Spirituality: Wellspring and Wastebasket by
William E. Alberts and Amy E. Alberts*
Spirituality reveals not only the infiniteness of divinity but the infinite varieties of humanity. Type “spirituality” in an Internet search service and over 6 ½ million references appear. Follow that with “Christian spirituality,” and you could spend another eternity studying almost 2 ½ million sources. Spirituality may tell us far more about humanity than about divinity. In fact, this brief examination of spirituality is not about tracing the “mysterious ways” in which “God moves. . . His wonders to perform,” as the hymn declares, but about identifying the many and various ways in which the human spirit moves to perform its wonders. Nor do we presume to cover the manifold meanings of spirituality. Still, our study of the human spirit is believed to contain hints of the nature of any divinity.
Our focus is on two human “wonders” of spirituality. Spirituality may be a way to affirm, nourish, renew and empower the human mind, body and spirit. A wellspring of comfort and strength, enabling coping and wellness, and reflection and direction and connectedness with other human beings. A wellspring that overflows into love of one’s neighbor as oneself.
On the other hand, spirituality can be a wastebasket into which an individual or group may dump cause-and-effect understanding of the behavioral and societal and natural-event determinants of health and illness. A wastebasket that may accommodate ignorance and an excessive self-centered need for authority and absolutes that promise a “cure-all,” alleviate feelings of powerlessness, and legitimize anti-democratic beliefs and tendencies and behavior. First, spirituality as a wellspring of self-empowerment and connectedness with other human beings.
Foremost, spirituality is personal. It may be defined by, but not confined to, creed or ritual. It may be explained but not contained, described but not proscribed. It may be entertained but not solely institutionalized. For example, in a discussion about religion, a hospital patient was asked if he were “Baptist, Methodist, Catholic, Jewish, Muslim, or of another religion,” and he replied, “None of the above. I’m spiritual.” Like many persons, his spirituality did not fit traditional classifications. He voiced a private faith in a personal god which apparently helps him deal with his medical and other realities. He evidently is one of the 6 ½ million representations of spirituality on the Internet search service.
The assumed empowering personal nature of spirituality is seen in the prayer of a woman who has been blind and suffering from a chronic illness for 40 years: “God, I’m sick and thank you anyhow [italics added]. You have helped me through it for 40 years, and given me a loving husband and two wonderful children. I praise You not just for the good times but for the bad times too, which You have led me through.” She was not thanking her god for curing her blindness but for seeing her through it—though she may well have prayed often for a miracle earlier on.
In the face of illness, injury and death, many hospital patients and their families and friends find comfort and empowerment in the prayerful words, “Thank you, Jesus”—not for what has befallen them but for whom they believe is beholding them in love.
“Thank you anyhow” may exemplify studies showing that people with spiritual resources especially appear to possess resiliency in coping with illness and injury, and still enjoy a quality of life in the midst of stress, discomfort and limitations. Spirituality seems to foster a positive, accepting, empowering attitude, enabling people to proactively realize that they help to determine the possibilities of their limitations and the limitations of their possibilities. The connection between spirituality and attitude is perceptively expressed in Lamentations 3:19-23; “Remember my affliction and bitterness, the wormwood and the gall! My soul continually thinks of it and is bowed down within me. But this I call to mind [italics added], and therefore I have hope: The steadfast love of the Lord never ceases, his mercies never come to an end, they are new every morning.” (Lamentations 3:19-23)
Not that attitude is dependent on spirituality for will power and quality of life. One may call to mind inner emotional resources, loving human relationships, and positive experiences and therefore have hope and thrive in the face of adversity. Affirmation, inspiration, love, reinforcement come from a human spirit as well as from a “Holy Spirit.”. Spirituality is believed to be a source of inner strength not the source.
While spirituality is personal and usually perceived as heaven sent, it also moves in horizontal ways. Spirituality has a “human touch.” The wondrous horizontal “ways” of spirituality are seen in a woman who underwent two additional unexpected surgeries, and, when finally ready, and eager, to be discharged developed a complication which continued to hospitalize and depress her. “I had had it,” she said. “I just stopped trying, stopped fighting to get better, gave in and just left it all in God’s hands. I had given up. But later, when I heard my roommate start to hum ‘Love lifted me,’ my body surged upward; and then she began to sing the words. . .”
Spirituality may involve more of a human touch than is readily understood and appreciated. It may be impossible to know where an individual’s emotional and physical make-up end and spirituality begins. For example, an attractive older female pastoral care volunteer visited a very sick-appearing, listless, prone male hospital patient. As she stood next to his bed and engaged him in conversation, his body began to stir. Their exchanges grew more spontaneous, personal, familiar, and even light-hearted joshing, leading him to literally rise up in his bed, his body animated, his full smile reflecting an uplifted spirit. Her presence and their exchange seem to have not only made his day but his hospital stay. Her prayer appeared to be anti-climactic. He had already caught the spirit. Was it agape or eros? Or both?
Spirituality can be empowering. Individual religious experience can alleviate guilt, give peace of mind, certainty and inner strength. It can turn an individual around, lead one to be “born again,” to become sober, clean, responsible, focused, creative. A patient suddenly stopped abusing his body with alcohol and cigarettes when he discovered that someone else loved it and him—and revealed it was a temple of spirituality. That someone was Jesus, whom he accepted as his savior, which acceptance not only helped to save him from years of self-abuse but also inspired him to write songs and sing them for others in churches and on radio broadcasts.
In the face of imprisonment, “the prayer of a righteous man availeth much,” a Black man newly converted to the Muslim faith. Even in confinement, self-empowerment is obtained in solidarity with people of like-minded realities and beliefs, affirming and liberating the spirit in the face of an oppressive environment and society. The spiritual power of solidarity even in solitary confinement.
While many studies claim to show that spirituality promotes health, Dr. Richard P. Sloan and associates provide their own cautionary research. “Even in the best studies,” they write, “the evidence of association between religion, spirituality and health is weak and inconsistent.” They also cite ethical issues implied by belief in a god who seems to favor the faithful, one issue of which is, “Are the more devout adherents ‘better’ people, more deserving of health than others?” They assume that such a belief suggests “illness is due to [patients’] own moral failure,” and produces an “additional burden of guilt.” (“Religion, spirituality, and medicine,” by R. P. Sloan, E. Bagiella and T. Powell,
The Lancet, Feb. 20, 1999, Pages 664-667, Vol. 353, Issue 9153) It is as if their god plays favorites, which seems contrary to Jesus’ teaching that “your Father who is in heaven . . . makes his sun rise on the evil and the good, and sends his rain on the just and the unjust . . . and is kind to the ungrateful and the selfish.” (Matthew 5: 46; Luke 6: 35, 36)
Not that Dr. Sloan and his colleagues disregard the power of prayer. They write, “No one can object to respectful support for patients who draw upon religious faith in times of illness.” But they conclude that “it is premature to promote faith and religion as adjunctive medical treatments.” They say that until related “ethical issues are resolved, suggestions that religious activity will promote health, that illness is the result of insufficient faith, are unwarranted.” (Ibid.)
Dr. Sloan also states that “attempts to make religious activities adjunctive medical treatments . . . come dangerously close to efforts to validate religion by its effects on health.” He says, “Religion does not need science to justify its existence or appeal.” (“Should Physicians Prescribe Religious Activities,” The New England Journal of Medicine, June 22, 2000, Vol. 342: 1913-1916, No. 25)
Mayo Clinic internal medicine specialist and researcher Paul S. Mueller, while more positive than Dr. Sloan and associates about the relationship between religion and health, grounds spirituality this way: “Although the relationship between religious
involvement and spirituality and health outcomes seems valid, it is difficult to establish causality. . . . The benefits of religious and spiritual involvement are likely conveyed
through complex psychosocial, behavioral and biological processes that are incompletely understood.” (www.science-spirit.org)
The intrinsically personal and individual nature of spirituality reveals the difficulty involved in trying to determine common denominators. The “spirit” moves one group of worshippers to stand, sway, clap their uplifted hands and say “Hallelujah!” “Amen!” “Thank you, Jesus!”—to the beat of gospel music and preaching. Another congregation may sit quietly, attuned to orderly measures of an anthem and sermon that accommodate and inform their meditative mood. A third group may find their spirits quickened and renewed in chanting, ritual and sacrament. While a fourth may find their spirituality uplifted and community reinforced and empowered in bowing together and facing Northeast toward Ka’bah, the holy shrine in Mecca, and kneeling and praying in unison as equals. And a fifth may find the light of spirituality in silence. Each group might not “get” the other’s access to and expression of spirituality. Yet the legitimacy of each would seem to be obvious. But too often it is not.
Spirituality can be a wastebasket into which an individual or group may dump, deny and even deify insecurities, lack of knowledge and the need for certainty reflected in self-centered, submissive or dominating tendencies. A person who has spent years abusing his or her lungs, liver and/or heart may pray for miraculous healing when confronted with reaping what she or he has sown. Here spirituality may be resorted to in an attempt to hurdle the reality of cause and effect—a very human, but usually futile and despairing tendency. However, it may not just be about choices and self-abuse but also about the health- or illness-disposed genetic makeup one inherits. And lest one fails to appreciate another’s reality: illness naturally makes one physically, emotionally and spiritually centered on oneself.
Certain biblically-guided Christians believe that their “God is able” to perform the miraculous healing of a dying or physically paralyzed loved one (or another) in the face of cause-and-effect scientific medical reality. They believe what is needed, as Jesus said, is enough faith: “And whatever you ask in prayer, you will receive, if you have faith.” (Matthew 21: 22) When death ensues, or the physical impairment remains, those who “pray without ceasing” may blame themselves, believing their faith was not strong enough to elicit their god’s favor. Such Bible-inspired belief is understandably propelled by love and hope and fear—and denial. But in the end there may be a spiritual Catch-22 of guilt—with a letdown of faith caused by a seemingly narcissistic, reality-denying diety who professes to favor those who favor him. It would appear that spirituality should help one to deal with reality not short cut or deny it.
While people inevitably reap the cause-and-effect they sow, certain people reap what others have sown for them. There remains in America an historic, institutionalized White-controlled hierarchy of access to political and economic power. This hierarchy has enabled White persons to sow far more educational and economic opportunities than people of color—and thus reap far greater health and health care. At the heart of America’s “lingering racial divide” is a job gap that creates a health gap. Black persons continue to reap an unhealthy, discriminatory, White-favored political and economic order sown for those at the bottom of the hierarchy. Those who suffer from lack of adequate paying jobs, insufficient diet, polluted air, an indifferent and often hostile environment, and a tokenistic power structure are more likely to reap hypertension, anxiety, high blood pressure, diabetes, kidney failure, asthma, stroke, cancer, heart disease, mental illness, HIV/AIDS, implosive physical violence, and lower life expectancy. (“Patients With H.I.V. Seen as Separated By a Racial Divide,” The New York Times, August 7, 2004; “Disparities found in health care for blacks,” The Boston Globe, August 5, 2004; “Report finds minorities get poorer healthcare,” by Ron Blakey, March 20, 2002, http://www.cnn.com/; “Mental Health Problems Among Minorities,” by Richard A. Sherer, http://www.healthyplace.com/.)
In a report, the Northwest Federation of Community Organizations in Seattle concluded, “Unconscious racism is so entrenched in the US medical system that the only way to eliminate disparities is to change the rules . . .” Will Pittz, lead author of the report, said, “The healthcare system as a whole provides vastly unequal access and treatment based on race, language, and ethnicity. . . . Racism within the health system is literally making people of color sick.”
The Boston Globe news story on the report also cited former US Surgeon General Dr. David Satcher, who “found that more than 80,000 black Americans die every year because of continuing disparities in healthcare.” The news story, called “Racism blamed for health disparities,” also cited another study: “Last September, the Sullivan
Commission on Diversity in the Health Workforce found that while Black, Hispanics, and Native Americans make up more than 25 percent of the US population, they represent only 9 percent of the nation’s nurses, 6 percent of doctors, and 5 percent of dentists.” (July 20, 2005)
The health care disparity was used by President Bush, to sell his plan to privatize Social Security, in a meeting with 24 selective African American religious and community leaders. Bush reportedly “told black leaders yesterday that his plan to add private accounts to Social Security would benefit blacks because they tend to have shorter lives than some other Americans and end up paying more than they get out.” (The Boston Globe, Jan. 26, 2005) Why Black people do not live as long as “some other Americans” [italics added] evidently was not discussed.
A recent New York Times editorial called diabetes an “epidemic,… a disease defined by economic disparity,” with “blacks and Hispanics… disproportionately stricken.” Entitled “Declare War on Diabetes,” the editorial warned, “Ignore it, and it can lead to heart disease, strokes, amputations and shortened lives.” (Feb 5, 2006)
Economically speaking, one group’s wellspring may be another group’s wastebasket. Spiritually speaking, one person’s blessing may be another person’s curse. A healthy expression of spirituality would seem to include addressing what in society is unhealthy.
Matters of the spirit can also be recreated in the image of an individual’s or group’s need for certainty, security, rightness, power over others and domination. Spirituality can be a vehicle to authenticate and dictate “correct” theological belief rather than just, ethical behavior. Here spirituality is a means by which to obtain the right experience and belief, not do the right thing—as if that which is perceived as spiritual can be contained, controlled, claimed, patented. Here also spirituality is often about a personal, other-worldly destination, more than about an interpersonal journey with others—unless they are, or become, like-minded.
To claim absoluteness in matters of the spirit is to reveal ignorance of the spirit that matters to other kinds of people. To claim one’s religion has, or religious experience is, the key to the “spiritual kingdom” is to unknowingly confess one’s own spiritual serfdom. Such confinement of spirit may be acted out in an interfaith or community observance or national event at which a Christian minister or priest gives an invocation or benediction “in the name of Your only Son, our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ.” Classic examples are the closing words of Baptist evangelist Rev. Franklin Graham’s Invocation at President George W. Bush’s January 2001 Inauguration: “. . . We pray this in the name of the Father, and of the Son, the Lord Jesus Christ, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen;” and the conclusion of United Methodist minister Kirbyson Caldwell’s Benediction at the same Inaugural: “We respectfully submit this humble prayer in the name that’s above all other names, Jesus, the Christ. Let all who agree say amen.”
A Christian minister or priest who is unaware of or disregards, for example, the Jews or Muslims in an audience before him (or her) is far more likely to be oblivious to the Muslims or Jews being oppressed around him—or beyond him by his government in his name. “Christocentrism,” like egocentrism and ethnocentrism, is threatened by, oblivious to and wars against diversity. Only “in Jesus name” can become like a box one cannot think or relate outside of. Such spirituality may not only accommodate imperialistic political policies but foster them.
Charles Marsh, religion professor at the University of Virginia, writes about “Wayward
Christian Soldiers,” his own brother and sister American evangelicals, whose pre-Iraq invasion “war sermons” had a common theme: “Our president is a real brother in Christ, and because he has discerned that God’s will is for our nation to be at war with Iraq, we shall gloriously comply.” Marsh quotes a Christian missionary who expressed a sentiment shared by certain evangelicals: “American foreign policy and military might have opened an opportunity for the Gospel in the land of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob.” Marsh says that “both Franklin Graham, the evangelist son of Billy Graham, and Marvin Olasky, . . . a former advisor to President Bush on faith-based policy, echoed these sentiments, claiming that the American invasion of Iraq would create exciting new prospects for proselytizing Muslims.”
Marsh states that “an astonishing 87 percent of all white evangelical Christians in the United States supported the president’s decision in April 2003 [to invade Iraq],” and “recent polls indicate that 68 percent of white evangelicals continue to support the war.” He writes that their support was not based on “Christian moral doctrine” of pursuing peace and loving enemies, but on “our Faustian bargain for access and power,” which “has undermined the credibility of our evangelistic witness in the world.”
Marsh’s concluding sentence reveals the apparent imperialistic bent of many evangelical Christians: “The Hebrew prophets might call us to repentance, but repentance is a tough demand for a people utterly convinced of their righteousness.” (“Wayward Christian Soldiers,” The Boston Globe, Jan. 20, 2006) Fascism parading as faith “Marching as to war, With the cross of Jesus Going on before!”
With spirituality, the danger to one’s neighbor comes when one moves from simply doing “good works” to a theological group identity that feels superior and then to domination over those seen as “inferior.” Where does spirituality end and personality, culture, and patriotic national identity begin?
Where does faith end and cause-and-effect begin? Certain religious leaders and their followers need to protect their god—and themselves—from knowledge. The more mysterious their god’s ways, the more they can actually control his movement—with an infallible compass, the Bible. They need to believe that their god’s ways are “unsearchable.” Therein lies these religious leaders’ authority and power over people—and their people’s need to remain dependent and powerless. Such religious leaders can turn to their divinely revealed Bible to interpret their god’s ways and will. Thus a prominent Southern Baptist author reportedly told pastors at a workshop, “The tsunamis that hit South Asia were God’s punishment of a [Muslim] area where Christians have experienced particularly intense persecution.” (“Blackaby says tsunamis God’s judgement; missions experts question theology,” by Ken Camp, Associated Baptist Press-News, 1/27/2005)
Thus “some religious conservatives (Rev. Pat Robertson, Hal Lindsey, and Charles Colson) have speculated that . . . Hurricane Katrina was sent by God as an omen or as a punishment for America’s alleged sins,” especially “legalized abortion.” (“Religious conservatives claim Katrina was God . . . ,” Media Matters for America, Sept. 13, 2005)
Thus “an organization of Christian fundamentalists claims the destruction brought on by Hurricane Katrina is God’s judgement against New Orleans for holiday festivals like the annual gay Southern Decadence party. ‘Although the loss of life is deeply saddening, this act of God destroyed a wicked city,’ said Repent America director Michael Marcavage on the organization’s website.” (“Religious groups link Hurricane to gay event,” Christopher Curtis.gay.com/Planet Ont.com Network)
Thus such divine judgement appears to be shared by Rev. Franklin Graham who said, “There’s been a black spiritual cloud [italics added] over New Orleans for years.” Appearing at Liberty University, a Christian college, “Graham spoke about how some believed God was using the hurricane to spark a religious revival there,” because “New Orleans is a city known for Satan worship, orgies and widespread drinking and drug use.” (“Some US Christians say Katrina was God’s handiwork,” by Paul Simao, Reuters Alert Net, Oct. 16, 2005) What would a white spiritual cloud represent? Goodness? Showers of blessings? The revelation of Rev. Franklin Graham’s own unconscious feelings of racial superiority? To what degree are spirituality and one’s god colored by one’s own racial conditioning and identity?
Thus Rev. Jerry Falwell interpreted the 9/11/2001 attacks as “God’s judgement on America.” “I really believe,” Falwell said, “that the pagans, and the abortionists, and the feminists, and the gays and the lesbians who are actually trying to make that an alternative lifestyle, the ACLU, People for the American Way, all of them who have tried to secularize America. I point the finger in their face and say ‘you helped this happen.’”
Rev. Pat Robertson reportedly said “Amen!” to Falwell’s prophetic judgement-- which “revelation” Falwell later retracted. (“Falwell apologizes to gays, feminists, lesbians,” CNN.com/U.S., Sept. 14, 2001)
Civilized society punishes people severely for committing a fraction of the wanton and destructive behavior certain Christian fundamentalist and other religious leaders attribute to their god. It would seem that such leaders are projecting onto their god their own unconscious hatred and aggression. Such a destructive god should be restricted to history, or banished to the heavens, or confined to a book, or studied in a laboratory to understand his terroristic nature -- and not allowed to return and “move in mysterious ways” upon the earth and among human beings until his worshippers enjoy the therapeutic touch of a Golden Retriever, or unexpectedly discover the humanizing love of a gay or lesbian son or daughter, or experience unconditional love themselves from another human being.
The attempt to protect one’s god from empirical knowledge (the need to dumb-down one’s god) is seen in the change in the training of ministers in pastoral care and counseling at Southern Baptist Theological Seminary in Louisville, Kentucky. The seminary has dropped “secular psychology” from its curriculum and “is taking its Christian counseling department in a new direction, one built upon the sufficiency of Scripture and designed to train pastors to deal biblically with the needs of hurting people.” This “wholesale change in emphasis [is] built upon the view that Scripture is sufficient to answer comprehensively the deepest needs of the human heart” [italics added]. The very psychological knowledge and supervised clinical training, through which ministers gain self-understanding and are thus better able to love themselves and hence, their neighbor, are dumped into a wastebasket. Replaced by “true ‘pastoral care’ as defined by the Scriptures.” (“Southern Seminary Launches new vision for biblical counseling,” by Jeff Robinson, (BP) news, Feb. 15, 2005)
A concerned pastoral psychotherapist, Rev. Dr. Perry Miller, writes that he and other psychotherapists and clinical supervisors of ministers-in-training “have had to pick up the pieces of people’s lives, who have been counseled or supervised by such a limited model.” Miller stresses the importance of clergy gaining insight into themselves and other persons through integrating knowledge of the social sciences under the guidance of a clinically trained supervisor. (“A Threat to Clinical Pastoral Training,” by Perry Miller, Pastoral Report.com, The Newsletter of the College of Pastoral Supervision and Psychotherapy, Feb. 23, 2005). The spiritual health of worshippers depends in part on the emotional health of their religious leaders.
Religious leaders and their followers who need to protect their god from cause-and-effect, from knowledge are projecting on to their god their own need to protect themselves from self-knowledge. They tend to be anti-introspective persons, not wanting to look at and understand their own feelings and motivations. Paul the Apostle said, “Faith without works is dead.” (James 2:26) One might add, faith and works without self-knowledge can be deadly.
Jesus seemed to ground spirituality in self-knowledge and human relationships. When asked which was the greatest commandment in the law,” he answered, “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart . . . [And] the second is like it: “You shall love you neighbor as yourself.” (Matthew 22:25-30) It is assumed that love of one’s neighbor depends on love of oneself: one’s ability to experience one’s own humanness and to embrace one’s own worth and rights.
Self-knowledge is believed to be a fundamental qualification of any clergy person—and of anyone committed to democratic values. One has to know where he or she is coming from in order to know where other persons are at. Self-knowledge helps one to avoid getting in one’s own way in living and working with and serving people. The more one is in touch with and accepting of oneself, the better prepared one is to experience and accept other persons as themselves – better able to experience rather than interpret their reality.
