In 1945 the US Supreme Court affirmed the conviction of Fred Koramatsu for violating the Exclusion Order issued in 1942 which sent all citizens of Japanese ancestry to concentration camps. Fred, a life long resident of San Leandro, California, was simultaneously excluded from leaving the area; therefore, his only wrongdoing was his ethnicity of birth. Justice Hugo Black writing for the 6 justices who affirmed the conviction, rationalized: “Hardships are a part of war, and war is an aggregation of hardships.”
More than 50 years later, Koramatsu received the Presidential Medal for Freedom, for his courage and persistence in opposing injustice. In accepting the award Fred reminded the nation: “we should be vigilant to make sure this will never happen again.” At Holden we studied the brief Koramatsu filed with the Supreme Court in 2004 urging them to hear the appeals of the Guantanamo detainees challenging the legality of their incarceration. Among the many instances of the misuse of the rubric of “military necessity” to violate civil liberties, Koramatsu quoted a distinguished legal panel reviewing the government response to the Red Scare in the 1920s:
...and we may well wonder in view of the precedents now established whether constitutional government as heretofore maintained in this republic could survive another great war even victoriously waged.”
Questions we wrestled with included:
Why does the Koramatsu case matter to us as Christians?
Why does it matter to us as citizens in 2007?
Sunday, March 18, 2007
Peacemaking
What are Christian responses to Empire in a time of war?
Without repentance, a nation can lose its soul. Lincoln began this idea for the US in his 1863 Proclamation Appointing a National Fast Day, which ends with the famous line: “with malice toward none; with charity for all.” In the National Fast day Proclamation Lincoln asserted the biblical claim that a nation so blessed with liberty and equality “can long endure” only as it continually passes through the crucible of national self-interrogation and repentance, especially when that crucible comes in the shape of war. Lincoln understood this patriotism as obligating both the President and the citizens to “confess their [political] sins and transgressions” as a national practice of truth.[1]
Even-especially!-a presidential declaration of war did not suspend national interrogation and genuine repentance. Regardless of the nature or justification of war, repentance is necessary because accountability to God is paramount.
The Holden community, at the last session of God, War and the Law, brainstormed ideas beyond repentance as responses to war and violence, including:
1. Be faithful in small things, that’s where your strength is. Start with your next-door neighbor.
2. Don’t wait for the leaders!
3. Respectful relationships are the root of love and nonviolence.
4. Good works are links in the chain of love.
5. Peace begins with a smile.
6. Practice patience: seek first to understand before being understood.
7. Set aside your power and ego; begin the day with thanksgiving and be ready to accept forgiveness.
8. Redefine success in non-monetary terms.
9. Be open to true dialogue and changing your self.
10. Look for common ground.
11. Overcome fear, it leads to inhospitality.
12. Quit the myth of “melting pot.”
13. If the message of the church is exclusive, remember that God is love and we are all God’s children.
14. As we die and rise again, the church need do the same.
Peter Thompson
[1] Gary M. Simpson, “’By the dawn’s early light’: The Flag, the Interrogative, and the Whence and Wither of Normative Patriotism,” in Word & World, Vol. 23, no. 3 (St. Paul: Luther Seminary, Summer 2003)
Without repentance, a nation can lose its soul. Lincoln began this idea for the US in his 1863 Proclamation Appointing a National Fast Day, which ends with the famous line: “with malice toward none; with charity for all.” In the National Fast day Proclamation Lincoln asserted the biblical claim that a nation so blessed with liberty and equality “can long endure” only as it continually passes through the crucible of national self-interrogation and repentance, especially when that crucible comes in the shape of war. Lincoln understood this patriotism as obligating both the President and the citizens to “confess their [political] sins and transgressions” as a national practice of truth.[1]
Even-especially!-a presidential declaration of war did not suspend national interrogation and genuine repentance. Regardless of the nature or justification of war, repentance is necessary because accountability to God is paramount.
