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“When I look at a child, I see a living, breathing person, made in God's image, for whom God has a plan. As parent educators, we need to embrace a new notion of learning...we need to engage the heart in order to effectively educate the child. Our vision of a well-educated child is a child who has a heart for learning, a child who has the tools he needs to continue to learn for a lifetime and a child who has the love to want to do it.” - Elizabeth Foss  Fleeting Youth 15 000 hours, 900 000 minutes, 54 000 000 seconds. What could we do with this time? Fly around the world 333 times, read more than a 1000 books, hike to the summit of Mount Everest 10 times… or go to school once. This is the average amount of time, a child will spend in school. Who are we giving this time to? Who are we allowing to shape the minds of our children? And whose interests do they have at heart? The Bible clearly states that a child’s education is the responsibility of the parents. Why are we giving this responsibility away? Because the state can do a better job? Because we feel we aren’t competent? Because the responsibility is too much pressure? Because we’re too lazy? Because it’s the status quo? None of these are good enough reasons to let someone else influence the development of your child’s precious mind. Proverbs 22:6 clearly states that how a child’s mind is shaped in his youth, determines his behavior and ideologies in his future: “Train up a child in the way he should go; even when he is old he will not depart from it.” Proverbs 22:6  Education vs Indoctrination Let us start by looking at the difference between education and indoctrination: Education is the process of equipping students with the necessary skills, values and beliefs in order to acquire knowledge; whereas indoctrination, according to the Oxford Dictionary, is “teaching a person or group of people to accept a set of beliefs uncritically.” African American writer, Dick Gregory, puts it quite simply, “Education means to bring out wisdom, indoctrination means to push in knowledge.” This is distinctly accurate, as teaching students how to learn, so that as they get older they can critically analyse every bit of information given to them, whether from a teacher, a parent, a politician, or a priest, a child will have had a thorough and valuable education and will be able to continue to learn and grow for the remainder of his/her life. Whereas, in contrast, teaching them what to think limits the learning and therefore confines and restricts the child – the exact opposite of the intended growth, blooming and flourishing of true learning. The problem with modern “education”, and I use the term loosely, is that it is creating people intelligent enough to repeat what they’re told and to follow orders, dumb enough to think this makes them intelligent, and blind enough not to question it.  Shaping the Minds of Future Thinkers BBC News reported that children aged 5 to 16 spend an average of 6 hours a day in front of electronic screens – either TV, gaming, cell phones, tablets or computers. All these hours of screen time, being influenced by Hollywood and unachievable worldly ideals, coupled with all the hours of school and being inveigled by a pawn in a government sponsored system, how much time do you as a parent have to actually raise your child with morals and values that are in line with what you believe to be right? As clear-minded, responsible parents who love their children, we need to be very cautious and think very carefully before we give this essential responsibility and privilege to people who not only don’t truly know and care for your child and their future, like you do as the parent, but also simply are using a child as a means for socially engineering their personal progress and benefits, regardless of the detrimental effects it may have on the child and even society as a whole? Jesus clearly states that the Greatest Commandment is to love the Lord with our whole heart, and soul and mind. We often try to protect the hearts and souls of our children, yet too often, we so swiftly and willingly throw their minds, and our own for that matter, to the world to have and do with as it pleases. This is so dangerous as at the end of the day, it is in our mind that our thoughts and feelings originate, which influences our actions and the way we will then later protect our own hearts and souls. So once the world has control of our minds, we are impressionable and therefore more useful to them than if we were strong, independent individuals rooted in the truths of the Bible - that are clearly the antithesis of what the world teaches. This is why Marxist leaders throughout time have targeted the youth. We need to be informed, we need to know the truth. Unfortunately, ignorance isn’t bliss, it’s just ignorant. It is time we start taking a stand for our children, time we start protecting our youth, and time we resist the agenda of these Marxist-Communists.  