What would cause a man (and in almost every case it is a man) to burn himself alive? Two men in recent months have publicly done so: one protesting the Israeli assault on Hamas, the other’s motive somewhat unclear but somehow connected to the trial of Donald Trump.
In the Roman Martyrology, we often read of the faithful being burned alive by authorities who feared Christ and His ability to evoke a loyalty higher than any on earth. In the case of St. Joan of Arc, the immolationists were Church authorities who betrayed their Lord. Human immolation appears in many cultures, sometimes as a method of execution or as a form of sacrifice. Pagans had their reasons for doing things. One of the paramount successes of the spread of Christianity was the overthrow of paganism and its attendant despair with the hope of eternal life with Christ.
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But the two recent examples of self-immolation seem like (at best) a return to pagan darkness or (at worst) a post-pagan nihilism devoid of any kind of hope. The best-known instance of human self-immolation is that of Vietnamese Buddhist monk Thich Quang Duc, who took his own life to protest alleged oppression by the Catholic-led government in 1963. The image of “the burning monk” has become, in our post-modern era, a symbol of…well, something.
The socialist rap-rock band Rage Against the Machine used a photo of the incident on an album cover promoting the tearing down of the capitalist system. Arun Starkey, writing about the album’s cover photo by Associated Press reporter Malcolm Browne, asserts that “the photograph was so moving that the widespread international attention it garnered led U.S. President John F. Kennedy to withdraw its support for Diệm’s government.” And just like that, the burning of a human being became a political act against Christianity rather than a lamentable action to kill Christians who nevertheless died with the supernatural, grace-filled hope of Heaven.
The 1960s, being the cesspool of confusion it was, brings us the case of Roger LaPorte, who set himself aflame on November 9, 1965, in front of the U.N. building, and died the next day. What set LaPorte apart from the Buddhist self-immolation was the fact of his being a Catholic. Indeed, he was affiliated with the Catholic Worker (CW). Critics of the CW see its trajectory over the years as starting from a personalist, works-of-compassion organization but, by the 1960s, becoming increasingly political. In short, the CW mimicked American Catholicism, trading the Good News for a mess of politicized pottage.
