So here are the two main reasons that Godeschalc, who was killed in 1066, ends up as a saint: (1) as a warrior who subdued large tracts of land previously controlled by barbarians/pagans and built many churches, monasteries, convents, and Christian properties designed to save the souls of the conquered; and (2) amazingly, Godeschalc, et al, proved not to be popular among the conquered people and ended up being murdered “by these Vandals, or Slavi, who remained obstinately attached to their idolatry”–hence, our Godeschalc was deemed a martyr for Christ.

Amazing how people do not appreciate being colonized and then Christianized! And amazing how the colonizers want to act as though their actions were righteous and, to the extent that they might not have been, such minor and incidental and, really (when you think about it) co-created abuses are in the past, and should not be held against the victors. Butler provides the party line about the reasons behind Godeschalc’s and his comrades’ murders: “The [later Christian!] historians of the northern nations unanimously agree that the only cause of their death was the hatred which these Pagans had conceived of the Christian religion”–an assessment eerily similar to claims that those Islamic persons who have killed people in the G-7 nations during the last 20 years did so because these Infidels hate us for our enlightened freedoms and liberties.

Is it really so difficult to conceive that people do not like having their lands taken over by colonizers, chopped up and sectioned off with no regard for these conquered peoples, and then having their own belief systems trampled underfoot and replaced by those of the conquerors? Is any resultant hatred really because they are jealous of how good, how freedom-loving, how righteous the conquerors are? And should it be expected that the conquered people should just “get over it” and embrace their new reality–especially when the conquerors see this new reality as a “trade up” for the backwards people they have subdued?!

Maybe we can be generous about this all, and give these conquered people some time to acclimate to their new status. If so, how long? Should the Palestinians be “over” their displacement from 1948? After all, it’s been 70 years. How about the Iraqis, whose country was cobbled together by the victors of World War I in 1920 who eagerly dismantled the former Ottoman Empire? That’s 98 years–surely no one is alive who remembers that, right? Native Americans? Enslaved and exported Africans?

Really, when you think about it, those Pagans/Vandals/Muslims/Africans, et al., are just sore losers. And they are envious of the religions, values, freedoms, and shiny qualities of those they lost to. Remember: Envy is one of the Seven Deadly Sins, along with Wrath and Pride! And these sore losers who insist on holding onto grudges are dangerous, precisely because they are poor sports who don’t recognize a good thing when it’s staring them in the face. And for their descendants to act like what happened “back then” is any reason not to get with the dominant program now is simply not worth taking seriously–it’s just subterfuge for laziness, recalcitrance, and fanaticism–all forms of inexcusable self-indulgence at the expense of the good guys.

In fact, are such people even fully human? (We already know they’re not fully divine!)

Maybe the real question is whether their Christian colonizers were (and are).