Posts
Saddam is dead. And what good shall come of this?
I don't think this will be helpful. As UN ambassador Richard Holbrook said tonight immediately afterwards, Saddam was not the one leading the insurgency and those engaged in the insurgency were not working to get Saddam back into power.
I think we will see additional violence, if indeed there can be any further violence beyond the mass killings we have now.
Will even the killing of an evil man really create that much good in the world?
Friday, December 29, 2006
Saturday, December 23, 2006
We Love War
Paul Campos, a Colorado law professor, writes quite well on the topic:
"At the outbreak of World War I, the streets of the great cities of Europe were filled with cheering crowds who welcomed that indescribable catastrophe as if it were a particularly exciting sporting event. A dark truth about human beings is that, at some perverse level of our psyches, we like war.
Nothing illustrates this better than the willingness of intelligent people in the grip of war fever to make arguments that, in any other mood, they would recognize as absurd. "
The rest of the article can be found via the link
to this site.
"At the outbreak of World War I, the streets of the great cities of Europe were filled with cheering crowds who welcomed that indescribable catastrophe as if it were a particularly exciting sporting event. A dark truth about human beings is that, at some perverse level of our psyches, we like war.
Nothing illustrates this better than the willingness of intelligent people in the grip of war fever to make arguments that, in any other mood, they would recognize as absurd. "
The rest of the article can be found via the link
to this site.
Wednesday, December 13, 2006
Blood Diamonds and the Church
I just heard a powerful, very well-done program on Chicago Public Radio's 'Worldview' program on the issues surrounding conflict diamonds. "Think, Americans, how much you pay to have a person killed, when you buy a cheap diamond," was the quote that stuck out most from a Congolese human rights worker. Also on how much money in exports leaves the country through colonial-model corporations when the people are starving as well as unable to access basic medical supplies. The audio should be up shortly here:
http://www.chicagopublicradio.org/audio_library/wv_radec06.asp
Being in seminary, I was trying to think how pastors could best help staunch the trade of blood diamonds. Perhaps by the time engaged couples get to the pastor, the ring has already been brought. However, you could still preach, and speak to this issue with age groups that are most likely to be buying diamonds in the next few years; namely, high school and young adult ministries.
This also addresses in a substantial way the problem of the church-world relevance gap which I believe causes so many of our young idealistic people to leave the church. When we insulate ourselves in church fights and neglect global and community outreach, we miss the opportunity to build strong leadership in our churches that will lead us into more peaceful tomorrows.
Who will we allow to teach our youth about corporate responsibility?
http://www.chicagopublicradio.org/audio_library/wv_radec06.asp
Being in seminary, I was trying to think how pastors could best help staunch the trade of blood diamonds. Perhaps by the time engaged couples get to the pastor, the ring has already been brought. However, you could still preach, and speak to this issue with age groups that are most likely to be buying diamonds in the next few years; namely, high school and young adult ministries.
This also addresses in a substantial way the problem of the church-world relevance gap which I believe causes so many of our young idealistic people to leave the church. When we insulate ourselves in church fights and neglect global and community outreach, we miss the opportunity to build strong leadership in our churches that will lead us into more peaceful tomorrows.
Who will we allow to teach our youth about corporate responsibility?
Priest Sentenced in Rwandan Massacres
The BBC reported today that a priest had been sentenced to fifteen years for his participation in the massacre of Tutsi refugees in his church. He ordered Hutu militants to bulldoze the church with all the people inside, and to shoot anyone who tried to escape.
Link to news story:
http://www.afrol.com/articles/22757 An African news source, also reporting on the rape of refugee girls and women by the priest, as well as France's refusal to extradite those who participated in the genocide.
http://edition.cnn.com/2006/WORLD/africa/12/13/rwanda.priest.ap/ The AP report via CNN, which describes the massacre in more detail and the actions of other priests and nuns.
Myself in training to become a pastor, I think it's stories like these that frighten me most. What was happening inside this priest's mind when he committed this terrible act? What did he believe he would gain? What caused him to leave behind the Great Commandment?
Of course, clergy have done terrible things in many war zones around the world, particularly noted are those in this past century. There also of course are the many good clergy who acted justly and generously under great personal risk to themselves to protect the vulnerable.
I am still in search of a satisfying answer. It doesn't seem enough to say that clergy are people with (broken) morals, just like everyone else. Is it really only up to chance and individual conscience?
Link to news story:
http://www.afrol.com/articles/22757 An African news source, also reporting on the rape of refugee girls and women by the priest, as well as France's refusal to extradite those who participated in the genocide.
http://edition.cnn.com/2006/WORLD/africa/12/13/rwanda.priest.ap/ The AP report via CNN, which describes the massacre in more detail and the actions of other priests and nuns.
Myself in training to become a pastor, I think it's stories like these that frighten me most. What was happening inside this priest's mind when he committed this terrible act? What did he believe he would gain? What caused him to leave behind the Great Commandment?
Of course, clergy have done terrible things in many war zones around the world, particularly noted are those in this past century. There also of course are the many good clergy who acted justly and generously under great personal risk to themselves to protect the vulnerable.
I am still in search of a satisfying answer. It doesn't seem enough to say that clergy are people with (broken) morals, just like everyone else. Is it really only up to chance and individual conscience?
How We Failed in Iraq
Six Reasons We Failed in Iraq
The Iraq Study Group report is out for public view now and I am heartened, if only for its accessibility. However, these days even NPR is little comfort; even they are missing the point. In a conflict where so few journalists venture outside their hotel rooms and the military propaganda is tired but still perpetuated, I would like to offer an alternate perspective based on my time as a human rights worker in the country during the early days of the U.S. invasion and occupation.
1. Failure to preserve infrastructure: This was not the Iraqis fault. At the point we captured Baghdad, it was us in control and us who had responsibility to prevent the looting, the breakdown. We were arresting anyone who had any association with the Ba’ath party, forgetting that a person had to register with the party even to get an elementary school teaching position. We took pride in ‘casting a wide net,’ and it was wide enough to do maximum damage. We decided that we didn't need to arrest those who began to loot government buildings and cultural heritage sites. Our 10,000 troops were too busy hanging out in the front yard at the Ministry of Oil.
2. Failure to rebuild: Again, we guarded the ministry of oil; even a year later, when driving through Baghdad and the surrounding countryside, the only evidence of U.S.-supported building you could see was massive military bases--in stark contrast to the numerous rotting hulks of municipal and federal buildings in the city center. This was humiliating as well as debilitating. We also left Iraq's previously functional phone network in a shambles and only gave phone connections to foreigners and occupying military. U.S. corporations' corruption left schools paid for but not rebuilt. Our shutdown of the military created mass unemployment and resulting mass hunger.
3. Failure to treat Iraqis as fully functional human beings: We could not bring ourselves to admit that they are as educated and capable of doing most of the work we insisted on doing poorly for them. We degraded them for the violence we provoked.
4. Failure to observe human rights and Geneva Conventions: This includes the first Fallujah massacre (where we used lethal force against a group of unarmed protestors, and lost our goodwill in that city); and the myriad devastating house raids, injury and killing of civilians, substandard prison conditions, the practice of 'disappearing' thousands of Iraqi citizens in our prison campus, and torture--which we never could admit was happening at a systematic level instead of only through seven 'bad apples.'
5. Failure to learn from history: When the British came to occupy Iraq, they employed 'divide and conquer,' placing the Sunni minority over the Shi'a majority. They were also run out in a year, when it became obvious that this was an occupation rather than a liberation. When we arrived to occupy Iraq, we tried to ally with Sistani, who didn’t really care, but his supporters did; in doing so we proved to the Sunni that none of them were safe in the New Iraq; nor were the Christians once Bush and our troops and our evangelists declared holy sanctioning of our actions there; and we sure invited the ire of Muqtada al Sadr, who believed that his Shi'a people should not align with us as the occupying power. This ushered in, perhaps more than anything, the sectarian violence and death squads we now hear the death tolls from daily.
6. Failure to recognize proportionality: We again ignore the enormous damage we have done in our human rights violations: A few pieces of candy or donated school supplies do not make up for killing a family member. But we hear it all the time, how kind and benevolent our soldiers are to the common Iraqi people.
None of this is news to us; except perhaps in its dissemination. All of this information we had readily available to us from on-the-ground experience of the human rights and relief organizations from year one of our military occupation. We were not willing to hear, and we have lost so very many lives since on account of our stubborness.
Still, I posit, we really succeeded at all we actually wanted to do: Bomb heavily, get rid of the man blocking us from the oil, and take the oil, making lots of money for our corporations in the meantime. We planned for that and we did that. (While Iraqi citizens were lined up on the roads in 24-hour waits to get a tank of gasoline, we were reporting record exports). We didn’t have any other real goals beyond that, and that is why we did not plan for those parts.
If anything, we created the situation we are now in to be even more profitable to us: We can’t possibly leave now; we’ve been saying that for a couple years now—we’re making so much money, and But it’s already a civil war. How much worse do you really think it will get? And it’s only the puppet government, with all its own human rights violations, that’s worried we might leave.
The Iraq Study Group report is out for public view now and I am heartened, if only for its accessibility. However, these days even NPR is little comfort; even they are missing the point. In a conflict where so few journalists venture outside their hotel rooms and the military propaganda is tired but still perpetuated, I would like to offer an alternate perspective based on my time as a human rights worker in the country during the early days of the U.S. invasion and occupation.
1. Failure to preserve infrastructure: This was not the Iraqis fault. At the point we captured Baghdad, it was us in control and us who had responsibility to prevent the looting, the breakdown. We were arresting anyone who had any association with the Ba’ath party, forgetting that a person had to register with the party even to get an elementary school teaching position. We took pride in ‘casting a wide net,’ and it was wide enough to do maximum damage. We decided that we didn't need to arrest those who began to loot government buildings and cultural heritage sites. Our 10,000 troops were too busy hanging out in the front yard at the Ministry of Oil.
2. Failure to rebuild: Again, we guarded the ministry of oil; even a year later, when driving through Baghdad and the surrounding countryside, the only evidence of U.S.-supported building you could see was massive military bases--in stark contrast to the numerous rotting hulks of municipal and federal buildings in the city center. This was humiliating as well as debilitating. We also left Iraq's previously functional phone network in a shambles and only gave phone connections to foreigners and occupying military. U.S. corporations' corruption left schools paid for but not rebuilt. Our shutdown of the military created mass unemployment and resulting mass hunger.
3. Failure to treat Iraqis as fully functional human beings: We could not bring ourselves to admit that they are as educated and capable of doing most of the work we insisted on doing poorly for them. We degraded them for the violence we provoked.
4. Failure to observe human rights and Geneva Conventions: This includes the first Fallujah massacre (where we used lethal force against a group of unarmed protestors, and lost our goodwill in that city); and the myriad devastating house raids, injury and killing of civilians, substandard prison conditions, the practice of 'disappearing' thousands of Iraqi citizens in our prison campus, and torture--which we never could admit was happening at a systematic level instead of only through seven 'bad apples.'
5. Failure to learn from history: When the British came to occupy Iraq, they employed 'divide and conquer,' placing the Sunni minority over the Shi'a majority. They were also run out in a year, when it became obvious that this was an occupation rather than a liberation. When we arrived to occupy Iraq, we tried to ally with Sistani, who didn’t really care, but his supporters did; in doing so we proved to the Sunni that none of them were safe in the New Iraq; nor were the Christians once Bush and our troops and our evangelists declared holy sanctioning of our actions there; and we sure invited the ire of Muqtada al Sadr, who believed that his Shi'a people should not align with us as the occupying power. This ushered in, perhaps more than anything, the sectarian violence and death squads we now hear the death tolls from daily.
6. Failure to recognize proportionality: We again ignore the enormous damage we have done in our human rights violations: A few pieces of candy or donated school supplies do not make up for killing a family member. But we hear it all the time, how kind and benevolent our soldiers are to the common Iraqi people.
None of this is news to us; except perhaps in its dissemination. All of this information we had readily available to us from on-the-ground experience of the human rights and relief organizations from year one of our military occupation. We were not willing to hear, and we have lost so very many lives since on account of our stubborness.
Still, I posit, we really succeeded at all we actually wanted to do: Bomb heavily, get rid of the man blocking us from the oil, and take the oil, making lots of money for our corporations in the meantime. We planned for that and we did that. (While Iraqi citizens were lined up on the roads in 24-hour waits to get a tank of gasoline, we were reporting record exports). We didn’t have any other real goals beyond that, and that is why we did not plan for those parts.
If anything, we created the situation we are now in to be even more profitable to us: We can’t possibly leave now; we’ve been saying that for a couple years now—we’re making so much money, and But it’s already a civil war. How much worse do you really think it will get? And it’s only the puppet government, with all its own human rights violations, that’s worried we might leave.
Lebanon
Lebanon is heating up again and is looking very fragile at the moment; we had hoped it would go differently for the poor people there (ya haram, ya muskeni). My previous supervisor, Rob, and I were working with Lebanese church and seminary leaders to create a study travel program on interfaith perspectives following the devastation of this past summer's war. It's not looking too good right now, both for institutional seminary support as well as for current political realities.
I first penned the following poem after my first visit to Lebanon and learning about the terrible war experienced there during the 80's. Rob had been a human rights activist there several years ago while his father worked at the seminary. My writing reflects the conversation I wanted to have with him about the differing experiences of two human rights workers in two different contexts, and the difficulty we had in talking on this issue.
Lebanon
August 16, 2005
Lebanon.
I want to let it in
but I can’t.
I want to put myself into that place,
I want to have felt to have seen to have touched to
have witnessed
everything
but even small stories
stir up nightmares
and I’m not so sure I can
hear these stories now
even in the daytime.
My war was not your war, I think
that is, the war I chose to visit
in my age and in my time
a passing traveler, freely involved
and not forced
like those whose blood was there
Does ‘my war’ even compare?
In numbers in size in scope in length in destruction in insanity
In bodies.
And yet all war, is.
To cope with these realities
not just a passed moment in history but
still, now, ongoing
Can I muster any more compassion
or comprehension
to encompass all of this?
I am not enough,
measured, and found wanting.
I first penned the following poem after my first visit to Lebanon and learning about the terrible war experienced there during the 80's. Rob had been a human rights activist there several years ago while his father worked at the seminary. My writing reflects the conversation I wanted to have with him about the differing experiences of two human rights workers in two different contexts, and the difficulty we had in talking on this issue.
Lebanon
August 16, 2005
Lebanon.
I want to let it in
but I can’t.
I want to put myself into that place,
I want to have felt to have seen to have touched to
have witnessed
everything
but even small stories
stir up nightmares
and I’m not so sure I can
hear these stories now
even in the daytime.
My war was not your war, I think
that is, the war I chose to visit
in my age and in my time
a passing traveler, freely involved
and not forced
like those whose blood was there
Does ‘my war’ even compare?
In numbers in size in scope in length in destruction in insanity
In bodies.
And yet all war, is.
To cope with these realities
not just a passed moment in history but
still, now, ongoing
Can I muster any more compassion
or comprehension
to encompass all of this?
I am not enough,
measured, and found wanting.
Tuesday, December 12, 2006
Fully God and Fully Human
Jesus,
Whatever else beyond our comprehension he was,
Was born into the world an earthly being
The same way all the rest of us earthly beings were:
Between a woman’s legs,
With all the blood and feces and amniosis
And with all the screaming
And gasping for air
That birth entails.
For all his other human experiences
And his violent suffering bleeding death,
Why do we insist
On creating an inhumanly calm and sanitized
Nativity?
Written for Dr. Vitor Westhelle
Systematic Theology
Recently published in SIMUL, the anthology of Lutheran poetry.
Whatever else beyond our comprehension he was,
Was born into the world an earthly being
The same way all the rest of us earthly beings were:
Between a woman’s legs,
With all the blood and feces and amniosis
And with all the screaming
And gasping for air
That birth entails.
For all his other human experiences
And his violent suffering bleeding death,
Why do we insist
On creating an inhumanly calm and sanitized
Nativity?
Written for Dr. Vitor Westhelle
Systematic Theology
Recently published in SIMUL, the anthology of Lutheran poetry.
Thursday, December 07, 2006
Boycotting the 'Holiday' Boycott
(revised from last year)
I am one Christian who would like to buck this year's fundamentalist trend by wishing all of my neighbors 'Happy Holidays.' By this, I mean all the holidays: Christmas, yes, but also Thanksgiving, New Year's, and Epiphany. For six long weeks we have a number of holidays, or 'holy-days,' and I see wise stewardship of resources in creating advertising that lasts an entire season.