The Holden community, at the last session of God, War and the Law, brainstormed ideas beyond repentance as responses to war and violence, including:
1. Be faithful in small things, that’s where your strength is. Start with your next-door neighbor.
2. Don’t wait for the leaders!
3. Respectful relationships are the root of love and nonviolence.
4. Good works are links in the chain of love.
5. Peace begins with a smile.
6. Practice patience: seek first to understand before being understood.
7. Set aside your power and ego; begin the day with thanksgiving and be ready to accept forgiveness.
8. Redefine success in non-monetary terms.
9. Be open to true dialogue and changing your self.
10. Look for common ground.
11. Overcome fear, it leads to inhospitality.
12. Quit the myth of “melting pot.”
13. If the message of the church is exclusive, remember that God is love and we are all God’s children.
14. As we die and rise again, the church need do the same.
Peter Thompson
[1] Gary M. Simpson, “’By the dawn’s early light’: The Flag, the Interrogative, and the Whence and Wither of Normative Patriotism,” in Word & World, Vol. 23, no. 3 (St. Paul: Luther Seminary, Summer 2003)
Wednesday, March 14, 2007
Torture
Torture Definitions
Convention Against Torture (1984)
“…any act by which severe pain or suffering, whether physical or mental, is intentionally inflicted on a person…”
Federal law
“…torture means an act committed by a person acting under color of law specifically intended to inflict severe physical or mental pain or suffering…”
Universal Declaration of Human Rights (1948)
“No one shall be subjected to torture or to cruel inhumane or degrading treatment or punishment.”
Geneva Convention (1950) (treatment of prisoners of war)
“No physical or mental torture, nor any other form of coercion, may be inflicted on prisoners of war to secure from them information of any kind whatsoever.”
Yoo & Bebee Memo August 1, 2002 (Office of Legal Counsel):
"Physical pain amounting to torture must be equivalent in intensity to the pain accompanying serious physical injury, such as organ failure, impairment of bodily function, or even death. For purely mental pain or suffering to amount to torture … it must result in significant psychological harm of significant duration, e.g., lasting for months or even years.”
What Yoo does not - and in the opinion of this author cannot - understand, is that these treaties reflect fundamental principles that lie at the very core of the military profession - principles that reflect a delicate balance between the necessities of war and the dictates of humanity.
What those who have, or do, serve in uniform on behalf of our nation intuitively understand is the implied covenant that exists between the armed forces and the nation under whose flag they fight, kill, destroy, and detain. The essence of this covenant is a willingness to engage in such conduct based on a belief that doing so will be consistent with the inherent notion of morality. Because members of the military profession have historically understood that preserving this sense of morality would be most severely stressed during armed conflict, they were at the forefront of developing non-negotiable principles to limit the brutality of conflict, and in so doing limit the corrosive moral consequence of conflict for those called upon to engage therein. When Senator McCain reminds us that the conduct we endorse during armed conflict reflects more about us than it does our enemy, it reflects his intuitive appreciation of this truism.
Geoffrey S. Corn
Law Professor and former Lt Col. U.S. Army
Peter Thompson
Convention Against Torture (1984)
“…any act by which severe pain or suffering, whether physical or mental, is intentionally inflicted on a person…”
Federal law
“…torture means an act committed by a person acting under color of law specifically intended to inflict severe physical or mental pain or suffering…”
Universal Declaration of Human Rights (1948)
“No one shall be subjected to torture or to cruel inhumane or degrading treatment or punishment.”
Geneva Convention (1950) (treatment of prisoners of war)
“No physical or mental torture, nor any other form of coercion, may be inflicted on prisoners of war to secure from them information of any kind whatsoever.”
Yoo & Bebee Memo August 1, 2002 (Office of Legal Counsel):
"Physical pain amounting to torture must be equivalent in intensity to the pain accompanying serious physical injury, such as organ failure, impairment of bodily function, or even death. For purely mental pain or suffering to amount to torture … it must result in significant psychological harm of significant duration, e.g., lasting for months or even years.”
What Yoo does not - and in the opinion of this author cannot - understand, is that these treaties reflect fundamental principles that lie at the very core of the military profession - principles that reflect a delicate balance between the necessities of war and the dictates of humanity.