Each person seems to have his/her own unique “spiritual fingerprints”—as does each group have its own individual ways of performing its spiritual wonders. The spiritual lives of individuals seem to be as varied as their emotional make-up, physical identities, and cultural orientations and conditioning. The influence of personality, culture and spirituality on each other is believed to determine the various ways in which the human spirit moves to perform its wonders.
If the individual and personal nature of spirituality reveals (inadvertently) anything about divinity, it appears to be the diversity of divinity--and thus the divinity of diversity. Spirituality seems to disclose that any divinity is evidently comfortable with, affirms and embraces humanity’s diversity and connectedness, individuality and commonality, uniqueness and oneness. An apparently spiritually inspired Paul the Apostle declared, “If I have all faith, so as to remove mountains but have not love, I am nothing.” (I Corinthians 13:26).
Whether the source of one’s spirituality is the “Holy Spirit” or a human spirit, spirituality would appear to include what one does with what one feels and believes. It would seem that one’s spiritual experiences and beliefs would lead to identification and connectedness with all living beings. The bottom line of spirituality, therefore, would seem to be behavior and not simply belief, action and not just awe, outreach and not merely uplift, introspection and not only inspiration, justice as well as joy. The morality of spirituality.
*Rev. William E. Alberts, Ph.D. is a hospital chaplain, and a Diplomate in the College of Pastoral Supervision and Psychotherapy. Both a Unitarian Universalist and United Methodist minister, he has written research reports, essays and articles on religion, racism, war and politics. He can be reached at aea121@hotmail.com.
Amy E. Alberts, M.A. is a Ph.D. student at Tufts University in the Eliot-Pearson Department of Child Development. She is co-editor, with Dr. Jacqueline Lerner, of Current Directions in Developmental Psychology, a Pearson Prentice Hall book of readings from the American Psychological Society (2004). She can be reached at aea121@hotmail.com.
Friday, February 17, 2006
Spirituality: Wellspring and Wastebasket by
William E. Alberts and Amy E. Alberts*
Spirituality reveals not only the infiniteness of divinity but the infinite varieties of humanity. Type “spirituality” in an Internet search service and over 6 ½ million references appear. Follow that with “Christian spirituality,” and you could spend another eternity studying almost 2 ½ million sources. Spirituality may tell us far more about humanity than about divinity. In fact, this brief examination of spirituality is not about tracing the “mysterious ways” in which “God moves. . . His wonders to perform,” as the hymn declares, but about identifying the many and various ways in which the human spirit moves to perform its wonders. Nor do we presume to cover the manifold meanings of spirituality. Still, our study of the human spirit is believed to contain hints of the nature of any divinity.
Our focus is on two human “wonders” of spirituality. Spirituality may be a way to affirm, nourish, renew and empower the human mind, body and spirit. A wellspring of comfort and strength, enabling coping and wellness, and reflection and direction and connectedness with other human beings. A wellspring that overflows into love of one’s neighbor as oneself.
On the other hand, spirituality can be a wastebasket into which an individual or group may dump cause-and-effect understanding of the behavioral and societal and natural-event determinants of health and illness. A wastebasket that may accommodate ignorance and an excessive self-centered need for authority and absolutes that promise a “cure-all,” alleviate feelings of powerlessness, and legitimize anti-democratic beliefs and tendencies and behavior. First, spirituality as a wellspring of self-empowerment and connectedness with other human beings.
Foremost, spirituality is personal. It may be defined by, but not confined to, creed or ritual. It may be explained but not contained, described but not proscribed. It may be entertained but not solely institutionalized. For example, in a discussion about religion, a hospital patient was asked if he were “Baptist, Methodist, Catholic, Jewish, Muslim, or of another religion,” and he replied, “None of the above. I’m spiritual.” Like many persons, his spirituality did not fit traditional classifications. He voiced a private faith in a personal god which apparently helps him deal with his medical and other realities. He evidently is one of the 6 ½ million representations of spirituality on the Internet search service.
The assumed empowering personal nature of spirituality is seen in the prayer of a woman who has been blind and suffering from a chronic illness for 40 years: “God, I’m sick and thank you anyhow [italics added]. You have helped me through it for 40 years, and given me a loving husband and two wonderful children. I praise You not just for the good times but for the bad times too, which You have led me through.” She was not thanking her god for curing her blindness but for seeing her through it—though she may well have prayed often for a miracle earlier on.
In the face of illness, injury and death, many hospital patients and their families and friends find comfort and empowerment in the prayerful words, “Thank you, Jesus”—not for what has befallen them but for whom they believe is beholding them in love.
“Thank you anyhow” may exemplify studies showing that people with spiritual resources especially appear to possess resiliency in coping with illness and injury, and still enjoy a quality of life in the midst of stress, discomfort and limitations. Spirituality seems to foster a positive, accepting, empowering attitude, enabling people to proactively realize that they help to determine the possibilities of their limitations and the limitations of their possibilities. The connection between spirituality and attitude is perceptively expressed in Lamentations 3:19-23; “Remember my affliction and bitterness, the wormwood and the gall! My soul continually thinks of it and is bowed down within me. But this I call to mind [italics added], and therefore I have hope: The steadfast love of the Lord never ceases, his mercies never come to an end, they are new every morning.” (Lamentations 3:19-23)
Not that attitude is dependent on spirituality for will power and quality of life. One may call to mind inner emotional resources, loving human relationships, and positive experiences and therefore have hope and thrive in the face of adversity. Affirmation, inspiration, love, reinforcement come from a human spirit as well as from a “Holy Spirit.”. Spirituality is believed to be a source of inner strength not the source.
While spirituality is personal and usually perceived as heaven sent, it also moves in horizontal ways. Spirituality has a “human touch.” The wondrous horizontal “ways” of spirituality are seen in a woman who underwent two additional unexpected surgeries, and, when finally ready, and eager, to be discharged developed a complication which continued to hospitalize and depress her. “I had had it,” she said. “I just stopped trying, stopped fighting to get better, gave in and just left it all in God’s hands. I had given up. But later, when I heard my roommate start to hum ‘Love lifted me,’ my body surged upward; and then she began to sing the words. . .”
Spirituality may involve more of a human touch than is readily understood and appreciated. It may be impossible to know where an individual’s emotional and physical make-up end and spirituality begins. For example, an attractive older female pastoral care volunteer visited a very sick-appearing, listless, prone male hospital patient. As she stood next to his bed and engaged him in conversation, his body began to stir. Their exchanges grew more spontaneous, personal, familiar, and even light-hearted joshing, leading him to literally rise up in his bed, his body animated, his full smile reflecting an uplifted spirit. Her presence and their exchange seem to have not only made his day but his hospital stay. Her prayer appeared to be anti-climactic. He had already caught the spirit. Was it agape or eros? Or both?
Spirituality can be empowering. Individual religious experience can alleviate guilt, give peace of mind, certainty and inner strength. It can turn an individual around, lead one to be “born again,” to become sober, clean, responsible, focused, creative. A patient suddenly stopped abusing his body with alcohol and cigarettes when he discovered that someone else loved it and him—and revealed it was a temple of spirituality. That someone was Jesus, whom he accepted as his savior, which acceptance not only helped to save him from years of self-abuse but also inspired him to write songs and sing them for others in churches and on radio broadcasts.
In the face of imprisonment, “the prayer of a righteous man availeth much,” a Black man newly converted to the Muslim faith. Even in confinement, self-empowerment is obtained in solidarity with people of like-minded realities and beliefs, affirming and liberating the spirit in the face of an oppressive environment and society. The spiritual power of solidarity even in solitary confinement.
While many studies claim to show that spirituality promotes health, Dr. Richard P. Sloan and associates provide their own cautionary research. “Even in the best studies,” they write, “the evidence of association between religion, spirituality and health is weak and inconsistent.” They also cite ethical issues implied by belief in a god who seems to favor the faithful, one issue of which is, “Are the more devout adherents ‘better’ people, more deserving of health than others?” They assume that such a belief suggests “illness is due to [patients’] own moral failure,” and produces an “additional burden of guilt.” (“Religion, spirituality, and medicine,” by R. P. Sloan, E. Bagiella and T. Powell,
The Lancet, Feb. 20, 1999, Pages 664-667, Vol. 353, Issue 9153) It is as if their god plays favorites, which seems contrary to Jesus’ teaching that “your Father who is in heaven . . . makes his sun rise on the evil and the good, and sends his rain on the just and the unjust . . . and is kind to the ungrateful and the selfish.” (Matthew 5: 46; Luke 6: 35, 36)
Not that Dr. Sloan and his colleagues disregard the power of prayer. They write, “No one can object to respectful support for patients who draw upon religious faith in times of illness.” But they conclude that “it is premature to promote faith and religion as adjunctive medical treatments.” They say that until related “ethical issues are resolved, suggestions that religious activity will promote health, that illness is the result of insufficient faith, are unwarranted.” (Ibid.)
Dr. Sloan also states that “attempts to make religious activities adjunctive medical treatments . . . come dangerously close to efforts to validate religion by its effects on health.” He says, “Religion does not need science to justify its existence or appeal.” (“Should Physicians Prescribe Religious Activities,” The New England Journal of Medicine, June 22, 2000, Vol. 342: 1913-1916, No. 25)
Mayo Clinic internal medicine specialist and researcher Paul S. Mueller, while more positive than Dr. Sloan and associates about the relationship between religion and health, grounds spirituality this way: “Although the relationship between religious
involvement and spirituality and health outcomes seems valid, it is difficult to establish causality. . . . The benefits of religious and spiritual involvement are likely conveyed
through complex psychosocial, behavioral and biological processes that are incompletely understood.” (www.science-spirit.org)
The intrinsically personal and individual nature of spirituality reveals the difficulty involved in trying to determine common denominators. The “spirit” moves one group of worshippers to stand, sway, clap their uplifted hands and say “Hallelujah!” “Amen!” “Thank you, Jesus!”—to the beat of gospel music and preaching. Another congregation may sit quietly, attuned to orderly measures of an anthem and sermon that accommodate and inform their meditative mood. A third group may find their spirits quickened and renewed in chanting, ritual and sacrament. While a fourth may find their spirituality uplifted and community reinforced and empowered in bowing together and facing Northeast toward Ka’bah, the holy shrine in Mecca, and kneeling and praying in unison as equals. And a fifth may find the light of spirituality in silence. Each group might not “get” the other’s access to and expression of spirituality. Yet the legitimacy of each would seem to be obvious. But too often it is not.
Spirituality can be a wastebasket into which an individual or group may dump, deny and even deify insecurities, lack of knowledge and the need for certainty reflected in self-centered, submissive or dominating tendencies. A person who has spent years abusing his or her lungs, liver and/or heart may pray for miraculous healing when confronted with reaping what she or he has sown. Here spirituality may be resorted to in an attempt to hurdle the reality of cause and effect—a very human, but usually futile and despairing tendency. However, it may not just be about choices and self-abuse but also about the health- or illness-disposed genetic makeup one inherits. And lest one fails to appreciate another’s reality: illness naturally makes one physically, emotionally and spiritually centered on oneself.
Certain biblically-guided Christians believe that their “God is able” to perform the miraculous healing of a dying or physically paralyzed loved one (or another) in the face of cause-and-effect scientific medical reality. They believe what is needed, as Jesus said, is enough faith: “And whatever you ask in prayer, you will receive, if you have faith.” (Matthew 21: 22) When death ensues, or the physical impairment remains, those who “pray without ceasing” may blame themselves, believing their faith was not strong enough to elicit their god’s favor. Such Bible-inspired belief is understandably propelled by love and hope and fear—and denial. But in the end there may be a spiritual Catch-22 of guilt—with a letdown of faith caused by a seemingly narcissistic, reality-denying diety who professes to favor those who favor him. It would appear that spirituality should help one to deal with reality not short cut or deny it.
While people inevitably reap the cause-and-effect they sow, certain people reap what others have sown for them. There remains in America an historic, institutionalized White-controlled hierarchy of access to political and economic power. This hierarchy has enabled White persons to sow far more educational and economic opportunities than people of color—and thus reap far greater health and health care. At the heart of America’s “lingering racial divide” is a job gap that creates a health gap. Black persons continue to reap an unhealthy, discriminatory, White-favored political and economic order sown for those at the bottom of the hierarchy. Those who suffer from lack of adequate paying jobs, insufficient diet, polluted air, an indifferent and often hostile environment, and a tokenistic power structure are more likely to reap hypertension, anxiety, high blood pressure, diabetes, kidney failure, asthma, stroke, cancer, heart disease, mental illness, HIV/AIDS, implosive physical violence, and lower life expectancy. (“Patients With H.I.V. Seen as Separated By a Racial Divide,” The New York Times, August 7, 2004; “Disparities found in health care for blacks,” The Boston Globe, August 5, 2004; “Report finds minorities get poorer healthcare,” by Ron Blakey, March 20, 2002, http://www.cnn.com/; “Mental Health Problems Among Minorities,” by Richard A. Sherer, http://www.healthyplace.com/.)
In a report, the Northwest Federation of Community Organizations in Seattle concluded, “Unconscious racism is so entrenched in the US medical system that the only way to eliminate disparities is to change the rules . . .” Will Pittz, lead author of the report, said, “The healthcare system as a whole provides vastly unequal access and treatment based on race, language, and ethnicity. . . . Racism within the health system is literally making people of color sick.”
The Boston Globe news story on the report also cited former US Surgeon General Dr. David Satcher, who “found that more than 80,000 black Americans die every year because of continuing disparities in healthcare.” The news story, called “Racism blamed for health disparities,” also cited another study: “Last September, the Sullivan
Commission on Diversity in the Health Workforce found that while Black, Hispanics, and Native Americans make up more than 25 percent of the US population, they represent only 9 percent of the nation’s nurses, 6 percent of doctors, and 5 percent of dentists.” (July 20, 2005)
The health care disparity was used by President Bush, to sell his plan to privatize Social Security, in a meeting with 24 selective African American religious and community leaders. Bush reportedly “told black leaders yesterday that his plan to add private accounts to Social Security would benefit blacks because they tend to have shorter lives than some other Americans and end up paying more than they get out.” (The Boston Globe, Jan. 26, 2005) Why Black people do not live as long as “some other Americans” [italics added] evidently was not discussed.
A recent New York Times editorial called diabetes an “epidemic,… a disease defined by economic disparity,” with “blacks and Hispanics… disproportionately stricken.” Entitled “Declare War on Diabetes,” the editorial warned, “Ignore it, and it can lead to heart disease, strokes, amputations and shortened lives.” (Feb 5, 2006)
Economically speaking, one group’s wellspring may be another group’s wastebasket. Spiritually speaking, one person’s blessing may be another person’s curse. A healthy expression of spirituality would seem to include addressing what in society is unhealthy.
Matters of the spirit can also be recreated in the image of an individual’s or group’s need for certainty, security, rightness, power over others and domination. Spirituality can be a vehicle to authenticate and dictate “correct” theological belief rather than just, ethical behavior. Here spirituality is a means by which to obtain the right experience and belief, not do the right thing—as if that which is perceived as spiritual can be contained, controlled, claimed, patented. Here also spirituality is often about a personal, other-worldly destination, more than about an interpersonal journey with others—unless they are, or become, like-minded.
To claim absoluteness in matters of the spirit is to reveal ignorance of the spirit that matters to other kinds of people. To claim one’s religion has, or religious experience is, the key to the “spiritual kingdom” is to unknowingly confess one’s own spiritual serfdom. Such confinement of spirit may be acted out in an interfaith or community observance or national event at which a Christian minister or priest gives an invocation or benediction “in the name of Your only Son, our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ.” Classic examples are the closing words of Baptist evangelist Rev. Franklin Graham’s Invocation at President George W. Bush’s January 2001 Inauguration: “. . . We pray this in the name of the Father, and of the Son, the Lord Jesus Christ, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen;” and the conclusion of United Methodist minister Kirbyson Caldwell’s Benediction at the same Inaugural: “We respectfully submit this humble prayer in the name that’s above all other names, Jesus, the Christ. Let all who agree say amen.”
A Christian minister or priest who is unaware of or disregards, for example, the Jews or Muslims in an audience before him (or her) is far more likely to be oblivious to the Muslims or Jews being oppressed around him—or beyond him by his government in his name. “Christocentrism,” like egocentrism and ethnocentrism, is threatened by, oblivious to and wars against diversity. Only “in Jesus name” can become like a box one cannot think or relate outside of. Such spirituality may not only accommodate imperialistic political policies but foster them.
Charles Marsh, religion professor at the University of Virginia, writes about “Wayward
Christian Soldiers,” his own brother and sister American evangelicals, whose pre-Iraq invasion “war sermons” had a common theme: “Our president is a real brother in Christ, and because he has discerned that God’s will is for our nation to be at war with Iraq, we shall gloriously comply.” Marsh quotes a Christian missionary who expressed a sentiment shared by certain evangelicals: “American foreign policy and military might have opened an opportunity for the Gospel in the land of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob.” Marsh says that “both Franklin Graham, the evangelist son of Billy Graham, and Marvin Olasky, . . . a former advisor to President Bush on faith-based policy, echoed these sentiments, claiming that the American invasion of Iraq would create exciting new prospects for proselytizing Muslims.”
Marsh states that “an astonishing 87 percent of all white evangelical Christians in the United States supported the president’s decision in April 2003 [to invade Iraq],” and “recent polls indicate that 68 percent of white evangelicals continue to support the war.” He writes that their support was not based on “Christian moral doctrine” of pursuing peace and loving enemies, but on “our Faustian bargain for access and power,” which “has undermined the credibility of our evangelistic witness in the world.”
Marsh’s concluding sentence reveals the apparent imperialistic bent of many evangelical Christians: “The Hebrew prophets might call us to repentance, but repentance is a tough demand for a people utterly convinced of their righteousness.” (“Wayward Christian Soldiers,” The Boston Globe, Jan. 20, 2006) Fascism parading as faith “Marching as to war, With the cross of Jesus Going on before!”
With spirituality, the danger to one’s neighbor comes when one moves from simply doing “good works” to a theological group identity that feels superior and then to domination over those seen as “inferior.” Where does spirituality end and personality, culture, and patriotic national identity begin?
Where does faith end and cause-and-effect begin? Certain religious leaders and their followers need to protect their god—and themselves—from knowledge. The more mysterious their god’s ways, the more they can actually control his movement—with an infallible compass, the Bible. They need to believe that their god’s ways are “unsearchable.” Therein lies these religious leaders’ authority and power over people—and their people’s need to remain dependent and powerless. Such religious leaders can turn to their divinely revealed Bible to interpret their god’s ways and will. Thus a prominent Southern Baptist author reportedly told pastors at a workshop, “The tsunamis that hit South Asia were God’s punishment of a [Muslim] area where Christians have experienced particularly intense persecution.” (“Blackaby says tsunamis God’s judgement; missions experts question theology,” by Ken Camp, Associated Baptist Press-News, 1/27/2005)
Thus “some religious conservatives (Rev. Pat Robertson, Hal Lindsey, and Charles Colson) have speculated that . . . Hurricane Katrina was sent by God as an omen or as a punishment for America’s alleged sins,” especially “legalized abortion.” (“Religious conservatives claim Katrina was God . . . ,” Media Matters for America, Sept. 13, 2005)
Thus “an organization of Christian fundamentalists claims the destruction brought on by Hurricane Katrina is God’s judgement against New Orleans for holiday festivals like the annual gay Southern Decadence party. ‘Although the loss of life is deeply saddening, this act of God destroyed a wicked city,’ said Repent America director Michael Marcavage on the organization’s website.” (“Religious groups link Hurricane to gay event,” Christopher Curtis.gay.com/Planet Ont.com Network)
Thus such divine judgement appears to be shared by Rev. Franklin Graham who said, “There’s been a black spiritual cloud [italics added] over New Orleans for years.” Appearing at Liberty University, a Christian college, “Graham spoke about how some believed God was using the hurricane to spark a religious revival there,” because “New Orleans is a city known for Satan worship, orgies and widespread drinking and drug use.” (“Some US Christians say Katrina was God’s handiwork,” by Paul Simao, Reuters Alert Net, Oct. 16, 2005) What would a white spiritual cloud represent? Goodness? Showers of blessings? The revelation of Rev. Franklin Graham’s own unconscious feelings of racial superiority? To what degree are spirituality and one’s god colored by one’s own racial conditioning and identity?
Thus Rev. Jerry Falwell interpreted the 9/11/2001 attacks as “God’s judgement on America.” “I really believe,” Falwell said, “that the pagans, and the abortionists, and the feminists, and the gays and the lesbians who are actually trying to make that an alternative lifestyle, the ACLU, People for the American Way, all of them who have tried to secularize America. I point the finger in their face and say ‘you helped this happen.’”
Rev. Pat Robertson reportedly said “Amen!” to Falwell’s prophetic judgement-- which “revelation” Falwell later retracted. (“Falwell apologizes to gays, feminists, lesbians,” CNN.com/U.S., Sept. 14, 2001)
Civilized society punishes people severely for committing a fraction of the wanton and destructive behavior certain Christian fundamentalist and other religious leaders attribute to their god. It would seem that such leaders are projecting onto their god their own unconscious hatred and aggression. Such a destructive god should be restricted to history, or banished to the heavens, or confined to a book, or studied in a laboratory to understand his terroristic nature -- and not allowed to return and “move in mysterious ways” upon the earth and among human beings until his worshippers enjoy the therapeutic touch of a Golden Retriever, or unexpectedly discover the humanizing love of a gay or lesbian son or daughter, or experience unconditional love themselves from another human being.
The attempt to protect one’s god from empirical knowledge (the need to dumb-down one’s god) is seen in the change in the training of ministers in pastoral care and counseling at Southern Baptist Theological Seminary in Louisville, Kentucky. The seminary has dropped “secular psychology” from its curriculum and “is taking its Christian counseling department in a new direction, one built upon the sufficiency of Scripture and designed to train pastors to deal biblically with the needs of hurting people.” This “wholesale change in emphasis [is] built upon the view that Scripture is sufficient to answer comprehensively the deepest needs of the human heart” [italics added]. The very psychological knowledge and supervised clinical training, through which ministers gain self-understanding and are thus better able to love themselves and hence, their neighbor, are dumped into a wastebasket. Replaced by “true ‘pastoral care’ as defined by the Scriptures.” (“Southern Seminary Launches new vision for biblical counseling,” by Jeff Robinson, (BP) news, Feb. 15, 2005)
A concerned pastoral psychotherapist, Rev. Dr. Perry Miller, writes that he and other psychotherapists and clinical supervisors of ministers-in-training “have had to pick up the pieces of people’s lives, who have been counseled or supervised by such a limited model.” Miller stresses the importance of clergy gaining insight into themselves and other persons through integrating knowledge of the social sciences under the guidance of a clinically trained supervisor. (“A Threat to Clinical Pastoral Training,” by Perry Miller, Pastoral Report.com, The Newsletter of the College of Pastoral Supervision and Psychotherapy, Feb. 23, 2005). The spiritual health of worshippers depends in part on the emotional health of their religious leaders.
