Realistic About Government

“Our weapons were cudgels, lead-lined clubs, chains and guns,” relates Stelvio, who in the 1970’s was a political activist in southern Europe. At clandestine military-like camps he had learned how to organize mobs and carry on city warfare.

But after some years a change came. One of Jehovah’s Witnesses visited Stelvio’s home, teaching the Bible. The effect? “It opened my eyes to see that nationalism and political factions divide men. I learned from the Bible that God made out of one man every nation of men, to dwell upon the earth. (Acts 17:26) This realization is a unifying force. It freed me of hating others just because their political ideas were different.”

This formerly violent activist adds: “I keep asking myself: How can man ever resolve his problems by politics, since politics itself has caused divisions of mankind? For men to get together, the reasons for divisions must disappear. I have seen among Jehovah’s Witnesses blacks and whites getting baptized in the same water, former Protestants and Catholics in Ireland stop hating one another, Arabs and Jews meeting together during the Six-Day War. I have learned to love those that I had hated.

“Nobody can say that God’s Kingdom, which Jehovah’s Witnesses long for, is a mere Utopian dream, because there is already an international community united under that Kingdom. Applying Bible principles has brought results that no other religious, political or social group has achieved.

“To those who, like me in the past, struggle to bring justice, peace and social order, I say: ‘Be realistic and admit that man has been unable to bring them. Look, though, at Jehovah’s Witnesses. Have they not overcome problems with war, political divisions, racial discrimination, peace and unity? Men trust in men and have problems. Jehovah’s Witnesses submit to God’s Kingdom and have resolved the main problems of living.’”