Reading notes

Howard Zinn is an amazing writer who zeroes in on the heart of the matter:

Is not nationalism — that devotion to a flag, an anthem, a boundary so fierce it engenders mass murder — one of the great evils of our time, along with racism, along with religious hatred? These ways of thinking — cultivated, nurtured, indoctrinated from childhood on — have been useful to those in power, and deadly for those out of power. …

One of the effects of nationalist thinking is a loss of a sense of proportion. The killing of 2,300 people at Pearl Harbor becomes the justification for killing 240,000 in Hiroshima and Nagasaki. The killing of 3,000 people on September 11 becomes the justification for killing tens of thousands of people in Afghanistan and Iraq.

What makes our nation immune from the normal standards of human decency? …

We need to assert our allegiance to the human race, and not to any one nation. We need to refute the idea that our nation is different from, morally superior to, the other imperial powers of world history.

Yes — hence my long-time bumper sticker, “God bless the whole world — no exceptions.”

I’m convinced that nationalism as now practiced is a scourge, a disease afflicting the inner- and outer Kingdom of God envisioned in scripture, a Sin with a capital S. I wrote a short entry about nationalism’s bullying symptoms back on May 23, 2003.

[via Dale]

Wow, if churches around me had adopted this stance from the beginning, everything now would be different for me. And likely, I think, for all of us:

One-third of the professors at an evangelical Christian college [Calvin College] in Grand Rapids, Mich., are taking out a large ad in a local newspaper Saturday to protest President Bush’s commencement speech.

“As Christians, we are called to be peacemakers and to initiate war only as a last resort,” the ad will say. “We believe your administration has launched an unjust and unjustified war in Iraq.” …

“No single political position should be identified with God’s will,” says the ad, which also chastises the president for “actions that favor the wealthy of our society and burden the poor.”

Christians are to be characterized by love and gentleness, it adds, but “we believe that your administration has fostered intolerance and divisiveness and has often failed to listen to those with whom it disagrees.”

Moreover, says the letter, set to run in the Grand Rapids Press, the Bush administration’s environmental policies “have harmed creation,” and it asks the president “to re-examine your policies in light of our God-given duty to pursue justice with mercy.”

Personally, I think this is the only stance a Christian can take and still be worthy of the name Christian. It is the only Christian stance with integrity.

The damage done by supporting BushCo’s diabolical behavior, especially any part of the Church Universal supporting it, is incalculable.

But turn, turn, turning is still possible and is, I think, the first step toward redemption. That the option is still open implies to me a mercy beyond my understanding.

[via Semper Fi]

2005-05-27 update:
Neo alerts me to the following informed and articulate analysis intended to be “the first of a four-part series by Neo Prose on the events at Calvin College”:

Christians of Conscience Stage Insurrection at Calvin College (May 24, 2005)

Just read it. You go, Neo.