Rick Santorum on Tuesday stood by comments he made in 2008 about Satan attacking the United States, telling reporters here that he is going to “stay on message” and continue to talk about jobs, security and “taking on forces around this world who want to do harm to America.” The three-year-old speech is getting renewed scrutiny after several Web-based publications circulated audio and text of his remarks over the holiday weekend. Speaking to a group at Ave Maria University in Naples, Fla., Santorum said, “This is not a political war at all. This is not a cultural war at all. This is a spiritual war. And the Father of Lies has his sights on what you would think the Father of Lies, Satan, would have his sights on: a good, decent, powerful, influential country: the United States of America.”
Let's see. The reason this is a story is because people, certain people, believe this shows Santorum to be a religious nutcase. Though he might be a nutcase otherwise, Biblical teaching is pretty clear about this. The Father of Lies has his sights on all of us, in the world. Whether it be a good, decent, powerful, influential country or not. That does not make one a nutcase. That makes one a reader of scripture.
This notion that good and evil doesn't exist is a quaint one. But Jesus wasn't so quick to dismiss this one we call Satan.
Jesus said of the Father of Lies, 22 And the teachers of the law who came down from Jerusalem said, “He is possessed by Beelzebul! By the prince of demons he is driving out demons.”
23 So Jesus called them over to him and began to speak to them in parables: “How can Satan drive out Satan? 24 If a kingdom is divided against itself, that kingdom cannot stand. That was said to point out that he couldn't be both good and evil, but that last sentence speaks so much toward what is happening in this country that it can't be dismissed outright.
When we get tired of beating ourselves up over religion, maybe we'll go on to trying to fix what ails us. Until then, Satan wins.
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