A few nights ago I watched Hotel Rwanda for the first time. It was heartbreaking.

There is one part which particularly stands out in my mind: Paul, the hotel manager, who is hidding refugees in his hotel, is speaking with Jack, a foreign journalist. Paul thanks him for shooting footage of the genocide, as it means people will come to help them. Then, and this is what breaks my heart, Jack makes a comment which is, to our shame, too often true:

“I think if people see this footage, they’ll say ‘Oh, my God, that’s horrible.’ And then they’ll go on eating their dinners.”

We don’t care enough. It doesn’t have a big enough impact on us. There is so much talk about defending our fellow citizens and their freedoms. That is why we went to Iraq (supposedly) – to liberate the people, give them freedom, and protect our own freedoms. Have we forgotten, however, that as Christians our first loyalty is to Jesus? Our home is in heaven – we are citizens of heaven first and foremost, being a citizen of the UK or of the USA is secondary. Should our first loyalty not be to our fellow brothers and sisters around the world then? As Christians, as citizens of heaven, should we not be against war? Against the slaughter of innocent lives. Our brothers lives.

Forgive me if I have this all wrong. I’m still wrestling with it and trying to understand it in my own mind.

“… I believe in a God of scandalous grace. I have pledged allegiance to a King who loves evildoers so much he died for them, teaching us that there is something worth dying for but nothing worth killing for.”

[Shane Claiborne]