Religious leaders and their followers who need to protect their god from cause-and-effect, from knowledge are projecting on to their god their own need to protect themselves from self-knowledge. They tend to be anti-introspective persons, not wanting to look at and understand their own feelings and motivations. Paul the Apostle said, “Faith without works is dead.” (James 2:26) One might add, faith and works without self-knowledge can be deadly.
Jesus seemed to ground spirituality in self-knowledge and human relationships. When asked which was the greatest commandment in the law,” he answered, “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart . . . [And] the second is like it: “You shall love you neighbor as yourself.” (Matthew 22:25-30) It is assumed that love of one’s neighbor depends on love of oneself: one’s ability to experience one’s own humanness and to embrace one’s own worth and rights.
Self-knowledge is believed to be a fundamental qualification of any clergy person—and of anyone committed to democratic values. One has to know where he or she is coming from in order to know where other persons are at. Self-knowledge helps one to avoid getting in one’s own way in living and working with and serving people. The more one is in touch with and accepting of oneself, the better prepared one is to experience and accept other persons as themselves – better able to experience rather than interpret their reality.
Each person seems to have his/her own unique “spiritual fingerprints”—as does each group have its own individual ways of performing its spiritual wonders. The spiritual lives of individuals seem to be as varied as their emotional make-up, physical identities, and cultural orientations and conditioning. The influence of personality, culture and spirituality on each other is believed to determine the various ways in which the human spirit moves to perform its wonders.
If the individual and personal nature of spirituality reveals (inadvertently) anything about divinity, it appears to be the diversity of divinity--and thus the divinity of diversity. Spirituality seems to disclose that any divinity is evidently comfortable with, affirms and embraces humanity’s diversity and connectedness, individuality and commonality, uniqueness and oneness. An apparently spiritually inspired Paul the Apostle declared, “If I have all faith, so as to remove mountains but have not love, I am nothing.” (I Corinthians 13:26).
Whether the source of one’s spirituality is the “Holy Spirit” or a human spirit, spirituality would appear to include what one does with what one feels and believes. It would seem that one’s spiritual experiences and beliefs would lead to identification and connectedness with all living beings. The bottom line of spirituality, therefore, would seem to be behavior and not simply belief, action and not just awe, outreach and not merely uplift, introspection and not only inspiration, justice as well as joy. The morality of spirituality.
*Rev. William E. Alberts, Ph.D. is a hospital chaplain, and a Diplomate in the College of Pastoral Supervision and Psychotherapy. Both a Unitarian Universalist and United Methodist minister, he has written research reports, essays and articles on religion, racism, war and politics. He can be reached at aea121@hotmail.com.
Amy E. Alberts, M.A. is a Ph.D. student at Tufts University in the Eliot-Pearson Department of Child Development. She is co-editor, with Dr. Jacqueline Lerner, of Current Directions in Developmental Psychology, a Pearson Prentice Hall book of readings from the American Psychological Society (2004). She can be reached at aea121@hotmail.com.
William E. Alberts and Amy E. Alberts*
Spirituality reveals not only the infiniteness of divinity but the infinite varieties of humanity. Type “spirituality” in an Internet search service and over 6 ½ million references appear. Follow that with “Christian spirituality,” and you could spend another eternity studying almost 2 ½ million sources. Spirituality may tell us far more about humanity than about divinity. In fact, this brief examination of spirituality is not about tracing the “mysterious ways” in which “God moves. . . His wonders to perform,” as the hymn declares, but about identifying the many and various ways in which the human spirit moves to perform its wonders. Nor do we presume to cover the manifold meanings of spirituality. Still, our study of the human spirit is believed to contain hints of the nature of any divinity.
Our focus is on two human “wonders” of spirituality. Spirituality may be a way to affirm, nourish, renew and empower the human mind, body and spirit. A wellspring of comfort and strength, enabling coping and wellness, and reflection and direction and connectedness with other human beings. A wellspring that overflows into love of one’s neighbor as oneself.
On the other hand, spirituality can be a wastebasket into which an individual or group may dump cause-and-effect understanding of the behavioral and societal and natural-event determinants of health and illness. A wastebasket that may accommodate ignorance and an excessive self-centered need for authority and absolutes that promise a “cure-all,” alleviate feelings of powerlessness, and legitimize anti-democratic beliefs and tendencies and behavior. First, spirituality as a wellspring of self-empowerment and connectedness with other human beings.
Foremost, spirituality is personal. It may be defined by, but not confined to, creed or ritual. It may be explained but not contained, described but not proscribed. It may be entertained but not solely institutionalized. For example, in a discussion about religion, a hospital patient was asked if he were “Baptist, Methodist, Catholic, Jewish, Muslim, or of another religion,” and he replied, “None of the above. I’m spiritual.” Like many persons, his spirituality did not fit traditional classifications. He voiced a private faith in a personal god which apparently helps him deal with his medical and other realities. He evidently is one of the 6 ½ million representations of spirituality on the Internet search service.
The assumed empowering personal nature of spirituality is seen in the prayer of a woman who has been blind and suffering from a chronic illness for 40 years: “God, I’m sick and thank you anyhow [italics added]. You have helped me through it for 40 years, and given me a loving husband and two wonderful children. I praise You not just for the good times but for the bad times too, which You have led me through.” She was not thanking her god for curing her blindness but for seeing her through it—though she may well have prayed often for a miracle earlier on.
In the face of illness, injury and death, many hospital patients and their families and friends find comfort and empowerment in the prayerful words, “Thank you, Jesus”—not for what has befallen them but for whom they believe is beholding them in love.
“Thank you anyhow” may exemplify studies showing that people with spiritual resources especially appear to possess resiliency in coping with illness and injury, and still enjoy a quality of life in the midst of stress, discomfort and limitations. Spirituality seems to foster a positive, accepting, empowering attitude, enabling people to proactively realize that they help to determine the possibilities of their limitations and the limitations of their possibilities. The connection between spirituality and attitude is perceptively expressed in Lamentations 3:19-23; “Remember my affliction and bitterness, the wormwood and the gall! My soul continually thinks of it and is bowed down within me. But this I call to mind [italics added], and therefore I have hope: The steadfast love of the Lord never ceases, his mercies never come to an end, they are new every morning.” (Lamentations 3:19-23)
Not that attitude is dependent on spirituality for will power and quality of life. One may call to mind inner emotional resources, loving human relationships, and positive experiences and therefore have hope and thrive in the face of adversity. Affirmation, inspiration, love, reinforcement come from a human spirit as well as from a “Holy Spirit.”. Spirituality is believed to be a source of inner strength not the source.
While spirituality is personal and usually perceived as heaven sent, it also moves in horizontal ways. Spirituality has a “human touch.” The wondrous horizontal “ways” of spirituality are seen in a woman who underwent two additional unexpected surgeries, and, when finally ready, and eager, to be discharged developed a complication which continued to hospitalize and depress her. “I had had it,” she said. “I just stopped trying, stopped fighting to get better, gave in and just left it all in God’s hands. I had given up. But later, when I heard my roommate start to hum ‘Love lifted me,’ my body surged upward; and then she began to sing the words. . .”
Spirituality may involve more of a human touch than is readily understood and appreciated. It may be impossible to know where an individual’s emotional and physical make-up end and spirituality begins. For example, an attractive older female pastoral care volunteer visited a very sick-appearing, listless, prone male hospital patient. As she stood next to his bed and engaged him in conversation, his body began to stir. Their exchanges grew more spontaneous, personal, familiar, and even light-hearted joshing, leading him to literally rise up in his bed, his body animated, his full smile reflecting an uplifted spirit. Her presence and their exchange seem to have not only made his day but his hospital stay. Her prayer appeared to be anti-climactic. He had already caught the spirit. Was it agape or eros? Or both?
Spirituality can be empowering. Individual religious experience can alleviate guilt, give peace of mind, certainty and inner strength. It can turn an individual around, lead one to be “born again,” to become sober, clean, responsible, focused, creative. A patient suddenly stopped abusing his body with alcohol and cigarettes when he discovered that someone else loved it and him—and revealed it was a temple of spirituality. That someone was Jesus, whom he accepted as his savior, which acceptance not only helped to save him from years of self-abuse but also inspired him to write songs and sing them for others in churches and on radio broadcasts.
In the face of imprisonment, “the prayer of a righteous man availeth much,” a Black man newly converted to the Muslim faith. Even in confinement, self-empowerment is obtained in solidarity with people of like-minded realities and beliefs, affirming and liberating the spirit in the face of an oppressive environment and society. The spiritual power of solidarity even in solitary confinement.
While many studies claim to show that spirituality promotes health, Dr. Richard P. Sloan and associates provide their own cautionary research. “Even in the best studies,” they write, “the evidence of association between religion, spirituality and health is weak and inconsistent.” They also cite ethical issues implied by belief in a god who seems to favor the faithful, one issue of which is, “Are the more devout adherents ‘better’ people, more deserving of health than others?” They assume that such a belief suggests “illness is due to [patients’] own moral failure,” and produces an “additional burden of guilt.” (“Religion, spirituality, and medicine,” by R. P. Sloan, E. Bagiella and T. Powell,
The Lancet, Feb. 20, 1999, Pages 664-667, Vol. 353, Issue 9153) It is as if their god plays favorites, which seems contrary to Jesus’ teaching that “your Father who is in heaven . . . makes his sun rise on the evil and the good, and sends his rain on the just and the unjust . . . and is kind to the ungrateful and the selfish.” (Matthew 5: 46; Luke 6: 35, 36)
Not that Dr. Sloan and his colleagues disregard the power of prayer. They write, “No one can object to respectful support for patients who draw upon religious faith in times of illness.” But they conclude that “it is premature to promote faith and religion as adjunctive medical treatments.” They say that until related “ethical issues are resolved, suggestions that religious activity will promote health, that illness is the result of insufficient faith, are unwarranted.” (Ibid.)
Dr. Sloan also states that “attempts to make religious activities adjunctive medical treatments . . . come dangerously close to efforts to validate religion by its effects on health.” He says, “Religion does not need science to justify its existence or appeal.” (“Should Physicians Prescribe Religious Activities,” The New England Journal of Medicine, June 22, 2000, Vol. 342: 1913-1916, No. 25)
Mayo Clinic internal medicine specialist and researcher Paul S. Mueller, while more positive than Dr. Sloan and associates about the relationship between religion and health, grounds spirituality this way: “Although the relationship between religious
involvement and spirituality and health outcomes seems valid, it is difficult to establish causality. . . . The benefits of religious and spiritual involvement are likely conveyed
through complex psychosocial, behavioral and biological processes that are incompletely understood.” (www.science-spirit.org)
The intrinsically personal and individual nature of spirituality reveals the difficulty involved in trying to determine common denominators. The “spirit” moves one group of worshippers to stand, sway, clap their uplifted hands and say “Hallelujah!” “Amen!” “Thank you, Jesus!”—to the beat of gospel music and preaching. Another congregation may sit quietly, attuned to orderly measures of an anthem and sermon that accommodate and inform their meditative mood. A third group may find their spirits quickened and renewed in chanting, ritual and sacrament. While a fourth may find their spirituality uplifted and community reinforced and empowered in bowing together and facing Northeast toward Ka’bah, the holy shrine in Mecca, and kneeling and praying in unison as equals. And a fifth may find the light of spirituality in silence. Each group might not “get” the other’s access to and expression of spirituality. Yet the legitimacy of each would seem to be obvious. But too often it is not.
Spirituality can be a wastebasket into which an individual or group may dump, deny and even deify insecurities, lack of knowledge and the need for certainty reflected in self-centered, submissive or dominating tendencies. A person who has spent years abusing his or her lungs, liver and/or heart may pray for miraculous healing when confronted with reaping what she or he has sown. Here spirituality may be resorted to in an attempt to hurdle the reality of cause and effect—a very human, but usually futile and despairing tendency. However, it may not just be about choices and self-abuse but also about the health- or illness-disposed genetic makeup one inherits. And lest one fails to appreciate another’s reality: illness naturally makes one physically, emotionally and spiritually centered on oneself.
Certain biblically-guided Christians believe that their “God is able” to perform the miraculous healing of a dying or physically paralyzed loved one (or another) in the face of cause-and-effect scientific medical reality. They believe what is needed, as Jesus said, is enough faith: “And whatever you ask in prayer, you will receive, if you have faith.” (Matthew 21: 22) When death ensues, or the physical impairment remains, those who “pray without ceasing” may blame themselves, believing their faith was not strong enough to elicit their god’s favor. Such Bible-inspired belief is understandably propelled by love and hope and fear—and denial. But in the end there may be a spiritual Catch-22 of guilt—with a letdown of faith caused by a seemingly narcissistic, reality-denying diety who professes to favor those who favor him. It would appear that spirituality should help one to deal with reality not short cut or deny it.
While people inevitably reap the cause-and-effect they sow, certain people reap what others have sown for them. There remains in America an historic, institutionalized White-controlled hierarchy of access to political and economic power. This hierarchy has enabled White persons to sow far more educational and economic opportunities than people of color—and thus reap far greater health and health care. At the heart of America’s “lingering racial divide” is a job gap that creates a health gap. Black persons continue to reap an unhealthy, discriminatory, White-favored political and economic order sown for those at the bottom of the hierarchy. Those who suffer from lack of adequate paying jobs, insufficient diet, polluted air, an indifferent and often hostile environment, and a tokenistic power structure are more likely to reap hypertension, anxiety, high blood pressure, diabetes, kidney failure, asthma, stroke, cancer, heart disease, mental illness, HIV/AIDS, implosive physical violence, and lower life expectancy. (“Patients With H.I.V. Seen as Separated By a Racial Divide,” The New York Times, August 7, 2004; “Disparities found in health care for blacks,” The Boston Globe, August 5, 2004; “Report finds minorities get poorer healthcare,” by Ron Blakey, March 20, 2002, http://www.cnn.com/; “Mental Health Problems Among Minorities,” by Richard A. Sherer, http://www.healthyplace.com/.)
In a report, the Northwest Federation of Community Organizations in Seattle concluded, “Unconscious racism is so entrenched in the US medical system that the only way to eliminate disparities is to change the rules . . .” Will Pittz, lead author of the report, said, “The healthcare system as a whole provides vastly unequal access and treatment based on race, language, and ethnicity. . . . Racism within the health system is literally making people of color sick.”
The Boston Globe news story on the report also cited former US Surgeon General Dr. David Satcher, who “found that more than 80,000 black Americans die every year because of continuing disparities in healthcare.” The news story, called “Racism blamed for health disparities,” also cited another study: “Last September, the Sullivan
Commission on Diversity in the Health Workforce found that while Black, Hispanics, and Native Americans make up more than 25 percent of the US population, they represent only 9 percent of the nation’s nurses, 6 percent of doctors, and 5 percent of dentists.” (July 20, 2005)
The health care disparity was used by President Bush, to sell his plan to privatize Social Security, in a meeting with 24 selective African American religious and community leaders. Bush reportedly “told black leaders yesterday that his plan to add private accounts to Social Security would benefit blacks because they tend to have shorter lives than some other Americans and end up paying more than they get out.” (The Boston Globe, Jan. 26, 2005) Why Black people do not live as long as “some other Americans” [italics added] evidently was not discussed.
A recent New York Times editorial called diabetes an “epidemic,… a disease defined by economic disparity,” with “blacks and Hispanics… disproportionately stricken.” Entitled “Declare War on Diabetes,” the editorial warned, “Ignore it, and it can lead to heart disease, strokes, amputations and shortened lives.” (Feb 5, 2006)
Economically speaking, one group’s wellspring may be another group’s wastebasket. Spiritually speaking, one person’s blessing may be another person’s curse. A healthy expression of spirituality would seem to include addressing what in society is unhealthy.
Matters of the spirit can also be recreated in the image of an individual’s or group’s need for certainty, security, rightness, power over others and domination. Spirituality can be a vehicle to authenticate and dictate “correct” theological belief rather than just, ethical behavior. Here spirituality is a means by which to obtain the right experience and belief, not do the right thing—as if that which is perceived as spiritual can be contained, controlled, claimed, patented. Here also spirituality is often about a personal, other-worldly destination, more than about an interpersonal journey with others—unless they are, or become, like-minded.
To claim absoluteness in matters of the spirit is to reveal ignorance of the spirit that matters to other kinds of people. To claim one’s religion has, or religious experience is, the key to the “spiritual kingdom” is to unknowingly confess one’s own spiritual serfdom. Such confinement of spirit may be acted out in an interfaith or community observance or national event at which a Christian minister or priest gives an invocation or benediction “in the name of Your only Son, our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ.” Classic examples are the closing words of Baptist evangelist Rev. Franklin Graham’s Invocation at President George W. Bush’s January 2001 Inauguration: “. . . We pray this in the name of the Father, and of the Son, the Lord Jesus Christ, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen;” and the conclusion of United Methodist minister Kirbyson Caldwell’s Benediction at the same Inaugural: “We respectfully submit this humble prayer in the name that’s above all other names, Jesus, the Christ. Let all who agree say amen.”
A Christian minister or priest who is unaware of or disregards, for example, the Jews or Muslims in an audience before him (or her) is far more likely to be oblivious to the Muslims or Jews being oppressed around him—or beyond him by his government in his name. “Christocentrism,” like egocentrism and ethnocentrism, is threatened by, oblivious to and wars against diversity. Only “in Jesus name” can become like a box one cannot think or relate outside of. Such spirituality may not only accommodate imperialistic political policies but foster them.
Charles Marsh, religion professor at the University of Virginia, writes about “Wayward
Christian Soldiers,” his own brother and sister American evangelicals, whose pre-Iraq invasion “war sermons” had a common theme: “Our president is a real brother in Christ, and because he has discerned that God’s will is for our nation to be at war with Iraq, we shall gloriously comply.” Marsh quotes a Christian missionary who expressed a sentiment shared by certain evangelicals: “American foreign policy and military might have opened an opportunity for the Gospel in the land of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob.” Marsh says that “both Franklin Graham, the evangelist son of Billy Graham, and Marvin Olasky, . . . a former advisor to President Bush on faith-based policy, echoed these sentiments, claiming that the American invasion of Iraq would create exciting new prospects for proselytizing Muslims.”
Marsh states that “an astonishing 87 percent of all white evangelical Christians in the United States supported the president’s decision in April 2003 [to invade Iraq],” and “recent polls indicate that 68 percent of white evangelicals continue to support the war.” He writes that their support was not based on “Christian moral doctrine” of pursuing peace and loving enemies, but on “our Faustian bargain for access and power,” which “has undermined the credibility of our evangelistic witness in the world.”
Marsh’s concluding sentence reveals the apparent imperialistic bent of many evangelical Christians: “The Hebrew prophets might call us to repentance, but repentance is a tough demand for a people utterly convinced of their righteousness.” (“Wayward Christian Soldiers,” The Boston Globe, Jan. 20, 2006) Fascism parading as faith “Marching as to war, With the cross of Jesus Going on before!”
With spirituality, the danger to one’s neighbor comes when one moves from simply doing “good works” to a theological group identity that feels superior and then to domination over those seen as “inferior.” Where does spirituality end and personality, culture, and patriotic national identity begin?
Where does faith end and cause-and-effect begin? Certain religious leaders and their followers need to protect their god—and themselves—from knowledge. The more mysterious their god’s ways, the more they can actually control his movement—with an infallible compass, the Bible. They need to believe that their god’s ways are “unsearchable.” Therein lies these religious leaders’ authority and power over people—and their people’s need to remain dependent and powerless. Such religious leaders can turn to their divinely revealed Bible to interpret their god’s ways and will. Thus a prominent Southern Baptist author reportedly told pastors at a workshop, “The tsunamis that hit South Asia were God’s punishment of a [Muslim] area where Christians have experienced particularly intense persecution.” (“Blackaby says tsunamis God’s judgement; missions experts question theology,” by Ken Camp, Associated Baptist Press-News, 1/27/2005)
Thus “some religious conservatives (Rev. Pat Robertson, Hal Lindsey, and Charles Colson) have speculated that . . . Hurricane Katrina was sent by God as an omen or as a punishment for America’s alleged sins,” especially “legalized abortion.” (“Religious conservatives claim Katrina was God . . . ,” Media Matters for America, Sept. 13, 2005)
Thus “an organization of Christian fundamentalists claims the destruction brought on by Hurricane Katrina is God’s judgement against New Orleans for holiday festivals like the annual gay Southern Decadence party. ‘Although the loss of life is deeply saddening, this act of God destroyed a wicked city,’ said Repent America director Michael Marcavage on the organization’s website.” (“Religious groups link Hurricane to gay event,” Christopher Curtis.gay.com/Planet Ont.com Network)
Thus such divine judgement appears to be shared by Rev. Franklin Graham who said, “There’s been a black spiritual cloud [italics added] over New Orleans for years.” Appearing at Liberty University, a Christian college, “Graham spoke about how some believed God was using the hurricane to spark a religious revival there,” because “New Orleans is a city known for Satan worship, orgies and widespread drinking and drug use.” (“Some US Christians say Katrina was God’s handiwork,” by Paul Simao, Reuters Alert Net, Oct. 16, 2005) What would a white spiritual cloud represent? Goodness? Showers of blessings? The revelation of Rev. Franklin Graham’s own unconscious feelings of racial superiority? To what degree are spirituality and one’s god colored by one’s own racial conditioning and identity?
Thus Rev. Jerry Falwell interpreted the 9/11/2001 attacks as “God’s judgement on America.” “I really believe,” Falwell said, “that the pagans, and the abortionists, and the feminists, and the gays and the lesbians who are actually trying to make that an alternative lifestyle, the ACLU, People for the American Way, all of them who have tried to secularize America. I point the finger in their face and say ‘you helped this happen.’”
