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Early Church Fathers on refusal of the sword

A collection of quotes

TERTULLIAN (160–220)

§ “Christ, in disarming Peter, disarmed every soldier.”

§ “Shall we carry a flag? It is a rival to Christ.”

§ “It is absolutely forbidden to repay evil with evil.”

§  “Only without the sword can the Christian wage war: the Lord has abolished the sword.”

§  “How will a Christian engage in war (indeed, how will a Christian even engage in military service during peacetime) without the sword, which the Lord has taken away?”

§  “Shall it be held lawful to make an occupation of the sword, when the Lord proclaims that he who uses the sword shall perish by the sword? And shall the son of peace take part in the battle when it does not become him even to sue at law?”

ST. JOHN CHRYSOSTOM (347–407)

§  “I am a Christian. He who answers thus has declared everything at once—his country, profession, family; the believer belongs to no city on earth but to the heavenly Jerusalem.”

JUSTIN THE MARTYR (100–165)

§  “We ourselves were well conversant with war, murder and everything evil, but all of us throughout the whole wide earth have traded in our weapons of war. We have exchanged our swords for plowshares, our spears for farm tools…now we cultivate the fear of God, justice, kindness, faith, and the expectation of the future given us through the Crucified One.”

§  “We who formerly hated and murdered one another now live together and share the same table. We pray for our enemies and try to win those who hate us.”

§  “God called Abraham and commanded him to go out from the country where he was living. With this call God has roused us all, and now we have left the state. We have renounced all the things the world offers. . . . The gods of the nations are demons.”

ARNOBIUS OF SICCA (died c. 330)

§  "For since we, a numerous band of men as we are, have learned from His  teaching and His laws that evil ought not to be requited with evil—that it is better to suffer wrong than to inflict it—that we should shed our own blood than stain our hands and consciences with that of another, an ungrateful world is now for a long period enjoying a benefit from Christ . . ."

IRENAEUS (c. 180)

§  “Christians have changed their swords and their lances into instruments of peace, and they know not now how to fight.”

MARCELLUS OF TANGIER (spoken as he left the army of Emperor Diocletian in 298)

§  ““I threw down my arms for it was not seemly that a Christian man, who renders military service to the Lord Christ, should render it by earthly injuries.” “It is not lawful for a Christian to bear arms for any earthly consideration.”

THEOPHILUS OF ANTIOCH (died c. 185)

§  “Say to those that hate and curse you, You are our brothers!”

MARTIN OF TOURS (315–397)

§  “Hitherto I have served you as a soldier; allow me now to become a soldier to God. Let the man who is to serve you receive your donative. I am a soldier of Christ; it is not permissible for me to fight.”

ATHANASIUS OF ALEXANDRIA (293–373)

§  “Christians, instead of arming themselves with swords, extend their hands in prayer.”

CLEMENT OF ALEXANDRIA (150–214)

§  “Above all Christians are not allowed to correct by violence sinful wrongdoings.”

§  The Christian poor are “an army without weapons, without war, without bloodshed, without anger, without defilement.”

§  “We Christians are a peaceful race . . . for it is not in war, but in peace, that we are trained.”

HIPPOLYTUS (170–236)

§  “The professions and trades of those who are going to be accepted into the community must be examined. . . . . A military constable must be forbidden to kill, neither may he swear; if he is not willing to follow these instructions, he must be rejected. A proconsul or magistrate who wears the purple and governs by the sword shall give it up or be rejected. Anyone taking or already baptized who wants to become a soldier shall be sent away, for he has despised God.”

§  “A person who has accepted the power of killing, or a soldier, may never be received [into the church] at all.”

TATIAN OF ASSYRIA (died c. 185)

§  “I do not wish to be a ruler. I do not strive for wealth. I refuse offices connected with military command.”

ORIGEN (185–254)

§  “You cannot demand military service of Christians any more than you can of priests. We do not go forth as soldiers with the Emperor even if he demands this.”

§  “We have become sons of peace for the sake of Jesus, who is our leader.”

§  “To those who ask us whence we have come or whom we have for a leader, we say that we have come in accordance with the counsels of Jesus to cut down our warlike and arrogant swords of argument into ploughshares, and we convert into sickles the spears we of Alexandria. For we no longer take ‘sword against a nation,’ nor do we learn ‘any more to make war,’ having become sons of peace for the sake of Jesus, who is our leader, instead of following the ancestral customs in which we were strangers to the covenants.”

THE 2ND EPISTLE OF CLEMENT (anonymous author c. 95–140)

§  “For the Gentiles, hearing from our mouth the words of God, are impressed by their beauty and greatness: then, learning that our works are not worthy of the things we say, they turn to railing, saying that it is some deceitful tale. For when they hear from us that God says: ‘No thanks will be due to you, if ye love only those who love you; but thanks will be due to you, if ye love your enemies and those that hate you’—when they hear this, they are impressed by the overplus of goodness: but when they see that we do not love, not only those who hate us, but even those who love us, they laugh at us, and the Name is blasphemed.”

EPISTLE OF MATHETES TO DIOGNETUS (late 2nd Century)

§  Christians “love all people, and are persecuted by all; . . . they are reviled, and they bless; they are insulted, and are respectful.”

ARISTIDES OF ATHENS (c. 137)

§  “It is the Christians, O Emperor, who have sought and found the truth, for they acknowledge God. . . . They show love to their neighbors. They do not do to another what they would not wish to have done to themselves. They speak gently to those who oppress them, and in this way they make them their friends. It has become their passion to do good to their enemies. . . . This, O Emperor, is the rule of life of the Christians, and this is their manner of life.”

ST. CYPRIAN, BISHOP OF CARTHAGE (died c. 258)

§  “The whole world is wet with mutual blood; and murder, which, in the case of an individual, is admitted to be a crime, is called a virtue when it is committed wholesale.”

§  “[Christians] are not allowed to kill, but they must be ready to be put to death themselves . . . it is not permitted the guiltless to put even the guilty to death.”

§ “God wished iron to be used for the cultivation of the earth, and therefore it should not be used to take human life.

§  “It is the Christians, O Emperor, who have sought and found the truth, for they acknowledge God. . . . They show love to their neighbors. They do not do to another what they would not wish to have done to themselves. They speak gently to those who oppress them, and in this way they make them their friends. It has become their passion to do good to their enemies. . . . This, O Emperor, is the rule of life of the Christians, and this is their manner of life.”

ATHENAGORAS (133–190)

§  “We Christians cannot endure to see a man being put to death, even justly.”

SPERATUS (martyred 180)

§  “I recognize no empire of this present age.”

LACTANTIUS, instructor of Constantine’s son (240–320)

§  “For when God forbids us to kill, he not only prohibits us from open violence, which is not even allowed by the public laws, but he warns us against the commission of those beings which are esteemed lawful among men. . . . Therefore, with regard to this precept of God, there ought to be no exception at all, but that it is always unlawful to put to death a man, whom God willed to be a sacred animal.”

