Is God "Neutral"?
by David Harrison, IPA Media
Ever since Sept. 11, some American religious leaders
have been outspoken in calling for a peaceful response and respect for civil liberties.
Their perspectives contrast sharply with President Bush's bellicose invocations of
religious rhetoric, as in his Sept. 20 address to Congress when he declared that
"God is not neutral."
"Christians have a 'just war' teaching that in theory can be used to judge any
war. In practice, the teaching serves to bless rather than judge wars," said
Sister Evelyn Mattern, a program associate at the North Carolina Council of Churches.
"For example, the U.S. Roman Catholic bishops recently invoked the 'just war'
teaching with regard to Afghanistan. In their hurry to support the president, they
failed even to mention one of the main criteria for a just war: that it can be declared
only after every other effort has failed. It has yet to be revealed, I think, what
the U.S. tried and failed before it began bombing."
On the question of a "just war," David Potorti, who lost his brother in
the World Trade Center and who recently completed a peace walk from the Pentagon
to New York, said: "The phrase 'just war," used in reference to the battle
being waged in Afghanistan, is resonating, but not as a deep philosophical concept...
War, to the increasing exclusion of everything else, is almost the only thing that
America collectively cares about anymore... We direct our attention and our resources
into what we do best: war."
Rabbi Mordechai Liebling, director of the Shefa Fund's Torah of Money project, which
deals with Jewish ethics on finances and socially responsible investing, suggested
that U.S. foreign policy should address the root causes that push people in developing
countries to extremism. "We have to find a way of getting beyond the levels
of despair and misunderstanding that grip much of the world. Despair makes a populace
rife for an opportunistic leadership that easily divides the world into good and
evil, leading to bloodshed. The focus on defeating evil rather than on improving
living conditions leads to more people raised in despair. We need to rekindle hope.
That comes from working for real change."
"However vulnerable we might feel, we must caution against blind nationalism
which too often leads to irrational and violent behavior," commented the Rev.
Lucius Walker, director of the Interreligious Foundation for Community Organizing.
"As an interfaith agency, we condemn the vilification of Islam, a major world
religion which shares its roots with Judaism and Christianity. We are also deeply
concerned about the impact of a U.S. war on the already brutalized population of
Afghanistan. We cannot justify an attack on innocent civilians who are already living
under horrific conditions given the civil war that rages on. The tragic reality is
that people in many parts of the world have been the victims of terrorism, and that
much of that terrorism has been fomented by our government. This in no way excuses
the terrorist acts committed against the people of the U.S. -- but it must inform
our response to those terrorist acts."
From a Buddhist perspective, Sue Moon, the editor of Turning Wheel, the quarterly
magazine of the Buddhist Peace Fellowship, said: "I don't support the war and
I don't support the continuation of bombing in Afghanistan and I definitely don't
support the extension of the war to Iraq. As Buddhists, one of our first precepts
is not to kill and to search for ways of being nonviolent and to work for social
justice. I would be in favor of continuing international talks and agreements and
negotiations. Aid to Afghanistan is essential. We should cut back on arms sales and
reevaluate our energy policy, which is dependent on Middle Eastern oil, by supporting
alternative energy policies." Moon is the author of Being Bodies: Buddhist Women
on the Paradox of Embodiment.
On the issue of civil liberties, Dr. Laila al-Marayati, the founder of the Muslim
Women's League, said: "America pays lip service to things like human rights,
that makes it a source of hope, but when we don't walk the walk, that leads to resentment...
. We should not sacrifice our freedoms in the name of this war. The crackdown on
various religious charities feels like an attempt to limit the American Muslim community's
activism on behalf of legitimate causes like the suffering of Palestinians."
"Now we have the proposal to reinstate covert surveillance of religious and
political organizations in the United States," said the Rev. Jim Wallis, editor
of Sojourners magazine. "For those of us who have lived through those activities
in the past, it brings back all the memories of government harassment of dissent.
Finding and punishing those who committed the attacks of Sept. 11 and preventing
future attacks is something we all should support. Sacrificing our constitutional
civil liberties to do so is not."
David Harrison is a writer with IPA Media, a project of the Institute
for Public Accuracy.
|