Rev. Pat Robertson reportedly said “Amen!” to Falwell’s prophetic judgement-- which “revelation” Falwell later retracted. (“Falwell apologizes to gays, feminists, lesbians,” CNN.com/U.S., Sept. 14, 2001)
Civilized society punishes people severely for committing a fraction of the wanton and destructive behavior certain Christian fundamentalist and other religious leaders attribute to their god. It would seem that such leaders are projecting onto their god their own unconscious hatred and aggression. Such a destructive god should be restricted to history, or banished to the heavens, or confined to a book, or studied in a laboratory to understand his terroristic nature -- and not allowed to return and “move in mysterious ways” upon the earth and among human beings until his worshippers enjoy the therapeutic touch of a Golden Retriever, or unexpectedly discover the humanizing love of a gay or lesbian son or daughter, or experience unconditional love themselves from another human being.
The attempt to protect one’s god from empirical knowledge (the need to dumb-down one’s god) is seen in the change in the training of ministers in pastoral care and counseling at Southern Baptist Theological Seminary in Louisville, Kentucky. The seminary has dropped “secular psychology” from its curriculum and “is taking its Christian counseling department in a new direction, one built upon the sufficiency of Scripture and designed to train pastors to deal biblically with the needs of hurting people.” This “wholesale change in emphasis [is] built upon the view that Scripture is sufficient to answer comprehensively the deepest needs of the human heart” [italics added]. The very psychological knowledge and supervised clinical training, through which ministers gain self-understanding and are thus better able to love themselves and hence, their neighbor, are dumped into a wastebasket. Replaced by “true ‘pastoral care’ as defined by the Scriptures.” (“Southern Seminary Launches new vision for biblical counseling,” by Jeff Robinson, (BP) news, Feb. 15, 2005)
A concerned pastoral psychotherapist, Rev. Dr. Perry Miller, writes that he and other psychotherapists and clinical supervisors of ministers-in-training “have had to pick up the pieces of people’s lives, who have been counseled or supervised by such a limited model.” Miller stresses the importance of clergy gaining insight into themselves and other persons through integrating knowledge of the social sciences under the guidance of a clinically trained supervisor. (“A Threat to Clinical Pastoral Training,” by Perry Miller, Pastoral Report.com, The Newsletter of the College of Pastoral Supervision and Psychotherapy, Feb. 23, 2005). The spiritual health of worshippers depends in part on the emotional health of their religious leaders.
Religious leaders and their followers who need to protect their god from cause-and-effect, from knowledge are projecting on to their god their own need to protect themselves from self-knowledge. They tend to be anti-introspective persons, not wanting to look at and understand their own feelings and motivations. Paul the Apostle said, “Faith without works is dead.” (James 2:26) One might add, faith and works without self-knowledge can be deadly.
Jesus seemed to ground spirituality in self-knowledge and human relationships. When asked which was the greatest commandment in the law,” he answered, “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart . . . [And] the second is like it: “You shall love you neighbor as yourself.” (Matthew 22:25-30) It is assumed that love of one’s neighbor depends on love of oneself: one’s ability to experience one’s own humanness and to embrace one’s own worth and rights.
Self-knowledge is believed to be a fundamental qualification of any clergy person—and of anyone committed to democratic values. One has to know where he or she is coming from in order to know where other persons are at. Self-knowledge helps one to avoid getting in one’s own way in living and working with and serving people. The more one is in touch with and accepting of oneself, the better prepared one is to experience and accept other persons as themselves – better able to experience rather than interpret their reality.
Each person seems to have his/her own unique “spiritual fingerprints”—as does each group have its own individual ways of performing its spiritual wonders. The spiritual lives of individuals seem to be as varied as their emotional make-up, physical identities, and cultural orientations and conditioning. The influence of personality, culture and spirituality on each other is believed to determine the various ways in which the human spirit moves to perform its wonders.
If the individual and personal nature of spirituality reveals (inadvertently) anything about divinity, it appears to be the diversity of divinity--and thus the divinity of diversity. Spirituality seems to disclose that any divinity is evidently comfortable with, affirms and embraces humanity’s diversity and connectedness, individuality and commonality, uniqueness and oneness. An apparently spiritually inspired Paul the Apostle declared, “If I have all faith, so as to remove mountains but have not love, I am nothing.” (I Corinthians 13:26).
Whether the source of one’s spirituality is the “Holy Spirit” or a human spirit, spirituality would appear to include what one does with what one feels and believes. It would seem that one’s spiritual experiences and beliefs would lead to identification and connectedness with all living beings. The bottom line of spirituality, therefore, would seem to be behavior and not simply belief, action and not just awe, outreach and not merely uplift, introspection and not only inspiration, justice as well as joy. The morality of spirituality.
*Rev. William E. Alberts, Ph.D. is a hospital chaplain, and a Diplomate in the College of Pastoral Supervision and Psychotherapy. Both a Unitarian Universalist and United Methodist minister, he has written research reports, essays and articles on religion, racism, war and politics. He can be reached at aea121@hotmail.com.
Amy E. Alberts, M.A. is a Ph.D. student at Tufts University in the Eliot-Pearson Department of Child Development. She is co-editor, with Dr. Jacqueline Lerner, of Current Directions in Developmental Psychology, a Pearson Prentice Hall book of readings from the American Psychological Society (2004). She can be reached at aea121@hotmail.com.
Tuesday, December 13, 2005
The Forgotten Christmas Story
By
Rev. WILLIAM E. ALBERTS
There is a forgotten Christmas story. A story rarely dwelled on in Christian churches. A story often drowned out by a "multitude of the heavenly hosts" singing Christmas carols. It is not the story of Jesus' birth. It is the related story of a "troubled" King Herod ordering the slaughter of all the male Jewish children "two years old or under" in the region of Bethlehem, to kill off any threat to his power prophesied by the birth of a messiah. It is the story of "wailing and loud lamentation," of "Rachel weeping [inconsolably] for her children, because they were no more." (Matthew 2:1-18) I believe it is the real story of Christmas. Thus honoring Jesus' birth includes responding to today's Rachels and their children because that is what Jesus was about.
Who are today's Rachels and their children? Inconsolable weeping continues to be heard throughout Iraq, where, between 1990-98 alone, US-controlled UN economic sanctions contributed to the deaths of some 500,000 Iraqi children under five years of age. And Rachel's "bitter weeping" has intensified with the March 19, 2003 Bush administration-led invasion and ensuing occupation of Iraq_"wailing and loud lamentation" that have helped to fuel a powerful insurgency. And it is here that we see today's King Herod.
President Bush has followed in King Herod's footsteps, using secrecy and deception to pursue US global domination. The story of Jesus' birth states, "King Herod called the visitors from the East to a secret meeting, and found out from them the exact time the star had appeared. Then," the story continues, " he sent them to Bethlehem with these instructions: 'Go and make a careful search for the child; and when you find him, let me know so that I too may go and worship him.'" But the wise men later knowingly avoided Herod, whose anger led him to order the massacre of "all the children in [and around] Bethlehem . . . " (Ibid)
How many secret meetings did President Bush have early on with his "wise neoconservative men" in an attempt to use the tragedy of 9/11 to justify the travesty of pre-emptive war against Iraq? How many concealed meetings did it take to "fix" intelligence and mislead Congress and the American people into falsely believing Iraq had weapons of mass destruction and ties to Al-Qaeda and the 9/11 attacks against America? ("The secret Downing Street memo," by David Manning, From: Matthew Rycroft, The Sunday Times - Britain, May 1, 2005)
How many secluded meetings did Vice President Cheney have with Lewis Libby, his chief of staff, to plan the leaking of Valerie Plame's secret CIA identity, to punish her husband, Ambassador Joseph Wilson, for exposing "fixed" intelligence? How many private "telephone calls" did this now indicted "former Hill staffer" [italics added] then have with reporters to "out" Plame and punish her husband_and thus warn other potential whistle blowers of a similar fate? How many similarly focused secretive meetings might President Bush have had with Karl Rove, his chief of staff, who remains under investigation by special prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald's office?
The similarity between President Bush and King Herod may also be seen in their use of deception to mask imperialistic designs. Both used worship of life to hide opposite intentions. The one wanted to destroy a threat to his power under the pretense of, "When you find him, let me know, so that I too may go and worship him." The other saw 9/11 as an opportunity to advance American global domination, which he also wrapped in worship: "Freedom is not America's gift to the world, it is God's gift to every man and woman in the world." ("Acceptance Speech to Republican Convention Delegates," The New York Times, Sept. 9, 2004) Rachel's continued "wailing and loud lamentation" reveal that the Bush administration's war of choice is not about "freedom" and "democracy" but about occupation and oil and empire.
Rachels's ungoing inconsolable weeping for her dead and dying Iraqi children is extensively documented. Over a year ago, the well respected British medical journal, The Lancet published "the first reliable study" of Iraq's civilian deaths since the invasion: "about 100,000 . . . most were women and children . . . violent deaths were widespread . . . and air strikes from coalition forces accounted for most violent deaths." ("100,000 Iraqi civilians dead says study," Sarah Boseley, health editor, The Guardian, Oct. 29, 2004; "Mortality before and after the 2003 invasion of Iraq: cluster sample survey," by Les Roberts, Riyadh Lafta, Richard Garfield, Jamal Khudhairi, Gilbert Burnham, The Lancet, Oct. 30, 2004) The Lancet-published study assumes the Iraqi civilian death toll would be "far more" if it included those killed in the US forces November 2004 assault on Fallujah. (Ibid)
In fact, Rachel's cries for her Fallujah children are apparently finally beginning to be heard. The Independent recently reported, "Powerful new evidence emerged yesterday that the United States dropped massive quantities of white phosphorus on the Iraqi city of Fallujah during the attack on the city in November 2004, killing insurgents and civilians with the appalling burns that are the signature of this weapon." The evidence includes "hideous photographs and videos and interviews with American soldiers who took part in the Fallujah attack." ("US forces 'used chemical weapons' during assault on city of Fallujah," by Peter Popham, Nov. 8, 2005)
The use of chemical weapons is a violation of the Geneva Conventions_as is the failure of an occupying power to count the deaths of Rachel's children. Sadly, the Pentagon turns a deaf ear to Rachel's cries: it does not count civilian deaths and, for seemingly obvious reasons, discounts those of human rights and public health groups.
Rachel's intense and growing inconsolable weeping in Iraq is being picked up in various reports. Her sobbing is heard in an Associated Press story on UN hunger expert Jean Ziegler's March 2005 presentation to the UN Human Rights Commission. Ziegler summarized previously reported studies of Iraqi children by other specialists: "Malnutrition among the youngest Iraqis has almost doubled since the U.S.-led invasion toppled Saddam Hussein." Thus, "By last fall [2004], 7.7 percent of Iraqi children under 5 suffered acute malnutrition, compared to 4 percent after Saddam's ouster in April 2003," Ziegler said. "Overall more than a quarter of Iraqi children don't get enough to eat." And, "malnutrition, . . . exacerbated by a lack of clean water and adequate sanitation, is a major killer of children in poor countries." Ziegler also stated that "the situation facing Iraqi youngsters is 'a result of the war led by coalition forces.'" ("Expert: Malnutrition Affects Iraq Kids," Jonathan Fowler, UN Security Council-Global Policy Forum, Mar. 30, 2005)
Ironically, the major nutrition issue facing Iraqi children before the "Washington-championed" UN sanctions and the Bush administration's pre-emptive war was "obesity." ("Children Pay Cost of Iraq's Chaos," by Karl Vick, washington.post.com, Nov. 21, 2004)
Rachel's continuing cries are recorded by Medact, a global conflict-studying health charity, which produced three reports on the health of Iraqi people, one before and two after the Bush administration's invasion and occupation. Medact's 2004 report summarized "the enduring effects of war: . . . Iraq already had high child and adult mortality and there is an alarming reoccurrence of previously well-controlled communicable diseases including diarrhoeal diseases, acute respiratory infections and typhoid, particularly among children. Medact concludes that "the 2003 war exacerbated the threats to health already created by previous wars, tyranny and sanctions." ("Enduring effects of health in Iraq 2004, Executive Summary," Medact)
Deputy Director Gill Reeve, who released the report, also was quoted: "The health of the Iraqi people has deteriorated since the 2003 invasion . . . The 2003 war not only created the conditions for further health decline, but also damaged the ability of Iraqi society to reverse it." ("Iraq's Health Care Under the Occupation," by Ghali Hassan, counterpunch.com, Dec. 1, 2004)
Journalist John Pilger testified early on about Rachel and her children being "squeezed to death" by US-controlled UN sanctions. He reported a conversation with "Anupama Rao Singh, UNICEF's senior representative in Iraq, who told him:
In 1989, the literacy rate was 95%; and 93% of the population had free access to modern health facilities. Parents were fined for failing to send their children to school. . . . Iraq had reached a stage where the basic indicators we use to measure the overall well-being of human beings, including children, were some of the best in the world. Now it is among the bottom 20%. In 10 years, child mortality has gone from one of the lowest in the world, to the highest. ("Squeezed to death," The Guardian, March 4, 2000)
Rachel is also despairing for the education of her children. While the Bush administration's "Operation Iraqi Freedom" rhetoric claimed to have the Iraqi people's best interests at heart, the reality on the ground has proven otherwise. The first, UNICEF-supported and Iraqi-government directed, comprehensive study of Iraqi schools, following the US-led invasion and occupation, "shows that one-third of all primary schools in Iraq lack any water supply and almost half are without any sanitation facilities." In addition, "Since March 2003, over 700 primary schools had been damaged by bombing_a third of those in Baghdad_with more than 200 burned and over 3,000 looted. ("Iraq's school suffering from neglect and war," UN Children's Fund, Oct. 15, 2004)Said Roger Wright, UNICEF Iraq Representative, "Today millions of children in Iraq are attending schools that lack even basic water and sanitation facilities, have crumbling walls, broken windows, and leaking roofs.
The system is overwhelmed." Wright said that "the decay is the result of over a decade of neglect and underfunding during the sanctions era, as well as the impact of three wars. . . ." (Ibid) Ironically, President Bush ended his 2002 war drums-beating UN speech with, "Honest government, and respect for women, and the great Islamic tradition of learning can triumph in the Middle East and beyond." ("Remarks by the President in Address to United Nations General Assembly," The White House Office of the Press Secretary, Sept. 12, 2002)
The Bush administration's "Operation Iraqi freedom"-- bearing "gifts" of violent death and injury, malnutrition, contaminated water, unsanitary conditions, deteriorating education, constant threats to public and personal safety, civil war-like strife, and diminishing medical supplies, equipment and personnel-- has turned much of Rachel's country into a disease- and death-ridden nightmare.
There is even more irony here. Before the first Gulf war, most of Rachel's children had free access to health care and education paid for by Iraqi oil. Jesse, editor of TVNewsLies.org, suggests the irony in stating, "A college education [for women] was free," and then asking, "Where do American oil profits go?" ("Bill Maher and Tony Snow Continue the Saddam Lies," www.uruknet.info. Nov. 4, 2005)
Where do the huge American oil profits go? Evidently into the pockets of the oil barons and the campaign coffers of their political guardians. Politicians who cut taxes for the rich and social programs for Rachel and her children. Politicians who ignore those weeping inconsolably from hurricanes with, "Brownie, you're doing a heck of a job"--the expedient, self-serving words of President Bush to Michael Brown, then director of the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA), as dikes were giving way and water from Hurricane Katrina drowning their deception. Politicians like Republican presidential hopeful Governor Mitt Romney, who sent Rachel's Massachusetts National Guard sons and daughters off to kill and die in an immoral war against Iraq with words like, "We love you and pray for your safe return." Politicians who waste the country's human and material resources of "gold, frankincense and myrrh" on a criminal war, with Rachel "weeping [inconsolably] for her children"_in Iraq and in America.
I believe Christmas would lead us to Rachel and her children. Jesus was much more than a sweet, little, innocent, non-threatening baby in a manger calling for a seasonal adoration. His birth is not a once-a-year sentimental flight into fantasy (however precious fantasy is) but the thrusting into our society's midst every human being's right to his and her space, identity, belief, fulfillment. He came to set his oppressed Jewish people free from Roman occupation, which is why he was crucified.
He does not lead us to worship an infant in a manger, but to work for Rachel and her children's right to be and to belong and to become. He came "to set at liberty those who are oppressed (Luke 4:18b), not use their oppression as a pretext for coveting their oil and their land for military bases to control the Middle East.
Jesus was about empowering people not gaining power over them in pursuit of dominating "all the kingdoms of the world." (Luke 4:5-8, 18-21) "Blessed are the peacemakers, for they will be called children of God." (Matthew 5:9) "Love your enemies . . . [and] your neighbor as yourself." (Matthew 5: 44; 22:39) "The Sabbath was made for humankind, and not humankind for the Sabbath." (Mark 2: 27) "Let the children come to me, do not hinder them, for to such belongs the kingdom of God . . . .And he took them up in his arms and blessed them, laying his hands upon them." (Mark 10: 13-16)
Christmas does not mean worshipping what Jesus did but doing what he worshipped. Christmas comes whenever and wherever anyone joins in saying no! to the King Herods of our day and yes! to Rachel and her children.
Rev. William E. Alberts, Ph.D. is a hospital chaplain. Both a Unitarian Universalist and a United Methodist minister, he has written research reports, essays and articles on racism, war, politics and religion. He can be reached at william.alberts@bmc.org.
This article appeared in Counterpunch Weekend EditionDecember 3/4, 2005
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Thursday, October 13, 2005
Mainstream Religious Leaders in Bushtime
Guardians of the Status Quo
By Rev. WILLIAM E. ALBERTS
Many mainstream religious leaders appear to be guardians of the status quo more than agents of peace and justice. Instead of fulfilling their prophetic calling of speaking truth to power, they tend to mutter truth to power- equate truth with power, or defer truth to power. They often serve as echoes of, not ethicists for, American political policy--or they become its silent partners. They use code words--expressions of prayerful and democratic caring--to rationalize and hide the contradiction between profession and practice. Their real priorities are especially seen when the political is in obvious violation of the prophetic: their response is often prudent, prayerful, measured, muted, safe. Their leadership is a far cry from 19th century minister/reformer Theodore Parker's call for "the coming church" to "lead public opinion, not follow it." Their bottom line: not rocking the boat for fear their own ship won't come in- or that members of their denomination will abandon ship. Faith-based initiatives call for faith-based accommodation.
Mainstream religious leaders of the status quo betray a double standard, which is seen in their differing levels of moral outrage in response to injustice and terrorism. Their double standard, which protects them from risk, makes it easier for the Bush administration to continue "staying the course" of treasonous imperialistic policies that betray our country's democracy, waste its resources and threaten our security and that of our allies. The tragic bombings of London on 7/7 offer an important example of their double standard at work, and how it unwittingly helps to undermine our nation's security and bring the so-called "war on terrorism" closer to our shores.
The suicide bombings of London, which killed 52 persons and wounded over 700, elicited from prominent religious leaders swift and strong condemnation and great sympathy for the victims. An Associated Press story in The Washington Post was headlined, "Pope Deplores 'Barbaric' London Attacks," and began, "Pope Benedict XVI said Thursday he deplored the 'terrorist attacks' in London, calling them 'barbaric acts against humanity,' and said he was praying for the families of the victims." (July 7, 2005)
Chief executive of the United Methodist Board of Global Ministries Rev. R. Randy Day "wrote a letter of sympathy and concern to the Rev. David Deaks, top staff executive of the Methodist Church of Britain." Rev. Day also pronounced loud and clear judgment: "Terrorists are cowards in that they attack the most vulnerable- in the London case, men and women, young and old, on the way to work on a Thursday morning. Such action is senseless and cannot foster any cause." (United Methodist News Service Report, by Tim Tanton, managing editor, July 7, 2005)
A "horrified" and "grieved" Archbishop of Canterbury, Dr. Rowan Williams, was quoted as saying, "The appalling events in London this morning have shocked us all." He just happened to be spending "this morning with Muslim Colleagues and friends in West Yorkshire, and we were all as one in our condemnation of this evil, and in our shared sense of care and compassion for those affected in whatever way." ("Muslim, Christian and Jewish leaders condemn attacks," by Ruth Gledhill, Religion Correspondent, www.timesonline.co.uk, July 7, 2005)
The BBC News reported mainstream religious leaders' quick and firm denunciation of the London bombers with the caption, "UK religious leaders have issued a rare joint statement condemning Thursday's 'evil terrorist' attacks on London." Christian, Muslim, and Jewish leaders each read part of a statement that called the bombings "an evil that cannot be justified and that we utterly condemn and reject." The story seemed toned down when it came to Iraq, possibly inadvertently suggesting a double standard at work: "It is the third time the religious leaders have shown such a united front. They condemned the 11 September 2001 attacks, and in 2003 they expressed their shared concerns [italics added] over the war in Iraq." ("UK faith leaders condemn attacks, " UK Edition, July 10, 2005)
The forceful condemnation of the London attackers by the National Council of Churches offers another way by which to measure the double standard of mainstream religious leaders. The NCC's statement, released by General Secretary Bob Edgar, includes these words: "The National Council of Churches joins in prayer for those who were injured and offers sympathy to those who lost loved ones in the mass transit bombings in London today. Such violence reminds us not only of our need to be ever vigilant and to bring the perpetrators to justice [italics added]; it also reminds us of our need to strenuously pursue peace with justice." ("News from the National Council of Churches," July 7, 2005, New York).
The double standard of various mainstream religious leaders is seen in comparing their strong public condemnation of the "barbaric," "evil," "cowardly" bombings in London with their "shared concern over the war in Iraq." It is seen in who especially they decide are "the perpetrators" that they "need to bring to justice." Religious leaders could have included the same exact language- with far greater moral outrage--to publicly condemn President Bush and Prime Minister Tony Blair for their pre-emptive war against Iraq. But did they? While not exhaustive, the following comparison of the differing levels of moral outrage of religious leaders in response to Baghdad and London is believed to be revealing and instructive.
