Circle of Hope

Where were you on this date four years ago?  Has anything for you changed since?  For a 60,000 to 300,000 Iraqis it sure has.  This article has some other stats from a “why are we doing this again?” standpoint.

I remember the morning after the shock and awe began.  Several thousand of us across the states signed the Iraq Pledge of Resistance saying that if the bombing/sanctions that killed over a million Iraqis during the decade before escalated to a war that we would, in mass numbers go out to say know the day after either in non-violent civil disobedience or legal non-violent protest.

There were tons of people that morning outside the Federal Building at 6th and Market.  Over a hundred were arrested that day, a few dozen refused to pay the fine for their actions and spent a week in a Federal Detention Center.  Some of their statements in court were recorded, like this one by my buddy Michael Brix.

Especially after talking to friends after the Christian Peace Witness for Iraq in DC last Friday, I am wondering again whether our efforts are working.

I wish I was naive enough to think that tens of thousands saying NO over and over would shift foreign policy.  I’m glad I’m not naive enough to think that if we follow the rules everything will be fine.  We have to continue to live the Kingdom of God into reality-speaking the truth to the abyss, sticking the proverbial cocktail sword into the belly of the beast…and most importantly demonstrating Hope and showing another way of life.

When our efforts, when our words come out of authentic representations of life in Christ we actually have something to offer to the world.  There is hope.  Be those bless-ed‘ people.