Why I'm Already Against the Next War

The world was shocked at the news of the alleged shooting of 17 Afghan civilians recently by Army Staff Sgt. Robert Bales. What doesn’t get equal press is the almost routine “collateral damage” inflicted on innocent civilians through drone strikes, artillery attacks, land mines and other inevitable outcomes of war.  Victims suffer in unimaginably horrific ways, with limbs, bones and body parts shattered, burned, severed and mingled with the precious blood of human victims, all of them God’s children.

It’s time we declare war itself as the enemy and every kind of violence as evil, no matter for what cause or under whose flag. The devastation done to victim and perpetrator alike is profound and simply unacceptable by any standard of civilized society. Killing is just wrong, period, whether of civilians or combatants.

In a January 16, 2012 interview in Time magazine, Navy SEAL Chris Hyle, recipient of two Silver Stars in Iraq, and author of the book “American Sniper,”  admits that his combat experience still makes him easily startled when he is awakened at night or hears loud sounds that remind him of his time in active duty. Hyle holds the dubious record for the highest confirmed number of enemy killed in that conflict, 160 in all, and states, “The first time, you’re not even sure you can do it. But I’m not over there looking at those people as people. I’m not wondering if he has a family. I’m just trying to keep my guys safe.”

In one case he admits he shot a woman with a toddler because she had a grenade in her hand, but drew a line at shooting a child holding an RPG launcher. “I just couldn’t kill the kid,” he admitted. “He’ll probably grow up to fight us, but I just didn’t want to do it.” “(But) every time I kill someone (a combatant), he can’t plant an IED. You don’t think twice about it.”

As much  as I want to respect service men and women who are putting their lives at risk every day in military service, there’s something chilling about the institution of war itself and the way it brainwashes people into behaving in ways that are directly counter to the values most of us have been taught all of our lives. Like never initiating violence against another human being, and using preventive force only in those rare instances when your own life or those of others are in imminent danger.

If civilization is to survive, we must all promote the supreme value of loving every human neighbor everywhere as ourselves. Otherwise, the more we resort to war as a necessary evil, the more necessary it becomes and the less evil it seems.

That’s is why I chose the bumper sticker “I’m already against the next war” for the back of my pickup.

P. S. In an earlier piece, "Saying No To War," I share more of my views on the Biblical case against violence.

A Little Salt, a Dash of Pepper

On this 9/11 afternoon several dozen peace minded members of our community, including some our Muslim neighbors, attended a PowerPoint lecture at the Court Square Theater on "Sharia: the Threat to America," one that turned out to be a numbing two-hour demonization of all things Islam. The spirit of the meeting was almost the opposite of the hour-long vigil many of us had attended on the south side of  the Court House nearby the night before, a time of expressing lament but also of affirming hope and goodwill, of singing and praying together around the theme of "Turning Toward Peace." It was hopeful rather than hateful.

I encouraged like-minded friends to attend today's event to be a prayerful and respectful presence, to add a scattering of God-flavored "salt," we hoped, among the total of perhaps 150-200 people present. Or, as it turned out, maybe a dash of pepper, with a number of insightful questions being raised by some of our friends in the Q & A time--queries and concerns that were met mostly with sarcastic dismissals or further lecturing by the speaker. To be fair, not everyone who differed with him was always as respectful as I had wished, either.

Most of us wore something black as a sign of our mourning both the horrendous loss of life at 9/11/01 and the hatred, suspicion and violence that have followed.

Sponsored by members of the Valley Family Forum, ACT For America, and members of the local Tea Party Patriots, today's event was led by one of the co-authors of the Sharia report, who spent much of his time generalizing, stereotyping and attacking any and all who disagree with him and his worldview, including bashing former President Bush, most of the members of Congress and pretty much the entire Washington establishment.

Not surprisingly, the title of his newest book is to be "Too Stupid to Live," a categorization sure to include most of us.

After a day like this, when we are all reliving the awful events of 9/11, I find it hard to know how to respond. Just more information, someone has said, is the solution only to the extent that ignorance is the problem. And ignorance remains a serious problem for all of us, to be sure, but it's pretty clear that America's problems are much deeper than that, involving the kinds of fear, hatred, and prejudice as old as the human race.

So today I'll simply post something I wrote for our house church newsletter nearly ten years ago, soon after the 9/11/01 disaster:



Ridding the World of Terrorism

Terrorism. We must rid the world of it, we’re told, using every means necessary.