What those who have, or do, serve in uniform on behalf of our nation intuitively understand is the implied covenant that exists between the armed forces and the nation under whose flag they fight, kill, destroy, and detain. The essence of this covenant is a willingness to engage in such conduct based on a belief that doing so will be consistent with the inherent notion of morality. Because members of the military profession have historically understood that preserving this sense of morality would be most severely stressed during armed conflict, they were at the forefront of developing non-negotiable principles to limit the brutality of conflict, and in so doing limit the corrosive moral consequence of conflict for those called upon to engage therein. When Senator McCain reminds us that the conduct we endorse during armed conflict reflects more about us than it does our enemy, it reflects his intuitive appreciation of this truism.
Geoffrey S. Corn
Law Professor and former Lt Col. U.S. Army
Peter Thompson
Empire: The Idolatry of Power
Today’s empire requires neither annexation nor traditional expansion. Empire is “a situation in which a single state shapes the behavior of others, whether directly or indirectly, partially or completely, by means that can range from the outright use of force through intimidation, dependency, inducements, and even inspirations.” An empire is any “large, ambitious, and expanding nation determined to grow in size, power, and influence – a nation determined to overcome all obstacles that block its path to greatness.” One prominent author has coined the term “empire lite” to describe America’s empire of free market economy, democracy and human rights, enforced by the most awesome military power the world has ever known. Others put it more bluntly: The American Empire amounts to armed American global supremacy.
A year after 9/11 President Bush stood before the Statue of Liberty and said:
“The ideal of America is the hope of all mankind. That hope drew millions to this harbor. That hope still lights our way. And the light shines in the darkness. And the darkness will not overcome it. May God bless America.”
The intensely theological language in John 1:5 is in the past tense, “…and the darkness did not overcome it.” The use of the past tense is an acknowledgement of the accomplished wonder of Christ revealing his relationship to God and the salvation brought to all people. Christ is the life and the ‘true light’ and although threatened by the spiritual darkness of ignorance and confronted with rejection, the light was not overcome.
Bush’s rendering, on the other hand, strips the actual meaning of the text in order to give rhetorical significance to American values-freedom, human dignity, peace, and hope. By changing the tense, the light became descriptive of America’s present role in foreign affairs and the victory over darkness was made into something to still happen in the future. This use of scripture and the substitution of America for Christ are idolatrous.[1]
Peter Thompson
[1] Stephen B. Chapman, “Imperial Exegesis: When Caesar Interprets Scripture” in Anxious About Empire, ed. Wes Avram (Grand Rapids: Brazos Press, 2004)
A year after 9/11 President Bush stood before the Statue of Liberty and said:
“The ideal of America is the hope of all mankind. That hope drew millions to this harbor. That hope still lights our way. And the light shines in the darkness. And the darkness will not overcome it. May God bless America.”
The intensely theological language in John 1:5 is in the past tense, “…and the darkness did not overcome it.” The use of the past tense is an acknowledgement of the accomplished wonder of Christ revealing his relationship to God and the salvation brought to all people. Christ is the life and the ‘true light’ and although threatened by the spiritual darkness of ignorance and confronted with rejection, the light was not overcome.
Bush’s rendering, on the other hand, strips the actual meaning of the text in order to give rhetorical significance to American values-freedom, human dignity, peace, and hope. By changing the tense, the light became descriptive of America’s present role in foreign affairs and the victory over darkness was made into something to still happen in the future. This use of scripture and the substitution of America for Christ are idolatrous.[1]
Peter Thompson
[1] Stephen B. Chapman, “Imperial Exegesis: When Caesar Interprets Scripture” in Anxious About Empire, ed. Wes Avram (Grand Rapids: Brazos Press, 2004)
Tuesday, March 13, 2007
Habeas Corpus
The Military Comission Act of 2006 removes the right of habeas corpus for aliens detained at Guantanamo. It's constitutionality is being tested in the Courts. It is helpful to review the role of habeas corpus in understanding its importance to the US legal system.
In the 1600’s in England, active Puritan congregations bent on reforming the world were ready to defy the highest powers of church and state. They resisted injustice on grounds of individual conscience, natural law (as reflected in the Bible), the Magna Carta, and other precedents in English legal history. Puritans such as John Hampden, John Lilburne, Walter Udall, William Penn, and hundreds of others, by their open disobedience to existing law, laid a foundation for the future of civil liberties, both in England and in America.
