People cling to their guns and religion because they know that those are among the first things that dictators try to get rid of. (Venezuela and China are only individual examples.)
I give tyrants credit for knowing their business. They don't come to power by accident. They know where the threats against them lie.
Unlike tyrants in fiction
ReplyDelete"I'm your church now. You understand -- you've got to do what I say!" -- Simon Legree, Uncle Tom's Cabin.
ReplyDeleteA good discussion of the factors leading to increased persecution of Christians in China. Avi's wife
ReplyDeletehttps://www.opendoorsusa.org/christian-persecution/stories/3-major-factors-crackdown-church-china/
Grim. I wonder what entices leaders to try to become god-kings. Even Henry VIII only wanted to be pope.
ReplyDeleteTo reign in Hell rather than serve in Heaven?
ReplyDeleteIt occurred to me we ought to pray for Xi's redemption. After all, the prayer would be to a God who can easily ram a camel through a needle's eye without damaging either.
ReplyDeleteBTW, a way to remember his surname is that it's a rising-tone version of "shchi", Russian cabbage soup (complete with the same softer version of "sh" at the beginning).