Where is the merit behind the extremists' claims of a war against Christmas? I do not see what any truly faithless person would find meaningful in celebrating our holy day anyway. However, I do see that Christmas can be a means of grace, a doorway by which questions of faith behind traditions come to be asked, and people search for meaning which goes deeper than piles of gift-wrap.
If anything should be boycotted at Christmas, it is materialism itself, not gestures of hospitality and welcome. Our retail centers are not, and should not purport to be, Christian institutions. I do not go to Kmart seeking faith, I go seeking socks. A quick review of Wal-Mart's exploitative personnel policies certainly demonstrates it is not a Christian institution. But, the extremists are not boycotting Wal-Mart for its treatment of its poor.
What disturbs me most about the 'inclusive greetings boycott' is the implications of anti-Semitism. Hanukah is the most prominent non-Christian holiday celebrated at this time. Why would we want to so forcefully exclude Jews from our greetings of goodwill? Meanwhile, I would like to wish our Jewish friends Happy Holidays as well. Instead of picking this fight, I wish these extremists would get off their behinds and focus on feeding the poor, caring for the sick, visiting those in prison, and working for peace. That would be a useful Christian witness, any time of year.
I am one Christian who would like to buck this year's fundamentalist trend by wishing all of my neighbors 'Happy Holidays.' By this, I mean all the holidays: Christmas, yes, but also Thanksgiving, New Year's, and Epiphany. For six long weeks we have a number of holidays, or 'holy-days,' and I see wise stewardship of resources in creating advertising that lasts an entire season.
Where is the merit behind the extremists' claims of a war against Christmas? I do not see what any truly faithless person would find meaningful in celebrating our holy day anyway. However, I do see that Christmas can be a means of grace, a doorway by which questions of faith behind traditions come to be asked, and people search for meaning which goes deeper than piles of gift-wrap.
If anything should be boycotted at Christmas, it is materialism itself, not gestures of hospitality and welcome. Our retail centers are not, and should not purport to be, Christian institutions. I do not go to Kmart seeking faith, I go seeking socks. A quick review of Wal-Mart's exploitative personnel policies certainly demonstrates it is not a Christian institution. But, the extremists are not boycotting Wal-Mart for its treatment of its poor.
What disturbs me most about the 'inclusive greetings boycott' is the implications of anti-Semitism. Hanukah is the most prominent non-Christian holiday celebrated at this time. Why would we want to so forcefully exclude Jews from our greetings of goodwill? Meanwhile, I would like to wish our Jewish friends Happy Holidays as well. Instead of picking this fight, I wish these extremists would get off their behinds and focus on feeding the poor, caring for the sick, visiting those in prison, and working for peace. That would be a useful Christian witness, any time of year.
When God Screams
In my human rights ministries class last night, a student presented a collection of photos he had made of torture victims around the world. He is bringing us a CD of the collection and some of the documents our government has written defending these practices for our own use in congregations.
The reaction that I had was that of God screaming in my ear. It wasn't that I found the pictures shocking; I'd seen all that before. Rather, all that this student was saying, I had first-hand experience with in Baghdad; I have been too silent. The stories that I told are not being told right now in ways that people can understand them. Even I don't necessarily understand the stories once they've been put into heady, detached language or quick sound-bites.
So, as my life has gotten quite comfortable here in my new seminary; where I have little to fear in my own daily life; where I have an abundance of friends and few real challenges; I need to get a little more uncomfortable. I need to get back into churches, speaking about what I have seen. Getting back to showing Iraqis as real human beings, every bit as much as we ourselves are. Not deserving of what we have wrought on them, and confessing aloud that what is happening there now is a direct result of what we have done.
I said in Chapel this week as we lit candles for Advent that I had been up late nights waiting for something, only wishing I knew what it was. I have been searching for how to be a more faithful servant for God; and toward this I have been better prepared, and re-paired, in these past few months than I imagined possible. I think things are becoming a little clearer.
I have the time; I don't have parish commitments this year. I have the background; I even have pictures, and the ability to speak so people in congregations can hear. I will find the audiences.
Or, I am convinced, God will not let me sleep at night anymore.
The reaction that I had was that of God screaming in my ear. It wasn't that I found the pictures shocking; I'd seen all that before. Rather, all that this student was saying, I had first-hand experience with in Baghdad; I have been too silent. The stories that I told are not being told right now in ways that people can understand them. Even I don't necessarily understand the stories once they've been put into heady, detached language or quick sound-bites.
So, as my life has gotten quite comfortable here in my new seminary; where I have little to fear in my own daily life; where I have an abundance of friends and few real challenges; I need to get a little more uncomfortable. I need to get back into churches, speaking about what I have seen. Getting back to showing Iraqis as real human beings, every bit as much as we ourselves are. Not deserving of what we have wrought on them, and confessing aloud that what is happening there now is a direct result of what we have done.
I said in Chapel this week as we lit candles for Advent that I had been up late nights waiting for something, only wishing I knew what it was. I have been searching for how to be a more faithful servant for God; and toward this I have been better prepared, and re-paired, in these past few months than I imagined possible. I think things are becoming a little clearer.
I have the time; I don't have parish commitments this year. I have the background; I even have pictures, and the ability to speak so people in congregations can hear. I will find the audiences.
Or, I am convinced, God will not let me sleep at night anymore.
Understanding Torture: Resources
I have this handwritten list of good books for understanding torture, sitting on my bookshelf next to me, and before I lose it I would like to share it with you.
In Our Own Best Interest: How Defending Human Rights Benefits Us All: by William Schultz, 235pp
Ordinary People, Unspeakable Acts: the Dynamics of Torture, by John Conroy
Torture Worldwide: An Affront to Human Dignity, by Amnesty International
Racism and the Administration of Justice, by Amnesty
Stopping the Torture Trade, by Amnesty
Crimes of Hate, Conspiracy of Silence (hate crimes against GLBT people) by Amnesty
Hidden Scandal, Secret Shame: Torture and Ill-Treatment of Children, by Amnesty
Broken Bodies, Shattered Minds: Torture and Ill-Treatment of Women, by Amnesty
Through the Blindfold's Eyes: My Journey from Torture to Truth, by Sr. Dianna Ortiz
Torture, by Fr. John S Perry
In Our Own Best Interest: How Defending Human Rights Benefits Us All: by William Schultz, 235pp
Ordinary People, Unspeakable Acts: the Dynamics of Torture, by John Conroy
Torture Worldwide: An Affront to Human Dignity, by Amnesty International
Racism and the Administration of Justice, by Amnesty
Stopping the Torture Trade, by Amnesty
Crimes of Hate, Conspiracy of Silence (hate crimes against GLBT people) by Amnesty
Hidden Scandal, Secret Shame: Torture and Ill-Treatment of Children, by Amnesty
Broken Bodies, Shattered Minds: Torture and Ill-Treatment of Women, by Amnesty
Through the Blindfold's Eyes: My Journey from Torture to Truth, by Sr. Dianna Ortiz
Torture, by Fr. John S Perry
Monday, December 04, 2006
Courage to Resist; PTSD Treatment of Troops
Today I was glued to NPR's report on the treatment of soldiers affected by PTSD at Fort Carson. Given the symptoms they describe as well as the base's response, I feel more strongly than ever that we must be actively training pastors to provide spiritual care and counseling to returning soldiers.
Report is here: http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=6576505
I also have been reading up on the Iraq Vets Against the War website, and today found a new campaign, called Courage to Resist. It covers the stories of U.S. soldiers who have refused to go to Iraq and are now facing court martial:
http://www.couragetoresist.org/x/
If you are a veteran of Iraq (1991 or now), you can join Iraq Vets Against the War, or you can simply avail yourself of the comprehensive resources for veterans available on their website (not just anti-war issues, but health and education benefits, etc.)
www.ivaw.org Iraq Vets Against the War
Report is here: http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=6576505
I also have been reading up on the Iraq Vets Against the War website, and today found a new campaign, called Courage to Resist. It covers the stories of U.S. soldiers who have refused to go to Iraq and are now facing court martial:
http://www.couragetoresist.org/x/
If you are a veteran of Iraq (1991 or now), you can join Iraq Vets Against the War, or you can simply avail yourself of the comprehensive resources for veterans available on their website (not just anti-war issues, but health and education benefits, etc.)
www.ivaw.org Iraq Vets Against the War
Something Different
An assertion of independence written during my Lutheran seminary days, when I received some of the following responses to my pursuing human rights ministry, student activism, and making the denominational change to Presbyterian:
Something Different
I’m doing something different.
I know
Different isn’t cool.
Not here, not among us, it’s unconventional, confusing
maybe even frightening
it upsets the way we do things around here.
But I’m doing something different.
You said,
“But if you’re not doing what the rest of us are doing, then I don’t know who you are.”
Sure you do. You know my
faith and my character, my deep dreams
and hurts
I’ve shared them all with you and
I will keep sharing
and I will support you and your dreams but
I am doing something different.
July 25, 2005
Something Different
I’m doing something different.
I know
Different isn’t cool.
Not here, not among us, it’s unconventional, confusing
maybe even frightening
it upsets the way we do things around here.
But I’m doing something different.
You said,
“But if you’re not doing what the rest of us are doing, then I don’t know who you are.”
Sure you do. You know my
faith and my character, my deep dreams
and hurts
I’ve shared them all with you and
I will keep sharing
and I will support you and your dreams but
I am doing something different.
July 25, 2005
Sunday, December 03, 2006
What Will CTS Look Like Next Year?
Editorial:
(Written for the CTS Prophet student newspaper)
What Will CTS’ Community Look Like Next Year?
If you participated in last week’s Chapel service organized by ISO [International Students' Organization, you should have heard the message loud and clear: Community is important to us. It has been in the past, and despite major changes in student housing, it continues to be a top concern.
Some of you know I was around for Benny Liew’s Gospels class a year ago, before deciding to transfer here. During that time, I got to know about community life here through that class and mooching off Community Lunch, thanks to hospitable classmates who waved me in. I have been thinking how the life of the community, or at least the student body, has changed since then.
I’ve heard from students who have been here longer than me that McGiffert functioned as the center of community life. Not just in friendships and close proximity, but in on-campus and community organizing also. It was space for international students especially to be visible and integrated with the rest of our seminary community—particularly spouses and children who can’t work in this country and don’t know anyone else. Those needs are still there, even if student housing isn’t.
As I look around now, I wonder where the center of our community is. What pulls us all together? Is it class? We are spread out among many classes and different days, and there are many people from my orientation group I haven’t seen since September. Is it worship? Well…we can really turn out for our faculty tenure celebrations, but other days it’s a little sparse. So I started asking around, and the consensus arrived at was: ....lunch. Lunch? Uff-da.
For some of us, our life realities—families, work, and long distances—mean that we simply can’t be here as much as we would like. For others, we arrive at seminary having left our former lives behind, and are starting from scratch. We’re looking for community along with classes, a place to belong and a place to matter.
Except perhaps for those of us camped out on George Commons couches, we are now a 100% commuter campus. This year we still have a core of people who used to live together on campus that keep the rest of us together in this diaspora, but as time passes, our community life faces radical change. Will we become the kind of campus where most students just show up, take their classes, and leave, and whatever community that happens is, at best, accidental? Will we continue to think of ourselves as too-small, too-poor, too-busy, and too-stressed to get involved in life beyond the books? Will seminary become for us a mere inconvenience on the way to hoped-for better things in our futures?
We will have to change also, to keep what we hold most precious about this place. We need to work together to find creative solutions to our housing problem. We students will have to pitch in more to help Alison and Neil organize community life. I am grateful that we now have the newspaper as another way to meet the need for communication in this place, and particularly to get to know each other better. I am hopeful for a good student government, that even when we can’t all be here all the time, we will have people we trust to raise our voices and needs when it counts. Finish finals and rest up over Winter Break, and come back in the new term ready to help us all through these times.
(Written for the CTS Prophet student newspaper)
What Will CTS’ Community Look Like Next Year?
If you participated in last week’s Chapel service organized by ISO [International Students' Organization, you should have heard the message loud and clear: Community is important to us. It has been in the past, and despite major changes in student housing, it continues to be a top concern.
Some of you know I was around for Benny Liew’s Gospels class a year ago, before deciding to transfer here. During that time, I got to know about community life here through that class and mooching off Community Lunch, thanks to hospitable classmates who waved me in. I have been thinking how the life of the community, or at least the student body, has changed since then.
I’ve heard from students who have been here longer than me that McGiffert functioned as the center of community life. Not just in friendships and close proximity, but in on-campus and community organizing also. It was space for international students especially to be visible and integrated with the rest of our seminary community—particularly spouses and children who can’t work in this country and don’t know anyone else. Those needs are still there, even if student housing isn’t.
As I look around now, I wonder where the center of our community is. What pulls us all together? Is it class? We are spread out among many classes and different days, and there are many people from my orientation group I haven’t seen since September. Is it worship? Well…we can really turn out for our faculty tenure celebrations, but other days it’s a little sparse. So I started asking around, and the consensus arrived at was: ....lunch. Lunch? Uff-da.
For some of us, our life realities—families, work, and long distances—mean that we simply can’t be here as much as we would like. For others, we arrive at seminary having left our former lives behind, and are starting from scratch. We’re looking for community along with classes, a place to belong and a place to matter.
Except perhaps for those of us camped out on George Commons couches, we are now a 100% commuter campus. This year we still have a core of people who used to live together on campus that keep the rest of us together in this diaspora, but as time passes, our community life faces radical change. Will we become the kind of campus where most students just show up, take their classes, and leave, and whatever community that happens is, at best, accidental? Will we continue to think of ourselves as too-small, too-poor, too-busy, and too-stressed to get involved in life beyond the books? Will seminary become for us a mere inconvenience on the way to hoped-for better things in our futures?
We will have to change also, to keep what we hold most precious about this place. We need to work together to find creative solutions to our housing problem. We students will have to pitch in more to help Alison and Neil organize community life. I am grateful that we now have the newspaper as another way to meet the need for communication in this place, and particularly to get to know each other better. I am hopeful for a good student government, that even when we can’t all be here all the time, we will have people we trust to raise our voices and needs when it counts. Finish finals and rest up over Winter Break, and come back in the new term ready to help us all through these times.
Without Sanctuary
I wrote this after viewing the ‘Without Sanctuary’ exhibit at the Chicago Historical Society, which was a powerful visual memorial to the practice of lynching black people in our country. Several of the photographs on display were actually souvenir postcards sent by members of the crowd at these executions; one showed an entire family of young children brought out to witness these acts for an ‘entertaining’ afternoon.
The verge of tears is shaky ground:
Angry
Shocked
But I shouldn’t be
I knew this had happened before.
Still,
Pictures drive history into your heart
Close to home
Remembering Iraq
Palestine, soldiers
Smiling over corpses
Just like in these photos
We haven’t changed so much since then
Mangled bodies
Extreme violence
As family entertainment:
Come on! Bring the kids!
In the Museum you hear
Soft gasps of horror
Now.
The role of the faithful is both to struggle with,
and to die with--if necessary.
Yet who can be prepared
For things like this?
August 2005
The verge of tears is shaky ground:
Angry
Shocked
But I shouldn’t be
I knew this had happened before.
Still,
Pictures drive history into your heart
Close to home
Remembering Iraq
Palestine, soldiers
Smiling over corpses
Just like in these photos
We haven’t changed so much since then
Mangled bodies
Extreme violence
As family entertainment:
Come on! Bring the kids!
In the Museum you hear
Soft gasps of horror
Now.
The role of the faithful is both to struggle with,
and to die with--if necessary.
Yet who can be prepared
For things like this?
August 2005
King Once Had A Dream
This is another part of my recently retrieved poetry collection from summer 2005, which seems just as pertinent now:
King once had a dream. And now,
My dream for us today?
Can I dream?
Are there any more dreams to dream? Now?
Or am I foolish
I have no wisdom
No right words
Many years of ‘enlightenment training’
is not enough.
So difficult to change!
This is the white whine
Intoxicating,
Overwhelming, despair
guilt and not knowing
it’s little consolation to the oppressed:
But white despair
is there.
Sometimes it seems the only way
to un-do
is to un-be
it runs so deep, so long, so wide
So difficult to change
But that doesn’t mean give up;
To give up is to die
and love is deep too
and long, and wide
beyond us,
and our failing, inadequate steps.