“Freeborn” John Lilburne printed and distributed unlicensed Puritan books and pamphlets in London, for which he was arrested in December 1637 and brought before the Court of Star Chamber. The Star Chamber was an infamous inquisitional court which required an oath in advance of any charges being made. Lilburne refused to take the oath, asserting that swearing an oath violated his sacred obligation and further, that he should not required to be a witness against himself. His sentence was to be whipped at the cart-tail from the Fleet prison to the Palace Yard, Westminster,[1] where he was to stand in the pillory, then to be imprisoned until he conformed and admitted his guilt. The sentence was carried out on 18 April 1638 with Lilburne loudly declaring that he had committed no crime against the law or the state, but that he was a victim of the bishops' cruelty. Lilburne's punishment turned into an anti-government demonstration, with cheering crowds supporting him.
Lilburne was kept in prison for nearly three years. During his imprisonment, he wrote many pamphlets that publicized the injustices committed against him. In November 1640, King Charles reluctantly summoned the Parliament. Within a week of its meeting, Oliver Cromwell drew attention to Lilburne's case in a passionate speech denouncing the tyranny of the bishops, and Parliament ordered his release. Lilburne was later paid reparations by the House of Lords in recompense for his internment, and in 1641 the jurisdiction of the Star Chamber was abolished by statute. Lilburne’s case was emblematic of the Puritans’ use of the writ of habeas corpus to oppose the oppression of the Crown. The case was also the seminal event in the establishment of the United States’ Fifth Amendment constitutional right against self-incrimination.
Why is the right of an alien to challange the legality his custody important to a US citizen?
[1] Cart-tailing involved being dragged behind a cart while state agents and onlookers flogged the prisoner en route to the prison.
In the 1600’s in England, active Puritan congregations bent on reforming the world were ready to defy the highest powers of church and state. They resisted injustice on grounds of individual conscience, natural law (as reflected in the Bible), the Magna Carta, and other precedents in English legal history. Puritans such as John Hampden, John Lilburne, Walter Udall, William Penn, and hundreds of others, by their open disobedience to existing law, laid a foundation for the future of civil liberties, both in England and in America.
“Freeborn” John Lilburne printed and distributed unlicensed Puritan books and pamphlets in London, for which he was arrested in December 1637 and brought before the Court of Star Chamber. The Star Chamber was an infamous inquisitional court which required an oath in advance of any charges being made. Lilburne refused to take the oath, asserting that swearing an oath violated his sacred obligation and further, that he should not required to be a witness against himself. His sentence was to be whipped at the cart-tail from the Fleet prison to the Palace Yard, Westminster,[1] where he was to stand in the pillory, then to be imprisoned until he conformed and admitted his guilt. The sentence was carried out on 18 April 1638 with Lilburne loudly declaring that he had committed no crime against the law or the state, but that he was a victim of the bishops' cruelty. Lilburne's punishment turned into an anti-government demonstration, with cheering crowds supporting him.
Lilburne was kept in prison for nearly three years. During his imprisonment, he wrote many pamphlets that publicized the injustices committed against him. In November 1640, King Charles reluctantly summoned the Parliament. Within a week of its meeting, Oliver Cromwell drew attention to Lilburne's case in a passionate speech denouncing the tyranny of the bishops, and Parliament ordered his release. Lilburne was later paid reparations by the House of Lords in recompense for his internment, and in 1641 the jurisdiction of the Star Chamber was abolished by statute. Lilburne’s case was emblematic of the Puritans’ use of the writ of habeas corpus to oppose the oppression of the Crown. The case was also the seminal event in the establishment of the United States’ Fifth Amendment constitutional right against self-incrimination.
Why is the right of an alien to challange the legality his custody important to a US citizen?
[1] Cart-tailing involved being dragged behind a cart while state agents and onlookers flogged the prisoner en route to the prison.
Civil Disobedience and Relationship
In the act of civil disobedience, we meet particular people like ourselves, not ‘the state,’ and the most enduring thing we can achieve through such act is, in the end, our relationship to the people we touch and who touch us. Our hope should not be for any strategic victories over such representatives of the state, but rather loving nonviolent relationships with them in the midst of the arrests, trials, and jail sentences.