Origin of State “Education” Karl Marx said in the Communist Manifesto, “The education of all children from the moment that they can get along without a mother’s care, shall be in state institutions at state expense.” Did he say this out of the goodness of his heart because he wanted every child to receive a good education and he was willing to ensure this, even at the expense of the state or himself? NO! Three of Marx’s own children died of starvation, two committed suicide, and another child conceived with his maid was sent away and never supported financially! Children’s wellbeing was definitely not his priority! It was his own selfish gain and communist agendas that needed children to be brainwashed in order for anyone to actually believe that communism could work. Communism is called a dream of a communal utopia, because you have to be asleep to believe it. John D. Rockefeller said, “I don’t want a nation of thinkers, I want a nation of workers.” Therefore they needed to hijack the system and institutions where children are taught to think, and then limit that process. They don’t want people who could think for themselves and then possibly disagree with them, they simply want puppets and pawns to do their bidding. John Dewey, the father of “progressive education” and drafter of the Humanist Manifesto and signer of the Communist Manifesto, said that “you can’t make socialists out of individualists. Children who know how to think for themselves spoil the harmony of the collective society which is coming, where everyone is interdependent.” Dewey wanted to stop children from being independent and being able to think critically. So what do you think his education system would be teaching them? Definitely not how to read and write and succeed in life. Instead they will be taught to rely on the state and comply with everything it says. This would make it easier for the masses to be controlled and not resist their agenda. Lew Rockwell put it clearly when he said, “It isn’t a coincidence that governments everywhere want to educate children. Government education in turn, is supposed to be evidence of the state’s concern for our well-being. The real explanation is less flattering. If the government’s propaganda can take root as children grow up, those children will be no threat to the state apparatus. They’ll fasten the chains to their own ankles.” And thus the original Christian model of education, raising children with morals, values, manners, independence, critical thinking and ingenuity, was done away with. And so now the aim of public education is not to spread enlightenment at all, but rather simply to reduce as many individuals as possible to the same level, to breed a standard citizenry, to put down dissent and originality, just as cultural journalist Henry L. Mencken voiced decades ago. The sad truth is that these Communist leaders exploited parents’ desires to do what’s best for their children’s future, and packaged it just right, and now they’ve sold it, and unfortunately too many are buying their lies.  State “Education” Not the Only Way If children started school at six months old and their teachers gave them walking lessons, within a single generation people would come to believe that humans couldn’t learn to walk without going to school. What the state wants you to believe is that state education is the only way to get educated, that’s just so that you can be easily controlled and manipulated. Not only is it not the only way, but it is the worst way, and state schools shouldn’t be an option. I am a high school teacher, I have seen what is taught in the government-mandated curriculums, even in private schools, even in many so-called Christian schools, and it is atrocious. I will write a follow-up article focused on the nonsense filling our children’s textbooks and infiltrating their minds. And not only is the content appalling, but the manner in which it is done is not conducive to a child’s learning abilities. John Holt points out that at modern day schools we ask children to do everyday, for most of the day, what few adults are able to do even for an hour. How many of us, attending, say a lecture that doesn’t interest us, can keep our minds from wandering? Hardly any! Then some would like to argue that it is socially important for children to go to school, in order to learn how to interact in society, but once again as John Holt also so accurately points out, that the socializing aspects of school are actually unnatural and actually more likely to be harmful than helpful. In actual fact, the Biblical