Who’s Working Hard for Peace? (Part 2)
Now that we’ve determined that we can’t sit around and wait for politicians to find the path to peace, who are we going to entrust this important job to? I’ll be examining this question in the next few posts, and today I’d like to introduce another candidate: religious leaders from the major faiths of the world.
It’s truly sad how badly the current leaders of the world’s religions are faring as peacemakers. Their legacy is great. We don’t need to go as far back as Jesus of Nazareth, whose sharp words should be endlessly inspiring to people of any religion. Many great peacemakers of our recent past were religious figures: Mahatma Gandhi, Martin Luther King, Archbishop Desmond Tutu, Mother Teresa. The first two of these names are notable for their strict adherence to the doctrine of non-violence, and if anybody doubts the effectiveness of non-violence, they need only look at the success of the democratic, free, multi-cultural nation of India (which has weathered many crises but remains the brave nation Gandhi and his partners imagined into being) or the great progress made towards racial equality in America during the period when the innovative Martin Luther King was on television news every night. Here’s the surprising truth: non-violent protest works.
Unfortunately, no well-known religious leader of today compares to Mohatma Gandhi or Martin Luther King in either character or talent. I think I’ll refrain from naming names at this point (I’d rather buttress up my research before I start slinging any actual mud on this site, so please be patient and return soon). Today I’m just going to speak collectively about the whole set of Western religious leaders who are vocal about political issues today, including well-known representatives of various sects of Protestant Christianity, Catholicism, Sunni Islam, Shiite Islam, Orthodox Judaism, Hasidic Judaism, Reform Judaism. Yesterday I gave the politicans of the world a D+ for positive action towards peace. The religious leaders of the world, hmmm, well … is there an F-?
They are a disappointing lot. The Dalai Lama of Tibet is one exception — he’s a wonderful speaker and a humble Buddhist — but as wars rage and rockets fly and bombs fall I sometimes wish the Dalai Lama would meditate less and talk more.
Some mention Pope John Paul II as a peacemaker, and he was certainly inspiring in many ways. But in 1994 the Catholic nation of Rwanda burst into a orchestrated and politically motivated genocide, and the Vatican failed to find any way to influence events in this churchgoing nation. A million Catholics were killed by their fellow Catholics over the course of one scary month, often with the complicity of priests who allowed church grounds to be turned into slaughterhouses. (When I discussed this with a Catholic friend, he angrily asked what I expected the Pope to do: “Did you expect him to deploy the Vatican army to Rwanda?” Funny line, but what I expected the Pope to do was exercise his leadership to improve the situation. There is a direct line of communication and accountability from the Vatican to the parish priests, and I would have expected a remarkable effort to influence events, using the powerful weapons known as words.)
Other than the Dalai Lama, the field of religious leaders who work for peace is pretty empty. If I’m forgetting somebody, please do post a comment and let me know.
I plan to be observing the words of some of the world’s well-known religious figures more closely on this site in the future. Tomorrow I’ll continue this series with another party that might be considered a productive contributor towards the cause of world peace: the United Nations. (Now stop laughing. Yes, I’m going to talk about the United Nations as a positive force for peace.)
July 28th, 2006 at 8:16 am
The “conservative Christian” movement believes in war. They just think that we are the good guys. They see the United States and Israel as God’s people. Ironically, the early Catholics and Protestants did not like the Jews much. This gradually changed, but not necessarily for the right reasons.
As a child born in the 1950’s, I grew up thinking America was the greatest country on Earth. We won the two Big Wars against bad guys. The Superman TV show proclaimed that the Man of Steel fought for “truth, justice, and the American way.” When Israel became a nation again in 1948 with the help of the Allies, it became fashionable for American Christians to say, “The Jews are still God’s chosen people” and to pat ourselves on the back for whatever part we had in it.
Years ago, I was active in a Christian church. I studied the Bible quite a bit. The church and I parted ways, but I still find the Bible fascinating and lately I’ve been reading up on Judaism – the Torah, the Talmud, and so on. Of course, Judaism and Christianity are connected. One of the tenants of Christianity is that, through the teachings of Jesus, a “gentile” can be “grafted on to the Jewish vine.” In other words, I can become an “honorary Jew” in the sense that the Jews are God’s chosen people. I don’t think this refers to our nationality, but rather, what is inside of us. As the saying goes, our bodies can be seen as temples.
One of the more problematic books shared by both the Bible and the Torah Joshua. Almost everywhere else in the Bible, the Jews are victims, but in Joshua, they first spy on a foreign country with the help of a “harlot” who hides the two spies in her house, and then attack the country. And I mean, they fucking wail on this country, killing almost everybody. They take over the land. The Bible justifies this by saying that God told them to do it.
Obviously, this was a long time ago, so I’m not blaming anyone who is alive today, any more than I can blame a Japanese person for Pearl Harbor. My point is, these modern day conservative Christians can justify anything by saying that God told them to do it.
July 28th, 2006 at 8:39 am
Yay for Jesus … just wanted to say that F- does exist. I got one in Biology once.
