Hi gerard lynch

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Jonathan Brink
Provoketive Magazine

You posted the following comment:
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I agree. In '66, I was in my second year at the University of Maryland on a track and field scholarship--and a draft exemption. If you know about that era  U of M was home to SDS, students for a democratic society. The Jocks, of which I was supposed to count myself a member in great standing, hated these dirty, long-haired not sure if it was hippies or beatniks then. Anti-American not to slaughter villagers in foreign lands and just plain cowardice. 
But I did not need to listen to SDS, although I did, to find my position on war. To me, my faith in Christ made it abundantly clear: war is worldliness and as such enmity against God, never mind the great harm it does to the "least of these"; it actually creates them.
What SDS did help me decide was to do something about what I believed, but a vain political and divisive protest was not it. I would volunteer for the draft, going infantry all the way, and show them that a Christian does not return evil for evil. 
The lady at the Selective Service Board tried to vigorously dissuade me from changing my status; this was remarkable and may give an indication where my plan was actually headed. 
The story is too long but I never got to make my point, yet not for lack of much concerted effort on my part. I have had forty-six years of pondering and praying over this issue and see no room for a Christian to be an armed combatant for any government. This seems so blatantly plain to me today, it seems quite odd that it somehow remains a question for any of the faithful and sane.
I have been to services where they say The Pledge of Allegiance at the start and refuse to join in. I also feel flags of any nation do not belong in churches. Yes, we are to submit to the governing authorities but we are not, in my eyes, to be patriots: "have a love of country and zeal for its interest." 
Thanks for sharing.