virtues of kindness, patience, generosity and so forth are learned by children in intimate groups of two or three. Human beings tend to behave worse in large groups, like you find in school. There they learn something quite different. They learn popularity, conformity, bullying, teasing and things like that. Children can make friends after school hours, during holidays, community sports, church, the park. Is it really so radical to suggest that the current model of education is not the only way, let alone the only one that is inherently good for all children, as is often implied? Schools are not teaching children to become compassionate and independent human beings but rather, in most cases, just drugged-up obedient slaves. And in the end, we have been brainwashed by school, indoctrinated by propaganda and mesmerised by the mass media into believing that compliance is not only safe, but right and necessary. It is mandatory that we take the responsibility of our children’s education into our own hands – homeschool them, send them to small private Christian schools (not just private secular schools that attach a prayer to the beginning of the day) and most importantly, be aware of what is being taught in their curriculums. We need to be more involved and au fait with our children’s education. Sadly school is no longer a playground, it’s a battleground for the minds of our youth.  The Ugly Truth We send our children to school to receive an education. Albert Einstein said that “education is not the learning of facts but the training of the mind to think,” but this, unfortunately, is not the case in schools and universities today. What you say is monitored, even though we supposedly have freedom of speech. Anything that is contrary to what is being force-fed at these state institutions is considered hate speech. It’s so enforced that one can even commit a thought crime by thinking the wrong thing. So much for freedom. We send our children to school to learn to read, write, do maths, learn social skills, but in actual fact all we are doing is allowing the state to conform and indoctrinate our children to their lies. It’s by no mistake that education is going down hill, there are leaders in charge puppeteering the process, lowering the university standards so that under-qualified teachers are educating our youth, most of what they are actually teaching from the state mandated text books is complete disinformation, the standard to pass is dropping lower and lower, and then the university entrance credentials have to in-turn be lowered, and so we reach full circle on this detrimental downward spiral. They are purposely dumbing us down to protect their own interests. As we said earlier, critical thinking and independent individuals get in the way of their agenda. The government believes that good citizens don’t think, because thinking leads to reasoning, reasoning leads to right and wrong, being able to perceive wrong then leads to reflection, resistance and reformation. This gets in the way of their agenda, which is obviously not what they want. Therefore children are taught with rote learning, parrot fashioned memorisation style, where they are conditioned to regurgitate the propagated disinformation drilled into them. Because if something is true and correct, it must be hammered into the minds of defenseless little children, with no questions allowed, right? So in the end what they are actually learning at school is that truth comes from authority or from a show of hands; intelligence is the ability to remember and repeat; memorization and repetition are rewarded; non-compliance is punished; and ultimately taught to conform intellectually and socially. Instead, originally, education would teach that truth is truth even if no one believes it, a lie is a lie even if everyone believes it. You cannot determine truth by seeing what the majority think. Intelligence is the ability to critically analyze information (all of it, not only what is “safe” for you to know) and then come to an accurate conclusion, and to stand for what you believe in. They were then able to learn about other cultures, other religions, all parts of history and come to a conclusion. Truth doesn’t fear investigation. If something is true, it doesn’t mind if you ask questions, if you analyse everything and do your research, because it would be confident that you would always come back to the same conclusion. You would always come back to the Truth. When something is not allowed to be questioned and is instead drummed into your head and forced to be memorized, you should probably be cautious! That’s the wise thing to do, but that’s not what is taught, and that is not what is rewarded. Even the version of history that is taught in school, is heavily revised to favour our