Vinson's Vision For A Southern Church

Written By John Vinson With an Introduction By J.R. Dunmore

Here at Virginia Gentry, it has become customary for me to introduce new authors in their debut publication. John Vinson is a man who more should be familiar with. His writing on the “True South” has left its mark on me as a Southerner. He is someone who likes to pose solutions to problems rather than just complain about them. It is a tenacity that we would do well to adopt in facing the challenges ahead of us. That being said, in this essay, Mr. Vinson explains his vision for a uniquely Southern Church and why he believes it a necessary step in preserving the Christian Faith and unique culture of the South. Whether you are a Protestant, a Catholic, an Agnostic, or an Atheist, his words are worth your consideration. — J.R. Dunmore, EIC

---

A Church For The South

The South must have a Church of the South. The reasons are two-fold. Southerners need a refuge from the heresies prevalent in American church life and a spiritual institution to defend their cultural -- and even physical -- existence.

First, let's consider the heresies. Jesus said, "By their fruits, you will know them." The Christianity of the South, often just as much as that of the rest of the United States, lacks substantial fruit. Except as isolated religious ghettos, Southern churches offer little in the way of effective resistance to the greed, vulgarity, and sensuality of American mass culture.

Neither do they offer any effective resistance to the militant secularization of society, or the building of an all-demanding state which most probably will persecute Christians. A common attitude is that the primary goal of the church is saving souls for the next life, rather than worry about this one.

On the level of personal conduct, often the behavior of the churched and unchurched is hard to distinguish. One sad and telling statistic is that divorce rates among conservative Christians -- including those in the South -- are not significantly lower than those of nonbelievers.

Jesus said that a tree bearing bad fruit should be cut down to make way for a new tree. But if the new tree grows from a soil of heresies as the old tree did, it will yield the same bad fruits. Three prominent heresies are these:

Gnosticism:

Gnosticism is the most ancient and perhaps the most insidious anti-Christian doctrine. The early Church Fathers spared no effort to eradicate this system of belief, but it has reappeared from age to age. Basically Gnosticism teaches that only the spiritual is real and good, and that the physical world is meaningless, if not evil. This doctrine underlies the eastern faiths of Hinduism and Buddhism. It effectively denies the Christian doctrines of the Incarnation (Christ taking on human flesh) and His physical Resurrection.

Gnosticism denies distinctions. God and man, and good and evil, are all equal -- and all one. Man is divine because he has a "divine spark" within himself. Gnosticism gained a foothold in America through the New England Transcendentalists. They, and those influenced by them, condemned the South on the basis of "a higher law" derived from their personal sparks of divinity.

Antinomianism:

If Gnosticism is the first and greatest heresy, the second, antinomianism is like unto it. This deviation proclaims that man is no longer governed by the laws of God. Only grace now governs believers. An early source of this doctrine was the heretic Marcion who maintained that the Old Testament, the book of law, was an evil book authored by an evil god. The New Testament, said Marcion, was a book of love and grace from a god of love.

The practical consequence of this viewpoint is that Christians need not strive for high standards of personal conduct. Resistance to sin, defined by the Bible, as "transgression of the law," is not so significant as "love." Christians, say antinomians, must strive to be "nice" rather than righteous.

Egalitarianism:

Also like unto Gnosticism is the obsession that all entities are equal because, ultimately, they are the same in the higher reality of spirit. This tendency in Western thought received great reinforcement through the Enlightenment and the French Revolution. Under the leadership of the Jacobin party, that revolution proclaimed the equality of man under the all-powerful unitary state. Jacobin influence in America weakened commitment to the division of governmental power and state's rights. It also infected the church with the unbiblical idea that all men are essentially the same and essentially good.

By understanding these heresies, and their influence, one can understand why the American church is a salt without savor. It has little influence in the world because it is other-worldly. It lacks the manly virtue to make distinctions and resist evil because it is effeminate and partial to all-inclusiveness.

