🧵20th century pastor and theologian J. Gresham Machen was a proto-Bitcoiner.

Machen was one of the most brilliant and courageous Christian intellectual figures of the 20th century.

He staunchly opposed WWI and an imperialism thinly guised as a desire to spread democracy abroad. This set him at odds with his Presbyterian ruling elder and family friend Woodrow Wilson.

Machen stood against the advance of theological liberalism at Princeton University and the PCUSA, which led him to found Westminster Theological Seminary and the Orthodox Presbyterian Church.

He was also incensed by Executive Order 6102, in which FDR declared it illegal for ordinary citizens to own gold, which the constitution enshrined as one of only two tenders that states could issue to settle debts.

His objections weren’t on pragmatic grounds, but rather on the basis of honor.

Listen to Machen’s evaluation of Executive Order 6102 in his own words:

“I think the really significant thing that we find is that America has turned away from God.

In the political and social discussions of the day, God’s law has ceased to be regarded as a factor that deserves be reckoned with at all. That is true in regard to the higher ranges of human life; it is also true in regard to that mammon in which our Lord said a man must be faithful if he is to be faithful in higher things.

We hear much about mammon today: We hear much about the currency; we hear much about the question whether what is euphemistically called a “managed currency” is or is not economically more advantageous than the gold standard.

But the sad thing is that in all this discussion we hear little about simple honesty, which is the law of God.

I can remember when I had a certain patriotic pride in the good faith of the United States government, in those bygone days when the phrase “sound as a dollar” had not yet become a jest.

The United States government, in its business dealings, seemed to me to be the very embodiment of integrity; I regarded it as almost inconceivable that it would repudiate its corporate obligations.

Yet today it has done just that. Of course, there are times when a government or an individual must fail to meet obligations. That is when the government or the individual is bankrupt, when the government or the individual acknowledges the justice of the obligations but is under the necessity of pleading that they cannot be met.

I am not saying, therefore, that when a country goes off the gold standard it is necessarily acting dishonestly. But it is not such an honest bankruptcy which we have in the United States at the present time.

On the contrary, what we have is a very ruthless application of the devil's principle that “might makes right.” Look at a United States gold certificate, if you can find one somewhere in a museum today without being put in jail for looking at it.

Upon it the United States government promises to pay very specifically not in some other currency but in gold. It is a solemn obligation of the United States. It is a solemn contract–not of any individual, but of the United States government–a contract to the fulfillment of which the honor of the American people is pledged, a contract with the holder of the note.

Today not only is that contract not fulfilled, but the holder of the contract is threatened with imprisonment unless he hands over to the defaulting party the contract itself.

I tell you, my friends, there are many things that are uncertain about the future, but of one thing we can be sure: A nation that tramples thus upon the law of God, that tramples upon the basic principles of integrity, is headed for destruction unless it repents in time.”

Imagine a world where pastors and theologians were leading the way in resisting industrial-scale theft and destruction via warmongering, debt, and currency devaluation all over the world.

It happened before.

And it can happen again.

@ThankGodForBTC exists to help Christians understand why ethics of money production matter, to explain what Bitcoin is and why it matters, and how to use it for the glory of God and the good of people everywhere.