The only problem is, even the deadliest military force in the world isn’t strong enough to root it out. In fact, the more violence we use to destroy our enemies in retaliation, the more of the world’s moderate majority are likely to rally to join fringe elements dedicated to destroying us.  When it comes to winning the hearts and minds of the millions needed to join us in this effort, even nuclear weapons are far too weak and ineffectual, and their use would cause us to be seen as worse than those we seek to punish.

What force, then, is strong enough? Like the terrorists we accuse of ignoring their own Islamic teachings about respect for human life, far too many Christians have disregarded their own scriptures which say, “Vengeance is mine, I will repay, says the Lord.” We have overlooked passages that tell us to “Be still (means, literally, ‘Stop fighting!’) and know that I am God,” and that “God will make wars cease to the ends of the earth,” and will “break the bow and shatter  the spear; burn the shields with fire.” For too long followers of Jesus have set aside their Master’s commands to love their enemies and to feed them if they are hungry, give them water to drink if they are thirsty. Relying instead of on weapons of massive destruction, we have helped escalate the cycle of violence and genocide that threatens us all.

If we were to actually take the teachings of our faith seriously, we would blanket impoverished countries like Iraq and Afghanistan with prayer, bread, medical supplies and other forms of aid instead of responding with sanctions and with deadly weapons. This kind of incredibly surprising response, coupled with working with other peaceful nations to bring about actual perpetrators to justice, may be the only way to gain the necessary support of the world’s moderate millions in attacking and rooting out terrorism. It would result in far less loss of life and would cost a fraction of what it takes to engage in another war.

Will any other response rid the world of evil doers? 

I don’t think so.
                                                                                                           October 2001

P. S. You may also want to read my August 27 blog on Sharia Mania. And as always, your comments are welcome.

Independence, Freedom and the National Anthem

Mark Schloneger, pastor of the Springdale Mennonite Church near Waynesboro, created an unexpected stir with his essay,  "Why I Don’t Sing 'The Star Spangled Banner'" the lead piece on CNN’s website Sunday, June 26.

The essay, which closed with, “I love my country, but I sing my loyalty and pledge my allegiance to Jesus alone,” generated over 4000 on-line responses, many of which labeled him an ungrateful traitor for his problems over some of the words of the anthem, suggesting he and others like him should promptly emigrate elsewhere.

One response to his statement about 16th century Catholics and Protestants torturing and executing Anabaptists was, "I'm disappointed in the Catholics and Protestants. Looks like they missed a few."

There were many others, though, who either expressed support for Schloneger’s convictions or at least celebrated his right to state them, stressing that this was what America was all about.

In scanning the posts I learned a lot about just how hostile many Americans are toward religious minorities, but also about the actual history of our nation’s anthem.

One respondent, “Bruce,” explained:

Francis Scott Key wrote a poem called "Defence of Fort McHenry" in 1814 based on a battle he witnessed in the War of 1812. He didn't experience this war as a soldier, by the way, he was there as a lawyer negotiating the release of some prisoners.... It was not our national anthem officially until 1931, signed into law by President Hoover.

While the first rendition of the anthem at a sporting event was during the 7th inning stretch of the 1918 World Series, it was not until WWII that the tradition of singing it at the beginning of each game came into being. Coincident to this was the evolution of the Pledge of Allegiance, written in 1892... It wasn't officially our national pledge until 1942 (and didn't include the words, "under God," until Eisenhower signed a a new law into place in 1954). Placing your hand over your heart was a convention that happened in late 1942 (about 6 months after adoption), replacing what is now called the "Bellamy salute."

The national anthem, at least the notion that we should open up all of our sporting events with it, is a relatively recent phenomenon. It blossomed with the pledge at about the same time, during the McCarthy era and the red scare times, when our country was at a low point when it comes to political freedom.

What was overlooked in this discussion is that members of the sixteenth century Anabaptist  “free church” movement (of which Mennonites are a part) suffered and died by the thousands for claiming the right of everyone to belong (or not) to the church of their choosing, a freedom we all take for granted today. The official state churches of that time, far from advocating freedom of religion, supported the persecution, killing or banishment of those who refused to have their children baptized and registered in whatever was the official brand of Christendom of the region of their birth (e.g., all children born in Lutheran jurisdictions were baptized Lutheran, etc.).

