Fr. Jim’s Gems…. 02/10/2001
The secular press is overwhelmingly biased, as are
the TV and radio media, in its shaping of the public’s attitude toward
war. More provocative thinking of a peaceful nature is ordinarily
promoted by some good religious press, e.g. America magazine, The National
Catholic Reporter, The Christian Science Monitor, and Quaker publications.
Because most of us do not subscribe to such journals, I’ll tread where
angels fear to do so, and reprint random columns of a dove-ish bent from
the NCR. There is more than enough ink spilled for the other team.
The following article is an NCR editorial from
12/21/01 entitled, “Mr. Bush, we’re ready for new marching orders.”
I must admit, it would take an extraordinarily courageous person to lead
us in this direction.
Mr. Bush, we’re ready for new marching orders
What’s next in the war on terrorism? For
those who object to the bombing in Afghanistan, the question is serious
and difficult. For it is not unreasonable to conclude on one level,
that in this case, war is “working." On some level, war always works
for the United States. We’re good at it. So what else could
we do?
“Would someone please explain to me what we
should be doing instead?” asks a letter regarding the bombing in Afghanistan.
Another wants no more questioning of the past, just “answers for coping
with the current situation.”
At the moment, an alternative does not seem
likely. The Unites States has already committed such enormous firepower
to and expended such staggering (and largely unreported) sums on the war
that the question seems futile.
Add to the dollar amount the intangible costs
we will pay for the upending of Constitutional protections and the circumvention
of judicial procedures ordered recently by President Bush and Attorney
General John Ashcroft.
As a country, we are in full battle gear, long
beyond the point of asking if there might be an alternative. News
people who have enormous resources at their command and access to the top
decision makers apparently find it impossible to form questions that might
challenge the status quo.
If we dare ask, however, where we go from here,
we had better be ready to read the past, frustrating as that might be.
The record is revealing. We propped up the shah in Iran for 30 years,
let him run amok with his secret police, alienating large segments of the
population while offending the religious sensibilities of many. In
Iran, we paved the way for a revolution fueled by widespread hatred of
America.
We then armed both Iran and Iraq at different
times during their 1980-88 war with each other (and used Iran’s arms payments
to finance another war at the time, against Nicaragua). Iraq was
eventually victorious-and before long was menacing neighboring Kuwait.
So we went to war, this time with our former ally and now sudden enemy,
Saddam Hussein, and undoubtedly against some of the weaponry we had sold
him.
Even though we declared victory in 1991 in the
Gulf War, we have found it necessary to continue bombing that nation, almost
nonstop, for more than a decade.
And we’re still terrified of what might be in
the works in Saddam’s secret weapons facilities.
In Afghanistan, we once backed “freedom fighters”
battling our old menace, the Soviet Union. Those same “freedom fighters”
eventually gained control of Afghanistan and helped create and foster Osama
bin Laden and his network of terrorists. Meanwhile, we walked away
from the pressing needs of the war-torn nation. War is our game;
we show little interest in rooting out its causes.
In the mid ‘90s, when factions were fighting
for control of the country, the rebels who formed the Northern Alliance-our
ally now in Afghanistan-were feared as the Taliban later came to be.
Meanwhile we have become cozy with Pakistan’s
president, military strongman Pervez Musharraf.
And so it continues.
Some are offended at the recitation of this
record, saying it represents a blame-the-victim mentality that diminishes
the tragedy of Sept. 11 and the sense of loss.
Nothing could be further from the truth.
The real insult to those who lost their lives to terrorists would be the
stubborn continuation of unsuccessful policies that guarantee only more
terror and war.
This time, in Afghanistan, can we expect different
results? After all, the world is watching closely, and we have cited
the suffering of the Afghan people under the Taliban to help justify U.S.
bombing. With our new attentiveness, will we finally begin to face
the desperate poverty of that country and see it within a broader context?
Will we begin to imagine U.S. complicity in the suffering of the region?
Will we begin to repent the way we support dictatorships when it serves
U.S. economic interests? Can we finally imagine waging peace, not
war?
Part of the U.S. genius is its pragmatism, its
ability to get things done, to fix what needs fixing and get on the next
challenge. War is a sign of failure, not success.
So what needs fixing?
President Bush made much in a recent speech
about what the military has learned from its experience in Afghanistan,
about what works and what it will need in the future to remain an effective
fighting force. How much more encouraging it would have been had
he conducted an honest and open discussion about what had been learned
in recent weeks on the diplomatic front.
What if President Bush were to have suggested
that treating nations as if they exist solely to serve only short-term
U.S. interests creates widespread hostility? That propping up despots
and unpopular ruling families to assure U.S. access to resources in antithetical
to U.S. values? That we would have to find ways to close the chasm
between rich and poor because it is outrageously unfair--and counterproductive-that
5 percent of the world’s population, the U.S. population, consumes a third
or more of the world’s resources and produces almost half of its hazardous
waste.
What if the president asked for our help in
adjusting our lifestyles and expectations, even modestly, to make us less
dependent on foreign oil? What if he said he would take a portion
of money from the military and switch it to develop technologies to reduce
hazardous waste or nuclear stockpiles?
This would require leadership and a larger vision.
And the American people in their goodness would respond positively.
People are desperate for leadership and responses to the Sept. 11 attacks
in New York and Washington that go deeper than the President’s call to
return to normal and spend more money.
Afghanistan, so far, has proved that the United
States has daunting military might.
Can we extract ourselves from our own blind
cycle of violence and discover “what we should be doing instead”?
Or will hubris in the wake of this military campaign further blind us?
? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ?
? ? ? ?
He asked her to marry him. She said, “Absolutely
not!”, and they both lived happily ever after. Happy Valentine’s
Day!
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? ? ? ?
The Lonely Ember
A member of a certain church, who previously had been
attending services regularly, stopped going. After a few weeks, the
pastor decided to visit him. It was a chilly evening. The pastor
found the man at home alone, sitting before a blazing fire. Guessing
the reason for his pastor’s visit, the man welcomed him, led him to a big
chair near the fireplace and waited. The pastor made himself comfortable
but said nothing. In the grave silence, he contemplated the play
of the flames around the burning logs. After some minutes, the pastor
took the fire tongs, carefully picked up a brightly burning ember and placed
it to one side of the hearth all alone. Then he sat back in his chair,
still silent. The host watched all this in quiet fascination.
As the one lone ember’s flame diminished, there was a momentary glow and
then its fire was no more. Soon it was cold and “dead as a doornail”.
Not a word had been spoken since the initial greeting. Just before
the pastor was ready to leave, he picked up the cold, dead ember and placed
it back in the middle of the fire. Immediately it began to glow once
more with the light and warmth of the burning coals around it. As
the pastor reached the door to leave, his host said, “thank you so much
for your visit and especially for the fiery sermon. I shall be back
in church next Sunday”.
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? ? ?
Remember one resolution to pray,
one to fast,
and one to give alms.
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? ? ? ?
See you at this Tuesday’s Chili Cook-off!
Love in Jesus,
Fr. Jim
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