THE TESTAMENT OF OUR LORD (anonymous author, 4th or 5th Century)

§  “If anyone be a soldier or in authority, let him be taught not to oppress or to kill or to rob, or to be angry or to rage and afflict anyone. But let those rations suffice him which are given to him. But if they wish to be baptized in the Lord, let them cease from military service or from the [post of] authority, and if not let them not be received. Let a catechumen or a believer of the people, if he desire to be a soldier, either cease from his intention, or if not let him be rejected. For he hath despised God by his thought, and leaving the things of the Spirit, he hath perfected himself in the flesh and hath treated the faith with contempt.”

AMBROSE (338-397)

§  “The soldiers of Christ require neither arms nor spears of iron.”

§ “The servants of God do not rely for their protection on material defenses but on the divine Providence.” 

THE DIDACHE (also known as The Teachings of the 12 Apostles, is an early Christian document written c. 80–90)

§  “This is the way of life: first, thou shalt love the God who made thee, secondly, thy neighbor as thyself: and all things whatsoever thou wouldest not should happen to thee, do not thou to another. The teaching of these words is this: Bless those who curse you, and pray for your enemies, and fast on behalf of those who persecute you: for what thanks will be due to you, if ye love only those who love you? Do not the Gentiles also do the same? But love ye those who hate you, and ye shall not have an enemy.”

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©ken sehested @ prayerandpolitiks.org

Out of the House of Slavery

Bible study on “immigration"

by Ken Sehested

This material was delivered in 2010 to a North Carolina Council of Churches-sponsored series of clergy gatherings in various cities.

      My assignment is to do a Bible study relevant to the intense conversation underway in our nation over the question of immigration. Others will offer social analysis and practical strategies. But I should mention three presumptions I bring.

      First, I believe we have a powerful witness to bear from our Scriptures, one that is surprisingly relevant. It’s not more information that we need. We don’t so much need to be convinced as to be convicted.

      Second, while I believe we have some unique sources of conviction, that doesn’t mean we have privileged insight or expertise when it comes to shaping specific policies. For that we need to come to the table with other people of faith and conscience to forge workable policy options that take into consideration what has happened in the past and what is happening now as leverage for what could happen in the future.

      Third, our analysis must be informed by an intelligent reading of the economic realities shaping immigration policies and patterns. I firmly believe there is a kind of economic magnetism at work: a negative force, characterized by desperation (particularly in Latin America), shoving migrants across the border. And a positive force drawing them here: A lot of people make a lot of money employing migrants. In fact, people like you and I need to count the cost: Our standard of living depends on cheap labor. We, too, are implicated in this system.

      Several years ago, to supplement my income, I began a new career as a stonemason. I was paid $10.00 an hour doing very strenuous work. After a year, my boss laid me off, saying he could hire a Mexican for $8.00 an hour. “Nothing personal,” he said, “just business.” But in biblical terms, nothing is just business. In the long run, the only sustainable business is just business.

      Some of you may recall hearing the story of Manuel Jesus Cordova. He was in the news a couple years ago.[1] While sneaking across the border from Mexico, Cordova happened to find a 9-year-old boy, Christopher Buchleitner of Rimrock, Arizona, alone and injured in the desert. As it happens, Christopher and his mom had been in a single-car accident when their van went over a cliff on a remote road in southern Arizona. His mother had been killed, and Christopher went looking for help. Cordova gave the boy his sweater and some chocolate and built a fire to warm the boy. It was that fire that drew the attention of the border patrol. Authorities say Christopher would likely have died had Cordova not stopped to protect him.

      Cordova was honored for the rescue by U.S. and Mexican officials at a border crossing station. Then he was arrested by federal agents and returned to Mexico.

      I mention that story not to romanticize those who enter the U.S. without legal sanction. No doubt that within the ranks of immigrants—whether legal or illegal, documented or undocumented—there are the same proportion of saints and scoundrels as are already here. I mention his name—Manuel Jesus Cordova—as a reminder that each immigrant has a name and a story. They’re not simply statistics.

      By the way, Beatriz Lopez, the Mexican consul general for Nogales, had this stunningly prophetic insight in her comments to the press about this incident: “The desert has a way of rearranging priorities.”

      I have four brief points to consider for this Bible study.

      1.  There is a stunning amount of material in the Bible about “immigrants,” and all of it underscores the special attention that God commands on their behalf. In Scripture the commonly used words are “strangers” and “aliens.”

      •“You shall love the stranger, for you were strangers in the land of Egypt” (Deut. 10:19).

      •Among Job’s complaints was this assertion of holiness: “I was a father to the needy, and I championed the cause of the stranger” (29:16).

      • “When you reap the harvest of your land, you shall not reap to the very edges of your field. . . ; you shall leave them for the poor and for the alien” (Lev. 23:22)

      •The prophet Malachi explicitly links refusal to “fear” the Lord with the mistreatment of marginalized people: “Then I will draw near to you for judgment. . . . Those who oppress the hired workers in their wages, the widow and the orphan [two other classes of uniquely vulnerable people in ancient Middle Eastern cultures], against those who thrust aside the alien, and do not fear me, says the Lord of hosts” (3:5, italics added).

      •Jesus included “strangers” among those whose fate was tied up with his own: “. . . for I was hungry and you gave me food, I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink, I was a stranger and you welcomed me” (Matt. 25:35).

      •Even the Apostle Paul echoes this persistent theme throughout the Bible: “So then you are no longer strangers and aliens, but you are citizens with the saints and also members of the household of God. . . .” (Eph. 2:17-22).

      2. The holiness of God is attested by just relations within the earth. The story of the Hebrew people’s escape from Pharaoh’s brickyards is so familiar to us that we forget that it’s hardly a “religious” story at all. Rather, it is an ancient civil rights movement, a rebellion against empire, a stunning escape from slavery. The very memory of this liberation movement is asserted as the rationale for obeying the commands of Yahweh God: “Thus God spoke all these words: I am the Lord your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery.” This is the preamble to the Ten Commandments and all the law of Torah. It begins with: “You shall have no other God before me,” and ends with a prohibition against covetousness, which is to say, against hoarding life’s provisions. Over and over again in Scripture idolatry and exploitation are paired as frequently as are “fear of the Lord” and doing justice.

      “Having no other God” is finally played out by refusing monopoly and exploitative economic practices—something which later gets spelled out in the “Jubilee” laws, describing the year of the Lord’s favor as a time that slaves be freed, debts be canceled and land be returned to original owners. The great prophet Isaiah returned to this “jubilee” theme several times, as did Jesus when, in his inaugural sermon, he spoke of his mission “to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor” (Luke 4:19).

      3. To understand who these “strangers” are, we need to know a little more about the practice of slavery in Egypt. Among the many unfortunate distortions of Scripture caused by Hollywood movie-makers is the notion that those Egyptian pyramids were built by legions of slaves—the kinds of slaves that used to be imported to the U.S. from Africa for sale as chattel property. There simply is no historical evidence for this. There are no records of markets in Egypt for the buying and selling of slaves. Nor were Egyptian slaves primarily like “indentured servants” who worked for a period of time as servants to pay off a debt. Maybe the closest analogy is that slaves in Egypt were something like serfs in medieval Europe: a more or less permanent underclass who, merely because of the accident of birth and family history, were destined by economic and social sanctions to live at the very edge of material existence. Rulers’ domination was by divine right—much the way, currently, the “free hand of the market” is considered self-evident and unassailable. (Whether theistic or not, “God made it that way.”)