The danger of seeing civil disobedience as an assertion of conscience over against the evil of the state is that it may obscure the opportunity for relationship.
“How many martyrs ever had any practical programs for reforming society? Since politics weren’t working anyway, one had to find an act beyond politics: a religious act, a liturgical act, and act of witness. If only a small number of people could offer this kind of witness, it would purify the world. Wasn’t there a time in England when every Quaker was in jail? What a great scene that must have been! Perhaps that’s where all Christians should be today.” Fr. Daniel Berrigan
We are called to be faithful, not successful.
Peter Thompson
The danger of seeing civil disobedience as an assertion of conscience over against the evil of the state is that it may obscure the opportunity for relationship.
“How many martyrs ever had any practical programs for reforming society? Since politics weren’t working anyway, one had to find an act beyond politics: a religious act, a liturgical act, and act of witness. If only a small number of people could offer this kind of witness, it would purify the world. Wasn’t there a time in England when every Quaker was in jail? What a great scene that must have been! Perhaps that’s where all Christians should be today.” Fr. Daniel Berrigan
We are called to be faithful, not successful.
Peter Thompson
Sunday, March 11, 2007
A Nonviolent Culture?
Girard: Evolving Toward a Culture Beyond Violence
Renee Girard[1], a French anthropologist who recently retired from Stanford University, sees the resurrection as a new way to nonviolence in our world. In his view, Jesus was the ultimate innocent victim, meaning a victim of injustice with whom we can identify. In Girard’s anthropology, human culture is founded on the majority building unanimity through scapegoating a victim, and that cyclical process of ongoing violence is both covered up and justified by the mythology of religion. Most of human history, before the death of Christ, founded religion on the “single victim mechanism” which relied upon the guilt of the scapegoat.
The cycle of violence originates for Girard in the inherent human characteristic of imitation, which, when fueled by desire, creates jealously and exploding competition that leads to conflict and violence. Satan, rather than a being, is this process of perverse mimicry which ends in violence. God and Satan, therefore, are the “arch models”: one whose disciples desire nothing by way of greed, the other who models greed for whatever is desired.
The concern for the just treatment of victims in the Psalms and Prophets, Girard concludes, comes to fruition in Jesus. Following Jesus is building non-exclusive communities (including the church) that function without scapegoats.
Questions:
1. Where do we see the contagious cycle of violence in our world? In ourselves?
2. Can viewing the crucifixion as: Jesus showing the world how to return love for violence, be reconciled with our ideas of salvation?
Rev. Dan Geslin
[1] Renee Girard, I See Satan Fall Like Lightning (Marynoll, New York: Orbis Books, 1999)
Renee Girard[1], a French anthropologist who recently retired from Stanford University, sees the resurrection as a new way to nonviolence in our world. In his view, Jesus was the ultimate innocent victim, meaning a victim of injustice with whom we can identify. In Girard’s anthropology, human culture is founded on the majority building unanimity through scapegoating a victim, and that cyclical process of ongoing violence is both covered up and justified by the mythology of religion. Most of human history, before the death of Christ, founded religion on the “single victim mechanism” which relied upon the guilt of the scapegoat.
The cycle of violence originates for Girard in the inherent human characteristic of imitation, which, when fueled by desire, creates jealously and exploding competition that leads to conflict and violence. Satan, rather than a being, is this process of perverse mimicry which ends in violence. God and Satan, therefore, are the “arch models”: one whose disciples desire nothing by way of greed, the other who models greed for whatever is desired.
The concern for the just treatment of victims in the Psalms and Prophets, Girard concludes, comes to fruition in Jesus. Following Jesus is building non-exclusive communities (including the church) that function without scapegoats.
Questions:
1. Where do we see the contagious cycle of violence in our world? In ourselves?
2. Can viewing the crucifixion as: Jesus showing the world how to return love for violence, be reconciled with our ideas of salvation?
Rev. Dan Geslin
[1] Renee Girard, I See Satan Fall Like Lightning (Marynoll, New York: Orbis Books, 1999)
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