government’s agenda while hiding its crimes, and in doing so fosters an unrealistic sense of false patriotism used to manufacture our allegiance to a corporate entity masquerading as our government. Blade Nzimande, secretary of the South African Communist party, was also our Minister of Higher education for 8 years, up until last year. Why are politicians involved in educating our youth? The media and state education have successfully lobotomized society - all the better to manipulate them through fear, confusion and sensation. This isn’t a radical right wing conservative viewpoint, they have admitted it themselves. Vladimir Lenin said, “give me four years to teach the children and the seed I have sown will never be uprooted.” Benjamin Kidd, Darwinian author who wrote in his book The Science of Power, “the chief end of education…[is] to impose on the young the ideal of subordination to the common aims of organized humanity …give us the young and we will create a new mind and a new earth in a single generation.” Max Horkheimer was one of the leading Jewish Marxists of the Frankfurt school, which pioneered Cultural Marxism, and he said, “The Revolution won’t happen with guns, rather it will happen incrementally, year by year, generation by generation. We will gradually infiltrate their educational institutions and their political offices, transforming them slowly into Marxist entities as we move towards universal egalitarianism.” This is black and white, it doesn’t get any clearer as to what their aim is. And as writer G. Nascimento said, “If a man is born ignorant, to parents who are ignorant, in a society that is ignorant, lives a life of ignorance, and eventually dies ignorant, then ignorance is the norm. And thus indoctrination can be called education, hypnotism can be called entertainment, criminals can be called leaders, and lies can be called Truth, because his mind was never truly his own.” Birds born in a cage think flying is an illness.  True Education John Holt so accurately points out that “a person’s freedom of learning is part of his freedom of thought, even more basic than his freedom of speech. If we take from someone his right to decide what he will be curious about we destroy his freedom of thought. We say, in effect, you must not think about what interests and concerns you, but about what interests and concerns us.” This dismal truth echoes throughout our school corridors. And furthermore, state education destroys the love of learning in children which is so strong when they are small, by “encouraging and compelling them to work for petty and contemptible rewards, gold stars, or papers marked with a 100 and tacked to the wall, or A’s on a report card, or honour rolls, or dean’s lists, or Omega Beta Kappa keys. In short, for the ignoble satisfaction of feeling that they are better than someone else.” And this is what gets rewarded, by educators, by society, by organizations, and by parents. What I’d rather hear, is a parent who says, “I am the proud parent of a child who has resisted his teachers’ attempts to break his spirit and bend him to the will of his masters.” Children are born curious, they are always exploring. From the time a child is young, we lovingly teach them how to walk, how to talk, and once they have learned this, society tells them to sit down and shut up. “Sadly, children’s passion for learning often ends when they encounter a world that seeks to educate them for conformity and obedience only”, says educator Robert John Meehan. Education is more than just learning facts, it’s about instilling values and morals, it’s the ability and skills required to think critically and continually furthering the learning process as they engage with new information. This will help them to foster a love for solving problems and adapting to new details and circumstances in real life. Sandra Dodd points out that “kids who are in school just visit life sometimes, and then they have to stop to do homework or to go to sleep early or to get to class on time. They’re constantly reminded that they are preparing for ‘real life’, while being isolated from it.” John Holt, writer, educator and pioneer in youth rights theory, surmised that “any child who can spend an hour or two a day, with adults that he likes, who are interested in the world and like to talk about it, will on most days learn far more from their talk than he would learn in a week of school.” Don’t misunderstand me, this doesn’t replace learning literacy and numeracy. As an educator, I know the need for children to gain these skills, but they can very sufficiently be taught at home, or by a trustworthy friend of the parents’, without having all the propaganda and Marxist disinformation underlying every subject and lesson. Trade up with another mother, “you