We recently posted Gene TeSelle's report of an action in Nashville, protesting the President's moves toward a unilateral war, when he (the President, not Gene) was making a campaign visit to Nashville.

You are invited to a war with Iraq

Check out this very hip invitation to a war!

It begins, "Hello World Leaders! Come join us, The United States, as we wage war on Iraq, November 14th in Baghdad! It should be a good time: CNN is coming, and we have some really cool new missiles and stuff. Saddam is totally evil, so you're not going to want to miss this!!!!"

"Almost always, it is the conviction that 'I am right' or 'my cause is the cause of justice' that triggers violence. That is, ... the moment propaganda does its work, violence is unleashed.
And violence can be reduced by countering this propaganda."

- Jacques Ellul

One community takes a stand for peace.  So what's happening where you are?   

In Nashville, religious leaders organized what they consider a very successful witness for peace, warning against the rush toward a unilateral attack on Iraq. They wondered whether they were the first, since the media had not mentioned other such activities in other cities. Now they learn that the media cannot be trusted to give full or accurate reporting. So they decided to get the word out to people of faith in other communities, with a few "how to" suggestions based on their own experience. They would welcome similar narratives from other cities.  

We recently posted an essay by the Rev. Alex Awad about his view - as a Christian living among Palestinian Muslims - that American conservative Christians are harming the cause of Christ among Muslims by their hostile rhetoric.

Noted scholar Karen Armstrong, writing in the Washington Post, urges that "Americans should support Muslim initiatives to build a spiritually and intellectually vibrant American Islam, which could counter extremism at home and abroad."

The Rev. Robert Campbell sends his comments on the Rev. Alex Awad's essay about his view - as a Christian living among Palestinian Muslims - that American conservative Christians are harming the cause of Christ among Muslims by their hostile rhetoric.

Campbell agrees with Awad on some points, but sees major problems with Islam: that it " started out as an evangelical/military religion

An editorial from the Minneapolis Star-Tribune

One year ago the United States joined the rest of the world in experiencing the terror that comes with vulnerability. And the rest of the world stood with us.

A somber editorial in this morning's Star Tribune ("our" paper here in Minneapolis, 'way up north) sums up the sad decline since then.

"So much opportunity was wasted: the chance to link the pain Americans felt after Sept. 11 and the pain others in the world feel every day; the chance to knit the United States tightly into the world community; the chance to enlist NATO and other allies in a genuine quest to rip up terrorism by its roots.

"And it's a shame, for Bush's immediate response to Sept. 11 was superb -- brimming with great expectations. His execution of the military response also showed promise. Now, a year later, look at the American image in the world: Thanks to Washington's my-way-or-the-highway approach, it could hardly be lower."

Yet the American people have learned, the editorial goes on, that we really are a part of a larger world, and that we must find new ways of relating to that world.

It concludes:

The Rev. Alex Awad, a Methodist minister who teaches at Bethlehem Bible College, takes a thoughtful look at Christian attitudes toward Muslims -- from the perspective of one who lives in Israel/Palestine, with Muslims as friends and neighbors.  Hostile evangelical rhetoric condemning Islam is doing harm, he says, to the cause of Christ among Muslims.

A Florida sixth-grader came up with a brilliantly simple idea for peace education: a national campaign (like the successful anti-litter campaigns of a few years back) to convince kids that violence is "nerdy and uncool." Shani Abergel's ideas were originally published in the book Young Voices: Breaking the Cycle of Violence, and are excerpted in InnerSelf.

Elinor Mosser of the PresbyNet staff has sent this note:

On September 11, 2002 we are going to open the live chat room called "Hope and Pray Together" where people can stop by between the hours of 8:00 a.m. and 10:00 p.m. Eastern to chat, share feelings, reflections etc. At 10:00 p.m. Eastern we will have a worship service.

If you would like to assist by being present in the chat room during a portion of the day, or if you would like to assist in the worship service, we would love to have you do either. If you would like to help, email me and I'll invite you to the private planning meeting!