The strongest public, i.e., mainstream media-covered, religious opposition to the Bush administration's looming pre-emptive war came from Pope John Paul II, the world's most prominent Christian leader. Two weeks before the invasion of Iraq, Pope
John Paul sent an emissary to meet with President Bush in a final effort to avert the war. The emissary, Cardinal Pio Laghi, was described as "a friend of the president's father and the Vatican's first ambassador to Washington," and "brought to the White House the moral authority of the Roman Catholic Church." Laghi and Bush met privately for 40 minutes on Ash Wednesday; while back in Rome the Pope "called on Roman Catholics worldwide to fast and pray for peace" ("Pope's Emissary Meets with Bush, Calls War 'Unjust,'" by Johanna Neuman, the Los Angeles Times, Mar 6, 2003; "Bush meets with Vatican envoy," Associated Press, cnn.com, Mar. 5, 2003).
Before the meeting, Cardinal Laghi was quoted as saying "that the two most important things to the Vatican were 'avoiding a war and finding a peaceful solution to the problem of Iraq's disarmament.'" ("Bush meets with Vatican envoy," Ibid) After the meeting, Laghi said "that a war would be 'illegal and unjust,' but stopped short of calling it immoral." He said that "a decision regarding the use of military force can only be taken within the framework of the United Nations," adding "but always taking into account the grave consequences of such an armed conflict: the suffering of the people of Iraq and those involved in the military operations, a further instability in the region and a new gulf between Islam and Christianity." And Laghi "also called on Iraqi President Saddam Hussein to show more good faith in dismantling his weapons of mass destruction." ("Pope's Emissary meets with Bush," by Johanna Neuman, the Los Angeles Times, Mar. 6, 2003)
The closed-door meeting itself was reported- and thus what was said controlled- by senior White House officials. President Bush evidently disagreed with Pope John Paul II's belief that "a war would be a 'defeat for humanity' and would be neither morally nor legally justified." ("Bush meets with Vatican envoy," Associated Press, cnn.com, Mar. 5, 2003). "A White House spokeswoman" reported that "Bush explained to Laghi, as he has in recent speeches, that he feels a special obligation to protect the American people and that he believes the world will be safer if Hussein is disarmed." Furthermore, "he disputed the idea of a gulf between religions, citing success in rebuilding Afghanistan." (Pope's Emissary Meets with Bush, Calls War 'Unjust,'" by Johanna Neuman, the Los Angeles Times, Mar. 6, 2003)
The administration-reported meeting included Cardinal Laghi "deliver[ing] a letter in which the pope urged Bush to listen carefully to the Vatican envoy. Neither the letter nor the envoy specifically urged Bush to avoid war, the U.S. official said." ("Bush meets with Vatican envoy," Associated Press, cnn.com, Mar. 5, 2003) The Los Angeles Times provided a complementary diplomatic touch: "Laghi delivered a personal letter, but neither he nor the White House would disclose its contents." The story continued, "The cardinal said the president told him he appreciated the pope's effort to find a peaceful way out of the conflict," which evidently pleased Laghi. "We are not at the end yet," Laghi added. "I'm going away with hope." ("Pope's Emissary Meets With Bush, Calls War 'Unjust,'" by Johanna Neuman, Mar. 6, 2003)
The "end" came 15 days later. President Bush gave the order for 21,000-pound "mother of all bombs" and hundreds of cruise missiles to reign "shock and awe" on Baghdad and other Iraqi cities. Briefed on the planned first strike, a Pentagon official had told CBS News two months earlier, "There will not be a safe place in Baghdad." ("Iraq Faces Massive U.S. Missile Barrage," CBS Evening News, Jan. 24, 2003).
The following year President Bush visited Pope John Paul II at the Vatican and presented him with the Presidential Medal of Freedom. (America's highest civilian award) During the White House-initiated occasion, the pope reportedly "firmly reminded the president of the Vatican's opposition to the invasion of Iraq last year," and said the country's "sovereignty" needs to be restored and its "situation normalized" quickly , with active U.N. involvement, "in conditions of security for all its people." ("Pope Expresses Concern about Continuing Unrest in Iraq," by John Thavis, Catholic News Service, www.catholicherald.com, 6/3/04)
At this time, the pope made a general statement about recent "deplorable events [which] have come to light [and] have troubled the civic and religious conscience of all." ("Bush Meets with Pope at Vatican," Associate Press, FOX News.com, June 4, 2004) He did not elaborate. And no one seemed able or willing to say exactly whether he meant the abuse of Iraqi prisoners by American troops at Abu Ghraib prison or the kidnapping and beheading of foreign civilians by Islamic militants. (Ibid)
Another most "deplorable event" may well become Pope John Paul II's acceptance of the Presidential Medal of Freedom from President Bush. The accommodating media coverage of the seemingly scripted event appears to reveal that both the pope and the president were more concerned about appearances than reality. The Associated Press reported, "Seated next to the pope, Bush promised his nation would work for 'human liberty and human dignity,' without making any references to Iraq." (Ibid) A Catholic News Service story stated, "At the end of his talk, the pope assured the president of his prayers and invoked upon him God's blessings of wisdom, strength and peace." ("Pope Expresses Concern about Continuing Unrest in Iraq," by John Thavis, 6/3/2004)
The Vatican visit, the Presidential Medal of Freedom award, and the pope's blessing apparently contributed considerably to President Bush's gaining "prized swing votes" of Catholics and retaining his "sovereignty" as president in the election five months later. ("Bush, Pope to Meet Today at the Vatican," by Dan Balz and Alan Cooperman, The Washington Post, June 4, 2004) But the US-occupied Iraq people regaining their "sovereignty" and "security" as quickly as possible seems more remote than ever.
History may not be kind to Pope John Paul II. To whom much moral authority is given, much moral authority is expected. A timely papal-called global Christian peace pilgrimage to Iraq might have led President Bush to pray twice as hard about starting his war. Morally powerful also might have been a papal edict denying Communion to any Catholic supporting or participating in the life-aborting war against Iraq. Nor will history be kind to mainstream American Christian leaders who serve as custodians of the status quo more than as its conscience.
Not that other prominent Christian leaders did not try to meet with President Bush before he began his war of choice. Unlike Pope John Paul II, certain other Christian leaders could not get their foot in the White House door. A United Methodist, the president would not even meet with the bishops of his own denomination. The Los Angeles Times reported that "Methodist bishops, who say they have met with every president since George Washington, are upset that Bush has declined to see them." The story quotes Jim Winkler, General Secretary of United Methodism's Board of Church and Society: "There is disappointment because he's one of us. . . . We don't want to berate him or give him a hard time," Winkler added, "We want to pray with him, and we are bewildered that he has not been willing." ("Pope's Emissary Meets with Bush, Calls War 'Unjust,'" by Johanna Neuman, Mar 6, 2003)
Perhaps well-insulated President Bush already knew what his denominational leaders wanted to pray with him about. Six months earlier an Observer/UK story entitled "Iraq War 'Unjustifiable,' says Bush's Church Head," began, "President Bush's own Methodist Church has launched a scathing attack on his preparations for war against Iraq, saying they are 'without any justification according to the teaching of Christ.'" The story continued, "Jim Winkler, head of special policy for United Methodists, added that all attempts at a 'dialogue' between the President and his own church over the war had fallen on deaf ears at the White House." The story ends with Winkler saying "his church was 'keenly aware' that it counted the President and his deputy among its members, and that he was therefore 'frequently encouraged by others to be very careful about how I say things.'" (Guardian Newspapers United, Oct. 20, 2002)
Those "deaf ears" at the White House can definitely read--or be read to. Rev. Winkler also had been quoted as saying, "Methodist scriptural doctrine . . . specifies war as a last resort, primarily a defensive thing. And as far as I know," he pointed out, "Saddam Hussein has not mobilized military forces along the borders of the United States, nor along his own border to invade a neighboring country, nor have any of those countries pleaded for our assistance, nor does he have weapons of mass destruction targeted at the United States." (Ibid)Rev. Winkler and other United Methodist leaders apparently were not "very careful" about how "they voiced their opposition to the president's pre-emptive war preparations." They had "launched a scathing attack."
In an October 4, 2002 letter to the entire 10 million United Methodists, endorsed by the Council of Bishops, then Council President Sharon A Brown Christopher wrote, "A pre-emptive war by the United States against a nation like Iraq goes against the very grain of our understanding of the Gospel, our church's teachings, and our consciences." She also wrote that "a pre-emptive strike . . . does not allow for the adequate pursuit of peaceful means for resolving conflict." ("Council of Bishops' president joins call for restraint on Iraq" News Desk @ UMCOM.ORG, 7 Oct. 2002)
Rev. Winkler himself issued a strong statement: "United Methodists have a particular duty [italics added] to speak out against an unprovoked attack. President Bush and Vice President Cheney are members of our denomination. Our silence now could be interpreted as tacit approval of war." Nor was he "very careful" in also saying, "It is inconceivable that Jesus Christ, our Lord and Savior and the Prince of Peace, would support this proposed attack." ("Bush Urged to Turn Back From War," Mark Harrison, contact person, General Board of Church and Society, The United Methodist Church, Aug. 30, 2002).
Bishop Peter Weaver, current President of United Methodism's Council of Bishops, had also prophetically warned, "'War will not end terror. It will simply seed terror. It will come back on the United States like a boomerang,' he said, 'and make U.S. personnel into recruiters for al Qaeda'" ("Eight United Methodist bishops, other leaders, speak against war with Iraq," www.umc.org.) The July 7 London bombing attacks against the US's principal coalition partner seem to indicate that the "boomerang" may be coming full circle. And citizens of some neighboring Muslim and Arab countries help to swell a strong and resourceful Iraqi insurgency.
Numerous religious leaders joined Pope John Paul II and United Methodist officials with similarly strong public declarations, challenging the justification for a pre-emptive war against Iraq and warning of its disastrous consequences. And like Pope John Paul II and United Methodists officials, the statements of these faith-based leaders reveal the extent to which they also believed the Bush administration's repeated argument for a first strike war: American-hating Saddam Hussein's weapons of mass destruction and his links to the 9/11 attack against America and "harboring of terrorists." Their anti-war declarations would also seem to set the stage for, and fuel, far greater public moral outrage than that triggered by the July 7 suicide bombing attacks against London.
The run-up to the war was filled with prophetic concerns and warnings. Bishop Wilton D. Gregory, spokesperson for the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops, wrote a penetrating letter to President Bush, asking "troubling questions," including, "Is there clear and adequate evidence of a direct connection between Iraq and the attacks of September 11th or clear and adequate evidence of an imminent attack of a grave nature?" Gregory's letter ended by calling on "the Iraqi government to live up to its international obligations," and "urge[d}" Bush "to pursue actively alternatives to war," including "diplomatic efforts aimed, in part, at resuming rigorous, meaningful inspections." ("Letter to President Bush on Iraq," United States Conference of Catholic Bishops, Sept. 13, 2002)
Another letter to President Bush from 50 prominent Christian religious leaders contained a similar prophetic warning: that a pre-emptive war would result in the widespread deaths and suffering of Iraqi civilians, and that it would incite greater hatred of America and its allies throughout the Arab world. The letter also repeated a key concern of Bishop Gregory's: "It is detrimental to U.S. interests to take unilateral military action where there continues to be strong multilateral support for a new weapons inspection regime and when most governments in Europe and the Middle East resist supporting military action. It is important for the U.S. to cooperate with international efforts to control Iraq's weapons of mass destruction." ("Letter to President Bush on Iraq," Churches for Middle East Peace," Sept. 12, 2002)
The United Church of Christ leaders presented a powerful statement "opposing U.S. war in Iraq." These leaders repeated the commonly expressed prophetic predictions that "the human cost of a war would be enormous, both to the United States and to Iraq."
They also said "The case for a pre-emptive attack against Iraq has not been made," and called "on our leaders to step back from the brink of war [and] engage in honest and open consultation with parties around the world and especially in the Middle East to seek a non-military solution to the threat that Iraq may pose." They also joined the World Council of Churches in "calling for the Government of Iraq to respect the resolutions of the UN Security Council . . . to cooperate fully with UN inspections deployed to oversee compliance." ("Statement of United Church of Christ leaders opposing U.S. war against Iraq," Justice and Peace, not dated)
The Anglican Journal reported that Christian leaders have criticized the impetus towards a U.S.-led war against Iraq. It then stated the principal argument constantly used to justify a pre-emptive war against Iraq: "In recent weeks, the United States, noting that Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein had expelled United Nations weapons inspectors and is building biological and nuclear weapons, has urged the U.N. to lead an attack aimed at deposing Saddam." The story continued, "U.S. President George Bush has said he will act alone, if necessary. British Prime Minister Tony Blair supports him." ("Church leaders condemn rush to war with Iraq." (Staff News Service, Anglican Journal, The Anglican Church of Canada, Nov. 2002)
Other mainstream religious leaders and groups who went on record as opposing unilateral military action against Iraq included: the Presbyterian Church (USA), American Baptists, Unitarian Universalists, and the executive committee of the Union for Reformed Judaism. Presbyterian leaders reflect the widespread pre-war belief of mainstream religious leaders in urging Presbyterians to contact the President: "Remind President Bush that only the United Nations Security Council as a whole is capable of determining what qualifies as a breach of Security Council Resolution 1441 that provides for the return of weapons inspector to Iraq." ("What to Do about the Possibility of Military Action against Iraq." [PC-USA]- Presbyterian Peacemaking Program Iraq-Resources, Dec. 1, 2002)
It is time for mainstream religious leaders to remind themselves of the treasonous lies President Bush used to deceive and mislead them and other Americans into a criminal war. Lies resulting in the senseless deaths and disablement of tens of thousands of America's sons and daughters and hundred of thousands of Iraqi civilians. Lies that have made Bush administration-favored corporations like Halliburton richer, while squandering our country's resources and making Americans poorer. Lies that are undermining America's security while pretending to protect it. Lies that should fuel intense moral outrage. Lies that should lead religious leaders to shout their moral outrage from their steeple tops! There is a long trail of reminders!
The Bush administration constantly declared that Saddam Hussein had weapons of mass destruction and, if not stopped, planned use them against America and her allies, or give them to his 9/11 al Qaeda "terrorist" connections to inflict grave harm. President Bush repeatedly warned, "Saddam Hussein is harboring terrorists and the instruments of terror, the instruments of mass deaths and destruction. . . . Facing clear evidence of peril, we cannot wait for the final proof-and the smoking gun-that could come in the form of a mushroom cloud." ("President Bush Outlines Iraqi Threat," Cincinnati, Ohio, The White House, Oct. 7, 2002)
In his 2003 State of the Union Address, President Bush warned again, "The dictator of Iraq is not disarming. To the contrary, he is deceiving. From intelligence sources we know, for instance, that thousands of Iraqi security personnel are at work hiding documents and materials from the U.N. inspectors . . . If this threat is permitted to fully and suddenly emerge," Bush continued, "all actions, all words, and all recriminations would come too late. And for good measure, he added, "The dictator who is assembling the world's most dangerous weapons has already used them on whole villages-leaving thousands of his own citizens dead, blind or disfigured." ("President Delivers 'State of the Union,'" The White House, Jan. 28, 2003)
More reminders! Three days before President Bush launched his pre-emptive war against Iraq, he met on an American air base in the Azores with his two key "coalition of the willing" partners, British and Spanish Prime Ministers Tony Blair and Jose Maria Aznar. He again warned, "The dictator of Iraq and his weapons of mass destruction are a threat to the security of free nations. He is a danger to his neighbors . . . a sponsor of terrorism . . . possesses the weapons of mass murder." ("President Bush: Monday 'Moment of Truth' for World on Iraq," The White House, Mar. 17, 2003) Bush preceded this warning with words that should come back to haunt him: "Tomorrow is a moment of truth for the world," he declared in trying unsuccessfully "to extract a resolution from the U.N. Security Council that would give Iraq an ultimatum to disarm immediately or be disarmed by force" (Ibid.); "Bush: Monday is a 'moment of truth' on Iraq," (cnn.com/world, Mar. 17, 2003)
George W. Bush's "moment of truth for the world" was propelled by a lie, which should become the defining moment of his treasonous behavior as president of the United States. He lied repeatedly in sending America's sons and daughters to kill and die in an immoral war with, "Intelligence gathered by this and other governments leaves no doubt that the Iraq regime continues to possess and conceal some of the most lethal weapons ever devised. . . . This regime . . . has a deep hatred of America and our friends. And it has aided, trained and harbored terrorists, including operatives of al Qaeda."
President Bush poured it on. "The danger is clear," he warned, "Using chemical, biological or, one day, nuclear weapons, obtained with the help of Iraq, the terrorists could fulfill their stated ambition and kill thousands or hundreds of thousands of innocent people in our country or any other." ("President Bush Presents 48 Hour Ultimatum," Address to the Nation, The White House, Mar. 17, 2003)
Morally enraging reminders! President Bush's "moment of truth for the world" came. The final report on Iraq's weapons of mass destruction, prepared by Charles A. Duelfer, America's chief weapons inspector for Iraq, stated, "Iraq had destroyed its illicit weapons stockpile within months after the Persian Gulf War of 1991, and its ability to produce such weapons has significantly eroded by the time of the American invasion in 2003." (The New York Times, Oct. 7, 2004) Similarly, the bi-partisan 9/11 Commission found "no credible evidence" of a "collaborative relationship" between Iraq and Al-Qaeda. ("No Evidence Connecting Iraq to Al Qaeda, 9/11 Panel Says," by Dan Eggen, washingtonpost.com, June 16, 2004)
President Clinton was impeached for lying about sexual misconduct with an individual. President Bush remains at large after "fixing" intelligence to justify the rape of a country. ("The secret Downing Street memo," by David Manning, from: Matthew Rycroft, The Sunday Times-Britain, May 1, 2005)
Reminder of deception after deception! A morally illusive President Bush has continued to repackage his "moment of truth" to the world. The less the evidence for weapons of mass destruction, the more he wrapped himself in the lofty motive of removing a brutal dictator from power and bringing "freedom" to the oppressed Iraqi people.
History hides a contradictory truth. The United States aided and abetted Saddam Hussein during his brutal regime. At the very time he was killing his own people with poisonous gas, Bush's own father's administration reportedly sold him American farm products that could be used to produce chemical and biological weapons. And those weapons were used, with the help of satellite photographs provided by US intelligence agencies, to target Iranian troops during the decisive battles of the 1981-88 Iraqi-Iranian war. The US believed it was "imperative" to prevent Iran from overrunning "the important oil-producing countries in the Persian Gulf." Reported also is that, during the Reagan administration the decision was made "to remove the regime of Saddam Hussein-who was known in those days as the 'Butcher of Baghdad'-from the list of sponsors of terror!" ("What the U.S. President wants us to forget," by Robert Fisk, The Independent, Oct. 9, 2002; The New York Times, Aug. 18, 2002; "Justice in Iraq" by Kevin McKiernan, The Boston Globe, Feb 9, 2005). The trial of Saddam Hussein, if it is fair, may hold a "moment of truth" for American foreign policy, which has planted many seeds of hatred toward America.
When one lie does not take hold enough to justify the sacrifice of American lives, President Bush wraps himself in another. "Our men and women in uniform are fighting terrorists in Iraq, so we do not have to fight them here at home." ("State of the Union Address," The New York Times, Feb. 3, 2005) Iraq had no weapons of mass destruction, no connection to al Qaeda or 9/11. The country was greatly weakened by 12 years of US-enforced UN economic sanctions, and defenseless against the world's greatest super power and its coalition allies. The so-called "terrorists" in Iraq are Iraqis whose patriotism is every bit as strong as America's. Bush created a hornet's nest of resistance to America's invasion and occupation of Iraq. Now he is saying that Iraq is "filled with foreign fighters who have come from places like Saudi Arabia and Syria and Iran and Egypt and Sudan and Yemen and Libya." ("President Addresses Military Families, Discusses War on Terror," The White House, Nampa Idaho, Aug. 25, 2005)
The only really "foreign fighters" in Iraq are Americans and their coalition partners-just as the only weapons of mass destruction found in Iraq were unleashed by the American military. A Syrian stated that he was fighting Americans in Iraq so that he would not have to fight them in Syria. How many other Arab and Muslim people from neighboring countries are saying the same thing with their presence in Iraq?
One thing seems sure: We may be fighting so-called "terrorists" in America precisely because President Bush chose to invade Iraq. He also tries to justify his war of choice by saying, "See, they're coming into Iraq because they fear the march of freedom," (Ibid) It is not about a "march" but about an invasion, not about "freedom" but about occupation and global domination. It is about oil and empire.
A final reminder! President Bush reveals much about himself when he talks about Saddam Hussein. His projections seem obvious: "The dictator of Iraq is not disarming," Bush said. "To the contrary, he is deceiving." ("Text: Bush's 2003 State of the Union Address, The Washington Post, Jan. 28, 2005) That was his constant theme in the run-up to the war, in an attempt to depreciate the work of the UN weapons inspectors.
Most telling was the President's reaction to the UN inspectors' pre-war search for weapons of mass destruction in Iraq. His resistance to the inspectors led him to repeatedly say, "I'm sick and tired of games and deceptions." (The New York Times, Jan. 15, 2003) "How much time do we need to see clearly that he is not disarming." (The New York Times, Jan. 22, 2003) "No doubt he will play a last-minute game of deception. The game is over." (The New York Times, Feb. 7, 2003)
Saddam Hussein had stated, "As I told you and have said on many occasions before, that there are no weapons of mass destruction in Iraq whatsoever." ("60 Minutes II," CBS, Feb. 5, 2003) And the very day President Bush declared his "moment of truth for the world," Hussein "also repeated his denial of U.S. and British allegations that his country has weapons of mass destruction, dubbing the accusation 'a great lie'" ("Bush: Monday is 'a moment of truth' in Iraq," cnn.com./world, Mar. 17, 2003).
Whom is one to believe? "The dictator of Iraq and his weapons of mass destruction?" Or, the God-fearing, freedom-loving President of the United States? Bush repeatedly accused Hussein of the very deception he was practicing against the American people-and continues to practice.
The pre-war statements of mainstream religious leaders indicated they believed the Bush administration's pre-emptive, war-justifying falsehoods about Saddam Hussein's threatening weapons of mass destruction and ties to 9/11 and to "terrorists." The growing body of evidence, revealing that President Bush had deceived them and the American people, and had brought to pass with his war the very destructive consequences they had warned about, would seem to elicit from these religious leaders intense and sustained condemnation. One would expect to hear shouts of moral outrage against Bush and his administration, similar to, but far louder than, the spontaneous eruption of religious leaders in reaction to the bombings of London. Prophetic denunciations, such as: "Liars!" "Deceivers!" "Fear-mongerers!" "War-mongerers!" "State-organized terrorists!" "Killers!" "Barbaric!" "Imperialist conspirators!" "Treasonous!"