We must try to go on
In any imperfect way.
Or perhaps
In the least imperfect way
we can.
King once had a dream. And now,
My dream for us today?
Can I dream?
Are there any more dreams to dream? Now?
Or am I foolish
I have no wisdom
No right words
Many years of ‘enlightenment training’
is not enough.
So difficult to change!
This is the white whine
Intoxicating,
Overwhelming, despair
guilt and not knowing
it’s little consolation to the oppressed:
But white despair
is there.
Sometimes it seems the only way
to un-do
is to un-be
it runs so deep, so long, so wide
So difficult to change
But that doesn’t mean give up;
To give up is to die
and love is deep too
and long, and wide
beyond us,
and our failing, inadequate steps.
We must try to go on
In any imperfect way.
Or perhaps
In the least imperfect way
we can.
Friday, December 01, 2006
The Horrors of War, 1
I've been experimenting with what I can post here, and in this semester of the academic study of war and torture, I recalled my sketchbook from when I was in the Middle East.
The Horrors of War: Al-Amariyyeh, the cry of the mothers
This depicts the US bombing of the Al-Amariyyeh bomb shelter in suburban Baghdad, killing 400 civilians, primarily children and women, Valentine's Day, 1991. The parents were either outside in the early morning hours working or doing laundry and cooking. The US justifies the bombing for the phone interchange equipment located in the building above. The force of the blast incinerated the people inside, and created 'shadows' of them against the wall. It is now a haunting memorial.
I have five pages to share, each based on places I've visited and the stories of the horrors of war. Still, several years later as I look at them, I realize all too well these places and these stories are not unique. Pictures of Palestinians rounded up by Israelis in the past, look curiously like pictures of Iraqis rounded up by Americans today.
What have we learned?
What must we learn?
The Horrors of War: Al-Amariyyeh, the cry of the mothers
This depicts the US bombing of the Al-Amariyyeh bomb shelter in suburban Baghdad, killing 400 civilians, primarily children and women, Valentine's Day, 1991. The parents were either outside in the early morning hours working or doing laundry and cooking. The US justifies the bombing for the phone interchange equipment located in the building above. The force of the blast incinerated the people inside, and created 'shadows' of them against the wall. It is now a haunting memorial.
I have five pages to share, each based on places I've visited and the stories of the horrors of war. Still, several years later as I look at them, I realize all too well these places and these stories are not unique. Pictures of Palestinians rounded up by Israelis in the past, look curiously like pictures of Iraqis rounded up by Americans today.
What have we learned?
What must we learn?
Thursday, November 30, 2006
The Horrors of War, 2
Via Dolorosa, The Way of Sorrows: Military Occupation
This I drew to depict the events of al-Nakba, the Catastrophe of the Palestinians in 1948, a process that continues in shades through the present. The destruction of the villages, the rounding up and deportation of the men in large trucks, the concentration camps that have now become permanent 'refugee' camps throughout the middle east, as well as the prisons and dungeouns decried by Israeli and Palestinian human rights groups alike.
And still, this bears striking familiarity to our treatment of the Iraqis; there is nothing on this scrap of paper that we ourselves have not done. Three years after drawing this picture, I was taking photographs of the same images live.
Wednesday, November 29, 2006
The Horrors of War, 3
The Horrors of War: Safuriya-Sepphoris
Safuriya, or Sepphoris, is a small village to the northwest of Nazareth that was forcibly depopulated of Palestinians during the Catastrophe. The houses they left behind are now a chic suburb for Israelis, while the original homeowners often still wear their keys around their necks while they sit in refugee camps in Lebanon. It is also a popular spot with tourists for the archaeological ruins of Herod's recreational palace.
Tuesday, November 28, 2006
The Horrors of War, 4
The Horrors of War: Village Raids
The images repeat throughout the world. All too often, they are created through our tax dollars. The links to the right of this image are filled with information about how this happens, and what you can do to help.
Monday, November 27, 2006
The Horrors of War, 5
This is the last picture in this series, or the first, depending on how you are reading this blog. Look carefully at the small pebbles beneath the soldier's feet.
We forget too often what military occupation is; we blame the violence that ensues on the 'savagery' of the occupied, justifying our further repression of the people. We even declare God to be on our side; or declare ours to be the cause of freedom.
What have we freed Iraqis from?
What have we freed Iraqis for?
We forget too often what military occupation is; we blame the violence that ensues on the 'savagery' of the occupied, justifying our further repression of the people. We even declare God to be on our side; or declare ours to be the cause of freedom.
What have we freed Iraqis from?
What have we freed Iraqis for?
Tuesday, November 21, 2006
School of the Americas Protest, 2006
I returned yesterday from the School of the Americas protest at Ft. Benning, Columbus, GA. The School of the Americas is where we train soldiers from other countries in 'counter-insurgency' tactics, most notably torture. Graduates of this school have been responsible for tens of thousands of civilian deaths throughout Central and South America. These are a few of my initial impressions, as well as three pictures:
Perhaps the most moving moment for me was meeting the young 'Iraq Veterans Against the War.' I realized they were ten years younger than I am now, eighteen year-olds. I have family in the military, but they are older. I met plenty of soldiers in Iraq, but they seemed so aged and hardened in their roles there. I asked these guys how they got the bus organized and how they got down there, they admitted they had arrived 'on fumes' and weren't exactly sure how they'd get home afterwards. So I bought a t-shirt to support them, which said "Free the Troops." I thought it answered the unasked question in this support our troops/end the war debate. I thought afterwards, if ever there were a group of 'America's Finest,' it was these guys, who not only wanted to serve their country, but also were courageous enough to ask the hard questions about the consequences this service had--on themselves, on our country, on people around the world.
I participated in a 'die-in' with about thirty others, our faces painted white to symbolize death, and draped in black mourning shrouds. We carried coffins in the beginning of the funeral procession, then lay down in front of the entrance to the base and were covered in red paint to symbolize the massacres which have been committed:
...what I noticed most was the cold. The ground was cold, the 'blood' I was soaked in was cold, the air was cold, and I couldn't even feel the heat from the sun. It made my muscles and joints stiff and painful. I began to wonder how everyone else on the ground around me was doing. I lost track of time, and a few times, I think I drifted off into sleep and back. I couldn't speak or move really, since I was supposed to be 'dead.' I wasn't supposed to open my eyes. I could hear the voices of people walking around me, and I wondered if they saw me, or if my friends would recognize me. And then it struck me, that in a massacre, a person might have the very same thoughts...the cold, the fear of being un-seen, wondering how long you would be there, the pain, perhaps needing to 'play dead' in order to survive if the killers were still around. This has been the scene re-played throughout Central and South America, dozens of massacres by soldiers trained by the School of the Americas. And here we lay, the symbolic dead, at the gates of where it all begins.
I came away from the protest energized --knowing that mass demonstrations are not the work, but the rallies help us to continue with the daily work until our goals are acheived. It was good to meet others within the Presbyterian church and other seminaries and schools and organizations--all working together from all over the country--and to know we are not alone in our concerns. Also, I came away with a better perspective on my seminary studies. It seems like we as students always whine, "we're too busy, we have to study." As Rick Ufford-Chase told us during his visit to McCormick seminary recently, 'we do not have the luxury of being overwhelmed.' These are the times in which we study, and we need to view our studies not just as professional training, but as incorporating them into the struggle for justice. We need to get our professors on the same page with us, supporting us in responding to the world faithfully, even as students, and perhaps even coming up with alternative assignments to integrate the world and the classroom.
Perhaps the most moving moment for me was meeting the young 'Iraq Veterans Against the War.' I realized they were ten years younger than I am now, eighteen year-olds. I have family in the military, but they are older. I met plenty of soldiers in Iraq, but they seemed so aged and hardened in their roles there. I asked these guys how they got the bus organized and how they got down there, they admitted they had arrived 'on fumes' and weren't exactly sure how they'd get home afterwards. So I bought a t-shirt to support them, which said "Free the Troops." I thought it answered the unasked question in this support our troops/end the war debate. I thought afterwards, if ever there were a group of 'America's Finest,' it was these guys, who not only wanted to serve their country, but also were courageous enough to ask the hard questions about the consequences this service had--on themselves, on our country, on people around the world.
I participated in a 'die-in' with about thirty others, our faces painted white to symbolize death, and draped in black mourning shrouds. We carried coffins in the beginning of the funeral procession, then lay down in front of the entrance to the base and were covered in red paint to symbolize the massacres which have been committed:
...what I noticed most was the cold. The ground was cold, the 'blood' I was soaked in was cold, the air was cold, and I couldn't even feel the heat from the sun. It made my muscles and joints stiff and painful. I began to wonder how everyone else on the ground around me was doing. I lost track of time, and a few times, I think I drifted off into sleep and back. I couldn't speak or move really, since I was supposed to be 'dead.' I wasn't supposed to open my eyes. I could hear the voices of people walking around me, and I wondered if they saw me, or if my friends would recognize me. And then it struck me, that in a massacre, a person might have the very same thoughts...the cold, the fear of being un-seen, wondering how long you would be there, the pain, perhaps needing to 'play dead' in order to survive if the killers were still around. This has been the scene re-played throughout Central and South America, dozens of massacres by soldiers trained by the School of the Americas. And here we lay, the symbolic dead, at the gates of where it all begins.
I came away from the protest energized --knowing that mass demonstrations are not the work, but the rallies help us to continue with the daily work until our goals are acheived. It was good to meet others within the Presbyterian church and other seminaries and schools and organizations--all working together from all over the country--and to know we are not alone in our concerns. Also, I came away with a better perspective on my seminary studies. It seems like we as students always whine, "we're too busy, we have to study." As Rick Ufford-Chase told us during his visit to McCormick seminary recently, 'we do not have the luxury of being overwhelmed.' These are the times in which we study, and we need to view our studies not just as professional training, but as incorporating them into the struggle for justice. We need to get our professors on the same page with us, supporting us in responding to the world faithfully, even as students, and perhaps even coming up with alternative assignments to integrate the world and the classroom.
Friday, November 17, 2006
Le Anne's Manifesto:
I am catching up between hosting family and taking off early Friday morning for the School of the Americas protest (about a dozen of us going from the seminaries in Hyde Park; mostly McCormick, but a couple from the other schools also). I'm excited to get back down there, but I promise not to get arrested this year...but, I'm a bit fired up at the moment and want to write; while each of the pieces below has been with me some time, they've been coming together and becoming a much clearer vision much more recently--apologies, for brief manifesto to follow:
1. What is your interest? 2. What is your experience? 4. How do you see yourself serving Christ and the CHurch in the years to come?
My interest is in ecumenical and interfaith cooperation for social justice, particularly human rights and antimilitarism. I'm also in some human rights ministry classes at Catholic Theological Union (CTU) right now; for my final, I'm finishing my nonprofit plan for an 'Interfaith Peacemaker Teams.' For next semester's advanced human rights class, which requires hands-on work, I'm asking the professor to let me build the relationships with other human rights and interfaith groups in Chicago necessary to getting this group going. If all goes well by the end of the year, I'll drop down to half-time enrollment and begin recruiting and training to send interfaith human rights teams to active conflict zones. I have been blessed with much encouragement from those who have gone before me in this work, particularly Kathy Kelly and Voices in the Wilderness. I have been shying for some time now from the doors which have been opening--finally getting the courage to step through to those unknowns...
I was a human rights worker in the Middle East (mostly Israel, Palestine, Iraq) for four years, mostly with the Christian Peacemaker Teams, and we knew then but didn't have the ability to expand the model to include interfaith. Between the time I 'retired' from CPT and when I came to CTS, I got an MA in Christian-Muslim relations. But, whenever I do finish seminary (in one more year or two), I'm in the ordination process in the Presbyterian church.
Meanwhile, closer to home, I'm helping build a coalition of student organizers from all of the seminaries in Hyde Park, called the Seminary Student Action Network (www.seminaryaction.org). We launched an inter-campus paper which is gaining ground rapidly, we have monthly colloquy groups of student leaders (newspaper editors, student government, and organization leaders, etc) for mutual support and troubleshooting; and we're looking at ways to form intentionally ecumenical/
intercampus student housing to meet the shortage of affordable student housing near Hyde Park --probably also including a servant-learning component as part of the rental contract.
What I want to see coming from this, though, is a wider 'culture change' in the approach to theological education, at least for the Hyde Park seminaries. I have a funny ecumenical history here, where I've been a student and/or deeply involved with the communities at most of the seminaries here. None really touch the level of contextual, cross-cultural, servant-based education that is common to many denominational college campuses today. And it's not really about money; most of the college campus efforts are student-initiated before incorporated into the program, and students raise the funds to make them happen. I think it's mostly about commitment and creativity.
At CTS, we are blessed to have the CCT program for field site, and that the outside world is discussed within our classrooms, but I believe this is not enough to form truly globally- connected and societal- transforming ministers. I believe that physically being in the public community from start to finish of seminary education _is_ doing public theology; we can't just restrict this to the second-year field site and a section of CPE. But I do understand how it is difficult to transform these cultures from within institutional structures, which is why we are organizing as a coalition of students, to show how alternative spring break opportunities, increased cross-cultural travel seminars, and leadership/ organizing practicum opportunites can happen here for everyone.
There's one other thing I will mention, and that is my real excitement for pastoral counseling/ chaplaincy/ spiritual direction. I did CPE in a psychiatric ward this summer and loved it enough to get into Dr. Moore's classes here; I also used to lead the trauma training for new human rights workers entering Palestine, as well as the post-trauma debriefings when colleagues were killed. I know that from the accumulation of war traumas in four years, I personally can't do the direct work much anymore. The wounds are deep. But I find incredible energy for pastoring and shepherding the activists and aid workers. So...it all sort of fits together and makes it possible for me to carry on in a world of violence and despair. And I know I won't have to do it alone, through the friends that I have and continue to find in this wide body of faith. We and the Spirit can cheer each other on the way.
3. What do you see as the impact faith in the public square has made in this recent mid-term election?
I think people voted against what they saw in the religious right through the scandals and voted also against the way this war has been handled. I think now is the best time to speak an alternative view of faith in public life, before all things religious and church are seen as detestable. So we gotta get out there, not just get comfortable because we like who made it into office.
Y'all have had enough of me by now for sure. I'll close out this message with thanks to you all, and an invitation for further discussion/feedback, etc.
peace, friends,
Le Anne
1. What is your interest? 2. What is your experience? 4. How do you see yourself serving Christ and the CHurch in the years to come?
My interest is in ecumenical and interfaith cooperation for social justice, particularly human rights and antimilitarism. I'm also in some human rights ministry classes at Catholic Theological Union (CTU) right now; for my final, I'm finishing my nonprofit plan for an 'Interfaith Peacemaker Teams.' For next semester's advanced human rights class, which requires hands-on work, I'm asking the professor to let me build the relationships with other human rights and interfaith groups in Chicago necessary to getting this group going. If all goes well by the end of the year, I'll drop down to half-time enrollment and begin recruiting and training to send interfaith human rights teams to active conflict zones. I have been blessed with much encouragement from those who have gone before me in this work, particularly Kathy Kelly and Voices in the Wilderness. I have been shying for some time now from the doors which have been opening--finally getting the courage to step through to those unknowns...
I was a human rights worker in the Middle East (mostly Israel, Palestine, Iraq) for four years, mostly with the Christian Peacemaker Teams, and we knew then but didn't have the ability to expand the model to include interfaith. Between the time I 'retired' from CPT and when I came to CTS, I got an MA in Christian-Muslim relations. But, whenever I do finish seminary (in one more year or two), I'm in the ordination process in the Presbyterian church.
Meanwhile, closer to home, I'm helping build a coalition of student organizers from all of the seminaries in Hyde Park, called the Seminary Student Action Network (www.seminaryaction.org). We launched an inter-campus paper which is gaining ground rapidly, we have monthly colloquy groups of student leaders (newspaper editors, student government, and organization leaders, etc) for mutual support and troubleshooting; and we're looking at ways to form intentionally ecumenical/
intercampus student housing to meet the shortage of affordable student housing near Hyde Park --probably also including a servant-learning component as part of the rental contract.
What I want to see coming from this, though, is a wider 'culture change' in the approach to theological education, at least for the Hyde Park seminaries. I have a funny ecumenical history here, where I've been a student and/or deeply involved with the communities at most of the seminaries here. None really touch the level of contextual, cross-cultural, servant-based education that is common to many denominational college campuses today. And it's not really about money; most of the college campus efforts are student-initiated before incorporated into the program, and students raise the funds to make them happen. I think it's mostly about commitment and creativity.