      You remember the story of Joseph’s clan who came voluntarily into Egypt to avoid starvation. In other words, they were very much like the majority of modern immigrants fleeing lives of desperate poverty.

      It’s important to also remember than the origins of the “Hebrew” people were not primarily racial or ethnic. Biblical scholars believe the biblical term “Hebrew” is an alternate rendering of the word “habirû.” “Habirû” was the sociological designation for outsiders, people with no claim on the land—vagrants and vagabonds, the hoi polloi—people who at various times were merely an inconvenience, possibly a worry, and occasionally an overt threat to ruling authorities. [2]

      The word “Hebrew” comes from a root word meaning “to cross over.” Thus, the Hebrew is one who crosses borders, who have no social power and no legal claim on resources or status, whose desperate efforts of sheer survival push them to ignore the boundaries of assigned bounty. [3] (And some of them, like some of us, just long for expanded consumer options.)

      Recall Joseph’s story. Captured by a trade caravan after being left for dead by his brothers, Joseph was sold into bondage but then, remarkably, managed to rise through the ranks to become a key political operative in Pharaoh’s court. He became an insider. Recall how the text reads when his brothers come begging: “[The household servants] served [Joseph] by himself, and [his brothers] by themselves, because the Egyptians might not eat bread with the Hebrews, for that is an abomination to the Egyptians” (Gen. 43:32). Joseph had been co-opted, had become a part of the power elite. We know about that, don’t we?

      4. Theologian Douglas Meeks has suggested that much of Scripture—and particularly these teachings about care of strangers—depicts God through the metaphor of “homemaker” [4] I like this image a lot. Think of it: God as the one who makes a home for strangers and aliens. A God who takes a nameless and homeless people and gives them an identity and a place to call their own. A God who provides hospitality and welcome to those who find no room in the inn. A God who jumps into action at the sound of groaning slaves—not because of some special moral quality or devotional purity, but simply because they cry out. A God who undermines empires, who feeds the hungry with good things and sends the rich away empty-handed. A God who befriends the unworthy, the unwashed, the untouchable, a God who eats with “trashy” folk. A God who turns enemies into friends—and who invites us into the fray.

      “Once you were no people, but now you are God’s people; once you had not received mercy, but now you have received mercy” (1 Peter 2:10).

      This—I am suggesting—this is our story, this is our song. Such is the praise we raise all the day long.

Endnotes
1. Associated Press story in the Asheville Citizen-Times, Wednesday, 5 December 2007.
2. Walter Brueggemann, Interpretation and Obedience: From Faithful Reading to Faithful Living, p. 291.
3. Ibid., p. 292-293.
4. God the Economist: The Doctrine of God and Political Economy, cited by Ibid., pp.298-299.

Let Wisdom’s Way endure

A litany for worship inspired by Psalm 107

Listen now you who linger in wasted lands, consumed with wanton hearts: The Blessed One has eyes and ears opened and tuned to the cries of your distress.

Give thanks and rejoice you faint-of-limb and sick-of-soul: An open gate of Quenching Delight stands eager to receive you.

Listen now you who languish athirst, bowels rumbling in hunger: Bountiful tables—too wondrous to behold—are spread as ransom for your ruin.

Give thanks and rejoice you prisoners of misery: The Counsel of Mercy now argues your case in the court of the Most High.

Listen now you princes of contempt: The burdens you lay and the bonds you impose shall be seized and shattered and lifted and loosened.

Give thanks and rejoice you storm-tossed pilgrims: the Stiller of Storms is at your mast, hushing the wind and calming the waves.

Listen now you barking jackals: A diligent Voice will sever your tongue and seal your mouth forever.

Give thanks, you orphan and widow; rejoice, you refugee: Let the least of these join choirs of angels in grateful harmony! With Vindication near, no one need faint nor fear. Hope and harvest alike abound from hallowed, fertile ground. Let Wisdom’s Way endure; the Promised Reign, secure.

©Ken Sehested @ prayerandpolitiks.org

Amnesty

A litany for worship inspired by Psalm 130

If you, O God, should keep track of all our failures,
none of us would make the grade.

But your hands heap pardon on all the penitent.
Forgiveness is your middle name.
Mercy is your mandate; pardon, your provision.

Declarations of amnesty flow from your lips.
Every remorse is met with remission.

The feet of your grace rush to our incarcerated souls.

      Oh restless, fitful hearts:
Wait for your Redeemer;
           for the Word that unlocks prison doors,
                  that infiltrates our enslaved minds.

Inspired by Psalm 130, reprinted from In the Land of the Willing: Litanies, Prayers, Poems, and Benedictions.

©Ken Sehested @ prayerandpolitiks.org

Morning by morning

A litany for worship inspired by Lamentations 3 and Luke 19:41-42

Be gracious to me, Blessed One, for I am in distress.

My eyes are awash with grief; my bed swims in tears.

My bones bulge under the weight of unlived life.

Sighs crowd my heart and swell my tongue.

Jesus, weeping over Jerusalem.

      Weeping over this city.
           Over these people.
           Over this church.
           Over my own anemic,
                 knuckleheaded self.

Can you hear it? Can you hear it?

But the One who vindicates is near.

The Advocate’s approach stymies fear.

Morning by morning the Beloved awakens me,

Tuning my ear to heaven’s harmony.

Morning by morning new mercies I see.*

©Ken Sehested @ prayerandpolitiks.org. *Line from “Great is Thy Faithfulness,” Thomas Obediah Chisholm.

News, views, notes, and quotes

Signs of the Times  •  5 June 2018 •  No. 163

Invocation. “Imagine,” by John Lennon, performed by the Secaucus (New Jersey) High School and Middle School, on the 4 March 2018, National School Walkout.

Special issue on
IMAGINATION

Introduction

       Imagination is one of our age’s feel-good words, and if you use it (and I do, a lot), first pause to consider the term’s shadow side.

        Imaginary, a linguistic cousin, can be used to describe a life removed from the vicissitudes of history, e.g., pipe dreams sprinkled with pixie dust, also known as magical thinking. To call such living childish is an insult to children. Imagination is not escapism. Spiritual life is not evacuation to another world. . . .” —continue reading “Imagination and transformation: ‘Do not be conformed’”

Use the list quotes that follow as prompts to personal and communal prayer, to
recover and rejuvenate the longing that mortal life be delivered from the grip of
this brutal age and transformed by the One who makes all things new.

§ A vision without a task is but a dream, a task without a vision is drudgery, a vision with a task is the hope of the world. ~Church inscription, Sussex, England (1730)

§ Imagination is more important than knowledge. ~Albert Einstein

§ Violence is the behavior of someone incapable of imagining other solutions to the problem at hand. ~Vicenç Fisas

§ While the Passover narrative [in Exodus] energizes Israel’s imagination toward justice, Israel’s hard work of implementation of that imaginative scenario was done at Mt. Sinai. . . . Moses’ difficult work at Sinai is to transform the narrative vision of the Exodus into a sustainable social practice that has institutional staying-power, credibility, and authority. ~Walter Brueggemann

Short story. “Forty inmates lined up for smudging to enter the sacred circle for the Native American prayers. I spotted Genaro and a little alarm went off in my head. ‘Genaro, can I talk to you for a minute?’ He smiled and nodded.