Leaders of the National Council of Churches and member denominations have presented a delayed, but relatively clear prophetic reaction. A brief Associated Press-written Washington Post story reported that they chose last July 4th to issue "a petition stating vehement opposition to United States policy in Iraq." Sending their statement to President Bush, they "charged, it has become clear that the rationale for invasion was at best a tragic mistake, at worst, a clever deception." They "denounced the national leaders who sent Americans 'to fight a dishonorable war' and 'the abuse of prisoners that has shamed our nation.'" They "advocated 'an early fixed timetable for the withdrawal of United States troops,'" and stated that "the nation must restore 'truth telling' and abolish 'first strikes' justifications for warfare." ("Religion News in Brief," The Associated Press, July 7, 2005)
Those Christian leaders joining the National Council of Churches-sponsored statement included "executives of the United Methodist Church, to which Bush belongs," The Washington Post-printed story stated. These executives' support for such a comparatively forceful statement is a positive sign.
Last May five United Methodist bishops paid President Bush a "pastoral visit," during which they presented him "with a Bible signed by the Council of Bishops, . . . shared a moment of prayer with him," and told him that "they are praying for him," and "that they share his commitment to building a better world." Their leader, Council of Bishops President Peter Weaver, also reported that Bush told them he was "proud to be a Methodist." ("United Methodist bishops meet with president, 'open door to future,' by Tom Tanton, Managing Editor, The United Methodist News Service, May 3, 2005)
Rather than paying him a "pastoral visit" in the White House, moral outrage should seem to lead them to join Cindy Sheehan in prayer and protest vigils outside the White House-and wherever Bush "stays the course."
The short Washington Post-carried story, on the National Council of Churches-sponsored strong anti-war statement, seemed to strive for "balance." It quoted a critic of the church leaders' statement: "Alan Wisdom of the conservative Institute for Religion and Democracy, responded that the statement shows the National Council is divorced 'from the church members it claims to represent' and seeks Christian unity through narrow '1960s era protest politics' on which Christians may disagree rather than pursuing matters of faith." It is as if "matters of faith" can be separated from works that matter.
Many evangelical Christians appear to be "divorced" from the reality of President Bush's lies, and from the tragic human toll in Iraqi and American lives caused by his continuing deceit. The Pew Research Center for the People surveyed the religious views of a potential war, and found that "80% of evangelical white Protestants support the war, the highest tally of any group measured." ("Pope's Emissary Meets with Bush, Calls war 'Unjust,'" by Johanna Neuman, the Los Angeles Times, Mar. 6, 2003) This finding may explain why the "matters of faith" of many evangelical Christians have not yet caught up with the moral outrage on the ground.
One such staunch white Christian evangelical supporter of President Bush, Rev. Pat Robertson, has recently called for the assassination of President Hugo Chavez of Venezuela. Chavez is Latin America's strongest critic of Bush's war of terrorism in Iraq, and Venezuela has the largest oil reserves after the Middle East. Robertson said, on his Christian television program, The 700 Club, viewed by around one million people, "If he thinks we're [italics added] trying to assassinate him, I think we [italics added] really ought to go ahead and do it. It's a whole lot cheaper than starting a war," Robertson continued. "And I don't think any oil shipments will stop."
The Christian evangelist accused President Chavez of turning Venezuela "into 'a launching pad for communist infiltration and Muslim extremism.'" An empowered Robertson said, "We [italics added] have the ability to take him out, and I think the time has come that we [italics added] exercise that ability." ("Robertson Suggests U.S. Kill Venezuela's Leader," by Laurie Goodstein, The New York Times, Aug. 24, 2005)
The strong negative reaction in certain religious and government circles first led Pat Robertson to deny that he called for the assassination of President Chavez. "I didn't say 'assassination,' I said our special forces should 'take him out,' . . . 'Take him out' could be a number of things, including kidnapping." He later admitted using the word "assassination," said it was wrong and apologized, explaining, "I spoke in frustration that we [italics added] should accommodate the man who thinks the US is out to kill him." ("Robertson apologizes for Chavez assassination remarks," Associated Press, The Boston Globe, Aug. 25, 2005)
Pat Robertson's criminal suggestion would seem to be an easy target for the moral outrage of mainstream religious leaders and for certain influential evangelical Christian leaders. President Bush's reaction to Robertson's suggestion, and that of other evangelical leaders, may be a different story. The strongest criticism from the State Department thus far has been to call Robertson's comments "inappropriate." (Ibid) Robertson represents the violent extreme of true believers, which violence drives the Bush administration's goal of US global domination-wrapped, of course, in palatable slogans of "freedom" and "democracy." Such true believers may be called "Christian extremists."
Pat Robertson is not different from President Bush. More obvious? Yes! Less powerful? Of course! But Robertson probably received the inspiration and emboldenment for his verbal terrorist violence from Bush. All Robertson suggested was what Bush has done repeatedly.
The President's "moment of truth for the world" was about "taking out" Saddam Hussein. And in his 2003 State of the Union address, Bush flashed a look of triumphant pleasure in saying, "All told, more than 3,000 suspected terrorists have been arrested in many countries. Many others have met with a different fate." And then he paused, gloating-like, and said, "Let's put it this way-they are no longer a problem to the United States and our friends and allies." These words elicited "applause."
Power breeds arrogance. And arrogance breeds the abuse of power. It is easy to direct moral outrage at an obvious Pat Robertson. But President Bush is the one to whom mainstream religious leaders need to speak truth to power.
Pat Robertson represents the violent extreme to which "the one true Christian belief" can lead persons to inflict their will on other human beings. President Bush's behavior is so outrageous, and obviously far more dangerous than Robertson's. Bush's use of religion to mask his administration's pursuit of political/corporate world domination would seem to lead America's religious leaders to scream with moral outrage.
President Bush repeatedly told Americans he was praying for peace while hell-bent for war. At his March 6, 2003 news conference, two weeks before invading Iraq, Bush said, "I pray daily. I pray for wisdom and guidance and strength. . . . I pray for peace. I pray for peace." (The New York Time, Mar. 7, 2003) Two weeks later American military began bombing and invading Iraq.
One might wonder to whom President Bush was praying daily "for guidance and wisdom . . . [and] peace." His prayers evidently were not informed by intelligence showing no weapons of mass destruction in Iraq and no Iraqi ties to the 9/11 attacks against America-his administration's two key arguments to justify invading Iraq. Charges that were knowingly false. Had he talked with UN chief weapons inspector Hans Blix, before praying, he would have obtained "guidance and wisdom," as Blix would have told him that his team "found no evidence of Iraq possessing weapons of mass destruction." But a prayerful Bush apparently did not want to hear that. And his "moment of truth for the world" effectively ended the search for any weapons of mass destruction, which led Blix to respond, "I don't think it is reasonable to close the door to inspections after 3 _ months." (The Boston Globe, Mar. 19, 2003).
"I pray daily . . . for peace." President Bush's former Treasury Secretary Paul O'Neill said that removing Saddam Hussein from power "was topic 'A' 10 days after the inauguration-eight months before Sept. 11." ("Bush Sought 'Way' to Invade Iraq," www.cbsnews.com, Jan. 11, 2004)
"I pray daily . . . for peace." Richard Clarke, President Bush's former chief advisor on terrorism, reported that Bush seemed determined to use the 9/11 attack against America as a pretext to invade Iraq. According to Clarke, Bush told him "to find whether Iraq did this." And when he replied, "We looked at it . . . [and] there's no connection," Bush insisted that he "come back with a report that said Iraq did this." ("Clarke's Take on Terror," www.cbsnews.com, Mar. 21, 2004)
When no weapons of mass destruction were found in Iraq and no connection to 9/11, President Bush's "moment of truth for the world" began catching up with him. These realities must have led him again to prayer, where he evidently found another justification for military aggression against Iraq: "Freedom is not America's gift to the world, it is God's gift to every man and woman in the world." ("Acceptance Speech to Republican Convention Delegates," The New York Times, Sept. 3, 2004) The only difference between the Christianity of Pat Robertson and George Bush is that Bush is president and has the power to kill those who resist his understanding of "the ways of Providence." (The New York Times, Jan. 29, 2003).
Cloaking military violence, conquest, occupation, and exploitation in the name of "God" and "freedom" and "democracy" and "protecting America" should have mainstream Christian religious leaders proclaiming biblically-inspired moral outrage from their church-tops: "Hypocrites!" "Whitewashed tombs!" "False prophets!" "Defilers!" "Desecrators!" "Evildoers!" "Mercenaries!" "Murderers of the innocent!" "Devourers of the poor!" "Oppressors of the helpless!"
President Bush's hypocrisy is readily seen in his prostitution of freedom and democracy as well as of God to disguise and serve his administration's imperialistic crusade. Here again he does not practice what he preaches.
The president constantly preaches about spreading "freedom" and "democracy" throughout the world-especially after no war-justifying weapons of mass destruction were found in Iraq, and no links to 9/11 or al Qaeda. However, he continues to remind his audiences of 9/11, and to repeat, "I understand freedom is not America's gift to the world; freedom is Almighty God's gift to each man and woman in this world." ("President Addresses Military Families, Discusses War on Terror," Nampa, Idaho, The White House, Aug. 25, 2005)
President Bush gives a predictably "democratic" spin to the U.S.-installed puppet Iraqi leaders' struggle to create a "democratic constitution," one acceptable to his administration: "Iraqis are now at the beginning of a long process; and like our founders, they're grappling with difficult issues . . . They're arguing about the proper place of religion in the life of their nation. . . . minority rights . . . the rights of women . . . But what's important is that the Iraqis are resolving these issues through debate and discussion [italics added], not at the barrel of a gun." (Ibid) The Bush administration has provided the barrel of the gun!
A freedom-loving, evangelistic President Bush declares, "The road to Providence is uneven and unpredictable. Yet we know where it leads. It leads to freedom. . . freedom's power to change the world. We are part of a great venture . . . to spread the peace that freedom brings." (Transcript of State of the Union Address and cleared by the White House, The New York Times, Feb. 3, 2005)
President Bush continually tells his audiences, "Our enemies murder because they despise our freedom and our way of life . . . We believe in human rights. . . They'll kill women and children. . ." (President Addresses Military Families, Discusses War on Terror," Ibid.) It is as if America did not violate Iraq's national sovereignty, nor that merciless "shock and awe" bombs did not blow Iraqi women and children to bits-never mind the 12 years of US-controlled UN sanctions that contributed to the deaths of some 500,000 Iraqi children under 5 years of age.
President Bush preaches "freedom" and "democracy" all over the country and the world, but seems unable to practice it with anyone. "See, you can't talk sense to the terrorists. You can't negotiate with them. You cannot hope for the best. You must bring them to justice," he tells his screened audiences. He himself is protected from the very "debate and discussion" for which he is now lauding American-chosen Iraqi constitution-makers.
Tragically, it is not just "the terrorists" President Bush "can't talk sense to." It is also Hans Blix, who would have told him that "recent inspections proved far-ranging and more effective than any previously in Iraq," and that "while inspectors followed up leads from US intelligence, I must regret we have not found . . . any smoking guns." (The Boston Globe, Mar. 19, 2003) Nor could Bush evidently "talk sense to" his former anti-terrorism advisor Richard Clarke about "Iraq! Saddam!" when Clarke told him "there's no connection" between Iraq and the 9/11 attack on America.
Nor could President Bush "talk sense to" the United Nations Security Council. The deity to whom he prays "for guidance and wisdom and strength" evidently has a unilateral bent, that led Bush not into the United Nations, but delivered him from the French, the Germans, the Russians, the Chinese and the leaders of other countries. And he would not even open the White House door nor pray with any of his own religious leaders-or any other Christian "peacemakers"-until after his war was safely launched, so that he could use "support the troops" to drum up support for his war and drown out opposition.
Perhaps, most revealing of all is that President Bush cannot "talk sense" with Cindy Sheehan, the grief-stricken mother whose 24-year old son Casey died in Iraq in 2004 for Bush's "noble cause." A more informed Mrs. Sheehan continued to hold a vigil near Bush's ranch during his recent five-week vacation, asking him to meet on the road-side with her and explain the "noble cause" for which he said her son died. Having lost her son forever "through the barrel of a gun," she understandably felt entitled to resolve "issues through debate and discussion" with the "freedom"-espousing president-as the admirable Iraqi constitution-creators are doing. Bush's response to her request and presence near his ranch reveals the disconnect between what he says and what he does: "I sympathize with Mrs. Sheehan," he said. "She feels strongly about her position, and she has every right in the world to say what she believes. This is America." [italics added] ("Bush says he hears families' cries but pull out is wrong," by Deb Riechmann, Associated Press writer, Williamsport Sun-Gazette, Aug. 12, 2005) Bush will meet with grieving families of dead American troops. They just have to be screened first.
President Bush's treasonous behavior is especially seen in his response to Mrs. Sheehan's demand to know from him the "noble cause" that took her son's life. "We mourn the loss of every life," Bush said. "We pray for their loved ones. These brave men and women," he continued, "gave their lives for a cause that is just and necessary for the security of our country and now we will honor their sacrifice by completing their mission." (Ibid) His punch line also: "We owe them something. We will finish the task that they gave their lives for. We will honor their sacrifice by staying in the offensive against the terrorists." ("President Honors Veterans of Foreign Wars at National Convention," Salt Lake City, Utah, The White House, Aug. 23, 2005)
First, President Bush's "noble cause" was removing Iraq's threatening weapons of mass destruction and connection to al Qaeda, which "cause" proved to be neither just nor necessary for the security of our country. Then the "noble cause" became spreading "freedom" and "democracy" to "the darkest corners of the world"-for America's own protection and security as well. Now, with the growing cost in American lives and limbs, Bush's "noble cause" has become honoring the sacrifice of those who died in a dishonorable war by continuing "the fight" for which they died. America's sons and daughters are honorable. The war in which they were manipulated into fighting and killing and dying is not! How cruelly cynical to justify the lies for which Americans have died by saying that "honoring their sacrifice" requires other Americans to continue to die.
Today President Bush's "noble cause" even includes protecting Iraq's oil fields from "fall[ing] under the control of terrorist extremists," who would use them to fund their "terrorist attacks" ("Bush: U.S. Must Protect Iraq From Terror," by Jennifer Loven, The Associated Press, Aug 30, 2005) Never mind that the so-called "terrorists" are mostly Iraqis and the oil is theirs. The 'noble cause" is to be found in America not Iraq. Rather than being sent to "protect" Iraq's oil from Iraqis, those National Guard troops and resources are desperately needed to protect Americans from water. But since most of these Americans are black and/or poor, it probably was easier for Bush to remain oblivious to the water of Hurricane Katrina-until it began swamping the White House with a public relations disaster.
An editorial in the Sun Herald of Biloxi, Mississippi criticized Hurricane Katrina relief efforts, stating, "Our reporters have yet to find evidence of a coordinated approach to relieve pain and hunger or to secure property and maintain order." The editorial then asked, "Where is the National Guard, [italics added] why hasn't every able-bodied member of the armed forces in south Mississippi been pressed into service?" ("Biloxi Newspaper Raps Relief Effort, Begs for Help," by Greg Mitchell, Editor and Publisher, Sept. 1, 2005) Evidently the deity to whom President Bush prays "daily . . . for guidance and wisdom and strength" forgot to warn him about natural disasters that would demand the immediate and massive response of the National Guard's presence and resources.
Predictably, President Bush could not "talk sense to" very many victims of Hurricane Katrina. The New York Times reported that his first trip "to Louisiana and Mississippi . . .left Republicans cringing, in part because the president had little contact with residents left homeless." (Sept. 5, 2005). He avoided large crowds of stranded pleading, angry, desperate people in the Superdome and the New Orleans convention center and elsewhere-- probably because they could not be screened. He and his choreographers-- and television cameras-- found controllable settings and individuals easier to hug and console with words. (The New York Times, Sept. 3, 2005 and Sept. 6, 2005)
President Bush uses religion to demonize other human beings and dismiss their grievances against US foreign policy, by calling them "terrorists" and enemies in a "war of good vs. evil." And the way he says, "See, you can't talk sense to the terrorists" indicates he has no intention of trying to resolve hostilities by talking with America's enemies. It should be obvious by now that you can't talk sense to President Bush.
A greatly needed response to the President's tragic intransigence is found in a Boston Globe guest column by Mohammad-Mahmoud Ould Mohamedou, who raises a critical question: "Time to talk to Al Qaeda?" He asks, "How can the war be brought to an end,?" and answers, "Though dismissed widely, the best strategy may well be to acknowledge and address the collective reasons in which Al Qaeda anchors its acts of force." Those reasons: "The United States must end its military presence in the Middle East, its uncritical political support and military aid of Israel's occupation of Palestinian territories, and its support of corrupt and coercive regimes in the Arab and Muslim world." Mohamedou believes that "talking sense" with Al Qaeda could "bring an end to the war it declared in 1996 and in 1998, in return for some degree of satisfaction regarding its grievances." He offers his own concluding reminder: "In 2002, bin Laden declared: "Whether America escalates or deescalates this conflict, we will reply in kind.'" (Sept. 14, 2005)
What "we owe" those honorable Americans who were sacrificed for lies, and those continuing to be sent to be sacrificed, is to stop the dishonorable war now-and to put President Bush and certain members of his administration on trial for treason. Would that those honorable National Guard and Army troops, whose lives have been wrongfully sacrificed, were here to continue living their lives--and to join in the truly honorable work of rescuing and protecting the desperate victims of Hurricane Katrina.
What a horrible hoax and crime to commit against America's sons and daughters and their families and friends. What a horrible transgression to commit against another country: killing and wounding and occupying its people, controlling and exploiting its land and resources and provoking civil war-all in the name of "Operation Iraqi Freedom." What a tragic abdication of moral authority and responsibility by those mainstream religious leaders, and mainstream editors and columnists, and political officials who continue to call this international crime a "mistake."
President Bush's remaining at large is believed to have serious moral implications for mainstream religious leaders and mainstream media and political officials. His repeated treasonous lies and disastrous policies, which threaten America with far greater harm than the attack of 9/11, have yet to elicit effective moral, editorial and political outrage and accountability. History will try America's "freedom of religion" and "free press" and may find both morally wanting. We will cast a stigma of shame on future generations of citizens if we continue to be "good Americans."
More forceful prophetic outrage by religious leaders may have been made than appears in this brief study. If so, their voices and writings may not have been loud and visible enough to be newsworthy-though part of their problem could be a complicit mainstream media, which also often serve as guardians of the status quo. One also wonders what price Rev. Winkler, Rev. Edgar, and certain other religious leaders are now paying for not being "very careful about how" they have been speaking truth to power.
The Prophet Muhammed said, "The pinnacle of faith is to speak the truth in the face of the tyrant." (Bukhari) When Jesus was taken prisoner and faced the tyrant Pilate, he said his mission was "to testify to the truth," and "Pilate asked him, 'What is truth?'" (John 18:36-38) Jesus had already said it from the pinnacle of a mountaintop, which is why he was taken prisoner: "Blessed are the peacemakers for they will be called children of God. . . . Love your enemies. . . " (Matthew 5:9, 43) There is Jewish prophecy as well: "When all the prisoners of the land are crushed under foot, when human rights are perverted in the presence of the Most High, when one's case is subverted-does the Lord not see it?" (Lamentations 3:34-36). It is time for more mainstream religious leaders and their peoples of faith to see it clearly, and to demand that President Bush be held accountable for his treasonous behavior and crimes against humanity.
Rev. William E. Alberts, Ph.D. is a hospital chaplain. Both a Unitarian Universalist and a United Methodist minister, he has written research reports, essays and articles on racism, war, politics and religion. He can be reached at william.alberts@bmc.org.
Guardians of the Status Quo
By Rev. WILLIAM E. ALBERTS
Many mainstream religious leaders appear to be guardians of the status quo more than agents of peace and justice. Instead of fulfilling their prophetic calling of speaking truth to power, they tend to mutter truth to power- equate truth with power, or defer truth to power. They often serve as echoes of, not ethicists for, American political policy--or they become its silent partners. They use code words--expressions of prayerful and democratic caring--to rationalize and hide the contradiction between profession and practice. Their real priorities are especially seen when the political is in obvious violation of the prophetic: their response is often prudent, prayerful, measured, muted, safe. Their leadership is a far cry from 19th century minister/reformer Theodore Parker's call for "the coming church" to "lead public opinion, not follow it." Their bottom line: not rocking the boat for fear their own ship won't come in- or that members of their denomination will abandon ship. Faith-based initiatives call for faith-based accommodation.
Mainstream religious leaders of the status quo betray a double standard, which is seen in their differing levels of moral outrage in response to injustice and terrorism. Their double standard, which protects them from risk, makes it easier for the Bush administration to continue "staying the course" of treasonous imperialistic policies that betray our country's democracy, waste its resources and threaten our security and that of our allies. The tragic bombings of London on 7/7 offer an important example of their double standard at work, and how it unwittingly helps to undermine our nation's security and bring the so-called "war on terrorism" closer to our shores.