Please feel free to advertise the event to friends, your church, on websites or email lists. A link to the meeting where the chat will be, which you can email to people or put on a website is www.ecunet.org/topic/hope_and_pray_together

A failure of the churches? Or a victory for complacency?   

A lengthy and provocative essay on Beliefnet, based largely on a recent study by Barna Research (which is based in an evangelical background but is increasingly critical of the realities of conservative church life). 

Also:

Peter Sawtell, Executive Director of Eco-Justice Ministries, echoes Barna's analysis that a large part of the "failure" of American religious communities to have a moral impact after 9/11 rests on the refusal of lay people to accept the challenges presented by the crisis.

Stanley M. Hauerwas, professor of theological ethics at Duke Divinity School, has recently said, ''I find the lack of dissenting voices to the current outrage of Americans about September the 11th, and the resulting attack on Afghanistan, to be absolutely horrendous.''

He and Frank Lentricchia, a professor of literature and theater studies at Duke University, have edited a new collection of writings, ''Dissent from the Homeland: Essays After September 11,'' that is being published on Wednesday, Sept. 11, in a special edition of The South Atlantic Quarterly. In the journal, 18 theologians, philosophers, and literary critics speak out against the war on terrorism. Hauerwas and Lentricchia explain in their introduction that ''this war has ... seen the capitulation of church and synagogue to the resurgence of American patriotism and nationalism.''

Check out a review in the Boston Globe.

The essays have not appeared yet on the South Atlantic Quarterly web site, but you might check it after the publication date.

[received 9-6-02, and posted here on 9-9-02]

+ The first anniversary of the terrorist attack on NYC and DC is now 5 days away. What can I add to the conversation? I think GROUND ZERO needs to continue to be a sacred place. It needs to be hallowed ground. No particular organized religion can do this. The government can't. It can only be done by "the people." "The people" are creating something new and different. Some call it "the New Age." Some call it "the New Paradigm." Some call it a "spiritual awakening." But once a label is applied, it is no longer "the work of the people," the definition of the word liturgy.

Not far from GROUND ZERO is the United Nations building. The UN began operations in 1945, the year the atomic bomb was used to destroy 2 Japanese cities. Those two cities have both set apart hallowed ground for the world. Now, New York City has an opportunity to join them by allowing GROUND ZERO to remain a place where "the people" can come together somehow to share a vision of a peaceful world, of everybody getting along, of religious and ethnic and class intolerance disappearing because "the people" simply won't stand for it anymore. There's work to be done, not constructing new twin towers, but constructing a global village based solidly on love.

The rescue workers at the World Trade Center are legitimately celebrated as heroes, but it turns out that they were not in a position to enter the area with informed consent. Governmental agencies--local, state, and federal--assured them and nearby residents that they were safe, when in fact there were all sorts of hazardous materials in the air. They might have gone in anyway, but they were not given the full story.

A few weeks ago we posted information about "Let Love Ring!" - a program started in Nashville, TN, aiming to encourage communities around the nation to commemorate September 11^th with activities affirming world community.  

"A US unilateral preemptive war in Iraq, with no real allies, entered into by any American Political Administration, risks being such a failure as to cost that Party any chance to ever rule again."

If you share the concern of many that the Administration in Washington is determined to invade Iraq in spite of all the objections from around the world, one urgent need if for US citizens to join people from other nations is saying No to war.

Witherspooner Jean Rodenbough suggests one way to do this, through the web site of MoveOn.org.

Their home-page statement says: "As President Bush, Vice President Cheney, and Defense Secretary Rumsfeld drive the nation toward a war with Iraq, experts and senior Republicans from Brent Scowcroft to Dick Armey are urging them to reconsider. Sign our petition  calling on Congress to prevent a war on Iraq. Also, MoveOn is organizing constituent meetings next week with every Senate office to deliver this petition. 

You can also register on the site to join a meeting in your state and join thousands in personally voicing your concern.