        “The shade of the building sheltered us from the blistering noonday sun and got us out of hearing range of the other men. ‘Genaro, you know that you must either go into the circle to smoke the pipe, or stay outside the circle by yourself. Last week I noticed that another guy sat with you outside the circle. If custody staff sees that, they assume you’re passing tobacco.’

        “A glint of sun struck his face as he erupted. ‘Who told you to say this to me? You racist like everybody. . . .’

        “He turned away, his arms flailing with each billowing Spanish word that I didn’t need a translator to understand. A dozen Latinos broke their line and encircled him. I walked closer to them, clutching my radio. Officers who could have offered assistance were inside a locked door on the other side of the building, exactly where I wanted to be at that moment.” —continue reading Nancy Hastings Sehested’s “Imagine this: A story from prison”

§ It always seems impossible until it’s done. ~Nelson Mandela

§ As for me, the grounds of my hope have always been that history is wilder than our imagination of it and that the unexpected shows up far more regularly than we ever dream. ~Rebecca Solnit

§ I believe our task is to develop a moral and aesthetic imagination deep enough and wide enough to encompass the contradictions of our time and history, the tremendous loss and tragedy as well as greatness and nobility, an imagination capable of recognizing that where there is light there is shadow, that out of hubris and fall can come moral regeneration, out of suffering and death, resurrection and rebirth. ~Richard Tarnas

§ All things are possible to the one that believes. ~Jesus

§ Imagination is better than a sharp instrument. To pay attention, this is our endless and proper work. ~Mary Oliver

§ Hold fast to dreams, / for if dreams die,  / life is a broken-winged bird / that cannot fly. / Hold fast to dreams / For when dreams go / Life is a barren field / Frozen with snow. ~Langston Hughes

§ A person will worship something, have no doubt about that. We may think our tribute is paid in secret in the dark recesses of our hearts, but it will out. That which dominates our imaginations and our thoughts will determine our lives, and our character. Therefore, it behooves us to be careful what we worship, for what we are worshiping we are becoming. ~Ralph Waldo Emerson

§ Moral imagination is the capacity to imagine something rooted in the challenge of the real world yet capable of giving birth to that which does not yet exist. . . . The moral imagination believes and acts on the basis that the unexpected is possible. It operates with the view that the creative act is always within human potential, but creativity requires moving beyond the parameters of what is visible, what currently exists, or what is taken as given. . . .  ~John Paul Lederach

§ Every great advance in science has issued from a new audacity of imagination. ~John Dewey

§ To hope is a duty, not a luxury. To hope is not a dream, but to turn dream into reality. Happy are those who dream dreams, and are ready to pay the price to make them come true. ~Cardinal Leo Suenens

§ In order to create an effective movement for redemptive engagement, reflective work must be integrated with affective learning in the context of a community of conviction. Mind and imagination must be addressed, and these must be tethered to disciplines of concrete and communal commitments. ~Ken Sehested

§ Human imagination is not simply our means of reaching out to God but God’s means of manifesting himself to us. ~Christian Wiman

§ When we are dissatisfied with things as they are, or suffer and know pain, we begin to imagine what the world would be like if things were different—if there were no hunger or thirst and all tears were wiped away (Rev. 7:14). Creative imagination reaches toward God, and glimpses a new heaven and new earth. The new reality has nothing to do with the present order. In fact, the one who responds to call seeks to put something more beautiful in the place of what she sees. This is where the friction and fight begin. ~Elizabeth O’Connor

§ If you want to change people's obedience then you must change their imagination. ~Paul Ricoeur

§ The step between ecstatic vision and sinful frenzy is all too brief. ~Franciscan priest William of Manchester (played by Sean Connery), in the movie “The Name of the Rose”

§ You can't depend on your eyes when your imagination is out of focus. ~Mark Twain

§ The Eucharist has been preempted and redefined in dualistic thinking that leaves the status quo of the world untouched, so congregations can take the meal without raising questions of violence; the outcome is a “colonized imagination” that is drained of dangerous hope. ~Walter Brueggemann

§ To be sane in a mad time / Is bad for the brain, worse / For the heart. The world / Is a holy vision, had we clarity / To see it. ~Wendell Berry

§ Most peacemakers don’t begin with a grand vision. They begin with the troubles at hand and the resources they have. Then you act for good, for justice, for healing, for hope, for peace. It’s as simple as that. ~Dan Buttry

§ The two, suffering and hope, live from each other. Suffering without hope produces resentment and despair. Hope without suffering creates illusions, naïveté, and drunkenness. Let us plant dates, even though we who plant them will never eat them. We must live by the love of what we will never see. This is the secret discipline. ~Rubem Alves

§ Logic will get you from A to B. Imagination will take you everywhere. ~Albert Einstein

§ When we are dreaming alone, it is only a dream. When we are dreaming with others, it is the beginning of reality. ~Dom Hélder Câmara

§ Sometimes imagination pounces; mostly it sleeps soundly in the corner, purring. ~Terri Guillemets

§ You can’t depend on your eyes when your imagination is out of focus. ~Mark Twain

§ Those who dream by day are cognizant of many things that escape those who dream only at night. ~Edgar Allan Poe

§ Any real change implies the breakup of the world as one had always known it, the loss of all that gave one identity, the end of safety, and at such a moment, unable to see and not daring to imagine what the future will bring forth, one clings to what one knew, to what one possessed or dreamed that one possessed. Yet, it is only when a man is able, without bitterness or self pity, to surrender a dream he has long cherished, or a privilege he has long possessed, that he is set free—that he has set himself free—for higher dreams, for greater privileges. ~James Baldwin

§ Vision is the art of seeing things invisible. ~Jonathan Swift

§ The real voyage of discovery consists not in seeking new landscapes but in having new eyes. ~Marcel Proust

§ All people dream: but not equally. / Those who dream by night / in the dusty recesses of their minds / wake in the day to find that it was vanity. / But the dreamers of the day / are dangerous people, / for they may act their dream with open eyes / to make it possible. ~T.E. Lawrence

§ Fantasy mirrors desire. Imagination reshapes it. ~Mason Cooley

§ Rationalism is merely the human structuring of reality by those in power. ~author unknown

§ You will recognize your own path when you come upon it, because you will suddenly have all the energy and imagination you will ever need. ~Jerry Gillies

§ The Possible’s slow fuse is lit / by the Imagination. ~Emily Dickinson

§ Sometimes I've believed as many as six impossible things before breakfast. ~Lewis Carroll

§ Things are only impossible until they're not. ~Jean-Luc Picard, Star Trek: The Next Generation

§ Perhaps imagination is only intelligence having fun. ~George Scialabba

§ You can’t use up creativity. The more you use, the more you have. ~Maya Angelou

§ Discovery consists of seeing what everybody has seen and thinking what nobody has thought. ~Albert Szent-Györgyi

§ The difficulty lies not so much in developing new ideas as in escaping old ones. ~John Maynard Keynes

§ Love in action is a harsh and dreadful thing compared with love in dreams. Love in dreams is greedy for immediate action, rapidly performed and in sight of all. Men will give their lives if only the ordeal does not last long but is soon over, with all looking on and applauding as if on the stage. But active love is labor and fortitude. ~Fyodor Dostoyevsky

§ No problem can be solved from the same level of consciousness that created it. ~Albert Einstein