At CTS, we are blessed to have the CCT program for field site, and that the outside world is discussed within our classrooms, but I believe this is not enough to form truly globally- connected and societal- transforming ministers. I believe that physically being in the public community from start to finish of seminary education _is_ doing public theology; we can't just restrict this to the second-year field site and a section of CPE. But I do understand how it is difficult to transform these cultures from within institutional structures, which is why we are organizing as a coalition of students, to show how alternative spring break opportunities, increased cross-cultural travel seminars, and leadership/ organizing practicum opportunites can happen here for everyone.
There's one other thing I will mention, and that is my real excitement for pastoral counseling/ chaplaincy/ spiritual direction. I did CPE in a psychiatric ward this summer and loved it enough to get into Dr. Moore's classes here; I also used to lead the trauma training for new human rights workers entering Palestine, as well as the post-trauma debriefings when colleagues were killed. I know that from the accumulation of war traumas in four years, I personally can't do the direct work much anymore. The wounds are deep. But I find incredible energy for pastoring and shepherding the activists and aid workers. So...it all sort of fits together and makes it possible for me to carry on in a world of violence and despair. And I know I won't have to do it alone, through the friends that I have and continue to find in this wide body of faith. We and the Spirit can cheer each other on the way.
3. What do you see as the impact faith in the public square has made in this recent mid-term election?
I think people voted against what they saw in the religious right through the scandals and voted also against the way this war has been handled. I think now is the best time to speak an alternative view of faith in public life, before all things religious and church are seen as detestable. So we gotta get out there, not just get comfortable because we like who made it into office.
Y'all have had enough of me by now for sure. I'll close out this message with thanks to you all, and an invitation for further discussion/feedback, etc.
peace, friends,
Le Anne
Monday, November 06, 2006
Should Saddam Receive the Death Penalty?
(submitted as an op-ed)
I woke up this morning to grim news on the radio, that Saddam Hussein and two of his cohorts had been sentenced to death by hanging for his crimes against humanity. Iraqi officials were bracing themselves for anticipated riots following this pronouncement.
As a human rights worker, I was in Baghdad the day Saddam was captured. I remember sitting in our neighbor’s den watching the news with them. The family, who was Christian, seemed to have a flat affect. Their housekeeper, a Sunni woman, cried and touched his face on the screen. “They will hurt him,” she wept. “They will not let him live.”
As the news continued, I had to wonder at the wisdom of sentencing this man to die. It’s true, Shi’a and Kurdish Iraqis are rejoicing in the streets. However, Amnesty International said the tribunal had missed an opportunity to establish the rule of law in Iraq, and to ensure "truth and accountability for the massive human rights violations perpetrated by Saddam Hussein's rule."
Shall we kill this man? Let’s look at some of the reasons for opposing the death penalty, particularly in this case: As with Osama bin Laden, we have heard for years now that killing him will only make him a martyr. Riots are likely to lead to a far greater loss of life, in a country that has had far too many deaths already. The ‘deterrence factor,’ often cited in get-tough legislation, is unlikely to prove effective in a country where thousands of citizens pay the death penalty for walking out their front doors--if they even get that far.
Is this execution simply deserved? Probably. Saddam tortured and killed thousands of people, his own people and others. He used terrible weapons. These were indisputably crimes against humanity. But then, who else deserves to share this fate?
After all, our hands are bloody also. We supported Saddam’s rise to power; we gave him intelligence and the weaponry in order to carry out his crimes in Halabja and elsewhere. We promised to support the Shi’a if they revolted against him, then we looked the other way as he slaughtered them following the first Gulf War.
Meanwhile, I know another man who had over 3,000 of his own people killed; and gave the orders to kill tens of thousands more. A man who became an apologist for torture; who lied to his country and instilled a climate of repressed freedoms and constant terror. Who came to power through dubious elections processes. He has several henchmen behind him who helped to engineer this treason and tyranny. Who used massively destructive weapons against civilians time and time again. All while serving as a head of state—our own United States.
Should he be sentenced to death also? Shall he be tried for crimes against humanity?
I believe George W. Bush has plenty to answer for, along with Cheney, Rumsfeld, Wolfowitz, Rove, and the rest of his cohorts who took us into this dirty war. Still, as a human rights worker and a Christian, I simply cannot support the death penalty against anyone, no matter who it is.
When this man and his followers die, so too die the answers that thousands of Iraqi families seek about the fate of their loved ones. And, as often happens in state-sponsored terror, by the time you punish everyone who took part in these crimes, you will have effectively created yet another genocide. Where would we stop?
Instead, I believe the just sentence is multiple life sentences. Why not contain these men, prevent them from attaining power again, and over time seek the truth and accountability so desperately sought? Let Saddam be a living testament that these acts should never happen again, and that we should never support them again, instead of dead history too quickly forgotten.
I woke up this morning to grim news on the radio, that Saddam Hussein and two of his cohorts had been sentenced to death by hanging for his crimes against humanity. Iraqi officials were bracing themselves for anticipated riots following this pronouncement.
As a human rights worker, I was in Baghdad the day Saddam was captured. I remember sitting in our neighbor’s den watching the news with them. The family, who was Christian, seemed to have a flat affect. Their housekeeper, a Sunni woman, cried and touched his face on the screen. “They will hurt him,” she wept. “They will not let him live.”
As the news continued, I had to wonder at the wisdom of sentencing this man to die. It’s true, Shi’a and Kurdish Iraqis are rejoicing in the streets. However, Amnesty International said the tribunal had missed an opportunity to establish the rule of law in Iraq, and to ensure "truth and accountability for the massive human rights violations perpetrated by Saddam Hussein's rule."
Shall we kill this man? Let’s look at some of the reasons for opposing the death penalty, particularly in this case: As with Osama bin Laden, we have heard for years now that killing him will only make him a martyr. Riots are likely to lead to a far greater loss of life, in a country that has had far too many deaths already. The ‘deterrence factor,’ often cited in get-tough legislation, is unlikely to prove effective in a country where thousands of citizens pay the death penalty for walking out their front doors--if they even get that far.
Is this execution simply deserved? Probably. Saddam tortured and killed thousands of people, his own people and others. He used terrible weapons. These were indisputably crimes against humanity. But then, who else deserves to share this fate?
After all, our hands are bloody also. We supported Saddam’s rise to power; we gave him intelligence and the weaponry in order to carry out his crimes in Halabja and elsewhere. We promised to support the Shi’a if they revolted against him, then we looked the other way as he slaughtered them following the first Gulf War.
Meanwhile, I know another man who had over 3,000 of his own people killed; and gave the orders to kill tens of thousands more. A man who became an apologist for torture; who lied to his country and instilled a climate of repressed freedoms and constant terror. Who came to power through dubious elections processes. He has several henchmen behind him who helped to engineer this treason and tyranny. Who used massively destructive weapons against civilians time and time again. All while serving as a head of state—our own United States.
Should he be sentenced to death also? Shall he be tried for crimes against humanity?
I believe George W. Bush has plenty to answer for, along with Cheney, Rumsfeld, Wolfowitz, Rove, and the rest of his cohorts who took us into this dirty war. Still, as a human rights worker and a Christian, I simply cannot support the death penalty against anyone, no matter who it is.
When this man and his followers die, so too die the answers that thousands of Iraqi families seek about the fate of their loved ones. And, as often happens in state-sponsored terror, by the time you punish everyone who took part in these crimes, you will have effectively created yet another genocide. Where would we stop?
Instead, I believe the just sentence is multiple life sentences. Why not contain these men, prevent them from attaining power again, and over time seek the truth and accountability so desperately sought? Let Saddam be a living testament that these acts should never happen again, and that we should never support them again, instead of dead history too quickly forgotten.
Saturday, November 04, 2006
In the Aftermath of Abu Ghraib
(recently found in my old notebook of poems)
In the Aftermath of Abu Ghraib
And the Fallujah Massacre
Here in this war zone
We could die any time
I never felt fear of death
As I do now.
We sit by our window
And check which car is
Parked outside
They’re going after everyone now
Good deeds done in months past
Cannot measure up
To this great transgression
No longer targeting only
Soldier or spy
War profiteer
But aid worker
And human rights activist
They have the right to be angry
But in their rage
Will they still remember
This faithful friendship?
I never felt so acutely the
Fear of gang rape
Or drive-by shootings
Measuring every word spoken
So as not to bring death
Sooner upon us.
And seeing our tanks and checkpoints
On their soil
Seeing the blood-soaked deeds
Of my country
On their TV screens
I wonder, really
Who will kill us first?
Do all souls here die in a
blaze of glory
Or just the blaze of oil?
Spring 2004
In the Aftermath of Abu Ghraib
And the Fallujah Massacre
Here in this war zone
We could die any time
I never felt fear of death
As I do now.
We sit by our window
And check which car is
Parked outside
They’re going after everyone now
Good deeds done in months past
Cannot measure up
To this great transgression
No longer targeting only
Soldier or spy
War profiteer
But aid worker
And human rights activist
They have the right to be angry
But in their rage
Will they still remember
This faithful friendship?
I never felt so acutely the
Fear of gang rape
Or drive-by shootings
Measuring every word spoken
So as not to bring death
Sooner upon us.
And seeing our tanks and checkpoints
On their soil
Seeing the blood-soaked deeds
Of my country
On their TV screens
I wonder, really
Who will kill us first?
Do all souls here die in a
blaze of glory
Or just the blaze of oil?
Spring 2004
Friday, November 03, 2006
Seminary Students on Civil Disobedience
The following is a conversation among several seminary students on whether seminarians should be involved in acts of civil disobedience today:
Le Anne: I would like to start a conversation on seminary students engaging in acts of civil disobedience. This is just a brief message which I'll elaborate on later, but, several of my human rights colleagues asked me if I would be willing to participate in a nonviolent public witness that may involve a risk of arrest, if we make further gestures towards war in Iran. The School of the Americas protests annually at Ft. Benning, Columbus, GA, are also something many seminarians join and sometimes risk arrest. I am not asking about my own personal decisions/advice (although first in my deliberations was asking Susan's opinion and blessing); but to debate the ethics and implications of a seminary students risking arrest for social justice causes. Of course it happened plenty in the Civil Rights era, but do we see it as acceptable today?
Let's see what ye all think; peace, Le Anne
5 REPLIES [Hide Replies]
* FROM: AnnMarie (11/01/06)
SUBJECT: RE: seminary students, clergy, arrest?
I think these actions are not only acceptable, but necessary.
Jesus' life, as we know it, is framed by his arrest and prosecution. However, our written accounts of him show that he made choices about where he did what and when. I'm not saying that non-violent resistance and protest should be mandatory whenever and where-ever. We need to be prudent and, I think, lead by the Spirit in the choices that we make.
* FROM: Nathan (11/02/06)
SUBJECT: RE: seminary students, clergy, arrest?
Le Anne - This is something I'm keenly interested in - I've gone annually to the SOA protest since '01. The only risk of arrest at Ft. Benning involves crossing the boundary line onto the base, and this is not a 'risk' situation - you will be arrested and detained. We can talk about this at length later. I have been arrested three times at protests - twice during the lead up to the war and once during a farmer's strike in Los Angeles. I can tell you that having a ban and bar letter sucks because it shows up as a 'felony flag' on your record and if you ever have to stand before a judge for anything it will definitely come up in the conversation.
That said, I am entirely for civil disobedience - I think it is one of the most Christ-like activities we can engage in. However, it can screw up the amount of time it takes for you to earn your M.Div.
In short, I believe that seminary students should finish their studies, and then get arrested.
I really recommend reading Father John Dear's stuff - his prison book especially, as well as his articles. (He's my personal hero.)
This is from his bio:
"A native of North Carolina, John Dear was arrested on December 7, 1993 at the Seymour Johnson Air Force Base in Goldsboro, North Carolina for hammering on an F15 nuclear fighter bomber in an effort to "beat swords in plowshares," according to the biblical vision of the prophet Isaiah. Along with activist Philip Berrigan, he spent eight months in North Carolina county jails. Dear has been arrested over seventy-five times in acts of nonviolent civil disobedience for peace, and has organized hundreds of demonstrations against war and nuclear weapons at military bases across the country, as well as worked with Mother Theresa and others to stop the death penalty."
* FROM: Ken(11/02/06)
SUBJECT: RE: seminary students, clergy, arrest?
I agree with AnnMarie. I believe we have an obligation as Christians to take a stance. All that is necessary for evil to exist is that good men do nothing. However, Christ did choose his time and place to complete his mission. Remember there were times that he just vanished from the crowd.
* FROM: Christal(11/02/06)
SUBJECT: RE: seminary students, clergy, arrest?
I agree with the replies that have been posted. As a young African American women, I am where I am because of protest...If Rosa Parks gave up her seat...could I freely sit anywhere on the CTA...If there were no sit-its..could I eat where I wanted to?... I think that civil disobedience is acceptable.
Just my thoughts..
Christal
* FROM: Becky (11/02/06)
SUBJECT: RE: seminary students, clergy, arrest?
I always have to wonder, what will happen to my children if I end up in jail, as a result of my call to action as a person of faith. And when I raised this question with my pastor, she reminded me that I am part of a faith family, we take care of one another. That said, I need to be mindful of the impact on my family. I have no hesitation in stepping forward and engaging in acts of civil disobedience, on behalf of all God's children. I just need lead time to prepare my own children and family for the implications!
Do I see this acceptable today? I see it as necessary. Had I been able, I would have joined the folks who were arrested last year as the protested the immoral Federal Budget of our country.
Let's please keep in mind that the best way to move folks from apathy to interest is to give them an authentic connection to people willing to take action, raise voices, and take risks. And remember that we are a few generations removed from the impact of the Civil Rights movement. When I showed the video of the Children's March , provided to our church through "Teaching Tolerance," a project of the Southern Poverty Law Center, in a Sunday School class, most of the students had not been exposed to this part of our country's history.
Le Anne: I would like to start a conversation on seminary students engaging in acts of civil disobedience. This is just a brief message which I'll elaborate on later, but, several of my human rights colleagues asked me if I would be willing to participate in a nonviolent public witness that may involve a risk of arrest, if we make further gestures towards war in Iran. The School of the Americas protests annually at Ft. Benning, Columbus, GA, are also something many seminarians join and sometimes risk arrest. I am not asking about my own personal decisions/advice (although first in my deliberations was asking Susan's opinion and blessing); but to debate the ethics and implications of a seminary students risking arrest for social justice causes. Of course it happened plenty in the Civil Rights era, but do we see it as acceptable today?
Let's see what ye all think; peace, Le Anne
5 REPLIES [Hide Replies]
* FROM: AnnMarie (11/01/06)
SUBJECT: RE: seminary students, clergy, arrest?
I think these actions are not only acceptable, but necessary.
Jesus' life, as we know it, is framed by his arrest and prosecution. However, our written accounts of him show that he made choices about where he did what and when. I'm not saying that non-violent resistance and protest should be mandatory whenever and where-ever. We need to be prudent and, I think, lead by the Spirit in the choices that we make.
* FROM: Nathan (11/02/06)
SUBJECT: RE: seminary students, clergy, arrest?
Le Anne - This is something I'm keenly interested in - I've gone annually to the SOA protest since '01. The only risk of arrest at Ft. Benning involves crossing the boundary line onto the base, and this is not a 'risk' situation - you will be arrested and detained. We can talk about this at length later. I have been arrested three times at protests - twice during the lead up to the war and once during a farmer's strike in Los Angeles. I can tell you that having a ban and bar letter sucks because it shows up as a 'felony flag' on your record and if you ever have to stand before a judge for anything it will definitely come up in the conversation.
That said, I am entirely for civil disobedience - I think it is one of the most Christ-like activities we can engage in. However, it can screw up the amount of time it takes for you to earn your M.Div.
In short, I believe that seminary students should finish their studies, and then get arrested.
I really recommend reading Father John Dear's stuff - his prison book especially, as well as his articles. (He's my personal hero.)
This is from his bio:
"A native of North Carolina, John Dear was arrested on December 7, 1993 at the Seymour Johnson Air Force Base in Goldsboro, North Carolina for hammering on an F15 nuclear fighter bomber in an effort to "beat swords in plowshares," according to the biblical vision of the prophet Isaiah. Along with activist Philip Berrigan, he spent eight months in North Carolina county jails. Dear has been arrested over seventy-five times in acts of nonviolent civil disobedience for peace, and has organized hundreds of demonstrations against war and nuclear weapons at military bases across the country, as well as worked with Mother Theresa and others to stop the death penalty."