July 29th, 2006 at 11:31 am
A word of caution. Non-violence worked for Ghandi, perhaps (Wikipedia has a different view). I am personally familiar with Martin King’s efforts in the 60’s. You may not recall the summer of rage - was that 67 or so? Detroit and Watts on fire, riots throughout the land. Rap Brown chanting “burn baby burn.” Stokely Carmichael arrested again and again. There’s a good story to read about Ghandi’s salt march written by an Indian writer - it’s called “A Face to Avenge” by Dr. George Karimalil.
July 29th, 2006 at 4:00 pm
Stokely — I checked out the Wikipedia page on Gandhi. I’m not sure if I’m looking at the same page you are looking at, but I didn’t see a rebuttal of the idea that nonviolent protest helped end British rule in India. I think the evidence is pretty strong that it did.
You’re right that I was too young in the 60’s to have first-hand experience of the progress of the civil rights movement, but I’ve studied it enough to feel very comfortable with my assertion that M. L. King’s non-violent leadership made a significant positive difference. Do you not think so? Noisemakers like Rap Brown and Stokely Carmichael (your namesake?) are in my opinion a dime a dozen. History is filled with them. History has given us very few like Martin Luther King.
July 29th, 2006 at 5:52 pm
I’ve great admiration for Martin Luther King. Quite possibly I would feel the same way about Gandhi if I knew more about India. But I’m very skeptical about non-violent protest. I’ve just never seen it work. Not to argue with you, but I refer to Tienamen Square, the American Indian Movement failure, and the American union struggle. And these three links -
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quit_India
http://stokeycat.blogspot.com/2005/09/black-christmas.html
http://greendodo.com/zine/content/view/34/42/
July 29th, 2006 at 9:18 pm
The link about the Quit India movement is interesting. Of course Gandhi was controversial and widely disagreed with during his life, and of course his judgement wasn’t always perfect. I’ve studied a lot of history, and my conclusion is that the fastest way to affect major political and social change is through non-violent protest. I read your article about Stokely Carmichael — I know many feel the way you do, but I’m not one of them.
July 29th, 2006 at 10:28 pm
Not for publication, but just to clarify - I’m sure if you look up the life of Stokely Carmichael you’ll find that he became (from a white man’s perpective) needlessly anti-white, anti-American, and probably anti-Jewish. But at a frozen moment in time, as a young man, he was the most charismatic leader in this country - fearlessly putting his life on the line for justice. And if you grew up where and when I did, you’d hate white America too.
1964 Milledgeville GA - drinking 5-cent sodeypop at the gas station - scrawny grizzled white trash squattin on his haunches (like in Faulkner) filterless cigarette dangling from his lips, say to us kids “pretty soon them niggers gonna think they deserve a job; just like a white man…gonna take our jobs away; you wait and see.” 2006, substitute spic for nigger.
I’m not familiar with the anti-Jewish sentiment that some (all?) Black leaders have - like Farrakhan and others. Maybe it’s a Black Muslim thing, I don’t know. Blacks, Mexicans, Orientals, Jews - have some antipathies that I’m not knowledgable about. The movie “Crash” comes to mind.
As does “Hoffa” and “Bound for Glory” - I wish I had a good link to summarize the struggle of union workers against all the likes of the Andrew Carnegie-type captains of industry.
And I wonder if current-day Israel wasn’t born out of the failure of unarmed pacifists being massacred by Nazis - or unarmed refugees being massacred by Marionite Christians. I wish non-violence worked - who doesn’t. I know Olmert and Nasrallah don’t want to bury any more children. But you and I have kids - if somebody hurt one of them…then I couldn’t be non-violent, could you? Could you be an Arab or an Israeli and lose a child to a bomb…and then what?
Speculatively - Wendall says to my dad “I don’t believe in capitol punishment.” Dad says “what if someone raped your daughter?” Wendall says “I’d kill the son of a bitch!”
August 1st, 2006 at 7:58 pm
[…] Religious leaders […]
August 4th, 2006 at 12:06 pm
Well, violent protest is doing exactly what you say you are against. It often leads to retaliation and escalation.
I wrote a poem a while back with that message but I don’t know how clear I was. It was about American citizens throwing rocks at the Exxon Corporate Office until the price of gasoline was lowered. I would not really do that. My point was, in an imaginary scenario, the police say, “Stop throwing rocks!” They call in the National Guard. “Stop this outrageous behavior!” cries the Commander-in-Chief.
But we say, “Sir, we look to our leaders to set the example. YOU are killing people over oil - that’s all we’re doing, too!”
August 5th, 2006 at 10:29 am
[…] I hope I won’t seem impatient, though, if I express a wish that well-known Buddhist institutions and leaders would play a more active role. I understand that Tricycle is a magazine and not a blog or a news source, but I am disappointed to visit their site and see no indication that the editors of Tricycle believe Buddhists should be playing any helpful role in the Middle East. I complained last week that the Dalai Lama does not seem to be actively offering his involvement at this time either. I googled his name and all I came up with is the upcoming Peace Jam in Tennessee. Is this the best he can do? I would like to call on the various religious leaders of the world to please look within themselves to see what they can offer in terms of dialogue and mediation right now. Much is at stake, and much damage is being done every day. Maybe we need less jamming, and more peace. […]