§ When we engage in what we are naturally suited to do, our work takes on the quality of play and it is play that stimulates creativity. ~Linda Naiman

§ It seems to be one of the paradoxes of creativity that in order to think originally, we must familiarize ourselves with the ideas of others. ~George Kneller

§ It is good to be introduced by someone with a glib tongue, a vivid imagination and an elastic conscience. ~Foy Valentine

 § You can crush the flowers, but you can’t stop the spring. . . . As for me, the grounds of my hope have always been that history is wilder than our imagination of it and that the unexpected shows up far more regularly than we ever dream. ~Alexander Dubcek, hero of the Prague Spring uprising of 1968

§ We do not live by what is possessed but by what is promised. ~Walter Brueggemann

§ The person who loves their dream of community will destroy community, but the person who loves those around them will create community. ~Dietrich Bonhoeffer

§ I slept and dreamt that life was joy; / I awoke and saw that life was service; / I acted and, behold, service was joy. ~Rabindranath Tagore

§ Whoever you are, no matter how lonely, / the world offers itself to your imagination, / calls to you like the wild geese, harsh and exciting — / over and over announcing your place / in the family of things. ~Mary Oliver

§ We are a little lost here in America. Too many of us have tuned out, and too many of us are deeply tuned in to the wrong things. Our eccentricities have curdled into crochets. Our love for the strange and deeply weird has soured into a devotion to the mean and deeply angry. Our renegade national soul has given itself up to petty outlawry. . . . Imagination always has been the way out—a faith in that which seems impossible, a trust that not every mystery is a murder mystery, and that not every mysterious creature is a monster. Imagination is the way out—a belief that safety is not necessarily the primary (or even the secondary) goal of democratic citizenship, and that a self-governing political commonwealth does not always come with a lifetime guarantee. Yes, we are a little lost here in America, but we can find our way, and the best way that we can find is the one that seems like the least secure, the darkest trail, the one with the long, sweeping bend in the road that leads god knows where. ~Charles P. Pierce, “Goodbye to All That”

§ Where there is no vision, the people perish. ~Proverbs 29:18

Benediction. “When God imagined me / the Trinity was in harmony / I was no afterthought, no oversight.” — Alana Levandoski “When God Imagined Me” (Thanks Lenora.)

©Ken Sehested @ prayerandpolitiks.org. Language not otherwise indicated above is that of the editor, as are those portions cited as “kls.” Don’t let the “copyright” notice keep you from circulating material you find here (and elsewhere in this site). Reprint permission is hereby granted in advance for noncommercial purposes.

Feel free to copy and post any original art on this site. (The ones with “prayer&politiks.org” at the bottom.) As well as other information you find helpful.

Your comments are always welcomed. If you have news, views, notes or quotes to add to the list above, please do. If you like what you read, pass this along to your friends. You can reach me directly at kensehested@prayerandpolitiks.org.

 

Imagination and transformation

Do not be conformed

by Ken Sehested

            Imagination is one of our age’s feel-good words, and if you use it (and I do, a lot), first pause to consider the term’s shadow side.

            Imaginary, a linguistic cousin, can be used to describe a life removed from the vicissitudes of history, e.g., pipe dreams sprinkled with pixie dust, also known as magical thinking. To call such living childish is an insult to children. Imagination is not escapism. Spiritual life is not evacuation to another world.

            Also, imagination is not exempt from human manipulation for domineering purposes. Scientific and technological imagination created weapons of mass destruction and facilitated the rapacious assault on the ecosphere. We now live in what is now being called the Anthropocene, the epoch when human extraction from the biosphere exceeds nature’s capacity for replenishment.

            We live, in a very real sense, in an age of cannibalism and head-hunting far in excess of any examples from “primitive” cultures. But we have more sophisticated rationalizations of its plundering practices.

            By means of clever manipulation, Creation’s bounty—shared provision and sufficient sustenance—has been rendered as monetized booty. Whereas doxology—praise and the generosity it engenders—was once our intended posture, now there is domination by those despotic enough to assume control by the manipulation of debt and the misery it denotes.

            There is a substantial thread in Scripture where “imagination” is the seed of greed and the tyrannical behavior it evokes. Mary, in her pregnant song of praise, rejoices that God will “scatter the proud” in the “imagination of their hearts,” banishing the powerful and lifting up the lowly, satisfying the needs of the hungry and banishing every predator (Luke 1:51-53).

            Similarly, the Prophet Ezekiel (chapter 13) condemns religious charlatans who prophesy “out of their own imaginations,” when in fact they act as "jackals"—not because of pious impurity but the pursuit of profit. “You have profaned me for handfuls of barley and for pieces of bread,” killing the innocent and sparing oppressors.

            In Proverbs, the rich, in their imagination, believe their wealth will protect them “like a high wall” (18:11)—a text that has startling relevance for current political history in the US.

            Imagination can be the stimulus of deceit and trickery. Can you now see how the ancient prayer “Forgive us our debts,” with its linking of fiscal and spiritual poverty, is such a threat to imperial debt collectors, along with their political hirelings and armed mercenaries?

            Admitting these caveats, however, I believe the work of imagination is not only the key to clarified theological vision (Walter Brueggemann’s The Prophetic Imagination is of singular importance in my own formation) but also to the efficacious pursuit of the things that make for peace rooted in justice and mediated by mercy. (See John Paul Lederach’s The Moral Imagination: The Art and Soul of Building Peace.)

            “Do not be conformed to this world [in its present deathly configuration],” the Apostle Paul urged the church in Rome, “but be transformed by the renewing of your minds”—by the imaginative capacity to see and participate in “what is good and acceptable and perfect” (12:2).

            To that end, use the list of quotes that follow as prompts to personal and communal prayer, to recover and rejuvenate the longing that mortal life be delivered from the grip of this brutal age and transformed by the One who makes all things new.

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Imagine This

A story from prison

by Nancy Hastings Sehested
(Excerpt from an upcoming book of stories from work as a prison chaplain.)

            Forty inmates lined up for smudging to enter the sacred circle for the Native American prayers. I spotted Genaro and a little alarm went off in my head. “Genaro, can I talk to you for a minute?” He smiled and nodded.

            The shade of the building sheltered us from the blistering noonday sun and got us out of hearing range of the other men. “Genaro, you know that you must either go into the circle to smoke the pipe, or stay outside the circle by yourself. Last week I noticed that another guy sat with you outside the circle. If custody staff sees that, they assume you’re passing tobacco.”

            A glint of sun struck his face as he erupted. “Who told you to say this to me? You racist like everybody. You discriminating against Latinos. I write a grievance. You pickin’ on me. Why you say to me? I just helpin’ a brother. I not passing tobacco. I got no contraband. What you say I doin’?”

            He turned away, his arms flailing with each billowing Spanish word that I didn’t need a translator to understand. A dozen Latinos broke their line and encircled him. I walked closer to them, clutching my radio. Officers who could have offered assistance were inside a locked door on the other side of the building, exactly where I wanted to be at that moment. My eyes squinted as I held my gaze on the group and my finger on the radio. Genaro tapped into his anger—for him, an endless renewable energy—and he wanted others to join him.

Right: Cross necklace made from plastic bags by a prisoner.