* FROM: Ken(11/02/06)
SUBJECT: RE: seminary students, clergy, arrest?
I agree with AnnMarie. I believe we have an obligation as Christians to take a stance. All that is necessary for evil to exist is that good men do nothing. However, Christ did choose his time and place to complete his mission. Remember there were times that he just vanished from the crowd.
* FROM: Christal(11/02/06)
SUBJECT: RE: seminary students, clergy, arrest?
I agree with the replies that have been posted. As a young African American women, I am where I am because of protest...If Rosa Parks gave up her seat...could I freely sit anywhere on the CTA...If there were no sit-its..could I eat where I wanted to?... I think that civil disobedience is acceptable.
Just my thoughts..
Christal
* FROM: Becky (11/02/06)
SUBJECT: RE: seminary students, clergy, arrest?
I always have to wonder, what will happen to my children if I end up in jail, as a result of my call to action as a person of faith. And when I raised this question with my pastor, she reminded me that I am part of a faith family, we take care of one another. That said, I need to be mindful of the impact on my family. I have no hesitation in stepping forward and engaging in acts of civil disobedience, on behalf of all God's children. I just need lead time to prepare my own children and family for the implications!
Do I see this acceptable today? I see it as necessary. Had I been able, I would have joined the folks who were arrested last year as the protested the immoral Federal Budget of our country.
Let's please keep in mind that the best way to move folks from apathy to interest is to give them an authentic connection to people willing to take action, raise voices, and take risks. And remember that we are a few generations removed from the impact of the Civil Rights movement. When I showed the video of the Children's March , provided to our church through "Teaching Tolerance," a project of the Southern Poverty Law Center, in a Sunday School class, most of the students had not been exposed to this part of our country's history.
Tuesday, October 31, 2006
On Memorializing Well
[submitted as op-ed for class]
It is not, in my opinion, a tragedy that we have not gotten around to building a monument at the site of the Twin Towers, even if it has been now over five years since the attacks. It is not only the recent discovery of additional human remains at the site that leads me to say so.
Nor is the “bickering,” as Reuters puts it (October 26) over funding, security issues, and design, which has delayed plans, terribly troubling to me. I say this, because I believe it is good not to build permanent memorials too soon.
Building a memorial is a process of reconciliation; it is a ritual of choosing how we will remember what has happened, and how we will move forward faithfully. Bob Schreiter, an expert in the field of post-conflict reconciliation, teaches that we cannot start the process of reconciliation until the violence stops. Right now the violence is far worse than it was five years ago. Our soldiers continue to come home in boxes, and the Middle East continues to bleed. Our war is not yet over. And, our internal battles about the war we are waging outside are not over, either.
Right now, we are still concerned about how we will win. Or, if that moment has passed for some, how we can exit this mess without losing face any more than we have. However, we haven't talked quite as much as how we will live with our neighbors into the future. We cannot eradicate our 'enemies,' and our attempts to do so only increase the number of real threats that we have. In reality, they will still be here, and so will we. Yet, 'winning,' and 'losing,' are not the vocabulary of a hopeful future life together. For this we have to look beyond our present discourse.
We have spoken these past five years of the desire for and importance of freedom. The old theological question asks, 'freedom from what, and for what?' We would like to be free from fear, and free from pain. We say we want to be free to live our lives. Granted, for most of us in this country, the particulars of our daily lives have returned to normal.
Yet what kind of lives do we seek to lead? How shall we move forward in a way that does not neglect our dead, but does not entrench us in hatred? Knowing we cannot return to the times before, how will we learn to allow life to continue?
I believe that a monument built too soon, even if it is to be called the 'Freedom Tower,' will imprison us in our own shortsightedness. We may find ourselves stuck forever in the language of 'The evilness of Them and the purity of Us.' A monument built too soon may simply become a national sore spot, regardless of design; over unresolved divisions, or even holding us hostage to one narrow way of remembering this recent and still unfolding history.
Before we progress with this monument, I suggest we need a little freedom from the emotions of the moment; a freedom to look forward toward the kind of world we want our children to have. I believe this is a life not mired in unending war and cycles of revenge.
How then do we best memorialize such an event? How do we mourn our dead, set our eyes forward, and speak hope into the future? I believe the path that will bring authentic freedom for us will be one that acknowledges our own human capacity for evil, and the Other's human capacity for good. It will be the one that affirms the universal desire for peace and works for systematic justice; a path that offers safety and security to the Other as well as for us. These are the foundation on which reconciliation is built.
To do reconciliation on a national scale, requires a national will. It takes time to develop another way of remembering, one that recognizes the full humanity of the Other, beyond the moments of injury which have been done to us. We are not there yet. We have not entered a spirit for rebuilding and restoring. In our public discourse and in our military actions, we are still fueling the fires of war.
It is not, in my opinion, a tragedy that we have not gotten around to building a monument at the site of the Twin Towers, even if it has been now over five years since the attacks. It is not only the recent discovery of additional human remains at the site that leads me to say so.
Nor is the “bickering,” as Reuters puts it (October 26) over funding, security issues, and design, which has delayed plans, terribly troubling to me. I say this, because I believe it is good not to build permanent memorials too soon.
Building a memorial is a process of reconciliation; it is a ritual of choosing how we will remember what has happened, and how we will move forward faithfully. Bob Schreiter, an expert in the field of post-conflict reconciliation, teaches that we cannot start the process of reconciliation until the violence stops. Right now the violence is far worse than it was five years ago. Our soldiers continue to come home in boxes, and the Middle East continues to bleed. Our war is not yet over. And, our internal battles about the war we are waging outside are not over, either.
Right now, we are still concerned about how we will win. Or, if that moment has passed for some, how we can exit this mess without losing face any more than we have. However, we haven't talked quite as much as how we will live with our neighbors into the future. We cannot eradicate our 'enemies,' and our attempts to do so only increase the number of real threats that we have. In reality, they will still be here, and so will we. Yet, 'winning,' and 'losing,' are not the vocabulary of a hopeful future life together. For this we have to look beyond our present discourse.
We have spoken these past five years of the desire for and importance of freedom. The old theological question asks, 'freedom from what, and for what?' We would like to be free from fear, and free from pain. We say we want to be free to live our lives. Granted, for most of us in this country, the particulars of our daily lives have returned to normal.
Yet what kind of lives do we seek to lead? How shall we move forward in a way that does not neglect our dead, but does not entrench us in hatred? Knowing we cannot return to the times before, how will we learn to allow life to continue?
I believe that a monument built too soon, even if it is to be called the 'Freedom Tower,' will imprison us in our own shortsightedness. We may find ourselves stuck forever in the language of 'The evilness of Them and the purity of Us.' A monument built too soon may simply become a national sore spot, regardless of design; over unresolved divisions, or even holding us hostage to one narrow way of remembering this recent and still unfolding history.
Before we progress with this monument, I suggest we need a little freedom from the emotions of the moment; a freedom to look forward toward the kind of world we want our children to have. I believe this is a life not mired in unending war and cycles of revenge.
How then do we best memorialize such an event? How do we mourn our dead, set our eyes forward, and speak hope into the future? I believe the path that will bring authentic freedom for us will be one that acknowledges our own human capacity for evil, and the Other's human capacity for good. It will be the one that affirms the universal desire for peace and works for systematic justice; a path that offers safety and security to the Other as well as for us. These are the foundation on which reconciliation is built.
To do reconciliation on a national scale, requires a national will. It takes time to develop another way of remembering, one that recognizes the full humanity of the Other, beyond the moments of injury which have been done to us. We are not there yet. We have not entered a spirit for rebuilding and restoring. In our public discourse and in our military actions, we are still fueling the fires of war.
Sunday, October 29, 2006
Why Still Go to Iran?
I received a tempting invitation this afternoon, to join one of the peace delegations being organized to Iran. I’d go in a heartbeat, although I might check that by my professors expecting me to be in class certain times of the year. And it takes some work to do the fundraising, this also is true. Still, Iran has been a destination important to me these past few years, since Bush labeled it part of the Axis of Evil. (And let us not forget North Korea; but I’ve only seen a trip to the South. And my Persian is better than my Korean, but I digress).
I have been thinking of the amount of time it took for us to build up to a war with Iraq; after we took relatively little time to build up to a war in Afghanistan. Would our nation dare try to invade yet another country, Iran or North Korea? Is there enough time left in Bush’s term for him to take such a step? Would he try?
I want to say Bush couldn't pull it off anymore, but I also don’t want to get too comfortable. And sometimes I wonder if the current scandals in the Republican party are taking up the energy they would have put towards sending us into another war. And then sometimes even yet I wonder those scandals and the party’s weaknesses are all that are holding us back from more war.
What though, is our duty in preventing another war, which perhaps may never come? I wonder if we are not a tired peace movement that needs more excitement in order to find its adrenaline of three and four years ago. (Lord knows I could use a little adrenaline, a little outrage, to fuel my own writing these days…)
I do believe that even in this interim, in the uncertainty, that our work is in building bridges, making connections, revealing the human face of the ‘Other’ to those closer to home and more familiar to us: our neighbors, churches, and schools. There are so few of us with first-hand experience of these countries; it is too easy for us to dismiss these anonymous millions. The peace movement can get busy learning languages, buying plane tickets, making friends, taking pictures, giving presentations, and writing articles. And all the meanwhile pounding down the doors of our lawmakers.
I saw a t-shirt in the Northern Sun catalog (northernsun.com) this past week: “I’m already against the next war.” Indeed, wherever it may be and whenever it may come.
I have been thinking of the amount of time it took for us to build up to a war with Iraq; after we took relatively little time to build up to a war in Afghanistan. Would our nation dare try to invade yet another country, Iran or North Korea? Is there enough time left in Bush’s term for him to take such a step? Would he try?
I want to say Bush couldn't pull it off anymore, but I also don’t want to get too comfortable. And sometimes I wonder if the current scandals in the Republican party are taking up the energy they would have put towards sending us into another war. And then sometimes even yet I wonder those scandals and the party’s weaknesses are all that are holding us back from more war.
What though, is our duty in preventing another war, which perhaps may never come? I wonder if we are not a tired peace movement that needs more excitement in order to find its adrenaline of three and four years ago. (Lord knows I could use a little adrenaline, a little outrage, to fuel my own writing these days…)
I do believe that even in this interim, in the uncertainty, that our work is in building bridges, making connections, revealing the human face of the ‘Other’ to those closer to home and more familiar to us: our neighbors, churches, and schools. There are so few of us with first-hand experience of these countries; it is too easy for us to dismiss these anonymous millions. The peace movement can get busy learning languages, buying plane tickets, making friends, taking pictures, giving presentations, and writing articles. And all the meanwhile pounding down the doors of our lawmakers.
I saw a t-shirt in the Northern Sun catalog (northernsun.com) this past week: “I’m already against the next war.” Indeed, wherever it may be and whenever it may come.
Luxuries We Cannot Afford
By chance, I ran into a dear former professor of mine, on the day his most recent book was published. We had a few moments to catch up; in a few short months we’ve found ourselves in entirely different worlds.
He wondered how I even happened to be in the neighborhood since I was so rarely there anymore; I responded humbly that I was meeting with my own volunteer editor, in hopes of getting my writings from Iraq published. He mentioned that the market may be saturated already.
I wonder if it is. It’s true, I’ve waited a while before pulling things together; although I don’t think anyone’s written anything like mine. Or, perhaps the bigger question is, are we ‘saturated’ with Iraq? Have we heard so much about it we can’t bear to think of it anymore? And can we afford the luxury of not thinking about it anymore?
Recently Rick Ufford-Chase was here to visit, having recently completed his term as Moderator of the Presbyterian Church (PCUSA). He is now director of the Presbyterian Peace Fellowship, and focusing efforts on direct accompaniment human rights work in Colombia, and possibly now the Philippines. He said to us, “Being overwhelmed is a luxury the world cannot afford.” This must remain true for us. As we insulate ourselves further from frustrating news and retreat into our comfortable homes and lives, the world dies around us, often through methods we quietly fund through our own tax dollars.
Jesus told us about the repulsivity of those who were neither hot nor cold but lukewarm: too comfortable to care; disengaged almost entirely.
Bruce Cockburn sings, “When you think you’ve lost the difference between right and wrong, just go down/where the death squads live.”
The death squads are in Iraq now; we helped them to be there. And death squads are all too often a U.S.-originated weapon of choice throughout the world.
He wondered how I even happened to be in the neighborhood since I was so rarely there anymore; I responded humbly that I was meeting with my own volunteer editor, in hopes of getting my writings from Iraq published. He mentioned that the market may be saturated already.
I wonder if it is. It’s true, I’ve waited a while before pulling things together; although I don’t think anyone’s written anything like mine. Or, perhaps the bigger question is, are we ‘saturated’ with Iraq? Have we heard so much about it we can’t bear to think of it anymore? And can we afford the luxury of not thinking about it anymore?
Recently Rick Ufford-Chase was here to visit, having recently completed his term as Moderator of the Presbyterian Church (PCUSA). He is now director of the Presbyterian Peace Fellowship, and focusing efforts on direct accompaniment human rights work in Colombia, and possibly now the Philippines. He said to us, “Being overwhelmed is a luxury the world cannot afford.” This must remain true for us. As we insulate ourselves further from frustrating news and retreat into our comfortable homes and lives, the world dies around us, often through methods we quietly fund through our own tax dollars.
Jesus told us about the repulsivity of those who were neither hot nor cold but lukewarm: too comfortable to care; disengaged almost entirely.
Bruce Cockburn sings, “When you think you’ve lost the difference between right and wrong, just go down/where the death squads live.”
The death squads are in Iraq now; we helped them to be there. And death squads are all too often a U.S.-originated weapon of choice throughout the world.
Saturday, October 21, 2006
"An Entire Army of Potential Terrorists"
The following is excerpted from NPR this past week, on the assassination of Russian journalist Anna Politkovskaya. This is a reading of her final article, left unfinished:
http://guide.real.com/dir/news/world/12035075_a_russian_journalist's_final_story.html
The story she was writing is haunting as it is blunt. She was investigating the treatment of suspected Chechen rebels by the Russian government, in images that will strike us as all too familiar in human rights reports covering our own U.S. government's treatment of Arab and Muslim detainees:
"...subject to humiliation of their human dignity,"
"..on basis of their ethnicity; not allowed out of solitary confinement.."
The conclusions she came to should also have a familiar tone for us:
"They have produced more people who wanted to take revenge, i.e., potential terrorists."
"...an entire army that will return to us with warped lives and warped notions."
How often have I heard it said, or even have thought it myself, that our ‘pre-emptive’ tortures are only creating more people with reasons to hate us and seek revenge against us?
Tens of thousands of Iraqi young men, from young teens to retirement aged men, languish in our numerous desert prison camps, in Iraq, in Afghanistan, and beyond. They are subjected to the daily humiliations of prison camp life, and without access to legal representation, judicial processes, or often, even to letting their families know they are still alive, being held months and now years on end (www.cpt.org; www.hrw.org). Tens of thousands of men with very legitimate reasons to hate us…forget the madrasas; we’ve created our own terrorist training camps, enough to keep us in a senseless war for eternity.
http://guide.real.com/dir/news/world/12035075_a_russian_journalist's_final_story.html
The story she was writing is haunting as it is blunt. She was investigating the treatment of suspected Chechen rebels by the Russian government, in images that will strike us as all too familiar in human rights reports covering our own U.S. government's treatment of Arab and Muslim detainees:
"...subject to humiliation of their human dignity,"
"..on basis of their ethnicity; not allowed out of solitary confinement.."
The conclusions she came to should also have a familiar tone for us:
"They have produced more people who wanted to take revenge, i.e., potential terrorists."
"...an entire army that will return to us with warped lives and warped notions."
How often have I heard it said, or even have thought it myself, that our ‘pre-emptive’ tortures are only creating more people with reasons to hate us and seek revenge against us?
Tens of thousands of Iraqi young men, from young teens to retirement aged men, languish in our numerous desert prison camps, in Iraq, in Afghanistan, and beyond. They are subjected to the daily humiliations of prison camp life, and without access to legal representation, judicial processes, or often, even to letting their families know they are still alive, being held months and now years on end (www.cpt.org; www.hrw.org). Tens of thousands of men with very legitimate reasons to hate us…forget the madrasas; we’ve created our own terrorist training camps, enough to keep us in a senseless war for eternity.
