BE CAREFUL WHAT YOU WISH FOR

Saddam Hussein was an evil and brutal dictator. But Iraqi Christians were not persecuted by his secular regime. Indeed, his longtime foreign minister, deputy prime minister, and close advisor Tariq Aziz is, in fact, a Christian. So Hussein's reign was horrible, but Christians were allowed to worship there freely.

Of course, that all changed once the US toppled his government. And now we have ISIS persecuting Christians. While the US itself isn't doing the persecuting, our invasion and horribly botched occupation made it all possible. So it's our fault. If we had left Iraq alone, Christians there would have nothing to fear as far as religious freedom goes.

What's the lesson here? The denomination in which I grew up, the Southern Baptists, were by far the biggest religious group supporting the 2003 invasion, and they are now, I'm quite certain, absolutely horrified by what ISIS is doing over there. Here's the lesson: be very careful what you wish for because you can never be quite sure what you're going to get.

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