“I pursued my enemies and overtook them. I did not turn back ’til they were consumed. I thrust them through so that they were not able to rise. They fell under my feet,” Hegseth said. “And those who hated me, I destroyed. They cried for help, but there was none to save.” Hegseth called on God to “snap the rod of the oppressor” and “break the teeth of the ungodly.”
“Behold now the wicked who rise against your justice and the peace of the righteous. Snap the rod of the oppressor; frustrate the wicked plans. By the blast of your anger, let the evil perish. Grant this task force clear and righteous targets for violence. Surround them as a shield. Give them wisdom in every decision, endurance for the trial ahead, unbreakable unity, and overwhelming violence of action against those who deserve no mercy,” he said.
“Let every round find its mark against the enemies of righteousness and our great nation. Make their arrows like those of a skilled warrior who returned not empty-handed. Let justice be executed swiftly and without remorse, that evil may be driven back and wicked souls delivered to the eternal damnation prepared for them.”
“We ask these things in bold confidence in the mighty and powerful name of Jesus Christ,” he concluded.
This sounds like Mark Twain’s War Prayer ~
“O Lord our Father, our young patriots, idols of our hearts, go forth to battle ~ be Thou near them ! With them, in spirit, we also go forth from the sweet peace of our beloved firesides to smite the foe. O Lord our God, help us to tear their soldiers to bloody shreds with our shells; help us to cover their smiling fields with the pale forms of their patriot dead; help us to drown the thunder of the guns with the shrieks of their wounded, writhing in pain; help us to lay waste their humble homes with a hurricane of fire; help us to wring the hearts of their unoffending widows with unavailing grief; help us to turn them out roofless with their little children to wander unfriended the wastes of their desolated land in rags and hunger and thirst, sports of the sun flames of summer and the icy winds of winter, broken in spirit, worn with travail, imploring Thee for the refuge of the grave and denied it ~ for our sakes who adore Thee, Lord, blast their hopes, blight their lives, protract their bitter pilgrimage, make heavy their steps, water their way with their tears, stain the white snow with the blood of their wounded feet ! We ask it, in the spirit of love, of Him Who is the Source of Love, and Who is the ever-faithful refuge and friend of all that are sore beset and seek His aid with humble and contrite hearts. Amen.”
~ Mark Twain
Mark Twain’s War Prayer was written as pungent satire, but Pete Hegseth seems to offer his prayer at its face value.
Curriculum Vitae ~ links about the Author and his work.