teach our children Bio, and I’ll teach them math”, or whatever it may be. This way of learning will be surpassingly greater for them spiritually, emotionally, and mentally. The greatest gift we can give our children is our time, because when we give our time, we are giving a finite portion of our life that we can never have back. Thus every moment shared with our children must therefore be both presented and perceived as being highly valued and irreplaceable. A child will feel this and therefore also value it more. Great classrooms, whether in a field, in a library, in the kitchen, in a museum, or in a rock pool, are characterized by positive, open relationships, mutual respect, and a shared responsibility for the learning process. Instead of trying to fill children with facts and knowledge that we think will be most important and needed in the future, we don’t know what field they will go into or how society will develop, for example, so rather we should try to shape children into people who love learning so much and learn so well that they will be able to learn whatever needs to be learned. Fostering this culture of intrinsic motivation for continuous learning, coupled with beliefs and virtues instilled through the affectionate and good example of a loving parent or guardian - that is a true education. That will lead to a family, a community, a nation, that will thrive on unity and mutual respect. A nation that will excel with surpassing understanding. This is true education - the education God intended for us and is described in the Hand Book of Life.
By Emma Vaughan-Jones Henry Morton Stanley School of Christian Journalism Researcher Please feel free to contact me for, or with, any information, examples or comments. Cell: 079 6130399 Email: emma@frontline.org.za hmsscj@frontline.org.za www.hmsschoolofchristianjournalism.org Related Articles: Visit the Christian Action Website for more articles on this topic such as, The Roots of Education, Education Crisis, The Value of a Christian Education, Teach Your Children How to Live, Responsible Education. Visit Christian Liberty Books for home educating resources.
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 9 November, marks the fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989. A speech at Westminster College, Fulton, Missouri, 5 March 1946, declared that “An Iron Curtain has descended across the continent”. From Stettin in the North to Trieste in the South barbed wire and barricades, walls and machine gun towers were going up, sealing off the captive nations occupied by the Soviet Union from their neighbours in the West. The Iron Curtain divided a continent and trapped hundreds of millions of people under communism. The Soviet dictator, Joseph Stalin, declared that the Second World War was not a disaster but “a great opportunity” to extend communism into the very heart of Europe.  Poland Betrayed Even Poland, for whose freedom Great Britain had ostensibly entered the war, was now little more than a satellite of the Soviet Empire ruled by men chosen by Moscow. Its population was now imprisoned behind a line of barbed wire, watchtowers and minefields - a physical iron curtain.  Secret Police To spy on its captive populations the Soviet empire set up secret police. In the Soviet Union it was the KGB, in Bulgaria it was the DS, in Czechoslovakia the StB, in Hungary the AVB, in Poland the SB, in Romania the Securitatae, and in East Germany it was the STASI (the Ministry of State Security). The STASI maintained a huge network of 90,000 secret police and 175,000 paid informants. They kept files on 4,000,000 East Germans - a quarter of the population.  Berlin Blockade The Berlin Wall was manned by 15,000 guards - the so-called Volkspolizei (VOPOS). When Joseph Stalin attempted to starve West Berlin into submission by cutting off all electricity and supplies on 23 June 1948 the Western powers responded with the Berlin Airlift. The Berlin blockade was the first serious global crisis of the Cold War. West Berlin was kept alive by an airlift of over 150 aircraft supplying an average of 5,000 tons per day. By the time the Soviets ended the blockade on 12 May 1949 over 2.5 million tons had been delivered at the cost of 60 aircrew who had died in aircraft crashes.  Korean War There were numerous hot fronts in the Cold War. The Cold War included a full-scale military war in Korea where 2 million died in the three-year conflict. Evidence has since surfaced that Stalin was planning to follow up the Korean attack with a military offensive in Europe. He was deterred by the quick international response in Korea. Protests in Berlin After the death of Joseph Stalin (5/3/53), over 100,000 East Berlin workers protested against the Soviet occupation. Two Soviet armoured divisions were sent into East Berlin to crush the protest in June 1953. Over 100 civilians were killed and 25,000 protesters arrested.  