Thursday, October 12, 2006
More Marginalized Than Thou
In class tonight, a discussion began on the status of GLBTQ (gay, lesbian, bisexual, transgendered, and questioning/queer) people and why they should be concerned about torture, because both groups have experienced humiliation and oppression. I wholeheartedly agree.
At my former school one of our community dynamics was "my marginalization is greater than yours" and we couldn't move forward because we were too busy tearing each other down and competing for space at the table. Faculty and administration were just as guilty as students at playing this go-nowhere game, and it interfered with the dialogue that needed to happen to reduce the margninalization of all groups in that place. I really think the opposite has to happen: I in my marginalization and you in your marginalization now have something in common. Maybe we don't go so far as to 'worship our wounds' (as Dr. Moore would say), but we see the need to work together to restore a more just and reconciled order that recognizes the abundance of room to be.
Similarly, in keeping us activists from burning out, maybe I can't organize on every issue, but 'I can show up to your rally if you show to mine. '
At my former school one of our community dynamics was "my marginalization is greater than yours" and we couldn't move forward because we were too busy tearing each other down and competing for space at the table. Faculty and administration were just as guilty as students at playing this go-nowhere game, and it interfered with the dialogue that needed to happen to reduce the margninalization of all groups in that place. I really think the opposite has to happen: I in my marginalization and you in your marginalization now have something in common. Maybe we don't go so far as to 'worship our wounds' (as Dr. Moore would say), but we see the need to work together to restore a more just and reconciled order that recognizes the abundance of room to be.
Similarly, in keeping us activists from burning out, maybe I can't organize on every issue, but 'I can show up to your rally if you show to mine. '
Monday, October 09, 2006
Torture and Theodicy
(I wrote this tonight after the lecture in my class on Reconciliation at Catholic Theological Union, in which we discussed a common cry of those being tortured or subjected to extreme trauma. The emphasis which must be made is that even the most devout people, when subjected to this kind of suffering, will say that God was not there; not that they merely felt blinded to God's presence. Rather, it is the feeling of being utterly absent, isolated, alone.)
Torture and Theodicy
October 9, 2006
“In the darkest night of torture,
God was not there.”
Where did God go?
It is true, that
Sometimes evil gains the upper hand.
This we cannot deny.
Torn out of homes
Disappeared
In the middle of the night
On every continent
Those to whom we cry,
“Mother!” “Father!”
Are no longer there with us
a comfort
but separated by miles, chains, soldiers, fences, and walls
and the things that happen within.
In that moment,
Evil reigns.
When electrodes are fitted
To the body
Or water forced into lungs
And politely explained away to the public, then
Evil is reigning.
But, not forever.
For even like family
Who, though ripped from us
Still love us;
Even when the fullness of evil
Rips us from God,
Our Mother-Father
Will not stop loving us
Watching, waiting
Holding vigil
Agonizing
In that moment
When we find ourselves utterly alone,
abandoned
Like Christ, the Abandoned One before us
Who cried,
"My God, My God
Why have you forsaken me?"
Alone to die;
and God in God's own despair
tore the Temple curtain
and blocked the sun itself.
Hours of torture until death;
Still this was not the end:
God found a last Word
a restoration
a Resurrection
even if the scars still showed
And so I believe
Even if we are to die
We will be reunited
Even if we share
In the same dreadful Death
As the Tortured Christ
We will be reunited
At the last.
Torture and Theodicy
October 9, 2006
“In the darkest night of torture,
God was not there.”
Where did God go?
It is true, that
Sometimes evil gains the upper hand.
This we cannot deny.
Torn out of homes
Disappeared
In the middle of the night
On every continent
Those to whom we cry,
“Mother!” “Father!”
Are no longer there with us
a comfort
but separated by miles, chains, soldiers, fences, and walls
and the things that happen within.
In that moment,
Evil reigns.
When electrodes are fitted
To the body
Or water forced into lungs
And politely explained away to the public, then
Evil is reigning.
But, not forever.
For even like family
Who, though ripped from us
Still love us;
Even when the fullness of evil
Rips us from God,
Our Mother-Father
Will not stop loving us
Watching, waiting
Holding vigil
Agonizing
In that moment
When we find ourselves utterly alone,
abandoned
Like Christ, the Abandoned One before us
Who cried,
"My God, My God
Why have you forsaken me?"
Alone to die;
and God in God's own despair
tore the Temple curtain
and blocked the sun itself.
Hours of torture until death;
Still this was not the end:
God found a last Word
a restoration
a Resurrection
even if the scars still showed
And so I believe
Even if we are to die
We will be reunited
Even if we share
In the same dreadful Death
As the Tortured Christ
We will be reunited
At the last.
Friday, October 06, 2006
Beyond Theological Tourism
So I came across, and read, the book 'Beyond Theological Tourism,' edited by Dr. Thistlethwaite. I found it exciting, but it also left me a little bit sad.
I was so excited because the premise of the book was that professors and students traveled to several places throughout the world to learn about the troubling realities of our global neighbors, then returned to engage in activism with troubling realities closer to home. After all, it all connects. Folks who witnessed child sex workers overseas came home to work with at the Kovler center for treatment of torture survivors here, or in battered women's shelters, and so on. Then they wrote about the experience. For the time in which it was written, it seems pretty revolutionary.
Still, I said, it made me sad. I wonder if this was not an era of initial enthusiasm in seminary education that already has passed. There seem to be so few opportunities like this available for seminarians on the whole, that are truly affirmed and promoted by the schools. Living among the seminaries in Hyde Park, I know that it is really hard to do say, a semester abroad, and the options available for January terms seem rather limited. It also troubles me that so few students who enter the Hyde Park seminaries actually engage in the realities of the City. Speaking of the six seminaries in this area as a group, it seems that far more often students are shuffled off to 'safe' white neighborhoods in the suburbs to do their practicum work. Meanwhile, most are warned not to explore, let alone set foot in, the distressed neighborhoods surrounding our island of wealth and 'security.' And generally, students need to wait until their second year, a crazy busy year, before the seminaries have programming available to support their entry into cross-cultural ministry settings.
I do take hope in the programs that CTS has, between DEPTH and the Center for Community Transformation (CCT), which certainly attracted me to the campus; although I am a little concerned that I need a PCUSA site to complete my denominational requirements. There is a nearby Presbyterian church, but it's not part of the program, and neither is the Woodlawn neighborhood immediately to our south, which I've spent some time in and really care about. So, dunno, what's a seminarian to do?
And I have to cautiously critique that even for a seminary that markets itself as activist and progressive, we talk a good globalization, social justice talk in the classroom, but beyond the confines of these limited-access programs, it's hard for me to see how students and faculty together are really walking all that talk.
By comparison, the undergraduate Lutheran school I attended had about the same number as all our Hyde Park seminaries combined; our professors in the religion department taught us during the regular terms, supported us in our social justice organizing, and traveled with us on spring break service trips and May Terms alike. And our school had more offerings for May Term cross-cultural immersions than all of these seminaries combined. And our college was not unlike many other private liberal arts colleges across the country; and our lives were no less busy than they are now. Wartburg had an ethos of hands-on servant leadership that seminaries mostly don't seem to quite get, not even my newly beloved CTS.
Meanwhile, I have been working on a project and want to take the next steps. What has been an informal network of friends, (in which I function as I wander the various campuses to introduce as many to each other as possible), could be so much bigger. What if students from all the seminaries here started working together to gain just such an education, globally and locally? What if we as students forged the relationships needed to help us learn from Woodlawn? Or the rest of the world?
www.seminaryaction.org is the site I started last spring, and now that I'm getting settled in at my new school well enough I'm also finding the courage to move it forward. And yes, dear friends, there will also be a student newspaper...
I was so excited because the premise of the book was that professors and students traveled to several places throughout the world to learn about the troubling realities of our global neighbors, then returned to engage in activism with troubling realities closer to home. After all, it all connects. Folks who witnessed child sex workers overseas came home to work with at the Kovler center for treatment of torture survivors here, or in battered women's shelters, and so on. Then they wrote about the experience. For the time in which it was written, it seems pretty revolutionary.
Still, I said, it made me sad. I wonder if this was not an era of initial enthusiasm in seminary education that already has passed. There seem to be so few opportunities like this available for seminarians on the whole, that are truly affirmed and promoted by the schools. Living among the seminaries in Hyde Park, I know that it is really hard to do say, a semester abroad, and the options available for January terms seem rather limited. It also troubles me that so few students who enter the Hyde Park seminaries actually engage in the realities of the City. Speaking of the six seminaries in this area as a group, it seems that far more often students are shuffled off to 'safe' white neighborhoods in the suburbs to do their practicum work. Meanwhile, most are warned not to explore, let alone set foot in, the distressed neighborhoods surrounding our island of wealth and 'security.' And generally, students need to wait until their second year, a crazy busy year, before the seminaries have programming available to support their entry into cross-cultural ministry settings.
I do take hope in the programs that CTS has, between DEPTH and the Center for Community Transformation (CCT), which certainly attracted me to the campus; although I am a little concerned that I need a PCUSA site to complete my denominational requirements. There is a nearby Presbyterian church, but it's not part of the program, and neither is the Woodlawn neighborhood immediately to our south, which I've spent some time in and really care about. So, dunno, what's a seminarian to do?
And I have to cautiously critique that even for a seminary that markets itself as activist and progressive, we talk a good globalization, social justice talk in the classroom, but beyond the confines of these limited-access programs, it's hard for me to see how students and faculty together are really walking all that talk.
By comparison, the undergraduate Lutheran school I attended had about the same number as all our Hyde Park seminaries combined; our professors in the religion department taught us during the regular terms, supported us in our social justice organizing, and traveled with us on spring break service trips and May Terms alike. And our school had more offerings for May Term cross-cultural immersions than all of these seminaries combined. And our college was not unlike many other private liberal arts colleges across the country; and our lives were no less busy than they are now. Wartburg had an ethos of hands-on servant leadership that seminaries mostly don't seem to quite get, not even my newly beloved CTS.
Meanwhile, I have been working on a project and want to take the next steps. What has been an informal network of friends, (in which I function as I wander the various campuses to introduce as many to each other as possible), could be so much bigger. What if students from all the seminaries here started working together to gain just such an education, globally and locally? What if we as students forged the relationships needed to help us learn from Woodlawn? Or the rest of the world?
www.seminaryaction.org is the site I started last spring, and now that I'm getting settled in at my new school well enough I'm also finding the courage to move it forward. And yes, dear friends, there will also be a student newspaper...
The Practice of Enemy-Loving
A friend posed the question of what loving one's enemies meant in the context of human rights violations, or abuses of any kind.
I struggle with this issue incredibly. In fact, I do in the more painful parts of my life have a few enemies that I continue to try and figure out how to deal with.
But, at this moment, this is where I am:
Remember the bumper sticker that says, "When Jesus said, 'Love your enemies,' I think he probably meant don't kill them." (It's a good song well capitalized on by the Quakers--the FCNL has come out with some of the best peace paraphernalia lately anyway)
but I digress. I got to thinking:
I cannot say 'I love you' and kill you.
I cannot say 'I love you' and seek vengeance against you.
I cannot say 'I love you' and seek to destroy your life.
I cannot say 'I love you' and seek dominance over you.
However,
I can say 'I love you' and report you.
I can say 'I love you' and ask you to be accountable for your actions.
I can say 'I love you' and that I will not be silent.
I can say 'I love you' and seek your transformation, and mine, past the injury into a more hopeful future--even if I cannot in my current hurt imagine what that future may be.
I struggle with this issue incredibly. In fact, I do in the more painful parts of my life have a few enemies that I continue to try and figure out how to deal with.
But, at this moment, this is where I am:
Remember the bumper sticker that says, "When Jesus said, 'Love your enemies,' I think he probably meant don't kill them." (It's a good song well capitalized on by the Quakers--the FCNL has come out with some of the best peace paraphernalia lately anyway)
but I digress. I got to thinking:
I cannot say 'I love you' and kill you.
I cannot say 'I love you' and seek vengeance against you.
I cannot say 'I love you' and seek to destroy your life.
I cannot say 'I love you' and seek dominance over you.
However,
I can say 'I love you' and report you.
I can say 'I love you' and ask you to be accountable for your actions.
I can say 'I love you' and that I will not be silent.
I can say 'I love you' and seek your transformation, and mine, past the injury into a more hopeful future--even if I cannot in my current hurt imagine what that future may be.
On coping with an atmosphere of torture
Our professor asked me this week how I was coping in my classes, just after I said I spent half my week absorbed in the study of torture and its impact on the human psyche. Three of my five classes address the issue: Ministry to Survivors of Human Rights Abuses; Reconciliation (these two at Catholic Theological Union) and Public Theology at CTS, through which I now try to blog intelligently and more frequently.
I answered partially, by saying that to cope with the intensity of this ongoing discussion, I have invested far more time in my friendships and connections with others. These images and stories are not ones to be left with in isolation. This makes a certain amount of sense; since torture is all about the destructive power of isolation.
The other two classes I'm in, on pastoral care and counseling, do much to keep me going through the semester. I think in any good pastoral care class, or any good counseling class, even a little healing will rub off on you in the course of study.
I also write. I've been writing volumes ever since I went to Palestine, if only to keep experiences from playing continuously in my mind. And also to remind myself of the good, all the beautiful experiences in between moments of grisly human rights abuses.
'Secondary trauma is a phenomenon only recently discussed among aid workers and activists who work in places of intense suffering. A few short years ago, the belief was if you had enough faith, you could get through it; and to need treatment for PTSD, or even breaks for your own balance, was a sign of weakness. While this attitude still persists in places, I am glad for the change.
I've been aware for a while now, that I may not be able to go back to direct human rights work for much longer in the future. I may well have absorbed enough in the four years I was doing it--and there was a lot. Recruiting for more new human rights workers is getting easier in our global society; however, I think there is a severe need for pastoral caregivers attending especially to the workers in these places--trained in PTSD treatment as well as spiritual counseling. I notice the stirrings of energy and vision for this type of work; energy that I find hard to muster in many other situations. And this, really, is how I cope.
I answered partially, by saying that to cope with the intensity of this ongoing discussion, I have invested far more time in my friendships and connections with others. These images and stories are not ones to be left with in isolation. This makes a certain amount of sense; since torture is all about the destructive power of isolation.
The other two classes I'm in, on pastoral care and counseling, do much to keep me going through the semester. I think in any good pastoral care class, or any good counseling class, even a little healing will rub off on you in the course of study.
I also write. I've been writing volumes ever since I went to Palestine, if only to keep experiences from playing continuously in my mind. And also to remind myself of the good, all the beautiful experiences in between moments of grisly human rights abuses.
'Secondary trauma is a phenomenon only recently discussed among aid workers and activists who work in places of intense suffering. A few short years ago, the belief was if you had enough faith, you could get through it; and to need treatment for PTSD, or even breaks for your own balance, was a sign of weakness. While this attitude still persists in places, I am glad for the change.
I've been aware for a while now, that I may not be able to go back to direct human rights work for much longer in the future. I may well have absorbed enough in the four years I was doing it--and there was a lot. Recruiting for more new human rights workers is getting easier in our global society; however, I think there is a severe need for pastoral caregivers attending especially to the workers in these places--trained in PTSD treatment as well as spiritual counseling. I notice the stirrings of energy and vision for this type of work; energy that I find hard to muster in many other situations. And this, really, is how I cope.
Thursday, September 28, 2006
The Angst of Perceived Inadequacy
I confessed to my Public Theology class tonight the angst which I've experienced lately about writing well now on topics I've handled courageously enough before:
As I've gotten going with much enthusiasm for writing specifically for this class, to hone my skills as a 'public theologian,' staying in tune with the torture debate and other issues close to my heart, regularly tuning in to NPR, etc., I have to confess a certain amount of angst, or at least feeling very inferior to the task: What have I really to offer? For example, maybe the guy on NPR just said everything I might have thought of to say, and said it better than I could, and just got heard by a couple million people. Who am I by comparison? If the goal is to 'be witty, be brief, and be seated,' (good advice always), should I get up and talk for what can seem like the sake of talking? Dare I contribute to the information overload and endanger tuning out ever more people? Sometimes even liberal/progressive activism feels like a (somewhat meaningless) rat race.