Thankfully, all of this has changed, but the fact remains that the religious freedom guaranteed in the first amendment owes its origin not so much to the blood of history's soldiers as to that of it's martyrs. In supporting freedom of expression and freedom of religion we are now all Mennonites. In questioning whether we can give full allegiance to both Caesar and Jesus, we cast our lot with the martyrs of the first century, who were persecuted not because they worshiped another deity (of which there were many) but because they pledged "Jesus is Lord" rather than the mandated "Caesar is Lord."

Since I truly do appreciate all that is good about America, but am not so fond of "bombs bursting in air," I would love to see “My Country ‘Tis of Thee” become the nation’s theme song.

“Let freedom ring!”

Mandate to Pharaohs: “Let my people go”

February 11, 2011 will go down in history as the day ordinary Egyptian citizens successfully ousted a modern day Pharaoh, in a nonviolent revolution sparked by the recent successful uprising in Tunisia. It’s hard not to see this as a miraculous feat, given the kind of oppressive and dictatorial rule Egypt’s Hosni Mubarak successfully maintained in that country for over 30 years.

Which reminds me of the truly miraculous deliverance recorded in the Bible’s book of Exodus, one that took place in that same country over 3000 years before. The God of the universe, having heard the cries of the thousands of Hebrew slaves who labored there under brutal and harsh conditions, unleashed a series of disasters that finally led the Pharaoh to heed the words of God’s chosen liberator, Moses, “Let my people go!”

Since the beginning of time, the world’s Pharaohs, intent on maintaining power and adding to their lavish empires, have not given up their positions easily. But in the face of multitudes who manage to totally lose their fear and live only by their faith and hope, they can be rendered powerless. No amount of military might can stop them. God can either change the hearts of military leaders, as in the case of the 2/11 revolution, or can cause their chariots to mire down hopelessly as they pursue their subjects, as in the case of the 1290 BCE revolution.

What can we learn from this? Can we ask what might have happened to Iraq’s “Pharaoh” had we prayerfully partnered with the God of justice to bring him down, rather than through the violent means that have resulted in untold suffering and the loss of thousands of innocent lives? And dare we hope that the 2/11 event that happened recently in Egypt could set a precedent for similar liberations of a more peaceful kind?

I for one am not ready to underestimate the divine power of God-inspired justice that is in the DNA of every person on earth. Nor can I remain skeptical about what the intervention of God’s compassion can accomplish for today’s powerless and oppressed crying out for relief.

Biblical “salvation” is clearly about more than just being delivered from this present world and transported to another. Scripture is full of examples of God’s people being saved from disasters, from want, from injustices and oppression, and from their enemies, including their powerful Pharaohs and Caesars.

And all of that without the use of violence to combat violence, a strategy that ignores the life and example of Jesus and only compounds the problem it is meant to address.

Here are some related articles I found interesting:

"Egypt's Christians After Mubarak" by Cornelius Hulsman

"The Fallacy of the Clash of Civilizations" by Charles Kimball

And here's the text of a recent lecture on the Middle East by a friend of mine, Daryl Byler, serving with Mennonite Central committee in Lebanon:

	Microsoft Word - Kennel-Charles Lecture.10January2011[1].pdf 68K   View   Download

Saying No to War

There were 51,000 Civil War casualties at Gettysburg
alone.

“As disciples of Christ, we do not prepare for war, or participate in war or military service.”
       
This succinct statement taken from Article 22 of my church's "Confession of Faith in a Mennonite Perspective"  sets us apart from all but a small fraction of other Christians around the world, although I am heartened by more and more individuals and denominations, notably Quakers and the Church of the Brethren, supporting this position.  Yet the above was embraced universally by believers in the first and second centuries, and by most Anabaptist-minded (later Mennonite) Christians since the 16th century.

To cite two of many examples, Tertullian, a leader and theologian in the early church expressed this vision when he spoke of the church as a people who “join to beat their swords into plows, and their lances into sickles.”  Origin of Egypt, a contemporary of Tertullian’s said, “Nor do we ‘learn war any more,’ having become children of peace, for the sake of Jesus, our leader.”  

To them, Jesus spoke the final word from God on issues of war and peace.  War was simply over for Christians, a thing of the past. Menno Simons and other outspoken leaders and martyrs in Anabaptist and other renewal movements simply helped revive this conviction. Menno himself wrote, "True Christians do not know vengeance... their hearts overflow with peace... The regenerate do not go to war, or engage in strife...  they are the children of peace, who have beaten their swords into plowshares."