The suicide bombings of London, which killed 52 persons and wounded over 700, elicited from prominent religious leaders swift and strong condemnation and great sympathy for the victims. An Associated Press story in The Washington Post was headlined, "Pope Deplores 'Barbaric' London Attacks," and began, "Pope Benedict XVI said Thursday he deplored the 'terrorist attacks' in London, calling them 'barbaric acts against humanity,' and said he was praying for the families of the victims." (July 7, 2005)
Chief executive of the United Methodist Board of Global Ministries Rev. R. Randy Day "wrote a letter of sympathy and concern to the Rev. David Deaks, top staff executive of the Methodist Church of Britain." Rev. Day also pronounced loud and clear judgment: "Terrorists are cowards in that they attack the most vulnerable- in the London case, men and women, young and old, on the way to work on a Thursday morning. Such action is senseless and cannot foster any cause." (United Methodist News Service Report, by Tim Tanton, managing editor, July 7, 2005)
A "horrified" and "grieved" Archbishop of Canterbury, Dr. Rowan Williams, was quoted as saying, "The appalling events in London this morning have shocked us all." He just happened to be spending "this morning with Muslim Colleagues and friends in West Yorkshire, and we were all as one in our condemnation of this evil, and in our shared sense of care and compassion for those affected in whatever way." ("Muslim, Christian and Jewish leaders condemn attacks," by Ruth Gledhill, Religion Correspondent, www.timesonline.co.uk, July 7, 2005)
The BBC News reported mainstream religious leaders' quick and firm denunciation of the London bombers with the caption, "UK religious leaders have issued a rare joint statement condemning Thursday's 'evil terrorist' attacks on London." Christian, Muslim, and Jewish leaders each read part of a statement that called the bombings "an evil that cannot be justified and that we utterly condemn and reject." The story seemed toned down when it came to Iraq, possibly inadvertently suggesting a double standard at work: "It is the third time the religious leaders have shown such a united front. They condemned the 11 September 2001 attacks, and in 2003 they expressed their shared concerns [italics added] over the war in Iraq." ("UK faith leaders condemn attacks, " UK Edition, July 10, 2005)
The forceful condemnation of the London attackers by the National Council of Churches offers another way by which to measure the double standard of mainstream religious leaders. The NCC's statement, released by General Secretary Bob Edgar, includes these words: "The National Council of Churches joins in prayer for those who were injured and offers sympathy to those who lost loved ones in the mass transit bombings in London today. Such violence reminds us not only of our need to be ever vigilant and to bring the perpetrators to justice [italics added]; it also reminds us of our need to strenuously pursue peace with justice." ("News from the National Council of Churches," July 7, 2005, New York).
The double standard of various mainstream religious leaders is seen in comparing their strong public condemnation of the "barbaric," "evil," "cowardly" bombings in London with their "shared concern over the war in Iraq." It is seen in who especially they decide are "the perpetrators" that they "need to bring to justice." Religious leaders could have included the same exact language- with far greater moral outrage--to publicly condemn President Bush and Prime Minister Tony Blair for their pre-emptive war against Iraq. But did they? While not exhaustive, the following comparison of the differing levels of moral outrage of religious leaders in response to Baghdad and London is believed to be revealing and instructive.
The strongest public, i.e., mainstream media-covered, religious opposition to the Bush administration's looming pre-emptive war came from Pope John Paul II, the world's most prominent Christian leader. Two weeks before the invasion of Iraq, Pope
John Paul sent an emissary to meet with President Bush in a final effort to avert the war. The emissary, Cardinal Pio Laghi, was described as "a friend of the president's father and the Vatican's first ambassador to Washington," and "brought to the White House the moral authority of the Roman Catholic Church." Laghi and Bush met privately for 40 minutes on Ash Wednesday; while back in Rome the Pope "called on Roman Catholics worldwide to fast and pray for peace" ("Pope's Emissary Meets with Bush, Calls War 'Unjust,'" by Johanna Neuman, the Los Angeles Times, Mar 6, 2003; "Bush meets with Vatican envoy," Associated Press, cnn.com, Mar. 5, 2003).
Before the meeting, Cardinal Laghi was quoted as saying "that the two most important things to the Vatican were 'avoiding a war and finding a peaceful solution to the problem of Iraq's disarmament.'" ("Bush meets with Vatican envoy," Ibid) After the meeting, Laghi said "that a war would be 'illegal and unjust,' but stopped short of calling it immoral." He said that "a decision regarding the use of military force can only be taken within the framework of the United Nations," adding "but always taking into account the grave consequences of such an armed conflict: the suffering of the people of Iraq and those involved in the military operations, a further instability in the region and a new gulf between Islam and Christianity." And Laghi "also called on Iraqi President Saddam Hussein to show more good faith in dismantling his weapons of mass destruction." ("Pope's Emissary meets with Bush," by Johanna Neuman, the Los Angeles Times, Mar. 6, 2003)
The closed-door meeting itself was reported- and thus what was said controlled- by senior White House officials. President Bush evidently disagreed with Pope John Paul II's belief that "a war would be a 'defeat for humanity' and would be neither morally nor legally justified." ("Bush meets with Vatican envoy," Associated Press, cnn.com, Mar. 5, 2003). "A White House spokeswoman" reported that "Bush explained to Laghi, as he has in recent speeches, that he feels a special obligation to protect the American people and that he believes the world will be safer if Hussein is disarmed." Furthermore, "he disputed the idea of a gulf between religions, citing success in rebuilding Afghanistan." (Pope's Emissary Meets with Bush, Calls War 'Unjust,'" by Johanna Neuman, the Los Angeles Times, Mar. 6, 2003)
The administration-reported meeting included Cardinal Laghi "deliver[ing] a letter in which the pope urged Bush to listen carefully to the Vatican envoy. Neither the letter nor the envoy specifically urged Bush to avoid war, the U.S. official said." ("Bush meets with Vatican envoy," Associated Press, cnn.com, Mar. 5, 2003) The Los Angeles Times provided a complementary diplomatic touch: "Laghi delivered a personal letter, but neither he nor the White House would disclose its contents." The story continued, "The cardinal said the president told him he appreciated the pope's effort to find a peaceful way out of the conflict," which evidently pleased Laghi. "We are not at the end yet," Laghi added. "I'm going away with hope." ("Pope's Emissary Meets With Bush, Calls War 'Unjust,'" by Johanna Neuman, Mar. 6, 2003)
The "end" came 15 days later. President Bush gave the order for 21,000-pound "mother of all bombs" and hundreds of cruise missiles to reign "shock and awe" on Baghdad and other Iraqi cities. Briefed on the planned first strike, a Pentagon official had told CBS News two months earlier, "There will not be a safe place in Baghdad." ("Iraq Faces Massive U.S. Missile Barrage," CBS Evening News, Jan. 24, 2003).
The following year President Bush visited Pope John Paul II at the Vatican and presented him with the Presidential Medal of Freedom. (America's highest civilian award) During the White House-initiated occasion, the pope reportedly "firmly reminded the president of the Vatican's opposition to the invasion of Iraq last year," and said the country's "sovereignty" needs to be restored and its "situation normalized" quickly , with active U.N. involvement, "in conditions of security for all its people." ("Pope Expresses Concern about Continuing Unrest in Iraq," by John Thavis, Catholic News Service, www.catholicherald.com, 6/3/04)
At this time, the pope made a general statement about recent "deplorable events [which] have come to light [and] have troubled the civic and religious conscience of all." ("Bush Meets with Pope at Vatican," Associate Press, FOX News.com, June 4, 2004) He did not elaborate. And no one seemed able or willing to say exactly whether he meant the abuse of Iraqi prisoners by American troops at Abu Ghraib prison or the kidnapping and beheading of foreign civilians by Islamic militants. (Ibid)
Another most "deplorable event" may well become Pope John Paul II's acceptance of the Presidential Medal of Freedom from President Bush. The accommodating media coverage of the seemingly scripted event appears to reveal that both the pope and the president were more concerned about appearances than reality. The Associated Press reported, "Seated next to the pope, Bush promised his nation would work for 'human liberty and human dignity,' without making any references to Iraq." (Ibid) A Catholic News Service story stated, "At the end of his talk, the pope assured the president of his prayers and invoked upon him God's blessings of wisdom, strength and peace." ("Pope Expresses Concern about Continuing Unrest in Iraq," by John Thavis, 6/3/2004)
The Vatican visit, the Presidential Medal of Freedom award, and the pope's blessing apparently contributed considerably to President Bush's gaining "prized swing votes" of Catholics and retaining his "sovereignty" as president in the election five months later. ("Bush, Pope to Meet Today at the Vatican," by Dan Balz and Alan Cooperman, The Washington Post, June 4, 2004) But the US-occupied Iraq people regaining their "sovereignty" and "security" as quickly as possible seems more remote than ever.
History may not be kind to Pope John Paul II. To whom much moral authority is given, much moral authority is expected. A timely papal-called global Christian peace pilgrimage to Iraq might have led President Bush to pray twice as hard about starting his war. Morally powerful also might have been a papal edict denying Communion to any Catholic supporting or participating in the life-aborting war against Iraq. Nor will history be kind to mainstream American Christian leaders who serve as custodians of the status quo more than as its conscience.
Not that other prominent Christian leaders did not try to meet with President Bush before he began his war of choice. Unlike Pope John Paul II, certain other Christian leaders could not get their foot in the White House door. A United Methodist, the president would not even meet with the bishops of his own denomination. The Los Angeles Times reported that "Methodist bishops, who say they have met with every president since George Washington, are upset that Bush has declined to see them." The story quotes Jim Winkler, General Secretary of United Methodism's Board of Church and Society: "There is disappointment because he's one of us. . . . We don't want to berate him or give him a hard time," Winkler added, "We want to pray with him, and we are bewildered that he has not been willing." ("Pope's Emissary Meets with Bush, Calls War 'Unjust,'" by Johanna Neuman, Mar 6, 2003)
Perhaps well-insulated President Bush already knew what his denominational leaders wanted to pray with him about. Six months earlier an Observer/UK story entitled "Iraq War 'Unjustifiable,' says Bush's Church Head," began, "President Bush's own Methodist Church has launched a scathing attack on his preparations for war against Iraq, saying they are 'without any justification according to the teaching of Christ.'" The story continued, "Jim Winkler, head of special policy for United Methodists, added that all attempts at a 'dialogue' between the President and his own church over the war had fallen on deaf ears at the White House." The story ends with Winkler saying "his church was 'keenly aware' that it counted the President and his deputy among its members, and that he was therefore 'frequently encouraged by others to be very careful about how I say things.'" (Guardian Newspapers United, Oct. 20, 2002)
Those "deaf ears" at the White House can definitely read--or be read to. Rev. Winkler also had been quoted as saying, "Methodist scriptural doctrine . . . specifies war as a last resort, primarily a defensive thing. And as far as I know," he pointed out, "Saddam Hussein has not mobilized military forces along the borders of the United States, nor along his own border to invade a neighboring country, nor have any of those countries pleaded for our assistance, nor does he have weapons of mass destruction targeted at the United States." (Ibid)Rev. Winkler and other United Methodist leaders apparently were not "very careful" about how "they voiced their opposition to the president's pre-emptive war preparations." They had "launched a scathing attack."
In an October 4, 2002 letter to the entire 10 million United Methodists, endorsed by the Council of Bishops, then Council President Sharon A Brown Christopher wrote, "A pre-emptive war by the United States against a nation like Iraq goes against the very grain of our understanding of the Gospel, our church's teachings, and our consciences." She also wrote that "a pre-emptive strike . . . does not allow for the adequate pursuit of peaceful means for resolving conflict." ("Council of Bishops' president joins call for restraint on Iraq" News Desk @ UMCOM.ORG, 7 Oct. 2002)
Rev. Winkler himself issued a strong statement: "United Methodists have a particular duty [italics added] to speak out against an unprovoked attack. President Bush and Vice President Cheney are members of our denomination. Our silence now could be interpreted as tacit approval of war." Nor was he "very careful" in also saying, "It is inconceivable that Jesus Christ, our Lord and Savior and the Prince of Peace, would support this proposed attack." ("Bush Urged to Turn Back From War," Mark Harrison, contact person, General Board of Church and Society, The United Methodist Church, Aug. 30, 2002).
Bishop Peter Weaver, current President of United Methodism's Council of Bishops, had also prophetically warned, "'War will not end terror. It will simply seed terror. It will come back on the United States like a boomerang,' he said, 'and make U.S. personnel into recruiters for al Qaeda'" ("Eight United Methodist bishops, other leaders, speak against war with Iraq," www.umc.org.) The July 7 London bombing attacks against the US's principal coalition partner seem to indicate that the "boomerang" may be coming full circle. And citizens of some neighboring Muslim and Arab countries help to swell a strong and resourceful Iraqi insurgency.
Numerous religious leaders joined Pope John Paul II and United Methodist officials with similarly strong public declarations, challenging the justification for a pre-emptive war against Iraq and warning of its disastrous consequences. And like Pope John Paul II and United Methodists officials, the statements of these faith-based leaders reveal the extent to which they also believed the Bush administration's repeated argument for a first strike war: American-hating Saddam Hussein's weapons of mass destruction and his links to the 9/11 attack against America and "harboring of terrorists." Their anti-war declarations would also seem to set the stage for, and fuel, far greater public moral outrage than that triggered by the July 7 suicide bombing attacks against London.
The run-up to the war was filled with prophetic concerns and warnings. Bishop Wilton D. Gregory, spokesperson for the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops, wrote a penetrating letter to President Bush, asking "troubling questions," including, "Is there clear and adequate evidence of a direct connection between Iraq and the attacks of September 11th or clear and adequate evidence of an imminent attack of a grave nature?" Gregory's letter ended by calling on "the Iraqi government to live up to its international obligations," and "urge[d}" Bush "to pursue actively alternatives to war," including "diplomatic efforts aimed, in part, at resuming rigorous, meaningful inspections." ("Letter to President Bush on Iraq," United States Conference of Catholic Bishops, Sept. 13, 2002)
Another letter to President Bush from 50 prominent Christian religious leaders contained a similar prophetic warning: that a pre-emptive war would result in the widespread deaths and suffering of Iraqi civilians, and that it would incite greater hatred of America and its allies throughout the Arab world. The letter also repeated a key concern of Bishop Gregory's: "It is detrimental to U.S. interests to take unilateral military action where there continues to be strong multilateral support for a new weapons inspection regime and when most governments in Europe and the Middle East resist supporting military action. It is important for the U.S. to cooperate with international efforts to control Iraq's weapons of mass destruction." ("Letter to President Bush on Iraq," Churches for Middle East Peace," Sept. 12, 2002)
The United Church of Christ leaders presented a powerful statement "opposing U.S. war in Iraq." These leaders repeated the commonly expressed prophetic predictions that "the human cost of a war would be enormous, both to the United States and to Iraq."
They also said "The case for a pre-emptive attack against Iraq has not been made," and called "on our leaders to step back from the brink of war [and] engage in honest and open consultation with parties around the world and especially in the Middle East to seek a non-military solution to the threat that Iraq may pose." They also joined the World Council of Churches in "calling for the Government of Iraq to respect the resolutions of the UN Security Council . . . to cooperate fully with UN inspections deployed to oversee compliance." ("Statement of United Church of Christ leaders opposing U.S. war against Iraq," Justice and Peace, not dated)
The Anglican Journal reported that Christian leaders have criticized the impetus towards a U.S.-led war against Iraq. It then stated the principal argument constantly used to justify a pre-emptive war against Iraq: "In recent weeks, the United States, noting that Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein had expelled United Nations weapons inspectors and is building biological and nuclear weapons, has urged the U.N. to lead an attack aimed at deposing Saddam." The story continued, "U.S. President George Bush has said he will act alone, if necessary. British Prime Minister Tony Blair supports him." ("Church leaders condemn rush to war with Iraq." (Staff News Service, Anglican Journal, The Anglican Church of Canada, Nov. 2002)
Other mainstream religious leaders and groups who went on record as opposing unilateral military action against Iraq included: the Presbyterian Church (USA), American Baptists, Unitarian Universalists, and the executive committee of the Union for Reformed Judaism. Presbyterian leaders reflect the widespread pre-war belief of mainstream religious leaders in urging Presbyterians to contact the President: "Remind President Bush that only the United Nations Security Council as a whole is capable of determining what qualifies as a breach of Security Council Resolution 1441 that provides for the return of weapons inspector to Iraq." ("What to Do about the Possibility of Military Action against Iraq." [PC-USA]- Presbyterian Peacemaking Program Iraq-Resources, Dec. 1, 2002)
It is time for mainstream religious leaders to remind themselves of the treasonous lies President Bush used to deceive and mislead them and other Americans into a criminal war. Lies resulting in the senseless deaths and disablement of tens of thousands of America's sons and daughters and hundred of thousands of Iraqi civilians. Lies that have made Bush administration-favored corporations like Halliburton richer, while squandering our country's resources and making Americans poorer. Lies that are undermining America's security while pretending to protect it. Lies that should fuel intense moral outrage. Lies that should lead religious leaders to shout their moral outrage from their steeple tops! There is a long trail of reminders!
The Bush administration constantly declared that Saddam Hussein had weapons of mass destruction and, if not stopped, planned use them against America and her allies, or give them to his 9/11 al Qaeda "terrorist" connections to inflict grave harm. President Bush repeatedly warned, "Saddam Hussein is harboring terrorists and the instruments of terror, the instruments of mass deaths and destruction. . . . Facing clear evidence of peril, we cannot wait for the final proof-and the smoking gun-that could come in the form of a mushroom cloud." ("President Bush Outlines Iraqi Threat," Cincinnati, Ohio, The White House, Oct. 7, 2002)
In his 2003 State of the Union Address, President Bush warned again, "The dictator of Iraq is not disarming. To the contrary, he is deceiving. From intelligence sources we know, for instance, that thousands of Iraqi security personnel are at work hiding documents and materials from the U.N. inspectors . . . If this threat is permitted to fully and suddenly emerge," Bush continued, "all actions, all words, and all recriminations would come too late. And for good measure, he added, "The dictator who is assembling the world's most dangerous weapons has already used them on whole villages-leaving thousands of his own citizens dead, blind or disfigured." ("President Delivers 'State of the Union,'" The White House, Jan. 28, 2003)
More reminders! Three days before President Bush launched his pre-emptive war against Iraq, he met on an American air base in the Azores with his two key "coalition of the willing" partners, British and Spanish Prime Ministers Tony Blair and Jose Maria Aznar. He again warned, "The dictator of Iraq and his weapons of mass destruction are a threat to the security of free nations. He is a danger to his neighbors . . . a sponsor of terrorism . . . possesses the weapons of mass murder." ("President Bush: Monday 'Moment of Truth' for World on Iraq," The White House, Mar. 17, 2003) Bush preceded this warning with words that should come back to haunt him: "Tomorrow is a moment of truth for the world," he declared in trying unsuccessfully "to extract a resolution from the U.N. Security Council that would give Iraq an ultimatum to disarm immediately or be disarmed by force" (Ibid.); "Bush: Monday is a 'moment of truth' on Iraq," (cnn.com/world, Mar. 17, 2003)
George W. Bush's "moment of truth for the world" was propelled by a lie, which should become the defining moment of his treasonous behavior as president of the United States. He lied repeatedly in sending America's sons and daughters to kill and die in an immoral war with, "Intelligence gathered by this and other governments leaves no doubt that the Iraq regime continues to possess and conceal some of the most lethal weapons ever devised. . . . This regime . . . has a deep hatred of America and our friends. And it has aided, trained and harbored terrorists, including operatives of al Qaeda."
President Bush poured it on. "The danger is clear," he warned, "Using chemical, biological or, one day, nuclear weapons, obtained with the help of Iraq, the terrorists could fulfill their stated ambition and kill thousands or hundreds of thousands of innocent people in our country or any other." ("President Bush Presents 48 Hour Ultimatum," Address to the Nation, The White House, Mar. 17, 2003)
Morally enraging reminders! President Bush's "moment of truth for the world" came. The final report on Iraq's weapons of mass destruction, prepared by Charles A. Duelfer, America's chief weapons inspector for Iraq, stated, "Iraq had destroyed its illicit weapons stockpile within months after the Persian Gulf War of 1991, and its ability to produce such weapons has significantly eroded by the time of the American invasion in 2003." (The New York Times, Oct. 7, 2004) Similarly, the bi-partisan 9/11 Commission found "no credible evidence" of a "collaborative relationship" between Iraq and Al-Qaeda. ("No Evidence Connecting Iraq to Al Qaeda, 9/11 Panel Says," by Dan Eggen, washingtonpost.com, June 16, 2004)
President Clinton was impeached for lying about sexual misconduct with an individual. President Bush remains at large after "fixing" intelligence to justify the rape of a country. ("The secret Downing Street memo," by David Manning, from: Matthew Rycroft, The Sunday Times-Britain, May 1, 2005)
Reminder of deception after deception! A morally illusive President Bush has continued to repackage his "moment of truth" to the world. The less the evidence for weapons of mass destruction, the more he wrapped himself in the lofty motive of removing a brutal dictator from power and bringing "freedom" to the oppressed Iraqi people.
History hides a contradictory truth. The United States aided and abetted Saddam Hussein during his brutal regime. At the very time he was killing his own people with poisonous gas, Bush's own father's administration reportedly sold him American farm products that could be used to produce chemical and biological weapons. And those weapons were used, with the help of satellite photographs provided by US intelligence agencies, to target Iranian troops during the decisive battles of the 1981-88 Iraqi-Iranian war. The US believed it was "imperative" to prevent Iran from overrunning "the important oil-producing countries in the Persian Gulf." Reported also is that, during the Reagan administration the decision was made "to remove the regime of Saddam Hussein-who was known in those days as the 'Butcher of Baghdad'-from the list of sponsors of terror!" ("What the U.S. President wants us to forget," by Robert Fisk, The Independent, Oct. 9, 2002; The New York Times, Aug. 18, 2002; "Justice in Iraq" by Kevin McKiernan, The Boston Globe, Feb 9, 2005). The trial of Saddam Hussein, if it is fair, may hold a "moment of truth" for American foreign policy, which has planted many seeds of hatred toward America.
When one lie does not take hold enough to justify the sacrifice of American lives, President Bush wraps himself in another. "Our men and women in uniform are fighting terrorists in Iraq, so we do not have to fight them here at home." ("State of the Union Address," The New York Times, Feb. 3, 2005) Iraq had no weapons of mass destruction, no connection to al Qaeda or 9/11. The country was greatly weakened by 12 years of US-enforced UN economic sanctions, and defenseless against the world's greatest super power and its coalition allies. The so-called "terrorists" in Iraq are Iraqis whose patriotism is every bit as strong as America's. Bush created a hornet's nest of resistance to America's invasion and occupation of Iraq. Now he is saying that Iraq is "filled with foreign fighters who have come from places like Saudi Arabia and Syria and Iran and Egypt and Sudan and Yemen and Libya." ("President Addresses Military Families, Discusses War on Terror," The White House, Nampa Idaho, Aug. 25, 2005)
The only really "foreign fighters" in Iraq are Americans and their coalition partners-just as the only weapons of mass destruction found in Iraq were unleashed by the American military. A Syrian stated that he was fighting Americans in Iraq so that he would not have to fight them in Syria. How many other Arab and Muslim people from neighboring countries are saying the same thing with their presence in Iraq?