For a true Christian and a true Southron this situation of the modern church is intolerable. For the Southron, the most appropriate solution is a reformed church, specifically a Church of the South, not only for preserving faith, but for preserving the Southern people.

Now, secondly, let's consider the topic of Southern survival. At present the powers of liberalism are determined to complete the genocide begun during the War for Southern Independence. To attain their goal of an orderly New World Order, they aim to eliminate the freedom-loving Anglo-Celts of the South, the foremost and primary community of the region. The term genocide is appropriate. The man who coined the word, Raphael Lemkin, stated that it does not necessarily mean the physical annihilation of a people; it can also be a systematic attack on their well-being and identity as a people.

This genocide is proceeding in two ways. One is unceasing defamation and psychological warfare conducted by media, schools, colleges, and churches. Its goal is to instill self-hate in Southern Anglo-Celts, while encouraging other groups, notably African-Americans, to hate them. In the cases of schools and colleges, Anglo-Celts find their own money taxed from them to fund their defamation. Also, they -- and members of other communities -- find their money taxed to support a menacing and parasitic underclass.

With their morale greatly damaged, the Anglo-Celts also face the second and most deadly thrust of the liberal establishment's Final Solution for its Southern problem: uncontrolled Third World immigration. Growing segments of the Old Confederacy, such as South Texas and South Florida, are firmly in the grip of Latin American culture, a culture significantly removed from biblical Christianity. And in recent decades, entire cities in the Southern hinterland -- Dalton, Georgia; Gainesville, Georgia; and Siler City; North Carolina -- become virtual colonies of Mexico.

With the steadfast refusal of either political party to deal effectively with immigration, the prospect of religious and ethnic cleaning throughout Dixie is quite real. As this process goes on, Washington's liberal elites aim to enhance their power by manipulating the votes and passions of the newcomers.

For Southrons to prevent the dilution of their faith and the marginalization of their descendants into tyranny, they must heed the lessons of history as to how Godly peoples have survived occupation and oppression. Examples which come to mind are the Hebrews in Egypt and Babylon, the Greeks and Serbs under Turkish occupation, and the Irish under Britain. In all these cases, the respective peoples survived, against seemingly overwhelming odds, because they had an assembly or church from which to draw spiritual inspiration, courage, and direction.

Similarly, the Church of the South would be an ethnic church with the particular mission of ministering to a particular people, the Southern Anglo-Celts. From architecture, liturgy, to art, it would reflect this tie of kinship. Nevertheless, as an orthodox church, it would strive to preach the Gospel to all peoples.

Some people will criticize this particularity as "racism," a term coined by Marxists and neo-Jacobins to break down God-ordained diversity. After the fashion of Gnostics, they proclaim that oneness and goodness are one of the same. The biblical view, following the unity and diversity of God in the Trinity, is that unity does not deny the reality of particulars as they appear in the physical world. Humanity is one, but it is divided into "nations" so that, in the words of the Apostle Paul, "men might seek after God."

The New World Order, following the path of Lincoln's centralized government, proposes a world-ruling entity. To bring this about, all religious and ethnic/national distinctions must be suppressed so that such loyalties will not divert allegiance from the rulers of the Order and the unrighteous mammon and power they wield. Thus the affirmation of particularity is service to the cause of God and His design.

How can the Church of the South proceed to organize? It must begin as an idea among members of existing denominations. They must articulate their viewpoints and express in documents what the character and form of the church will be. More importantly, however, they must display Christian character, following in the footsteps of Lee and Jackson, which will distinguish them from the "nice" antinomian Christians around them.

In terms of physical organization, congregations may begin by meeting in homes, as the early Christians often did. In some cases, existing independent churches may declare themselves as members of the new body. From these steps, greater things may follow. It is clear today, for anyone with eyes to see, that American Christianity and the South are in crisis. The Babylonian system, foretold in the Book of Revelation, has cast its shadow over both. With this impending peril, the call from Scripture is clear: "Come out my people, come out from Babylon."