Sadly, few followers of Christ over the centuries have maintained such positions, which has resulted in Inquisitions, Crusades, multiple wars among so-called Christian nations in Europe and elsewhere, and Christians defending and participating in every kind of military adventure imaginable, all in the name of God and country, and each case defended as a "just war." And there has been a gradual erosion of anti-war conviction among Mennonites as well, members of a small “peace church” that has maintained for most of 500 years that military membership and church membership are incompatible.

To me, a weakening of any church’s position on this kind of witness represents a crying shame.  Surely there is a need for at least a remnant of people somewhere who consistently teach and demonstrate that Christians, by definition, are people who will not harm or kill under any circumstances, not even in a time of war, not even their enemies (and certainly not their fellow believers) anywhere in the world.

I see this as not about some sectarian “peace position,” but about an “agape position,” about Jesus's followers being a people defined by their passionate love for God above every other love or allegiance, and by a compassionate love for neighbor--friend, foe and foreigner alike. 

And lest we reduce agape to being a mere sentiment, an attitude of niceness, or as simply a benevolent feeling toward others (one that still allows us to engage in their destruction under certain circumstances), the New Testament makes clear that God's kind of unconditional love is defined by its actions, not merely its motives or emotions.  Thus Jesus, in explaining what loving ones neighbor actually means, tells the story of a Samaritan binding up the wounds of his mortal enemy, a Jew.  And Paul, in Romans 13 (the very passage that urges respect, rather than armed resistance, toward even the occupying, crucifying, terrorist Caesars) makes it clear that love will "do no harm to a neighbor." Period.

As Ghandi once observed, Christians seem to be the only ones who believe Jesus and the New Testament are not absolutely clear on these points: Do no harm.  Return good for evil.  Take up the cross, not the sword.  Follow Jesus’s personal example of a completely nonresistant life, who taught, "My kingdom (government) is not like those of this world. If that were so my servants would fight."

If, in our baptism, we receive a missionary commission to evangelize and reconcile God’s enemies to God and to each other, how can we accept a military commission to harm them?  And if we are convinced that in Jesus God’s future kingdom has already been inaugurated, how can we also pledge, under oath, to become a part of an enterprise committed to harming or coercing others “in the national interest”?

Clearly, most decent people, Christian or not, would renounce the following as immoral and unacceptable:

breaking and entering
lying and other forms of deception
physical, psychological, or other forms of torture and abuse
armed robbery
malicious wounding
organized acts of terrorism
using racial or other demeaning slurs
using explosives to destroy people or property
destroying land or other natural resources
stabbing or strangling
forcing people from their homes or communities
committing mass murder

Without question, most believers would speak out against members of churches engaging in such behaviors--and would disapprove of their supporting or belonging to any groups or organizations that do--yet raise no objections when military forces routinely encourage, train and/or command people to do all of the above and more.  Thus we are in danger of accepting, on a mass and organized scale, what we could not accept or allow on any other basis. Unlike legitimate police force, necessary in human societies to maintain order within national boundaries (and intended to preserve life and bring individuals to justice under laws designed to protect individual rights), military forces have a long history of plundering and destroying without benefit of such civilized restraints.

True, we pacifist Christians must repent of the many "beams" of self righteousness, materialism, and cowardly indifference that interfere with our moral vision. Because of these we may not always “see clearly” to lovingly help remove any specks of militarism from another’s eye.

But remove them we must, all of us, lest history write off the church as having been irrelevant and mute in one of the most pressing moral issues of all time.

I like this piece by Edna St. Vincent Millay:

CONSCIENTIOUS OBJECTOR

I shall die, but that is all that I shall do for Death.
I hear him leading his horse out of the stall; I hear the clatter on the barn-floor.
He is in haste; he has business in Cuba, business in the Balkans, many calls to make this morning.
But I will not hold the bridle while he cinches the girth.
And he may mount by himself; I will not give him a leg up.
Though he flick my shoulders with his whip, I will not tell him which way the fox ran.
With his hoof on my breast, I will not tell him where the black boy hides in the swamp.
I shall die, but that is all that I shall do for Death; I am not on his payroll.
I will not tell him the whereabouts of my friends nor of my enemies either.
Though he promise me much, I will not map him the route to any man's door.
Am I a spy in the land of the living that I should deliver men to Death?
Brother, the password and the plans of our city are safe with me; never through me
Shall you be overcome.