A rchive Date
[ 09-03-2003 ]
Category
[ International Relations ]
sub-Categoy
[ U.S ]
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[http://www.chron.com/cs/CDA/story.hts/editorial/outlook/1809302
A fellow Christian counters Bush
By SAM DUNNING
March 7, 2003, 9:07PM
Most mornings, my custom is to take my cup of coffee out onto the balcony of my second-story apartment. From this perch I take in my first look at the day. The apartment faces out to where two streets meet. Because this is the signature corner of the apartment complex, just inside the fence there is a tall flagpole with the American flag hoisted high.
This morning, the flag is breathless, flaccid and still. Cars whisk by. Parents ease their vehicles onto the driveway of a neighboring school, children giggle while lugging backpacks and a crossing guard whistles. A dog yaps from the confines of a back-yard fence across the way. All are signals of normalcy. But this day is anything but usual. I am writing the day after President Bush's brief talk and news conference on Thursday evening, presenting once more the rationale for his policy on Iraq.
The weather, the fog and washed-out sky match my mood, for last night I saw a man resolved to lead the most powerful nation on Earth into a new era of American hegemony based to a considerable degree upon the will and show of flexing military might. Here I am reminded of the words of Cicero, another man living in time of empire, confidant to the powerful, commentator extraordinaire, "I will cease not to advocate peace; even though unjust it is better than the most just war."
While I do not entirely agree with the venerable Roman sage, his extreme view offered from the perspective of an elite living in a highly militarized age is telling. I watched the president last night along with a number of people. An acquaintance of mine recalled a quote from Albert Einstein in which he said that he did not know what kind of weapons with which World War III would be fought, but he did know the weapons that would be used in World War IV. Sticks and stones.
I fear we are launching not into a brave new world but are attempting to fashion a Pax Americana that will require the continued and ever increasing application of public resources at the expense of the poor and vulnerable, at the cost of domestic progress and economic growth. Just hear the hue and cry of governors all over the land as their budgets are cut, services dismissed and food lines grow longer each day while Turkey is bribed with billions of dollars. Further, this peace will likely be false and tenuous at best, for if the threshold - the gauntlet - is the replacement of regimes inimical to our values, after Iraq, where next? How many millions of innocents will be slaughtered in the fray? How many mothers will bury sons? How many sisters will bury their brothers?
I respect the president and appreciate his life story that has resulted in a profound faith in God. But I, along with millions of other Christians around the world, also look at life through the lens of faith and we see the terrain quite differently. Pope John Paul II recently insisted, "It is a duty of believers, regardless of the religion to which they belong, to proclaim that they will never be able to be happy if we are pitted against one another; the future of humanity will never be able to be assured by terrorism and the logic of war."
It seems to me that the promise of the new millennium has been squandered in the pique of nationalism, regional war, genocide and various other examples of state-sponsored depravity or, as we Christians might say, examples of the fallen state of the human race.
But my faith tells me that such enmity and moral failure in the public square does not have to continue, at least on the par of late. The vision offered by [the Old Testament prophet] Isaiah might seem myopic at best, childishly naive or foolishly meek in a world about to go madly into war again. Nevertheless, it bears reflecting upon, "They shall beat their swords into plowshares and their spears into pruning hooks; One nation shall not raise the sword against another, nor shall they train for war again."
I agree that Saddam Hussein is an evil man. But there is other evil in the world that our power, might and reach could better defeat. In the time it takes a fighter pilot to complete his mission over Iraq, as many as 10,000 children will have died around the world from hunger and its effects. There have been billions spent on our military presence in the Middle East, while our own Texas suffers from a deficit of billions, and the poor of our state are now more vulnerable than ever. I believe the vision offered by Isaiah, the lamb lying down with the lion, will never be perfected on this side of the divide. But it can be brought into greater relief. Just imagine how the world would be if we had spent as much money, and engaged with as much determination as we have over Iraq to instead combat AIDS in Africa, poverty in Central America or to provide universal health care in this country?
I would never deign to lecture the president on the niceties of theology, or intricate nuances of morality. But it seems that as religious leaders the world over have decried the notion of a pre-emptive strike against Iraq, including the leaders of the president's own Methodist denomination, that perhaps this does give pause to the rush to war. While I agree that the president cannot be prisoner to public opinion, in the Christian world, however, there is a sensus fidelium that aids in the guidance of our worldly affairs. The Christian vision as uttered, preached and proclaimed by so many means not only defeating Saddam Hussein, but also making certain we never again give succor to such ilk. If we are going to apply a moral vision to the conduct of public and diplomatic affairs then consistency as well as persistence must be the order of the day.
As I look out my window, the flag is still lifeless and limp. I know that it will catch air late in the day, and it will flap back and forth with vigor. And I believe our nation can be restored as a beacon of not only justice, but also mercy. And I also believe that this nation's greatness cannot, should not, be measured by the reach of our jets, the size of our aircraft carriers nor the number of missiles we stock. Rather, I hope the legacy we pass on is measured by the number of children we helped educate, the number of families we helped house, the bodies we help heal, at home and abroad. It is in this I believe Christians have a special call, and a great stake, in helping our leadership to see, or at least to dream, as did Isaiah.
Dunning is director of the Office of Justice and Peace for the Diocese of Galveston-Houston. He is also a permanent deacon assigned to St. Thomas Aquinas in Sugar Land.
 World Fact Book (CIA)]
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