Uprising in Hungary In July 1956 a full scale uprising in Hungary shook the Soviet Empire. Mass demonstrations demanded the withdrawal of Soviet troops, and in Budapest a massive statue of Stalin was toppled. Soviet troops poured into Hungary and over 20,000 Hungarians were killed in the repression. Tens-of-thousands more were arrested and imprisoned. 250,000 Hungarians fled to the West.  The Berlin Wall The Berlin Wall was concrete proof of the failure of “scientific socialism”. To prevent Germans in the Soviet zone from fleeing to the Western zone in Berlin, a 165 km wall was constructed to seal off West Berlin's island of freedom from Soviet occupied communist East Germany. The Berlin Wall included 289 concrete observation posts/machine gun towers and 123 km of electric fencing.  Death Strip A further death strip stretching 1,393 km along the border between communist East Germany and free West Germany was constructed with: 724 observation posts/machine gun towers, 1,161 km of electric fencing, 54, 000 self-firing devices, and 190 km of mine fields.  Kill Zone Just between 13 August 1961 to 30 July 1983, 73 people were killed by the communists while attempting to escape over the Berlin Wall, 182 more people were killed attempting to escape from East Germany across the border into West Germany, 60,000 people were imprisoned for “preparation, assistance or complicity”, in attempting to escape from East to West Germany (with sentences ranging from 16 months to life imprisonment). Yet from the founding of the German Democratic Republic (GDR) in 1949, more than 4,500,000 (over one quarter of the population) voted with their feet by fleeing to West Germany. 38,515 escaped from East to West Berlin by tunnels, by improvised air machines or hot air balloons, hidden inside vehicles travelling from East to West Berlin. 2,768 East German soldiers and officers on duty (including a Colonel) escaped to the West. Cuban Missile Crisis The Cold War almost went nuclear during the Cuban missile crisis, October 1962. The vicious conflicts in Vietnam, Laos and Cambodia (1963 - 1975) were hot parts of the Cold War.  Invasion of Czechoslovakia Anyone who believed that communism could be reformed from within was shaken by the Soviet invasion of Czechoslovakia in 1968. Czech communist party chief, Alexander Dubcek, attempted to create “socialism with a human face.” As a result of economic reforms in Czechoslovakia, the other East European satellite states complained that their positions were being undermined by the reforms in Czechoslovakia. The response was that Leonid Brezhnev ordered a full-scale Warsaw Pact invasion of Czechoslovakia to restore orthodox communism. The Prague Spring ended in August 1968 as half-a-million Warsaw Pact troops invaded Czechoslovakia and overwhelmed the courageous resistance of Czech patriots. Détente Deception The Soviet Empire reached its peak during the period of Détente, as they sponsored, trained and armed revolutionaries to seize power in Cambodia, Laos and Vietnam in 1975, Ethiopia in 1974, Guinea Bissau, Angola and Mozambique in 1975, Grenada and Nicaragua in 1979 and Rhodesia/Zimbabwe in 1980. The Soviet invasion of Afghanistan in 1979 was a major wake up call to those in the West who still believed in Détente.  Freedom on the Offensive As a result of this unprecedented Soviet advance there was a backlash throughout the West, epitomised by staunch anti-communist US President, Ronald Reagan, British Prime Minister, Margaret Thatcher, West German Chancellor, Helmut Kohl and South Africa’s P.W. Botha. The West went on the offensive, directly supporting the anti-communist Solidarity trade union movement in Poland, which soon organised nationwide strikes and protests against the Soviet occupation. The USA began to arm and support anti-communist resistance movements as far afield as in Nicaragua, Afghanistan and Angola. Bankrupting the Soviets Ronald Reagan's policies forced the Soviets back onto the defensive and strategically undermined their economy. Spectacular re-armament programmes and the space based Strategic Defence Initiative (SDI) quickly left the Soviets far behind in the arms race and totally bankrupted the Soviet Union in their futile attempt to keep up with America.  The Iron Lady British Prime Minister, Margaret Thatcher's determination to fight to reclaim the Falkland Islands, after the Argentinean invasion, helped convince the Soviets that the West was not nearly so decadent and weak as they had imagined. Thatcher's success in reviving the British economy also helped demonstrate that capitalism had a future even while communism was bankrupting the Soviet Union in Eastern Europe. The Iron Lady had this to say about the Berlin Wall: “The Berlin Wall stands as concrete proof that when people have a choice, they choose to be free Freedom has its problems but we've never needed to build walls to keep our people in.”  