            But instead the men grabbed his thrashing arms and pulled them down by his side. One man rested a hand on his shoulder. A chorus of voices shouted through his yelling. They stopped him. He shrugged them all away and found a place in the grass to sit alone.

            Crisis averted, I sat back down in the shade to watch the men offer their prayers. I offered some of my own, praying first that my heart would dislodge from my throat. By the end, I was thinking I needed to sound a warning. I was convinced that I should chide, instruct, and impress on them the dire consequences of their outbursts—and retrieve my reputation as a fair-minded person.

            I asked Juan if he would translate for clarity. He agreed, but as he stepped beside me, he whispered, “Chap, could you let it go today? Jus’ let us take care of things our way. I assure you this isn’t gonna happen again. Let us deal with this brother. We’ve got our prison ways to deal with things.”

            “I know some of those ways. I’ll agree on the condition that no one—and I mean no one—gets hurt. Okay?”

            “Sí, sí, sí.”

            It’s not my instinct, but I remained silent until we entered the building. Then I asked Genaro to come to my office. He had no choice but to follow me. He remained steely-jawed as I invited him to sit down.

            “No. I stand.”

            “Okay. That’s fine. Stand if you like. I just have one question. What’s your favorite song?”

            He cocked his head. “What?”

            I asked him again.

            “John Lennon. ‘Imagine.’”

            “Really?” I asked. “You’re so young.”

            “Sí, but my parents play Beatles a lot in my house growing up. I always like them.”

            I quickly found the song on my computer and played it.

                  Imagine there's no heaven
                  It's easy if you try
                  No hell below us
                  Above us only sky
                  Imagine all the people
                  Living for today…

                  Imagine there's no countries
                  It isn't hard to do
                  Nothing to kill or die for
                  And no religion too
                  Imagine all the people
                  Living life in peace…

                  You may say I'm a dreamer
                  But I'm not the only one
                  I hope someday you'll join us
                  And the world will be as one

            The song ended. Genaro smiled as he extended his hand for a handshake. He said, “I love you, Chaplain.”

            Imagine that.

Nancy Hastings Sehested previously served as a prisoner chaplain at a maximum security prison for men. She is also co-founder and co-pastor of Circle of Mercy Congregation, Asheville, NC. ©prayerandpolitiks.org

           

 

al-Nakba

Meditation on Israel, Palestine, and the calculus of power

by Ken Sehested

        15 May is the anniversary of what Palestinians call al-Nakba, translated as “the Catastrophe” in reference to the day following Israel’s formation as a state in 1948. Some three-quarters of a million Palestinians were forced from their homes. Four hundred Palestinian villages cease to exist. The heirs of the expelled now number five million, most living in refugee camps on the West Bank, Gaza, and surrounding countries.

        I was in my 30s when I first heard the word Nakba, and the historical moment it represents, well into a career requiring broad knowledge of global affairs. In my experience, few here in North America know the word.

        A more evocative translation of al-Nakba could be “the Humiliation,” since in English “catastrophe” is often associated with “natural” disasters. As such, no human agency is implied—only the brute hand of climatic turbulence well beyond our control or even prediction.

        Al-Nakba was not natural, not beyond control, likely not even beyond prediction.

§  §  §

        The only vague memory I have of this period in Palestine’s history is watching one of Paul Newman’s early films, Exodus (1960), based in part on Leon Uris’ book by the same title, loosely retelling the dramatic saga of Holocaust surviving Jews attempting to reach Palestine from France after the war.

        I don’t remember that movie saying anything about Irgun and Lehi, Jewish terrorist groups, which carried out bombings and assassinations against British governance and military (during the “British Mandate” rule) and the predominantly Arab population.

        By the way, in my research I notice that Wikipedia prefers to speak of “Jewish paramilitary” groups who engaged in “Zionist political” military action during this period. The difference between terrorists and freedom fighters is almost always decided by whose future gains the upper hand.

§  §  §

        Among the vilest things I’ve ever heard about Jews came from the imam of a mosque in Basra in southern Iraq. Afterward our group quizzed our translator to make sure he wasn’t exaggerating. “Actually, it was a little worse,” he said.

        And some of the most reprehensible statements about Muslims I’ve seen were scrawled on the closed shop gates of Arab merchants in Hebron, spray painted by residents of the nearby Jewish settlement in the heart of that ancient West Bank city.

        One of the good recent articles regarding the situation in Gaza is by Rabbi Edward Retting of Rabbis for Human Rights in Israel, an organization that does courageous work. “There is only one way toward peace,” he writes. “That is the recognition that our dispute concerns two just causes [that of Jews and of Palestinians] tragically thrown into opposition one to the other.”

        Yes, I say in response. But one is an elephant, the other is a mouse. Without recognition of this premise, without clarifying the calculus of power, whatever conclusions emerge will only deepen the cycle of violence which now feeds on itself, like the record-breaking warmth of the Gulf of Mexico turning always-destructive hurricanes into monster storms.

§  §  §

        The work of reconciliation in the midst of conflict can never sidestep the question of power relations between conflicting parties. To illustrate that disparity, here are some figures from Israel’s 2014 invasion of Gaza.

        Between 10,626 and 10,895 Palestinians were killed (including 3,374 children, of whom over 1,000 were left permanently disabled). Sixty-six Israeli soldiers, five Israeli civilians (including one child) and one Thai civilian were killed and 469 Israeli soldiers and 261 Israeli civilians were injured (the latter by rockets fired by Hamas into southern Israel). The Gazan casualty rate was 65%-70%. (“2014 Israel-Gaza conflict,” Wikipedia)

        Until recently I could see no way forward in addressing this conflict other than the so-called “two state solution,” with the nation of Israel and a newly-created Palestinian state residing side-by-side, with a negotiated land swap that would approximate the pre-1967 war’s border.

        Everybody knows that Hamas, Gaza’s ruling party (chosen by democratic election), still refuses to recognize Israel’s legitimacy. Few know, however, that Israel’s ruling Likud Party, along with other parties in its governing coalition, are officially and adamantly opposed to any meaningful two-nation arrangement.

        The US is hardly an honest broker in this conflict. Israel is by far the largest recipient of US foreign aid, now at $3.8 billion per year. US support for the Palestinians is a tiny fraction of that, almost all of which is routed through various UN agencies to support basic infrastructure and refugee provisions. (President Trump has already cut those payments and is threatening to cancel them outright.)

        While it’s true that US recognition of Jerusalem as Israel’s capital does not affect any concrete structural changes; it does however give symbolic strength to Israel’s claim of sovereignty over all of Jerusalem, in contravention of United Nations’ mandates (which also make all of Israel’s West Bank settlements illegal under international law).

§  §  §

        There is a popular saying among visitors to Israel/Palestine: Stay for a week, and you think you can write a book. Stay for a month, and you think, well . . . maybe an essay. Stay for a year, and you don't know what to say.

        I do not pretend in these spare comments to offer policy guidance toward a different future. I do know, as the saying goes, that when you find yourself in a hole, the first thing you do is stop digging. And I do know, without a shadow of a doubt, that the dominant narrative in American political culture is not only shortsighted but also complicit with Israel’s brutal occupation of Palestine’s population.

        The only genuine, lasting security is mutual security. At present, the West Bank and Gaza are more like maximum security prisons.