Since I don't want to depress the entire class (or all activists), I also want to say I didn't always feel this way. When I was living and traveling in the Middle East, I knew I was seeing first hand what others were not seeing and what the media was not reporting. I had a very strong sense of mission there to communicate in any way I knew how. Since coming back however, where I am 'just another seminary student,' I really struggle to know how I can be helpful. It sometimes seems like, what do I know now that others don't know?
Yet, I signed up for this class because I wanted to learn how to overcome these feelings and personal issues, and to be helpful to the healing of the world from where I am and what little I have to offer.
As I've gotten going with much enthusiasm for writing specifically for this class, to hone my skills as a 'public theologian,' staying in tune with the torture debate and other issues close to my heart, regularly tuning in to NPR, etc., I have to confess a certain amount of angst, or at least feeling very inferior to the task: What have I really to offer? For example, maybe the guy on NPR just said everything I might have thought of to say, and said it better than I could, and just got heard by a couple million people. Who am I by comparison? If the goal is to 'be witty, be brief, and be seated,' (good advice always), should I get up and talk for what can seem like the sake of talking? Dare I contribute to the information overload and endanger tuning out ever more people? Sometimes even liberal/progressive activism feels like a (somewhat meaningless) rat race.
Since I don't want to depress the entire class (or all activists), I also want to say I didn't always feel this way. When I was living and traveling in the Middle East, I knew I was seeing first hand what others were not seeing and what the media was not reporting. I had a very strong sense of mission there to communicate in any way I knew how. Since coming back however, where I am 'just another seminary student,' I really struggle to know how I can be helpful. It sometimes seems like, what do I know now that others don't know?
Yet, I signed up for this class because I wanted to learn how to overcome these feelings and personal issues, and to be helpful to the healing of the world from where I am and what little I have to offer.
Monday, September 11, 2006
Rainy Sept.11 in Chicago
Greetings friends,
It is a rainy Monday in Chicago, which I started early listening to the September 11 memorial coverage on NPR. They have done well today speaking about both grief and loss as well as possibilities beyond revenge; and the additional tragedies of having gone so quickly into a war that after several years has no good end in sight.
It is a day where I look forward to starting my class tonight on ministering to the survivors of human rights abuses, taught at Catholic Theological Union a few blocks away. It's a very popular course, taught by a former missionary in South Africa. However, the reading will be very emotionally exhausting, I've already seen. My other courses are at CTS, in pastoral care, psychopathology in theological perspective, and public theology (or, how to write about religion for the public media).
Most of my ponderings the last several days as I crack the books open again, are thinking about ethics in religious leadership and why we don't make it a point of studying the whole person. What I mean by this is, we study the personal lives of some theologians and leaders but not others. Anton Boisen, for example, is the person who decided seminary students needed to have practical experience ministering to the sick, in hospital wards, and especially in mental health centers. He himself was a seminary professor and writer, who expereienced several bouts of schizophrenia during his lifetime. So, one doesn't really study Boisen without also talking about how his illness and experience of being a mental patient and also being feared/stereotyped affected his work. Meanwhile, we are studying Paul Tillich, who was a prominent theologian in the past century but also had a reputation for sleeping with his students and getting himself into similar forms of trouble personally. However, you don't study that or how it affected his writing (which as I read it seems to me it did) when you study Tillich. So, one professor will simply say he hates Tillich and another will worship the man, and neither will really go in-depth to discuss this with students for any helpful formational end. One professor I raised this question with said he thought such questions were ad hominem attacks and shouldn't be used to dismiss his contributions to society.
I gently disagreed. I think it's instead a lot like studying your own family tree: when you learn the stories and the patterns for what they really were (good and bad), you can start making better decisions about the future, knowing where your potential downfalls lie. And when we look respectfully and honestly at leaders, we learn from them rather than turning them into idols for our mindless consumption. It seems important for ethical leadership at all levels of the church, I think. So, that is my two cents for the day.
It is a rainy Monday in Chicago, which I started early listening to the September 11 memorial coverage on NPR. They have done well today speaking about both grief and loss as well as possibilities beyond revenge; and the additional tragedies of having gone so quickly into a war that after several years has no good end in sight.
It is a day where I look forward to starting my class tonight on ministering to the survivors of human rights abuses, taught at Catholic Theological Union a few blocks away. It's a very popular course, taught by a former missionary in South Africa. However, the reading will be very emotionally exhausting, I've already seen. My other courses are at CTS, in pastoral care, psychopathology in theological perspective, and public theology (or, how to write about religion for the public media).
Most of my ponderings the last several days as I crack the books open again, are thinking about ethics in religious leadership and why we don't make it a point of studying the whole person. What I mean by this is, we study the personal lives of some theologians and leaders but not others. Anton Boisen, for example, is the person who decided seminary students needed to have practical experience ministering to the sick, in hospital wards, and especially in mental health centers. He himself was a seminary professor and writer, who expereienced several bouts of schizophrenia during his lifetime. So, one doesn't really study Boisen without also talking about how his illness and experience of being a mental patient and also being feared/stereotyped affected his work. Meanwhile, we are studying Paul Tillich, who was a prominent theologian in the past century but also had a reputation for sleeping with his students and getting himself into similar forms of trouble personally. However, you don't study that or how it affected his writing (which as I read it seems to me it did) when you study Tillich. So, one professor will simply say he hates Tillich and another will worship the man, and neither will really go in-depth to discuss this with students for any helpful formational end. One professor I raised this question with said he thought such questions were ad hominem attacks and shouldn't be used to dismiss his contributions to society.
I gently disagreed. I think it's instead a lot like studying your own family tree: when you learn the stories and the patterns for what they really were (good and bad), you can start making better decisions about the future, knowing where your potential downfalls lie. And when we look respectfully and honestly at leaders, we learn from them rather than turning them into idols for our mindless consumption. It seems important for ethical leadership at all levels of the church, I think. So, that is my two cents for the day.
Monday, July 24, 2006
Lebanon on my Mind
I wake up listening to the NPR reports of the latest dead in this summer war between Hezbollah and Israel, or Israel and Lebanon and Syria and Gaza, or whatever you want to call it.
I listen to the sick justifications of mass destruction and dehumanization of the other that occurs in times of war, and gets broadcast to the world: 'They don't love thir children the way we do. That's why they deserve to die and we do not.' It's an often-repeated line.
I want to throw things at my radio. Or throw the radio. This may be another form of violence begetting violence.
Still that doesn't shut it out, or do really any good at all. As I go through my days in my hometown in Iowa, I hear churchmembers and synagogue members (where I go for interfaith midrash once a month) and even folks at the hospital, some of whom I'm trying to chaplain, saying the same things.
Dehumanization spreads, I realize, and it's on so many people's lips. Even in Iowa.
After a while, it almost becomes convincing.
Yet deeply this is what I still hold on to:
Violence is wrong.
And more violence is more wrong.
And violence against civilians is most wrong of all.
I don't buy the idea that there is 'no such thing as an Arab civilian;' that 'they all hide missiles in their hospitals;' that 'they don't value their lives and families the way we do;' that 'they are all out to get us.' Rather, I think we say that against anyone who becomes our enemy. Haven't we always?
Once again our media has overlooked the disproportionate use of force in this conflict; how many times more Lebanese civilians have been killed in this past month, yet we don't notice this because we are too busy villifying.
Still, that is not a complete answer, either: We need to mourn all who are lost. Mourn Israeli and Lebanese, mourn that most of the Israeli civilians killed are reportedly Palestinian, second-class citizens of Israel from Nazareth. Mourn soldiers as well as civilians. Mourn the senselessness of it all, but do not dismiss the opportunities and the ethical imperatives for peacemaking by dismissing the people themselves involved as 'senseless.'
To do so is to add dehumanizing fuel to the fire.
I listen to the sick justifications of mass destruction and dehumanization of the other that occurs in times of war, and gets broadcast to the world: 'They don't love thir children the way we do. That's why they deserve to die and we do not.' It's an often-repeated line.
I want to throw things at my radio. Or throw the radio. This may be another form of violence begetting violence.
Still that doesn't shut it out, or do really any good at all. As I go through my days in my hometown in Iowa, I hear churchmembers and synagogue members (where I go for interfaith midrash once a month) and even folks at the hospital, some of whom I'm trying to chaplain, saying the same things.
Dehumanization spreads, I realize, and it's on so many people's lips. Even in Iowa.
After a while, it almost becomes convincing.
Yet deeply this is what I still hold on to:
Violence is wrong.
And more violence is more wrong.
And violence against civilians is most wrong of all.
I don't buy the idea that there is 'no such thing as an Arab civilian;' that 'they all hide missiles in their hospitals;' that 'they don't value their lives and families the way we do;' that 'they are all out to get us.' Rather, I think we say that against anyone who becomes our enemy. Haven't we always?
Once again our media has overlooked the disproportionate use of force in this conflict; how many times more Lebanese civilians have been killed in this past month, yet we don't notice this because we are too busy villifying.
Still, that is not a complete answer, either: We need to mourn all who are lost. Mourn Israeli and Lebanese, mourn that most of the Israeli civilians killed are reportedly Palestinian, second-class citizens of Israel from Nazareth. Mourn soldiers as well as civilians. Mourn the senselessness of it all, but do not dismiss the opportunities and the ethical imperatives for peacemaking by dismissing the people themselves involved as 'senseless.'
To do so is to add dehumanizing fuel to the fire.
Saturday, June 17, 2006
Sin: The Great Forgetting
Some of you know that I am now working as a chaplain in a hospital psychiatric ward. This is during the days, and one night per week I stay over at the hospital, on-call, and respond to emergency pages on all the wards (ER, ICU, etc.)
In a brief time, I have learned, or re-learned, a lot about the web of life that surrounds each one of us, the complex relationships that are all affected when something happens to any one of us. When a fatal car accident happens, for example, it is not just the individual that dies, but the family, the friends, and the community. All those fine connecting strings get pulled and many lives are permanently altered.
And that is if everything is going well and healthy in all those relationships. I have already seen what happens when all is not well and the same relationships are strained. A child dies, and the divorced parents haven't even been on speaking terms for years. Who knows how it began, but worlds we try to hard to separately maintain come crashing together, through whatever walls we put up. And perhaps the result can be true reconciliation, or even further destructive pain.
I am thinking quite a bit about the fragility of life these days, and here is a thought:
Sin is the great forgetting.
Forgetting how short our days are on this earth
and how precious other human lives are to us;
as we lash out and grow impatient,
greedy and hateful, vengeful,
and then, all too suddenly,
one of us is lost
and we are jolted
God, shall we ever perfectly remember?
In a brief time, I have learned, or re-learned, a lot about the web of life that surrounds each one of us, the complex relationships that are all affected when something happens to any one of us. When a fatal car accident happens, for example, it is not just the individual that dies, but the family, the friends, and the community. All those fine connecting strings get pulled and many lives are permanently altered.
And that is if everything is going well and healthy in all those relationships. I have already seen what happens when all is not well and the same relationships are strained. A child dies, and the divorced parents haven't even been on speaking terms for years. Who knows how it began, but worlds we try to hard to separately maintain come crashing together, through whatever walls we put up. And perhaps the result can be true reconciliation, or even further destructive pain.
I am thinking quite a bit about the fragility of life these days, and here is a thought:
Sin is the great forgetting.
Forgetting how short our days are on this earth
and how precious other human lives are to us;
as we lash out and grow impatient,
greedy and hateful, vengeful,
and then, all too suddenly,
one of us is lost
and we are jolted
God, shall we ever perfectly remember?
Thursday, June 01, 2006
Could a Human Rights Worker Ever Become a Military Chaplain?
Could a former human rights worker ever become a military chaplain?
Those of you who know me know that I am an entering M.Div. student at Chicago Theological Seminary. After returning from Iraq, I received my MA in Christian- Muslim relations, and I hope to build an interfaith team-based human rights organization. Tom Fox, who was one of the four CPT hostages in Iraq, and who was killed this spring, replaced me on the Christian Peacemaker Team there when I returned to the US to begin seminary studies.
So it was with great interest that I attended CTS' spring Ministerial Institute on "Democracy, Patriotism, Faith: What Is Faithful Witness in a Time of War?" which featured an active military chaplain explaining the appropriateness of his chosen path for leaders in a progressive church body.
I have to say that our speaker had me won over on several valid points:
--that we must be in ministry to the real world, even when it conflicts with who we are;
--that the same people whom we taught as children that God is gracious and merciful need representation of that same God even when they join a military and go to war; and
--that we can't afford to say the military isn't a good place to do ministry because while we liberals are looking down our noses at it, plenty of conservative chaplains are there in our places--and we can't do anything about it unless we become part of it.
So I began to think that even I, as a peacenik and human rights worker, who spent four years in the Middle East (Israel, Palestine, Iraq, Afghanistan), and even spent most of a year in Baghdad investigating prisoner abuses prior to the Abu Ghraib scandal, might do well to consider military chaplaincy. In fact, it wouldn't be so incongruent. In my time with Christian Peacemaker Teams, I found myself providing occasions of pastoral presence to young and frightened soldiers standing at checkpoints. All of us did. I am also reminded that even Reinhold Niebuhr considered doing the same for World War I. And perhaps working from within is the best way to work for peace in these times.
And still, I realized that I myself could not. Not anymore for the reason of disagreeing with this war or disagreeing with military force altogether, but because so much of my life is still dedicated, in present and future years, to the efforts of interfaith and international peacemaking. And that necessitates not just working from within but reaching out in order to build trust where trust is shattered. I realized that were I to engage in roles associated with the U.S. military, even as a chaplain, it would present such a conflict of interest (even if only perceived) that I would not be trusted again in these communities and these roles. At least not in this generation.
So, I can now affirm the worthiness of the call to military chaplaincy and I would no longer discourage a colleague from doing so. I do still see and am deeply concerned for the human and spiritual needs of our soldiers in the field and at home. Perhaps the best way for me to aid those needs is to focus on soldiers returning, using my own first-hand experience of living in war to be a more empathetic ear. And to continue traveling to these countries in my human rights capacity; working in search of a time when I will not have to choose.
Those of you who know me know that I am an entering M.Div. student at Chicago Theological Seminary. After returning from Iraq, I received my MA in Christian- Muslim relations, and I hope to build an interfaith team-based human rights organization. Tom Fox, who was one of the four CPT hostages in Iraq, and who was killed this spring, replaced me on the Christian Peacemaker Team there when I returned to the US to begin seminary studies.
So it was with great interest that I attended CTS' spring Ministerial Institute on "Democracy, Patriotism, Faith: What Is Faithful Witness in a Time of War?" which featured an active military chaplain explaining the appropriateness of his chosen path for leaders in a progressive church body.
I have to say that our speaker had me won over on several valid points:
--that we must be in ministry to the real world, even when it conflicts with who we are;
--that the same people whom we taught as children that God is gracious and merciful need representation of that same God even when they join a military and go to war; and
--that we can't afford to say the military isn't a good place to do ministry because while we liberals are looking down our noses at it, plenty of conservative chaplains are there in our places--and we can't do anything about it unless we become part of it.
So I began to think that even I, as a peacenik and human rights worker, who spent four years in the Middle East (Israel, Palestine, Iraq, Afghanistan), and even spent most of a year in Baghdad investigating prisoner abuses prior to the Abu Ghraib scandal, might do well to consider military chaplaincy. In fact, it wouldn't be so incongruent. In my time with Christian Peacemaker Teams, I found myself providing occasions of pastoral presence to young and frightened soldiers standing at checkpoints. All of us did. I am also reminded that even Reinhold Niebuhr considered doing the same for World War I. And perhaps working from within is the best way to work for peace in these times.
And still, I realized that I myself could not. Not anymore for the reason of disagreeing with this war or disagreeing with military force altogether, but because so much of my life is still dedicated, in present and future years, to the efforts of interfaith and international peacemaking. And that necessitates not just working from within but reaching out in order to build trust where trust is shattered. I realized that were I to engage in roles associated with the U.S. military, even as a chaplain, it would present such a conflict of interest (even if only perceived) that I would not be trusted again in these communities and these roles. At least not in this generation.
So, I can now affirm the worthiness of the call to military chaplaincy and I would no longer discourage a colleague from doing so. I do still see and am deeply concerned for the human and spiritual needs of our soldiers in the field and at home. Perhaps the best way for me to aid those needs is to focus on soldiers returning, using my own first-hand experience of living in war to be a more empathetic ear. And to continue traveling to these countries in my human rights capacity; working in search of a time when I will not have to choose.