Defeating the Communists Brave anti-communist resistance fighters in Mozambique, Angola, Nicaragua and Afghanistan severely bled the Soviet forces, inflicting serious defeats upon them. The Rhodesian resistance throughout the 60s and 70s had set back the advance of communism in Southern Africa and the destruction of entire Cuban mechanised divisions in Angola by South African conventional forces in the battles on the Lomba River in 1987 and 1988 convinced the Soviet Union that they would not even be able to win a conventional war against the West. Recognising Reality Russian soldiers began to refer to Afghanistan as their 'Vietnam'. As Russian casualties mounted in that conflict, the ongoing political crisis in Poland, and widespread resistance to communism throughout the Soviet empire helped convince the Soviet leaders that their bankrupt system was doomed.  The Glasnost Gulag Even under Gorbachev's much-acclaimed Glasnost, the Soviet Gulag imprisoned millions. When US President, Ronald Reagan, stood at the Berlin Wall and challenged: “Mr Gorbachev, tear down this wall!” the Soviet Union operated 1,976 concentration camps, 273 prisons, 85 psychiatric prisons and 41 death camps. In this Soviet Gulag were incarcerated over 5,000,000 political and religious prisoners. Alexander Solzhenitsyn, author of The Gulag Archipelago, documented that between 1918 and 1953 (under Lenin and Stalin's rule) over 50,000,000 Russians served long sentences in the Soviet concentration camps - with millions perishing.  The Hypocrisy of Communism It was pointed out that while the communists claimed to have liberated Russia from the oppression of the Czars, there were 50 times more official executions under communist rule in Russia as occurred under Czarist rule in the same time period. By comparison with Russia under Czarist rule where the highest figure of political prisoners was 183,949, the communists imprisoned seventy times as many people at any one time.  Callous Disregard for Life Vladimir Lenin famously declared that it did not matter if three quarters of the population of Russia perished, as long as the remaining quarter were communist. Joseph Stalin observed: “The death of one person is a tragedy; whereas the death of a million is just a statistic!” Prayer and Protests As candlelit prayer vigils and protests spread from Leipzig, through Dresden, to all of East Germany, the East German government was bankrupt and tottering. Gorbachev's Soviet Union was also bankrupt and could no longer bail them out. So, Erich Honecker, the dictator of East Germany, turned to the West Germans (who in the past had always been willing to provide enough to keep East Germany going). This time, however, the West German Federal Government, was not willing to bail them out. They demanded reforms.  The Fall of the Wall While governments negotiated, the people in both East and West Berlin rose up to breach the wall and began to dismantle it physically. The leaders were overwhelmed by events. Days after the Berlin Wall collapsed, mass demonstrations broke out in Czechoslovakia. Vaclav Havel, long-time leader of the Resistance movement and prisoner of the communists, rose to power and dismantled communism in Czechoslovakia.  The Christmas Revolution Street fighting erupted in Romania to overthrow the brutal communist dictator Nicolae Ceausescu. Soon resistance spread to Bulgaria where the communists were overthrown in December 1989. In Hungary the communist government was overthrown in October 1990. In Albania the first free elections were held in March 1991. Yugoslavia split into different republics as each broke away from the communist control in Belgrade. Soon the Baltic Republics - Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania - were demanding and achieving their independence from the Soviet Union.  The End of the Soviet Union In August 1991 a coup in the Soviet Union was frustrated in its attempt to return the country to hard line communism. Boldly waving the white, blue and red Russian flag, Boris Yeltsin abolished the Soviet Union and pulled down the Soviet Flag. The Cold War had formally ended. Terrorist Threat from the Middle East But, even as the Cold War with Soviet Union communism ended, a new war was starting with radical Islamic terrorists declaring war on the West.  Victory Over Communism “There is nothing they despise more than weakness. There is nothing they respect more than strength.” The Cold War was won by a combination of Christian courage by persecuted Christians who endured decades of brutality, steadfast resistance by brave anti-communist soldiers who fought the Soviets to a standstill, persistent prayer and pressure from Christians in the West and the bold strategy of Ronald Reagan, which dismantled the Evil Empire. “While they promise them liberty, they themselves are slaves of corruption…” 2 Peter 2:19
