The Christian Imagination

As long as wer’re talking politics, I thought I would repost what I wrote on another blog back in December 2006. Rumsfeld is no longer in the picture, but his legacy lives on. Oh, and I just realized their website is no longer there, so my links to source material are no longer valid. I may have the source documents around, or feel free to do a search for the Project for a New American Century.

I was just reading a post from Jim Wallis’ blog. I found the following quote really interesting.

And don’t start in about Saddam. I was against him when Washington treated him like a pal—guess who was the liason to the Butcher of Baghdad: Donald Rumsfeld. We helped Saddam in his war with Iran and even helped him target his use of WMD’s against Iranians.

Rumsfeld, along with Dick Cheney, Gary Bauer, William J. Bennett, Jeb Bush, and Steve Forbes are part of a neo-conservative think tank called The Project for a New American Century. Back in 2000, they published a report called Rebuilding America’s Defenses. The report is not without merit, but it does draw some controversial concluions. Here are a few quotes:

About the US enforcing global security, not just US security (later called a Pax America):

At no time in history has the international security order been as conducive to American interests and ideals. The challenge for the coming century is to preserve and enhance this “American peace.”

How this security is meant to favor US interests:

The true cost of not meeting our defense requirements will be a lessened capacity for American global leadership and, ultimately, the loss of a global security order that is uniquely friendly to American principles and prosperity.

The following quote is from the NAC report Iraq: Setting the Record Straight. Do you know who said it?

What if [Saddam] fails to comply and we fail to act, or we take some ambiguous third route, which gives him yet more opportunities to develop this program of weapons of mass destruction….Well, he will conclude that the international community has lost its will. He will then conclude that he can go right on and do more to rebuild an arsenal of devastating destruction. And some day, some way, I guarantee you he’ll use this arsenal.

That’s right. Bill Clinton. The NAC details all the reasons why they feel the Iraq war was justified. If you’d like to read a 100 page detailed explanation from the source, there it is.

This letter, written by the NAC to Bill Clinton in 1998 is rather eye-opening. They talk with a sense of urgency about the threat of Saddam, WMDs, and removing Saddam from power.

This article by Duane Shank of Sojourners (a Christian organization) explains in more detail.

So there you have it. We helped Saddam build his empire. The man who helped bring him down helped build him up, Mr. Rumsfeld. The NAC, including Chaney and Rumsfeld were largely responsible for the George W. Bush Administration’s foreign policy. The NAC wanted Saddam out of power, period, back in 1998. Their 2000 report reinforced that Saddam was a threat. This report also talks about maintaining a Pax Americana and policing the world, with US interests at the forefront. Thus, any talk linking Iraq to Al Qaeda as a justification is just that, a justification for what they already intended to do.

Yes, Saddam was a threat, but it’s hard to take talk about freeing the Iraqi people seriously when we don’t apply our ‘ethic’ consistently. Genocide is going on in Sudan, and we are doing what? China commits human rights violations (as do others), and we use economics as leverage. For the record, I do not think the Iraq invasion was just. When we strike first (a pre-emptive war) and there are significant civilian casualties, that breaks two just war principles. Do a search for ‘Just War’ in Google and see what you come up with.

Has the US ever done anything wrong? Is there any legitimate reason why anyone in the world would hate us? Yes and yes. The US has done a lot of good in the world too. We are loved and hated, rationally and irrationally. I embrace my country. I am an American. We have done great things as a country and made mistakes, and sometimes do things that are questionable (CIA anyone?). I was reading Thomas Merton once and he was talking about the lunacy of the Superpowers focus on Nuclear Weapons and destruction. Is something as powerful as a nuke ever justified? Is modern war even just? Two examples that I have a hard time with the Atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki and the Bombing of Dresden. The Japanese cities were more significant militarily than Dresden. Still, all were civilian population centers. Dresden is still questionable. It is argued that nuking Hiroshima and Nagasaki ended the war sooner and saved lives in the long run. If true, that is really disturbing to me. In the battle of us versus them, is it as simple as pragmatically deciding that our lives are worth more than theirs, and therefore, any means necessarily to win is acceptable, even if it means destroying thousands or millions of lives, even innocent lives? As a Christian, I just have a hard time with that, as it just doesn’t line up with the Gospel of Jesus Christ.

It’s a complex world though, where people have layered motives for their actions, and where everybody is not as good as we’d like to believe. There are people who do evil things, and who will not stop doing evil things unless they are threatened with violence, and so we use violence. We seem to be rather uncomfortable though with the notion that there can be evil in our own hearts. We don’t like to think that we can possibly do anything wrong.

While violence is part of the world we live in, as a Christian, I believe in a higher ideal. Too often I think we take the easy way out, the way of the world, the pragmatic solution. Non-violent peacemaking isn’t always the best solution, but you know, if we took it seriously, and if we used it more often, I wholeheartedly believe it would be more effective. What’s that you say? It doesn’t work? It’s not reality? I beg to differ. Read A Force More Powerful: A Century of Non-Violent Conflict

This is a post a long time coming. I’ve debated with myself how much I even want to talk about politics, versus art and imagination. But really, imagination is a key component in this discussion. Walter Brueggemann, a Bible scholar, wrote The Prophetic Imagination several years ago, and talked about how rulers often discourage imagination and out-of-the-box thinking because it makes for a society that is easier to control, and makes it easier for those in power to stay in power. Prime examples of this can be seen in some African countries where the rulers live large and their people are without hope.

