“At Some Point, the Mask Falls.”
Howayeck on the Cleric Who Chose the Militia — and the God They Claim to Serve
In a powerful translated statement from Arabic, Jowelle Michel Howayeck draws a stark line between genuine faith and the weaponization of religion — calling out Hezbollah’s leadership by name, and defending attacked Christian clergy who dared speak freely.
At some point, the mask falls. The cleric ceases to be a cleric, no matter how much he shields himself with robes or rhetoric. It is enough for him to choose the weapon, to establish a militia or justify it, for him to transform into a military leader by privilege. Here, the discussion no longer remains religious, but becomes a struggle over power and force.
The cleric exists to rein in violence, not to lead it. But when religion is conscripted into a combat project, everything flips. Faith becomes a tool of mobilization, and debate is shut down in the name of sanctity. This is not spirituality, but domination.
The Lebanese model is clear. A speech issued by Naim Qassem, and before him Hassan Nasrallah, reveals this schizophrenia plainly: religious language in form, military in essence. Alignment, not guidance; mobilization, not preaching; and a logic of confrontation, not a logic of state.
And the most dangerous part is that this project does not confine itself to its own kind, but extends its behavior to others. We have witnessed campaigns and insults targeting Béchara Boutros al-Rahi and bishops like Moussa El-Hajj and Yaacoub Samir, simply because they expressed positions. Here, any claim to respect religious authorities collapses.
But the deeper truth is that what is called Hezbollah no longer even deserves its name. For many, it has become “Liars for God” — because the discourse is one thing and the practice is another. And in this sense, the name no longer signifies a creed, but a contradiction between what is said and what is done.
It is not merely a militia that uses religion, but a religious doctrinal project that ideologizes its environment and then transforms it into a militia structure. It begins with doctrine and ends with the weapon, making engagement in its project an extension of faith, not a political choice.
God has no parties and no militias. God is not reduced to an organization, nor confined within a political or military project. God does not market killing nor justify terrorism, because the essence of faith is to elevate humanity, not to drive it toward violence. And when God’s name is raised to justify the weapon, that is not a defense of religion, but a use of it and a distortion of its meaning.
And here lies the danger. When doctrine becomes a bridge to the weapon, religion transforms from a conscience into a tool of power. And then, it does not threaten just one adversary, but strikes at the very idea of the state itself — pushing everyone outside this project not only into a precarious position, but into a circle of targeting — psychologically and morally, and sometimes physically — through the logic of exclusion and treason that accompanies any closed militia structure.
It is impossible to combine religion and the weapon in one hand. Whoever chooses the militia has settled his position.
And all that remains is justification.
— Jowelle Michel Howayeck | جوال ميشال الحويك
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