Laden. But I'm not for Bush. I'm actively against the brutal, cynical, lying "war of civilisation" that he has begun so mendaciously in our name and which has now cost as many lives as the World Trade Centre mass murder. (emphasis added ...ed)

At this moment, I can't help remembering my dad. He was old enough to have fought in the First World War. In the third Battle of Arras. And as great age overwhelmed him near the end of the century, he raged against the waste and murder of the 1914-1918 war. When he died in 1992, I inherited the campaign medal of which he was once so proud, proof that he had survived a war he had come to hate and loathe and despise. On the back, it says: 'The Great War for Civilisation.' Maybe I should send it to George Bush."

OLD LIBERAL PARTY BELIEFS LIBERALLY CIRCULATED

BASIC FUND

It is heartening to see the response to our appeal resulting in a surge of contributions to the Basic Fund. Over the last week 16 supporters have contributed $2665.00 bringing the total to $14,571.22. Please keep up the momentum. The new year will bring many challenges for the League and for these challenges to be met we will need to ensure the basic fund is filled. Please examine your priorities, and where possible, make a generous contribution to ensure the continuity of the work of the League.

A sincere 'thank you' goes to each and every one of our supporters.
May we all be refreshed and our spiritual energies renewed during the Christ-mass Season.

MELBOURNE 'HUB' CLOSED FOR CHRISTMAS BREAK

THE CHRISTIAN ALTERNATIVE MOVEMENT AND THE CHURCH

We commend the work of the Christian Alternative Movement to our readers. The latest initiative is to try and crack the hardest nut of all – the Christian Church and all those ordained in the name of the Father, Son and Holy Ghost, writes Edward Rock, chairman of CAM..

"A moment's thought must convince us all that those so ordained would want to assist in establishing Christian principles governing the creation and distribution of money... In every community there are a number of different Christian Churches headed by a priest or pastor..."

Those who would like to be involved in the work of C.A.M.should write to: Mr. Edward Rock, 13 Nardoo Street, Cape Paterson, Vic., 3995, and offer your help.

In the ongoing battle, Ted has written the following letter to John Howard, Prime Minister: The Hon. John Howard. MP, Parliament House, Canberra, ACT, 2600. November 1st, 2001.

Dear Mr. Howard, The following statement is truth and tells us there is a solution to every human problem or crisis; "l am the way, the truth and the life. No man cometh unto the Father except by me." In this statement, God the Son linked himself to God the Father as equal authorities on every problem that assails mankind. Before he ascended to heaven Christ told the disciples he would send them the Holy Spirit who would lead them into all truth. He also commanded his disciples to "teach the nations... in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Ghost."
Thus the Holy Trinity: Father, Son and Holy Spirit was established as the source of all truth.

In respect to our present world crisis involving the three great religions of our time, Islam, Christianity, and Judaism, one of the great authorities on the Holy Trinity, Professor C.S. Lewis in his book Mere Christianity leads us in an understanding I have yet to see acknowledged by the thousands offering us their learned opinions since September 11th. In his book Mere Christianity in the chapter 'Social Morality', Lewis deals with a number of principles incumbent upon Christians concerned to build a Christian society. Towards the end of the chapter, almost as an afterthought Lewis says "Now another point" and goes on to relate how three great civilisations, Greek, Jewish and Christian had all joined in banning the practice of usury.
If he was alive today he would immediately remind us that Islam also banned usury and still does today, but the two other great religions, Judaism and Christianity, now condone, endorse, and practice usury. As Lewis pointed out, Judeo-Christians build everything they do and every decision made on the practice of usury. Usury has replaced Christ as our foundation stone. Lewis strongly suggests the debate should be reopened. Is it too late?

Usury is usually defined as the lending of money at interest, and Lewis accepted that definition. Christ did not condemn the practice of lending money at interest where both borrower and lender benefited, but usury as practiced today under Judeo-Christianity is an entirely different practice because both these religions have made friends with the mammon of unrighteousness in the form of all money created as a debt from where it is selectively distributed in the first instance to the friends of mammon. The nations and their people only get the crumbs that fall from the rich man's table.

When money is created as a debt, circulated as a debt, the creators of the debt reign supreme over the one way street they control, out of which there is no way out for their victims. However if Judeo-Christianity went back to banning usury it would insist that all money be created free of debt, and selective distribution replaced by democratic distribution, a practice emulating the grace of God, releasing a flood of God's love to heal and revive a sick and dying world.

Our present crisis which threatens to destroy the last remaining vestiges of Christian civilisation grew out of selectively favouring Israel with the finance to make it "the strong man capable of invading and robbing the homes and land of its neighbours". September 11th grew out of that practice. The way back is to revoke usury and introduce Christian creation and distribution of money. It is also time for the Bishops of the Christian churches to repudiate friendship with the mammon of unrighteousness and insist that national governments follow the path of Christ in the creation and distribution of money.

Although the crisis is deep, Christ being the author of time it is never too late. Would John Howard as a committed Christian care to give a lead? Let him approach the Bishops and ask for divine assistance. Your servant in Christ, Edward Rock.

P.S. John, this is not "idiosyncratic nonsense", it is the stuff of God. Let us see John Howard the family man become Christ's servant. For my part I will circulate this widely to those ordained in the name of Father, Son and Holy Ghost inviting them to encourage you and Kim (now Simon) to choose service to God rather than service to mammon.

THE LEAGUE'S BOOK SERVICES

As well as the publication of journals for the dissemination of information, the League publishes and distributes a wide range of educational books, videos and cassette tapes. These are available at meetings, at our Melbourne bookshop or by mail order from the following addresses:

Victoria & Tasmania: Heritage Bookshop, 2nd Floor, 145 Russell Street, Melbourne, 3000. (GPO Box 1052J, Melbourne, 3001). Phone: (03) 9650 9749; Fax: (03) 9650 9368.

New South Wales: Heritage Book Service, PO Box 6086, Lake Munmorah, 2259. Phone/Fax: (02) 4358 3634.

Queensland: Conservative Book Mailing Service, P.O. Box 7108, Toowoomba Mail Centre, 4352. Phone (07) 4635 7435.

Western Australia: Heritage Book Mailing Service, PO Box 163, Chidlow, 6556. Phone/Fax: (08) 9574 6042.

South Australia: Heritage Book-Mailing Service, PO Box 208, Ingle Farm, 5098. Phone: (08) 8395 9826; Fax: (08) 8395 9827