In the United States, we’re more in danger of becoming comfortable, lethargic, and apathetic, and still losing our imagination. But every 4 years, we get to be at each other’s throats over the Presidential election. Now, the next leader of the world’s most powerful country is not insignficant, but sometimes I get the impression that this is all people care about, as if there aren’t a number of other things people could do with their lives that matter, beyond arguing and voting for a single candidate.

Now, even with a moderate Republican and liberal Democrat, it seems people are settling into the liberal vs. conservative, Republican vs. Democrat camps to talk about how the other guy will bring about the end of civilization, like people said about Bush, like people said about Clinton, and on and on.

And the part that really annoys me is the oversimplification of it all. Somehow all the complex issues and complex people are able to be reduced into soundbites and various logical fallacies, and that’s assuming the candidates stances and platforms aren’t just words said to get votes. Yet, not only can we reduce the candidates, we can simplify so much that one side is always right and the other side is always wrong. Once we get there, we can just say, “Well, they’re a liberal,” and the discussion can be dismissed with those words. And actually, in a recent discussion I overheard, a guy said that Emergents were usually liberals and then equated them with socialists. Reductionism at it’s finest.

Funny thing is, I used to be squarely on the Religious Right. I went to Christian Coalition meetings, was a Republican Committeeman for a few years, was in the audience of the Rush Limbaugh show, met David Barton of Wallbuilders, and on and on. And after 4 years of going to a Christian college, I stopped thinking about just the USA and started thinking of myself as more of a world Christian, such that what’s in the best interest of the USA just doesn’t always seem like the Christian thing to do, and where the pragmatism (whatever works, common sense, etc) of Conservatism seems to rely on the wisdom of men too much while ignoring the life of faith…faith that sometimes propels us to aim for ideals. Prime example, I’ve come to be a big believer in fair trade with the 3rd world, a cause that is mostly championed by liberals. And why do I believe in it? Because, to me, it seems to be the more Biblical stance.

And so I have a hard time in election year, because not only does my search for truth sometimes lead me to different sides of the equation, but sometimes I end up off the line altogether. We can get so caught up in the dichotomies between each side that we may fail to see that there is no line, but that there are multiple choices in some cases, if we would use our imagination and actually think about it.

That’s one of the dangers of taking the Bible seriously, we may be challenged. My journey has led me to more of a moderate political AND religious stance, not because I can’t make up my mind, but because I have made choices, and they are sometimes conservative, sometimes liberal, and sometimes neither. It also forces me to look at things more wholistically. One comment I just read said that Obama is the least pro-life presidential candidate in a long time. If true (and you never know these days from what people say since there is rarely a source), and I’ll assume it is for now, then there’s the second part of the comment: thus, how could any Christian possibly consider voting for him? I honestly don’t know who I’m going to vote for because I want to research these guys myself and come to my own conclusions, and I find it insulting to have someone else reduce whether I should vote for someone to one issue crafted using problematic terminology. What about the whole body of work that the candidate has put together, coupled with who they are as a person? And while I oppose abortion, I have trouble reconciling the notion of pro-life with pro-torture, pro-war, pro-death penalty, no fair trade, and other typically conservative stances. All that to say, there is nothing simple about these issues, because there are a lot of factors surrounding them.

There’s a lot in this post that could be debated or that people could take issue with. I’m okay with that. If you want me to elaborate on anything, let me know. And if you flat-out disagree, you’re welcome to tell me that.

I’ve been reading through Taking it to the Streets this year. It’s a great book about how to live out faith as an artist, and gives some awesome examples of artists being incarnational on the streets of their city.

One story I found very cool is that of John Bjerklie, who started attending a Bible study targeting the homeless of New York City. He was invited to lead the Bible study through art, which he had done for five years at the time the book was written.

One of the things that I always did that helped me in my growth as an artist was I would read the Bible and I’d try to draw. So with the homeless people, we read the Bible and try to draw, I mean it’s about as basic as it gets. We would say, “What’s the picture that comes to your mind?” And then we’d sit down and we’d try to draw it, and it was just mind-blowing what would come out. (Corbitt & Nix-Early, 133)

That is amazing on so many levels, and profound in its simplicity. He also put together a Christmas calendar yearly featuring drawings from the Bible study members. All profits went to meet the needs of the homless group members.

Corbitt, J. Nathan & Nix-Early, Vivian. Taking it to the Streets. Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Books. 2003.

As part of my involvement in the coffee house community that we call Everyday Joe’s Coffee House, I mix sound for about 2 concerts a month, and have done so for 3 years or so.

I love live music, and this gives me a good incentive to not only hear their music, to but serve the musicians and get to know them a little better. It also gets me outside myself, as I have to be attentive to bringing out the best sound possible for any given song, to help the musicians enjoy themselves, and to keep the audience in mind as well. It’s rather surreal, really.

And while the sound is very important, so is the human element. Caring about people, and caring about the sound, and encouraging the musicians, and learning to empathize better with all that they have been through lately (driving, touring, lack of sleep, etc). We have all sorts of musicians from all sorts of places playing all sorts of styles come through our doors and grace our stage. Some share our faith in Christ, others don’t, but every weekend, we have an opportunity to love on them, and listen to them, and hear them, and it’s wonderful. The really cool part is how we’ve been able to build an extended family with some musicians and our coffee house community.

It just occured to me today that my life as a part-time volunteer sound tech is very relevant to this blog, yet I haven’t talked much about it, so this is a start. We hear a lot of great independent and soon-to-be-more-famous musicians, and there are some great ones to know. I may share some concert experiences, and who knows, maybe eventually I’ll have an occasional interview.

And if you are a musician and would like to play at our coffee house in Fort Collins, Colorado, let us know.