        Truth be told, over the past hours of writing I have fought off my own heart’s numerous pleas to cease and desist any public comments on this topic. I am connected to several communities for whom conversation about sexual orientation is a breeze compared to discussions of Israeli-Palestinian relations. The volatility quotient is enough to shut down meaningful dialogue. In addition, for people like myself, who at this distance face little existential threat, the subject easily becomes a conveniently liberal parlor exercise. When there’s no blood on the floor, talk is cheap.

        In the end, though, silence on the matter is both an abdication of liability (make it go away!) and a collaboration with infamy. We have the right neither to demand this conversation nor to abandon it. We sit, always, on a moral precipice—but that is exactly the proper posture of reverence. Shared reverence is our only hope.

§  §  §

        In the end, my political pessimism is held at bay because I know a few of the many (far more than you might think) Israelis and Palestinians—Jews, Christians, Muslims, and other people of conscience—who arise each day, indefatigably and almost beyond imagination, to practice truth-telling and justice seasoned with mercy and compassion. And I know a few others, here in the US and elsewhere, who persevere in their support for these militant agents of reconciliation.

        What to do? At the very least, dig deeper for information and perspective on this topic beyond what our dominant media supplies. Hold your heart open to the possibility of connecting with the network of resisters, healers, and visionaries who dream differently, inspired by the vision spoken of by the Prophet Micah, for the day when all shall sit under their own vine and fig tree, with none to make them afraid (4:4).

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©ken Sehested @ prayerandpolitiks.org. For more on this subject see “House to house, field to field: Reflections on a peace mission to the West Bank.”

News, views, notes, and quotes

Signs of the Times  •  25 May 2018 •  No. 162

Processional. Berzeit University (Ramallah, Palestine) performing the Palestinian Dabka folk dance. (58 seconds. Thanks, David.)

Above: The al Badawi olive tree in Bethlehem, which researchers peg to somewhere between 4,000 and 5,000 years old, is likely the oldest living olive tree in the world. —Colin Shultz, Smithsonian

Special Edition
AL-NAKBA
(“The Catastrophe”)

15 May is the anniversary of what Palestinians call al-Nakba, translated at “the Catastrophe” in reference to the day following Israel’s formation as a state in 1948. Some three-quarters of a million Palestinians were forced from their homes. . . .
        “A more evocative translation of al-Nakba could be ‘the Humiliation,’ since in English ‘catastrophe’ is often associated with “natural” disasters. No human agency is implied in such catastrophes—only the brute hand of climatic turbulence well beyond our control or even prediction.” —continue reading al-Nakba: Meditation on Israel, Palestine, and the calculus of power

Invocation. “Shelter beneath kanfei ha’shechinah, / the soft wings of your divine presence, / those who still live under military occupation, / who dwell in refugee camps, / those dispersed throughout the world / still dreaming of return. / Gather them mei’arbah kanfot ha’aretz / from the four corners of the earth / that their right to return to their homes / be honored at long last.” —Rabbi Brant Rosen, “A Jewish Prayer for Nakba Day”

Right: A Palestinian refugee and her child separated from their home by the “green line” after the 1948 war. Getty images

Call to worship. “My soul magnifies you, O Lord, and my spirit rejoices in your Saving Presence. . . . Your power is sufficient to baffle the aims of the arrogant. Imperial might trembles at the sound of your approach; but the prison yards and the sweatshops and the slaughterhouses erupt in jubilation!” —continue reading “My soul magnifies you,” a litany for worship inspired by Luke 1:39-57 (Mary’s “Magnificat”)

¶ “The Nakba,” a short (6:13 video) introduction to the historical context of Palestinians’ expulsion from their homeland in 1948.

Not sure what the Palestinian “Right of Return” is? Watch this brief (2:08) video.

Hymn of praise. “From the north to the south / from the west to the east / hear the prayer of the mothers / bring them peace / bring them peace.” —Yael Deckelbaum & Prayer of the Mothers, “This Land” (English translation of Hebrew and Egyptian Arabic lyrics), a 14-member ensemble of Jewish, Arab and Christian women

In case you haven't already figured this out, you can listen to music selections on this page while reading the text. Open two prayerandpolitiks.org tabs, listen to music on one, read on the other, going back and forth as you choose.

Watch this short (6:07) video of Sharif Abdel Kouddous, “Democracy Now” correspondent, reporting from Gaza on Monday 14 May in protests demanding the “right of return” to their homes in Israel.

Left: Street signs like this were hung all over Jerusalem for the official opening of the US embassy.

Of the many pieces dealing with US embassy move and the brutal killings in Gaza, here is the best thing I've read: “Israel, Palestine and Us: A Response to Toba Spitzer,” Rabbi Brant Rosen, Evolve.

Confession. “If we keep these lands, popular [Palestinian] resistance to the occupation is sure to rise, and Israel's army will be used to quell that resistance, with disastrous and demoralising results”. —Israeli General Matityahu Peled (1923-1995), addressing Israeli Cabinet meeting immediately after the June 1967 war

Hymn of supplication. “I have no place / And I have no country / I have no home / With my fingers I make the fire / And with my heart I sing for you / The ropes of my heart cries.” —English translation of lyrics to “Nací en Palestina” (“I Was Born In Palestine”), Emel Mathlouthi

¶ “Israel's existence is a priori protection for American oil interests in the Persian Gulf, Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Bahrain and Iran.” —I. L. Kenan , lobbyist for Israel, in testimony before the [U.S.] Committee on Foreign Affairs of the House of Representatives (July 22-23, 1970)

Israel is far and away the largest recipient of US foreign aid, which now totals $3.8 billion per year. US aid to the Palestinians $250 million, most of which is funneled through various United Nations agencies to support roads, schools, hospitals, and other infrastructure projects. Some $75 million goes to Israeli power and fuel companies to generate electricity to the West Bank and Gaza. President Trump has already reduced US support, from a pledged $125 million to $60 million, to a United Nations fund which provides food, shelter, education and health care for five million Palestinian refugees in the West Bank, Gaza, and neighboring countries.

The US currently has $1.8 billion of military supplies in pre-positioned storage in Israel. The stock includes ammunition, smart bombs, missiles, military vehicles and a military hospital with 500 beds. The US Congress is authorized to release these supplies to Israel when requested. —“War reserve stock,” Wikipedia

Words of assurance. “Lo Yira” (“Will Not Fear”), Yuval Ron Ensemble.

Confessing our faith. “Our word is a cry of hope, with love, prayer and faith in God. . . . We declare that the military occupation of Palestinian land constitutes a sin against God and humanity. Any theology that legitimizes the occupation and justifies crimes perpetrated against the Palestinian people lies far from Christian teachings.” —for more about the 2009 “Kairos Palestine Statement”

Hymn of lament. “How long, Lord? Will you forget me forever? How long will you hide your face from me?” —“How long, Lord?” English translation of Fayrouz Eela Mata Ya Rabbou’s hymn of lament over the Israeli massacres of Palestinian protestors in the Gaza Strip (Thanks Loren.)