One thing seems sure: We may be fighting so-called "terrorists" in America precisely because President Bush chose to invade Iraq. He also tries to justify his war of choice by saying, "See, they're coming into Iraq because they fear the march of freedom," (Ibid) It is not about a "march" but about an invasion, not about "freedom" but about occupation and global domination. It is about oil and empire.
A final reminder! President Bush reveals much about himself when he talks about Saddam Hussein. His projections seem obvious: "The dictator of Iraq is not disarming," Bush said. "To the contrary, he is deceiving." ("Text: Bush's 2003 State of the Union Address, The Washington Post, Jan. 28, 2005) That was his constant theme in the run-up to the war, in an attempt to depreciate the work of the UN weapons inspectors.
Most telling was the President's reaction to the UN inspectors' pre-war search for weapons of mass destruction in Iraq. His resistance to the inspectors led him to repeatedly say, "I'm sick and tired of games and deceptions." (The New York Times, Jan. 15, 2003) "How much time do we need to see clearly that he is not disarming." (The New York Times, Jan. 22, 2003) "No doubt he will play a last-minute game of deception. The game is over." (The New York Times, Feb. 7, 2003)
Saddam Hussein had stated, "As I told you and have said on many occasions before, that there are no weapons of mass destruction in Iraq whatsoever." ("60 Minutes II," CBS, Feb. 5, 2003) And the very day President Bush declared his "moment of truth for the world," Hussein "also repeated his denial of U.S. and British allegations that his country has weapons of mass destruction, dubbing the accusation 'a great lie'" ("Bush: Monday is 'a moment of truth' in Iraq," cnn.com./world, Mar. 17, 2003).
Whom is one to believe? "The dictator of Iraq and his weapons of mass destruction?" Or, the God-fearing, freedom-loving President of the United States? Bush repeatedly accused Hussein of the very deception he was practicing against the American people-and continues to practice.
The pre-war statements of mainstream religious leaders indicated they believed the Bush administration's pre-emptive, war-justifying falsehoods about Saddam Hussein's threatening weapons of mass destruction and ties to 9/11 and to "terrorists." The growing body of evidence, revealing that President Bush had deceived them and the American people, and had brought to pass with his war the very destructive consequences they had warned about, would seem to elicit from these religious leaders intense and sustained condemnation. One would expect to hear shouts of moral outrage against Bush and his administration, similar to, but far louder than, the spontaneous eruption of religious leaders in reaction to the bombings of London. Prophetic denunciations, such as: "Liars!" "Deceivers!" "Fear-mongerers!" "War-mongerers!" "State-organized terrorists!" "Killers!" "Barbaric!" "Imperialist conspirators!" "Treasonous!"
Leaders of the National Council of Churches and member denominations have presented a delayed, but relatively clear prophetic reaction. A brief Associated Press-written Washington Post story reported that they chose last July 4th to issue "a petition stating vehement opposition to United States policy in Iraq." Sending their statement to President Bush, they "charged, it has become clear that the rationale for invasion was at best a tragic mistake, at worst, a clever deception." They "denounced the national leaders who sent Americans 'to fight a dishonorable war' and 'the abuse of prisoners that has shamed our nation.'" They "advocated 'an early fixed timetable for the withdrawal of United States troops,'" and stated that "the nation must restore 'truth telling' and abolish 'first strikes' justifications for warfare." ("Religion News in Brief," The Associated Press, July 7, 2005)
Those Christian leaders joining the National Council of Churches-sponsored statement included "executives of the United Methodist Church, to which Bush belongs," The Washington Post-printed story stated. These executives' support for such a comparatively forceful statement is a positive sign.
Last May five United Methodist bishops paid President Bush a "pastoral visit," during which they presented him "with a Bible signed by the Council of Bishops, . . . shared a moment of prayer with him," and told him that "they are praying for him," and "that they share his commitment to building a better world." Their leader, Council of Bishops President Peter Weaver, also reported that Bush told them he was "proud to be a Methodist." ("United Methodist bishops meet with president, 'open door to future,' by Tom Tanton, Managing Editor, The United Methodist News Service, May 3, 2005)
Rather than paying him a "pastoral visit" in the White House, moral outrage should seem to lead them to join Cindy Sheehan in prayer and protest vigils outside the White House-and wherever Bush "stays the course."
The short Washington Post-carried story, on the National Council of Churches-sponsored strong anti-war statement, seemed to strive for "balance." It quoted a critic of the church leaders' statement: "Alan Wisdom of the conservative Institute for Religion and Democracy, responded that the statement shows the National Council is divorced 'from the church members it claims to represent' and seeks Christian unity through narrow '1960s era protest politics' on which Christians may disagree rather than pursuing matters of faith." It is as if "matters of faith" can be separated from works that matter.
Many evangelical Christians appear to be "divorced" from the reality of President Bush's lies, and from the tragic human toll in Iraqi and American lives caused by his continuing deceit. The Pew Research Center for the People surveyed the religious views of a potential war, and found that "80% of evangelical white Protestants support the war, the highest tally of any group measured." ("Pope's Emissary Meets with Bush, Calls war 'Unjust,'" by Johanna Neuman, the Los Angeles Times, Mar. 6, 2003) This finding may explain why the "matters of faith" of many evangelical Christians have not yet caught up with the moral outrage on the ground.
One such staunch white Christian evangelical supporter of President Bush, Rev. Pat Robertson, has recently called for the assassination of President Hugo Chavez of Venezuela. Chavez is Latin America's strongest critic of Bush's war of terrorism in Iraq, and Venezuela has the largest oil reserves after the Middle East. Robertson said, on his Christian television program, The 700 Club, viewed by around one million people, "If he thinks we're [italics added] trying to assassinate him, I think we [italics added] really ought to go ahead and do it. It's a whole lot cheaper than starting a war," Robertson continued. "And I don't think any oil shipments will stop."
The Christian evangelist accused President Chavez of turning Venezuela "into 'a launching pad for communist infiltration and Muslim extremism.'" An empowered Robertson said, "We [italics added] have the ability to take him out, and I think the time has come that we [italics added] exercise that ability." ("Robertson Suggests U.S. Kill Venezuela's Leader," by Laurie Goodstein, The New York Times, Aug. 24, 2005)
The strong negative reaction in certain religious and government circles first led Pat Robertson to deny that he called for the assassination of President Chavez. "I didn't say 'assassination,' I said our special forces should 'take him out,' . . . 'Take him out' could be a number of things, including kidnapping." He later admitted using the word "assassination," said it was wrong and apologized, explaining, "I spoke in frustration that we [italics added] should accommodate the man who thinks the US is out to kill him." ("Robertson apologizes for Chavez assassination remarks," Associated Press, The Boston Globe, Aug. 25, 2005)
Pat Robertson's criminal suggestion would seem to be an easy target for the moral outrage of mainstream religious leaders and for certain influential evangelical Christian leaders. President Bush's reaction to Robertson's suggestion, and that of other evangelical leaders, may be a different story. The strongest criticism from the State Department thus far has been to call Robertson's comments "inappropriate." (Ibid) Robertson represents the violent extreme of true believers, which violence drives the Bush administration's goal of US global domination-wrapped, of course, in palatable slogans of "freedom" and "democracy." Such true believers may be called "Christian extremists."
Pat Robertson is not different from President Bush. More obvious? Yes! Less powerful? Of course! But Robertson probably received the inspiration and emboldenment for his verbal terrorist violence from Bush. All Robertson suggested was what Bush has done repeatedly.
The President's "moment of truth for the world" was about "taking out" Saddam Hussein. And in his 2003 State of the Union address, Bush flashed a look of triumphant pleasure in saying, "All told, more than 3,000 suspected terrorists have been arrested in many countries. Many others have met with a different fate." And then he paused, gloating-like, and said, "Let's put it this way-they are no longer a problem to the United States and our friends and allies." These words elicited "applause."
Power breeds arrogance. And arrogance breeds the abuse of power. It is easy to direct moral outrage at an obvious Pat Robertson. But President Bush is the one to whom mainstream religious leaders need to speak truth to power.
Pat Robertson represents the violent extreme to which "the one true Christian belief" can lead persons to inflict their will on other human beings. President Bush's behavior is so outrageous, and obviously far more dangerous than Robertson's. Bush's use of religion to mask his administration's pursuit of political/corporate world domination would seem to lead America's religious leaders to scream with moral outrage.
President Bush repeatedly told Americans he was praying for peace while hell-bent for war. At his March 6, 2003 news conference, two weeks before invading Iraq, Bush said, "I pray daily. I pray for wisdom and guidance and strength. . . . I pray for peace. I pray for peace." (The New York Time, Mar. 7, 2003) Two weeks later American military began bombing and invading Iraq.
One might wonder to whom President Bush was praying daily "for guidance and wisdom . . . [and] peace." His prayers evidently were not informed by intelligence showing no weapons of mass destruction in Iraq and no Iraqi ties to the 9/11 attacks against America-his administration's two key arguments to justify invading Iraq. Charges that were knowingly false. Had he talked with UN chief weapons inspector Hans Blix, before praying, he would have obtained "guidance and wisdom," as Blix would have told him that his team "found no evidence of Iraq possessing weapons of mass destruction." But a prayerful Bush apparently did not want to hear that. And his "moment of truth for the world" effectively ended the search for any weapons of mass destruction, which led Blix to respond, "I don't think it is reasonable to close the door to inspections after 3 _ months." (The Boston Globe, Mar. 19, 2003).
"I pray daily . . . for peace." President Bush's former Treasury Secretary Paul O'Neill said that removing Saddam Hussein from power "was topic 'A' 10 days after the inauguration-eight months before Sept. 11." ("Bush Sought 'Way' to Invade Iraq," www.cbsnews.com, Jan. 11, 2004)
"I pray daily . . . for peace." Richard Clarke, President Bush's former chief advisor on terrorism, reported that Bush seemed determined to use the 9/11 attack against America as a pretext to invade Iraq. According to Clarke, Bush told him "to find whether Iraq did this." And when he replied, "We looked at it . . . [and] there's no connection," Bush insisted that he "come back with a report that said Iraq did this." ("Clarke's Take on Terror," www.cbsnews.com, Mar. 21, 2004)
When no weapons of mass destruction were found in Iraq and no connection to 9/11, President Bush's "moment of truth for the world" began catching up with him. These realities must have led him again to prayer, where he evidently found another justification for military aggression against Iraq: "Freedom is not America's gift to the world, it is God's gift to every man and woman in the world." ("Acceptance Speech to Republican Convention Delegates," The New York Times, Sept. 3, 2004) The only difference between the Christianity of Pat Robertson and George Bush is that Bush is president and has the power to kill those who resist his understanding of "the ways of Providence." (The New York Times, Jan. 29, 2003).
Cloaking military violence, conquest, occupation, and exploitation in the name of "God" and "freedom" and "democracy" and "protecting America" should have mainstream Christian religious leaders proclaiming biblically-inspired moral outrage from their church-tops: "Hypocrites!" "Whitewashed tombs!" "False prophets!" "Defilers!" "Desecrators!" "Evildoers!" "Mercenaries!" "Murderers of the innocent!" "Devourers of the poor!" "Oppressors of the helpless!"
President Bush's hypocrisy is readily seen in his prostitution of freedom and democracy as well as of God to disguise and serve his administration's imperialistic crusade. Here again he does not practice what he preaches.
The president constantly preaches about spreading "freedom" and "democracy" throughout the world-especially after no war-justifying weapons of mass destruction were found in Iraq, and no links to 9/11 or al Qaeda. However, he continues to remind his audiences of 9/11, and to repeat, "I understand freedom is not America's gift to the world; freedom is Almighty God's gift to each man and woman in this world." ("President Addresses Military Families, Discusses War on Terror," Nampa, Idaho, The White House, Aug. 25, 2005)
President Bush gives a predictably "democratic" spin to the U.S.-installed puppet Iraqi leaders' struggle to create a "democratic constitution," one acceptable to his administration: "Iraqis are now at the beginning of a long process; and like our founders, they're grappling with difficult issues . . . They're arguing about the proper place of religion in the life of their nation. . . . minority rights . . . the rights of women . . . But what's important is that the Iraqis are resolving these issues through debate and discussion [italics added], not at the barrel of a gun." (Ibid) The Bush administration has provided the barrel of the gun!
A freedom-loving, evangelistic President Bush declares, "The road to Providence is uneven and unpredictable. Yet we know where it leads. It leads to freedom. . . freedom's power to change the world. We are part of a great venture . . . to spread the peace that freedom brings." (Transcript of State of the Union Address and cleared by the White House, The New York Times, Feb. 3, 2005)
President Bush continually tells his audiences, "Our enemies murder because they despise our freedom and our way of life . . . We believe in human rights. . . They'll kill women and children. . ." (President Addresses Military Families, Discusses War on Terror," Ibid.) It is as if America did not violate Iraq's national sovereignty, nor that merciless "shock and awe" bombs did not blow Iraqi women and children to bits-never mind the 12 years of US-controlled UN sanctions that contributed to the deaths of some 500,000 Iraqi children under 5 years of age.
President Bush preaches "freedom" and "democracy" all over the country and the world, but seems unable to practice it with anyone. "See, you can't talk sense to the terrorists. You can't negotiate with them. You cannot hope for the best. You must bring them to justice," he tells his screened audiences. He himself is protected from the very "debate and discussion" for which he is now lauding American-chosen Iraqi constitution-makers.
Tragically, it is not just "the terrorists" President Bush "can't talk sense to." It is also Hans Blix, who would have told him that "recent inspections proved far-ranging and more effective than any previously in Iraq," and that "while inspectors followed up leads from US intelligence, I must regret we have not found . . . any smoking guns." (The Boston Globe, Mar. 19, 2003) Nor could Bush evidently "talk sense to" his former anti-terrorism advisor Richard Clarke about "Iraq! Saddam!" when Clarke told him "there's no connection" between Iraq and the 9/11 attack on America.
Nor could President Bush "talk sense to" the United Nations Security Council. The deity to whom he prays "for guidance and wisdom and strength" evidently has a unilateral bent, that led Bush not into the United Nations, but delivered him from the French, the Germans, the Russians, the Chinese and the leaders of other countries. And he would not even open the White House door nor pray with any of his own religious leaders-or any other Christian "peacemakers"-until after his war was safely launched, so that he could use "support the troops" to drum up support for his war and drown out opposition.
Perhaps, most revealing of all is that President Bush cannot "talk sense" with Cindy Sheehan, the grief-stricken mother whose 24-year old son Casey died in Iraq in 2004 for Bush's "noble cause." A more informed Mrs. Sheehan continued to hold a vigil near Bush's ranch during his recent five-week vacation, asking him to meet on the road-side with her and explain the "noble cause" for which he said her son died. Having lost her son forever "through the barrel of a gun," she understandably felt entitled to resolve "issues through debate and discussion" with the "freedom"-espousing president-as the admirable Iraqi constitution-creators are doing. Bush's response to her request and presence near his ranch reveals the disconnect between what he says and what he does: "I sympathize with Mrs. Sheehan," he said. "She feels strongly about her position, and she has every right in the world to say what she believes. This is America." [italics added] ("Bush says he hears families' cries but pull out is wrong," by Deb Riechmann, Associated Press writer, Williamsport Sun-Gazette, Aug. 12, 2005) Bush will meet with grieving families of dead American troops. They just have to be screened first.
President Bush's treasonous behavior is especially seen in his response to Mrs. Sheehan's demand to know from him the "noble cause" that took her son's life. "We mourn the loss of every life," Bush said. "We pray for their loved ones. These brave men and women," he continued, "gave their lives for a cause that is just and necessary for the security of our country and now we will honor their sacrifice by completing their mission." (Ibid) His punch line also: "We owe them something. We will finish the task that they gave their lives for. We will honor their sacrifice by staying in the offensive against the terrorists." ("President Honors Veterans of Foreign Wars at National Convention," Salt Lake City, Utah, The White House, Aug. 23, 2005)
First, President Bush's "noble cause" was removing Iraq's threatening weapons of mass destruction and connection to al Qaeda, which "cause" proved to be neither just nor necessary for the security of our country. Then the "noble cause" became spreading "freedom" and "democracy" to "the darkest corners of the world"-for America's own protection and security as well. Now, with the growing cost in American lives and limbs, Bush's "noble cause" has become honoring the sacrifice of those who died in a dishonorable war by continuing "the fight" for which they died. America's sons and daughters are honorable. The war in which they were manipulated into fighting and killing and dying is not! How cruelly cynical to justify the lies for which Americans have died by saying that "honoring their sacrifice" requires other Americans to continue to die.
Today President Bush's "noble cause" even includes protecting Iraq's oil fields from "fall[ing] under the control of terrorist extremists," who would use them to fund their "terrorist attacks" ("Bush: U.S. Must Protect Iraq From Terror," by Jennifer Loven, The Associated Press, Aug 30, 2005) Never mind that the so-called "terrorists" are mostly Iraqis and the oil is theirs. The 'noble cause" is to be found in America not Iraq. Rather than being sent to "protect" Iraq's oil from Iraqis, those National Guard troops and resources are desperately needed to protect Americans from water. But since most of these Americans are black and/or poor, it probably was easier for Bush to remain oblivious to the water of Hurricane Katrina-until it began swamping the White House with a public relations disaster.
An editorial in the Sun Herald of Biloxi, Mississippi criticized Hurricane Katrina relief efforts, stating, "Our reporters have yet to find evidence of a coordinated approach to relieve pain and hunger or to secure property and maintain order." The editorial then asked, "Where is the National Guard, [italics added] why hasn't every able-bodied member of the armed forces in south Mississippi been pressed into service?" ("Biloxi Newspaper Raps Relief Effort, Begs for Help," by Greg Mitchell, Editor and Publisher, Sept. 1, 2005) Evidently the deity to whom President Bush prays "daily . . . for guidance and wisdom and strength" forgot to warn him about natural disasters that would demand the immediate and massive response of the National Guard's presence and resources.
Predictably, President Bush could not "talk sense to" very many victims of Hurricane Katrina. The New York Times reported that his first trip "to Louisiana and Mississippi . . .left Republicans cringing, in part because the president had little contact with residents left homeless." (Sept. 5, 2005). He avoided large crowds of stranded pleading, angry, desperate people in the Superdome and the New Orleans convention center and elsewhere-- probably because they could not be screened. He and his choreographers-- and television cameras-- found controllable settings and individuals easier to hug and console with words. (The New York Times, Sept. 3, 2005 and Sept. 6, 2005)
President Bush uses religion to demonize other human beings and dismiss their grievances against US foreign policy, by calling them "terrorists" and enemies in a "war of good vs. evil." And the way he says, "See, you can't talk sense to the terrorists" indicates he has no intention of trying to resolve hostilities by talking with America's enemies. It should be obvious by now that you can't talk sense to President Bush.
A greatly needed response to the President's tragic intransigence is found in a Boston Globe guest column by Mohammad-Mahmoud Ould Mohamedou, who raises a critical question: "Time to talk to Al Qaeda?" He asks, "How can the war be brought to an end,?" and answers, "Though dismissed widely, the best strategy may well be to acknowledge and address the collective reasons in which Al Qaeda anchors its acts of force." Those reasons: "The United States must end its military presence in the Middle East, its uncritical political support and military aid of Israel's occupation of Palestinian territories, and its support of corrupt and coercive regimes in the Arab and Muslim world." Mohamedou believes that "talking sense" with Al Qaeda could "bring an end to the war it declared in 1996 and in 1998, in return for some degree of satisfaction regarding its grievances." He offers his own concluding reminder: "In 2002, bin Laden declared: "Whether America escalates or deescalates this conflict, we will reply in kind.'" (Sept. 14, 2005)
What "we owe" those honorable Americans who were sacrificed for lies, and those continuing to be sent to be sacrificed, is to stop the dishonorable war now-and to put President Bush and certain members of his administration on trial for treason. Would that those honorable National Guard and Army troops, whose lives have been wrongfully sacrificed, were here to continue living their lives--and to join in the truly honorable work of rescuing and protecting the desperate victims of Hurricane Katrina.
What a horrible hoax and crime to commit against America's sons and daughters and their families and friends. What a horrible transgression to commit against another country: killing and wounding and occupying its people, controlling and exploiting its land and resources and provoking civil war-all in the name of "Operation Iraqi Freedom." What a tragic abdication of moral authority and responsibility by those mainstream religious leaders, and mainstream editors and columnists, and political officials who continue to call this international crime a "mistake."
President Bush's remaining at large is believed to have serious moral implications for mainstream religious leaders and mainstream media and political officials. His repeated treasonous lies and disastrous policies, which threaten America with far greater harm than the attack of 9/11, have yet to elicit effective moral, editorial and political outrage and accountability. History will try America's "freedom of religion" and "free press" and may find both morally wanting. We will cast a stigma of shame on future generations of citizens if we continue to be "good Americans."
More forceful prophetic outrage by religious leaders may have been made than appears in this brief study. If so, their voices and writings may not have been loud and visible enough to be newsworthy-though part of their problem could be a complicit mainstream media, which also often serve as guardians of the status quo. One also wonders what price Rev. Winkler, Rev. Edgar, and certain other religious leaders are now paying for not being "very careful about how" they have been speaking truth to power.
The Prophet Muhammed said, "The pinnacle of faith is to speak the truth in the face of the tyrant." (Bukhari) When Jesus was taken prisoner and faced the tyrant Pilate, he said his mission was "to testify to the truth," and "Pilate asked him, 'What is truth?'" (John 18:36-38) Jesus had already said it from the pinnacle of a mountaintop, which is why he was taken prisoner: "Blessed are the peacemakers for they will be called children of God. . . . Love your enemies. . . " (Matthew 5:9, 43) There is Jewish prophecy as well: "When all the prisoners of the land are crushed under foot, when human rights are perverted in the presence of the Most High, when one's case is subverted-does the Lord not see it?" (Lamentations 3:34-36). It is time for more mainstream religious leaders and their peoples of faith to see it clearly, and to demand that President Bush be held accountable for his treasonous behavior and crimes against humanity.
Rev. William E. Alberts, Ph.D. is a hospital chaplain. Both a Unitarian Universalist and a United Methodist minister, he has written research reports, essays and articles on racism, war, politics and religion. He can be reached at william.alberts@bmc.org.
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