Dr. Peter Hammond Frontline Fellowship P.O. Box 74 Newlands 7725 Cape Town South Africa Tel: 021-689-4480 Fax: 086-494-8070 Email: mission@frontline.org.za Website: www.FrontlineMissionSA.org See also: The Greatest Killer The Heart and Soul of Karl Marx Freedom Betrayed The Failure of Atheism and the Triumph of Faith in the Soviet Union The Fall of the Berlin Wall  Remembrance Day Throughout the English speaking world, the 11th November is observed as a Remembrance Day to solemnly recall the end of hostilities of World War One at the 11th hour of the 11th day of the 11th month of 1918. In time, it has come to be observed as a Memorial Day for all who died in both World Wars and in other subsequent conflicts.  Remember the Fallen The two minute silence to remember all who paid the supreme sacrifice began in Cape Town, South Africa. When the first casualty list recording the horrific loss of life in the Battle of Delville Wood, 1916, was announced in Cape Town, Mr J.A. Eagar, a Cape Town business man, suggested that his congregation observe a special time of silence to remember those in the South African Infantry casualty list. Sir Percy Fitzpatrick, the famous South African author of Jock of the Bushveld, was also a member of that congregation.  A Time of Intercession In May 1918, Mr R.R. Brydon, a city councillor, suggested to the Mayor of Cape Town, Sir Harry Hands, that a period of silence to remember those engaged in the Battlefields of Europe on the Western Front be initiated formerly at the firing of the noon day gun from Signal Hill. In May 1918, Sir Harry Hands, as Mayor, announced that 14 May 1918 at the sound of the noon day gun there would be a three minute pause. At the corner of Adderley and Darling streets, a trumpeter would sound the Last Post to reverberate throughout the city during which time all were to stop what they were doing, stand still and bow their heads in silent prayer, praying for those engaged in the conflict, remembering those who had died and thanking God for those who had survived.  Personal Losses Mr Brydon's son, Major Walter Brydon had been wounded three times and gassed once. He was killed in action on the Western Front, 12 April 1918. A few days later, Captain Richard Hands, the son of the Mayor of Cape Town, Sir Harry Hands, a member of Brydon's battery, was mortally wounded in the same battle in which Major Brydon had been killed. The daily midday prayer time initiated by the noon day gun was last observed on 17 January 1919.  An Empire Wide Time of Prayer and Remembrance Sir Percy Fitzpatrick, Member of Parliament, wrote to King George V, to propose a two minute silence throughout the Empire on 11 November 1919, to mark the first anniversary of the Armistice which ended The Great War. On 7 November 1919, King George V proclaimed: "That at the hour when the Armistice came into force, the 11th hour of the 11th day of the 11th month, there may be, for the brief space of two minutes, a complete suspension of all our normal activities… so that in perfect stillness the thoughts of everyone may be concentrated on reverend remembrance of the glorious dead." The king instructed his secretary to communicate to Sir Percy Fitzpatrick: "The King, who learns that you are shortly to return to South Africa, desires me to assure you that he ever gratefully remembers the idea of the two minute pause on Armistice Day was due to your initiation, a suggestion readily adopted and carried out with heartfelt sympathy throughout the Empire."  The Noon Day Gun – a Call to Prayer The noonday gun has been an historic time signal in Cape Town since 1806. The guns were originally used to announce the arrival of a ship. The original guns - 18 pounder smooth ball muzzle loaders - are still in use today. These are the oldest guns still in daily use in the world. The guns are maintained by the South African Navy. "Greater love hath no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends." John 15:13
11 November is International Day of Prayer for the Persecuted. Visit www.idop-africa.org for resources to mobilise prayer and action on behalf of those suffering for Christ. Dr. Peter Hammond Livingstone Fellowship P.O. Box 74 Newlands 7725 Cape Town South Africa Tel: 021-689-4480 mission@frontline.org.za www.livingstonefellowship.co.za www.frontline.org.za www.ReformationSA.org.za Invitation to Join the Largest Prayer Movement for the Persecuted Praying for Justice |
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