Sunday, May 07, 2006
On Having Voice
Joy asked: Do you really think that you do not have a voice?
My response: When it really counts, no, I don’t think that I do.
Being outspoken is not necessarily the same as having a voice. Voice is being heard and having a positive impact on a given situation. There are many barriers to voice; mostly, they are the dangers threatened to one’s own well-being: threat of personal violence or violence against one’s family, of work or housing lost, of reputation destroyed, of education denied, of deportation. The risk for some to speak is greater than for others.
You can have a voice in some spheres but not others. As a white U.S. citizen and as a human rights worker, I clearly had voice when I spoke. I saw that others heard my words and were influenced by them. As a student, or as a future church leader, it is not so clear to me that I have a voice at all.
One great difference I see in my own voice between then and now is that while I was in the Middle East, although I was surrounded by war and violence, I was so rarely the recipient of it. That is quite different from my experiences now.
I have also observed, while in the same role, you can have a voice with some and not others. How many times did I hear from classmates these past two years that I had to keep speaking, not because I was at all effective with the administration, but because my words were life-giving for those who were even more voiceless than I?
That is a difficult role to be in. Although buoyed by the encouragement and care of friends, in trying to speak my truth I found I nearly lost my life. And I have in many ways lost much of my self in these two years, in paying the price for speaking in this context, although I am now finding it coming slowly back as hope returns and some level of freedom is near.
You can be heard enough that people will try their damnedest to silence you. Then your words are having some impact, true, but is it enough? Or is it useless martyrdom?
Still there is that quote from Gandhi: “First they ignore you, then they laugh at you, then they attack you, then you win.” I doubt that this is always true, but it encourages one to go on. It also indicates that once you speak, even if you are attacked, you are compelled to see it through to the end.
I think the key is to not be any more silenced than you have to be. That is, to recognize that while it may be too dangerous for you to speak in some places, there are many more where you have the power and influence to do so, and for good. Those chances and that privilege should not be wasted.
Although I may not have sufficient voice to improve my own situation as a student here and as a participant in my denomination, I still have voice to speak to many on human rights and interfaith work and the loving of one’s international enemies. I have to cultivate that. I may even have more voice than that, and I have to keep testing where the walls of silence lie. And I think I also ought to keep giving voice to pain, insofar as it becomes words of healing and encouragement for others who continue to struggle.
To do otherwise is to be yourself condemned by the voices left to die within.
My response: When it really counts, no, I don’t think that I do.
Being outspoken is not necessarily the same as having a voice. Voice is being heard and having a positive impact on a given situation. There are many barriers to voice; mostly, they are the dangers threatened to one’s own well-being: threat of personal violence or violence against one’s family, of work or housing lost, of reputation destroyed, of education denied, of deportation. The risk for some to speak is greater than for others.
You can have a voice in some spheres but not others. As a white U.S. citizen and as a human rights worker, I clearly had voice when I spoke. I saw that others heard my words and were influenced by them. As a student, or as a future church leader, it is not so clear to me that I have a voice at all.
One great difference I see in my own voice between then and now is that while I was in the Middle East, although I was surrounded by war and violence, I was so rarely the recipient of it. That is quite different from my experiences now.
I have also observed, while in the same role, you can have a voice with some and not others. How many times did I hear from classmates these past two years that I had to keep speaking, not because I was at all effective with the administration, but because my words were life-giving for those who were even more voiceless than I?
That is a difficult role to be in. Although buoyed by the encouragement and care of friends, in trying to speak my truth I found I nearly lost my life. And I have in many ways lost much of my self in these two years, in paying the price for speaking in this context, although I am now finding it coming slowly back as hope returns and some level of freedom is near.
You can be heard enough that people will try their damnedest to silence you. Then your words are having some impact, true, but is it enough? Or is it useless martyrdom?
Still there is that quote from Gandhi: “First they ignore you, then they laugh at you, then they attack you, then you win.” I doubt that this is always true, but it encourages one to go on. It also indicates that once you speak, even if you are attacked, you are compelled to see it through to the end.
I think the key is to not be any more silenced than you have to be. That is, to recognize that while it may be too dangerous for you to speak in some places, there are many more where you have the power and influence to do so, and for good. Those chances and that privilege should not be wasted.
Although I may not have sufficient voice to improve my own situation as a student here and as a participant in my denomination, I still have voice to speak to many on human rights and interfaith work and the loving of one’s international enemies. I have to cultivate that. I may even have more voice than that, and I have to keep testing where the walls of silence lie. And I think I also ought to keep giving voice to pain, insofar as it becomes words of healing and encouragement for others who continue to struggle.
To do otherwise is to be yourself condemned by the voices left to die within.
Tuesday, March 14, 2006
Tom Fox Remembered
Greetings friends,
I was at the Ecumenical Advocacy Days for Global Peace with Justice conference in Washington, DC, this past weekend when I heard the news that Tom Fox's body had been found in Baghdad. I had just turned on CNN while still lying in bed in my hotel room. In some ways, it was what I already knew when Tom was not in the last video released last week. However, the reality did not fully begin sinking in until I saw my friends and former colleagues from Iraq, Quaker representatives Rick MacDowell and Mary Trotochard, later that morning.
It was good, given the circumstances, to be among activists and church people this weekend, folks that understood why a person might wish to go to a place like Iraq, as a living-out of one's faith and a deeper understanding of the costs of discipleship, in which one's life is no longer comfortable and safety is not guaranteed.
Anniversaries and new events this week remind me of the fragility of life and also the imperative of working for peace. It is nearly the third anniversary of our war in Iraq; it is nearly the third anniversary of Rachel Corrie's killing by Israeli forces, followed by the shootings of Tom and Brian (Tom Hurndall died last year after many months in a coma). Today I listened to another colleague from Palestine, Donatella, report on yet other colleagues in Gaza being taken hostage; I do not yet know how many of them I know from my time there.
I do not know yet what all this means for me; I do not know what it means for my life, my future, my vocational call. These are restless days, and I do my best to listen for God's direction.
I was invited to speak a little about Tom yesterday at an interfaith prayer vigil in front of the Capitol. Here is what I said:
Remarks made at the Interfaith Prayer Vigil for Peace in Iraq
Capitol Hill
March 13, 2006
"When I left Baghdad in 2004 to begin seminary studies, Tom Fox took my place there with the Christian Peacemaker Teams. I knew him to be a thoughtful and committed human rights worker who cared deeply for the Iraqi people. In Baghdad, he carried on the work we were doing of documenting and publicizing the human rights abuses taking place under the U.S. occupation.
We grieve and pray now in remembrance of Tom and the family he leaves behind, and we pray for the safe return of Jim, Harmeet, and Norman. At the same time, I ask you to pray for the thousands of Iraqi citizens in our U.S. prison camps, who have no contact with their families, no access to lawyers, and no idea when they will be returned safely home.
We do not seek vengeance against the people who killed Tom, and we believe strongly that further violence benefits no one. Tom was a member of the Quaker tradition, and as such I would like to ask that we observe a moment of silence for this time.
Thank you."
I am including links to two news stories in which I was featured this weekend, one in my local paper and one via Church World Service:
http://www.globegazette.com/articles/2006/03/14/local/doc441658650bb94594421221.txt
http://churchworldservice.org/news/archives/2006/03/419.html
I was at the Ecumenical Advocacy Days for Global Peace with Justice conference in Washington, DC, this past weekend when I heard the news that Tom Fox's body had been found in Baghdad. I had just turned on CNN while still lying in bed in my hotel room. In some ways, it was what I already knew when Tom was not in the last video released last week. However, the reality did not fully begin sinking in until I saw my friends and former colleagues from Iraq, Quaker representatives Rick MacDowell and Mary Trotochard, later that morning.
It was good, given the circumstances, to be among activists and church people this weekend, folks that understood why a person might wish to go to a place like Iraq, as a living-out of one's faith and a deeper understanding of the costs of discipleship, in which one's life is no longer comfortable and safety is not guaranteed.
Anniversaries and new events this week remind me of the fragility of life and also the imperative of working for peace. It is nearly the third anniversary of our war in Iraq; it is nearly the third anniversary of Rachel Corrie's killing by Israeli forces, followed by the shootings of Tom and Brian (Tom Hurndall died last year after many months in a coma). Today I listened to another colleague from Palestine, Donatella, report on yet other colleagues in Gaza being taken hostage; I do not yet know how many of them I know from my time there.
I do not know yet what all this means for me; I do not know what it means for my life, my future, my vocational call. These are restless days, and I do my best to listen for God's direction.
I was invited to speak a little about Tom yesterday at an interfaith prayer vigil in front of the Capitol. Here is what I said:
Remarks made at the Interfaith Prayer Vigil for Peace in Iraq
Capitol Hill
March 13, 2006
"When I left Baghdad in 2004 to begin seminary studies, Tom Fox took my place there with the Christian Peacemaker Teams. I knew him to be a thoughtful and committed human rights worker who cared deeply for the Iraqi people. In Baghdad, he carried on the work we were doing of documenting and publicizing the human rights abuses taking place under the U.S. occupation.
We grieve and pray now in remembrance of Tom and the family he leaves behind, and we pray for the safe return of Jim, Harmeet, and Norman. At the same time, I ask you to pray for the thousands of Iraqi citizens in our U.S. prison camps, who have no contact with their families, no access to lawyers, and no idea when they will be returned safely home.
We do not seek vengeance against the people who killed Tom, and we believe strongly that further violence benefits no one. Tom was a member of the Quaker tradition, and as such I would like to ask that we observe a moment of silence for this time.
Thank you."
I am including links to two news stories in which I was featured this weekend, one in my local paper and one via Church World Service:
http://www.globegazette.com/articles/2006/03/14/local/doc441658650bb94594421221.txt
http://churchworldservice.org/news/archives/2006/03/419.html
Thursday, February 02, 2006
Hamas in Charge--What Does This Mean?
Hamas in Charge—What does this mean?
February 1, 2006
Democracy is breaking out in the Middle East as an oppressed people exercise their right to self-determination and…elect Hamas, a hard-line political party our government can’t stand! Lately, I’ve been fielding plenty of questions on campus regarding Hamas’ overwhelming victory in the Palestinian parliamentary elections. It’s been a few years since I lived there in the thick of things, but I will try to offer a little insight to this situation.
Why were they elected?
I understand Hamas’ victory to be primarily an anti-corruption vote. Fatah, Arafat’s more secular party which has been in power for over a decade, is notorious for pocketing funds designated for infrastructure and relief of its citizens. Meanwhile, Hamas and most Arab political parties function like fraternal organizations or ‘burial societies’ as we used to have them here: If your street is full of potholes, Hamas collects money, hires workers, and fixes your road. If your neighborhood needs a park, they get things together and build it. If your kid is run over by a tank, they pay for the funeral, and so on. They’re fairly efficient at this, and tangible results do lead to political popularity. Curiously enough, each political party maintains its own militia. (Remember Sinn Fein and the IRA?) Usually, the militia is all we hear about here. It’s also curious that many Palestinians reported voting for Abu Mazen to replace Arafat because he was the candidate most favored as a ‘partner for peace’ by Israel and the U.S. As soon as he was elected, both countries changed their stance and the people felt tricked. This time, they weren’t going to make the same mistake.
What about the rhetoric?
Hamas has a reputation for claiming Israel has no right to exist, and for using violence as a method of resisting the military occupation of Palestinian lands. For this reason, the U.S. and other donors are considering withholding aid to Palestine, which keeps civil society afloat, until it renounces both these stances. It is worth noting that the other nation involved is not being asked to renounce violence or acknowledge the right of Palestine and its citizens to exist in order to continue qualifying for our aid, which is mostly military in nature. With U.S. dollars, we are largely responsible for making Israel the 4th largest military power in the world. This is despite its heavily documented human rights abuses. Violence is violence, and attacks on civilians are attacks on civilians. While both parties have participated in each, Israel has carried out a far higher proportion of both (see Human Rights Watch, www.hrw.org, Amnesty International, www.amnestyusa.org).
What’s worth worrying about?
I’m most concerned about women’s rights. NPR reported (Morning Edition,1/31/06) that legislation is already being proposed to mandate the headscarf and abaya for all women. Currently, Palestinians are one of the most secular Arab peoples, with customs varying by family and location. Curiously enough, in the same newscast, NPR reported that the Dutch government is considering legislation to ban the burqa. Do nations really have any business either mandating or banning women’s dress or faith practices?
What is responsible action on our part?
I don’t like the idea of cutting off Western funding because the citizens of a heavily aid-dependent country freely elected a political party we dislike. Political or religious extremism and economic freezes simply do not mix. Aid dollars that support education and communication with the outside world are what help nurture real democracy and moderation. Our commitment in dollars to a civilian population’s basic needs is also the only legitimacy we have in telling a suffering people how they should or should not resist military occupation.
While we should condemn all forms of violence in this conflict, particularly against civilians, we have a responsibility ourselves not to harm civilians in our response to this new arrangement of power in Palestine.
We can encourage the redemption of Hamas, providing adequate resources for them to begin meeting the daily life needs of the people, as well as incentives for peacemaking gestures. To shut them out completely can only lead to more disillusionment and violence. We must do the same for the Israeli government.
February 1, 2006
Democracy is breaking out in the Middle East as an oppressed people exercise their right to self-determination and…elect Hamas, a hard-line political party our government can’t stand! Lately, I’ve been fielding plenty of questions on campus regarding Hamas’ overwhelming victory in the Palestinian parliamentary elections. It’s been a few years since I lived there in the thick of things, but I will try to offer a little insight to this situation.
Why were they elected?
I understand Hamas’ victory to be primarily an anti-corruption vote. Fatah, Arafat’s more secular party which has been in power for over a decade, is notorious for pocketing funds designated for infrastructure and relief of its citizens. Meanwhile, Hamas and most Arab political parties function like fraternal organizations or ‘burial societies’ as we used to have them here: If your street is full of potholes, Hamas collects money, hires workers, and fixes your road. If your neighborhood needs a park, they get things together and build it. If your kid is run over by a tank, they pay for the funeral, and so on. They’re fairly efficient at this, and tangible results do lead to political popularity. Curiously enough, each political party maintains its own militia. (Remember Sinn Fein and the IRA?) Usually, the militia is all we hear about here. It’s also curious that many Palestinians reported voting for Abu Mazen to replace Arafat because he was the candidate most favored as a ‘partner for peace’ by Israel and the U.S. As soon as he was elected, both countries changed their stance and the people felt tricked. This time, they weren’t going to make the same mistake.
What about the rhetoric?
Hamas has a reputation for claiming Israel has no right to exist, and for using violence as a method of resisting the military occupation of Palestinian lands. For this reason, the U.S. and other donors are considering withholding aid to Palestine, which keeps civil society afloat, until it renounces both these stances. It is worth noting that the other nation involved is not being asked to renounce violence or acknowledge the right of Palestine and its citizens to exist in order to continue qualifying for our aid, which is mostly military in nature. With U.S. dollars, we are largely responsible for making Israel the 4th largest military power in the world. This is despite its heavily documented human rights abuses. Violence is violence, and attacks on civilians are attacks on civilians. While both parties have participated in each, Israel has carried out a far higher proportion of both (see Human Rights Watch, www.hrw.org, Amnesty International, www.amnestyusa.org).
What’s worth worrying about?
I’m most concerned about women’s rights. NPR reported (Morning Edition,1/31/06) that legislation is already being proposed to mandate the headscarf and abaya for all women. Currently, Palestinians are one of the most secular Arab peoples, with customs varying by family and location. Curiously enough, in the same newscast, NPR reported that the Dutch government is considering legislation to ban the burqa. Do nations really have any business either mandating or banning women’s dress or faith practices?
What is responsible action on our part?
I don’t like the idea of cutting off Western funding because the citizens of a heavily aid-dependent country freely elected a political party we dislike. Political or religious extremism and economic freezes simply do not mix. Aid dollars that support education and communication with the outside world are what help nurture real democracy and moderation. Our commitment in dollars to a civilian population’s basic needs is also the only legitimacy we have in telling a suffering people how they should or should not resist military occupation.
While we should condemn all forms of violence in this conflict, particularly against civilians, we have a responsibility ourselves not to harm civilians in our response to this new arrangement of power in Palestine.
We can encourage the redemption of Hamas, providing adequate resources for them to begin meeting the daily life needs of the people, as well as incentives for peacemaking gestures. To shut them out completely can only lead to more disillusionment and violence. We must do the same for the Israeli government.
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