¶ “The pre-eminent obstacle to peace is Israel's colonization of Palestine. Israel's occupation of Palestine has obstructed a comprehensive peace agreement in the Holy Land, regardless of whether Palestinians had no formalized government, one headed by Yasser Arafat or Mahmoud Abbas, or with Abbas as president and Hamas controlling the parliament and cabinet." —former US President Jimmy Carter, who in 1979 negotiated the Camp David Accord treaty between Israel and Egypt

Confused about the hubbub surrounding the US embassy to Israel moving to Jerusalem? Watch this brief (2:54) video for a brief, graphic history lesson from If Not Now. (Thanks Shanta.)

President Trump’s favorite pastor, Rev. Robert Jeffress, pastor of First Baptist Church, Dallas, Texas, delivered the opening prayer at the recent official opening of the US Embassy in Jerusalem in its transition from Tel Aviv. This is the same pastor who, the day before, said Jews go to hell. —Lahav Harkov, Jerusalem Post

        Later the closing prayer for the event was offered by another US pastor, John Hagee, who once said that Hitler was sent by God to draw the Jewish people into Israel.

More on God’s supposed will. Among the US representatives at the US embassy opening in Jerusalem was Sen. Lindsey Graham who commented “It’s been U.S. policy since 1995, and if you have a problem, then you need to take it up with God.” —Washington Post

¶ “In Opening Its Embassy in Jerusalem, the US Has Slammed the Door on the Peace Process.” —Mustafa Barghouti, The Nation

¶ “Moving the embassy empowers the war-makers among Palestinians and attenuates the legitimacy of Palestinian peacemakers.” —Rev. Professor Yohanna Katanacho, of the Nazareth Evangelical College and Bethlehem Bible College

Hymn of intercession. “No fine song, no impressive music / can attempt to relieve my heart / in this hour I am called to grieving / lest no others will play this part.” —John Bell’s translation and arrangement of the traditional Palestinian song, “So Much Wrong,” performed by the Wild Goose Choir

In “early in1956, the Israeli chief of staff Moshe Dayan made a famous speech at the funeral of an Israeli commander killed on the border with Gaza. What, Dayan wondered, explained the Palestinians’ ‘terrible hatred of us’? Then he answered his own question: ‘For years now they have sat in the refugee camps of Gaza, and have watched how, before their very eyes, we have turned their lands and villages, where they and their forefathers previously dwelled, into our home.’” —excerpt from Footnotes in Gaza, Joe Sacco

By the numbers. The summer 2014 Israeli invasion of Gaza killed between 2,125 and 2,310 Gazans and wounded between 10,626 and 10,895 (including 3,374 children, of whom over 1,000 were left permanently disabled). 66 Israeli soldiers, 5 Israeli civilians (including one child) and one Thai civilian were killed and 469 IDF soldiers and 261 Israeli civilians were injured. More than 7,000 homes were destroyed and an additional 89,000 homes damaged. —“2014 Israel-Gaza conflict,” Wikipedia

When only the blues will do. “Blues for Gaza,” Aguabella.

Preach it. “Jesus was born under occupation, he spent his entire life under occupation and was crushed on the cross by occupation. How we can understand the historical Jesus without understanding what occupation means, what it does and how it controls life in its entirety?” —Rev. Mitri Raheb, Lutheran pastor in Bethlehem

¶ “If I was [a Palestinian] at the right age, at some stage I would have entered one of the terror organizations.” —Ehud Barak, highly decorated officer in Israel’s army, Minister of Defense and former Prime Minister of Israel

Can’t makes this sh*t up. “We shall endeavour to expel the poor population [of Palestine] across the border unnoticed, procuring employment for it in the transit countries, but denying it any employment in our country”. —Theodor Herzl (1860-1904), founder of political Zionism, from a Personal Diary entry 12 June 1895

¶ “The so-called ‘Palestinian autonomous areas’ are Bantustans. These are restricted entities within the power structure of the Israeli apartheid system.” —former South African President Nelson Mandela

Call to the table. And there can be no peace for the Jew / Till there’s peace for the Palestinian too / May the justice of God fall down like fire / And bring a home for the Palestinian / May the mercy of God pour down like rain / And protect the Jewish people.” —Rev. Garth Hewitt, “Ten Measures of Beauty”

Right: This ad was published as a full-page ad in Israel’s most widely read newspaper, Yedioth Ahronoth.

The state of our disunion. “There is only one way toward peace. That is the recognition that our dispute concerns two just causes [that of Jews and of Palestinians] tragically thrown into opposition one to the other.” —Rabbi Edward Rettig, Rabbis for Human Rights in Israel
        Yes, I say in response. But one is an elephant, the other is a mouse. Without recognition of this premise, the conclusion will be inadequate.

Best one-liner. “Nothing, nothing justifies terrorism.” —Mahmoud Darwish (13 March 1941–9 August 2008), considered the Palestinian national poet

For the beauty of the earth. Now this is a lightning storm. (0:52 video. Thanks Linda.)

¶ This longer video (22:31) by Abby Martin provides a fuller account of this story: “The Empire Files: How Palestine Became Colonized.”

Altar call. “Sisters and brothers, lend your ears to this teaching, for it is true and lasting. Do not say with your lips, “The Spirit of the Lord! The Spirit of the Lord!” when your hearts are shackled in fear, enslaved to security. / Have you grown confused by the barking of market reports? By the demands of national security? By your 401K addiction?” —continue reading “Anointed,” a litany for worship inspired by Isaiah 61:1-2 and Luke 4:18

¶ “I am among those raised on ‘cowboy and Indian’ movies in North America, where the latter were stereotyped as barbarous, untrustworthy and bloodthirsty savages who prey on the weak and innocent. A similar portrait of Arab peoples has been painted by modern movies and news programs. Until that field of vision changes we will continue to be clueless in reading history and in charting a redemptive future.” —continue reading “House to house, field to field: Reflections on a peace mission to the West Bank”

Left: "In the Name of God, Most Gracious, Most Merciful," written in Arabic calligraphy.

Benediction. “Psalm 117: Give Thanks to the Lord” (In Arabic. Thanks Tom.)

Just yesterday Israel’s defense minister announced plans to fast-track the building of 2,500 new homes on the West Bank in 2018 for Israeli settlers. —Ilan Ben Zion, Associated Press

Recessional. “Palestine Symphony,” Murat Malay and the Istanbul Symphony Orchestra.

Lectionary for this Sunday. “. . . to provide for those who mourn in Zion—to give them a garland instead of ashes. . . .” —Isaiah 61:5a

Lectionary for Sunday next. “Let love be genuine; hate what is evil, hold fast to what is good; love one another with mutual affection; outdo one another in showing honor. . . . Extend hospitality to strangers. Bless those who persecute you; bless and do not curse them.” —Romans 12:9-14

Just for fun. “Battle Hymn of the Republic” adapted for current relevance. (4:51 video. Thanks Loren.) —Parody Project

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Featured this week on prayer&politiks

• "al-Nakba: Meditation on Israel, Palestine, and the calculus of power"

• “My soul magnifies you,” a litany for worship inspired by Luke 1:39-57 (Mary’s “Magnificat”)

• “Memorial Day preparation materials: Commentary, sermon, and other resources for worship preparation

Other features

• “House to house, field to field: Reflections on a peace mission to the West Bank,” an essay

• “Boycott, divestment and sanctions: Israel and the Occupation: We cannot ignore this contentious conversation,” an essay

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