I am always surprised to see how readily most Christians assume the permanent disappearance of certain forms and spirits of paganism, as personified by the ancient pagan deities. A glance through the history of Christian literature will show plentiful references to Mammon, but there is hardly anything written about no less formidable gods, such as Bacchus and Venus, Moloch and Mars. Yet these relics of paganism are far from dead, and the mystique of Mars in particular is with us in the glorification of warrior values and the exaltation of violent heroes. It persists today as strongly as ever. Can the pagan war-god really be reconciled with Jesus? It cannot! Jesus says, “No,” to Mars, and to all his evils and all his pomps, all his deceits and all his spirits.
–-Jean Lasserre (1908-1983),
Pastor, Reform Church of France, Christian Theologian of Peace, Secretary of the French branch of the Fellowsip of Reconciliation, editor of the Cahiers de la Reconciliation, author of a seminal work on Christian Nonviolence, still in print, War and the Gospel(1953).
