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June, 2002
Audrey Mazur amazur@plgsc.org:

The same day I was asked to write for this site I was also working on a violence prevention curriculum for young people. It's a project designed to teach cooperation skills, conflict resolution, bullying prevention, etc. Coming to the final lessons of the curriculum, I began to think about the need to address the issue of revenge.

When the research came out about the circumstances surrounding recent school shootings, the prevailing conclusion was that the kids who did the shooting were not the kids most often thought of as violent-- the "bullies"-- but rather, they were the "victims" of severe and prolonged bullying. The shooters were typically kids who felt they simply could not bear one more experience of humiliation, degradation or violence. They decided to take control. They sought revenge. Even when the price of revenge was death.

The FBI published the leading report on the school shootings. Governmental and nonprofit agencies now rally behind the concept of bullying prevention. Certainly a good and worthy cause. But I must wonder, when will our government develop its own bullying prevention curriculum and then practice it? I wonder which of our governmental agencies has recognized the parallels between suicidal school shootings and suicidal bombings? Humiliation, degradation, violence. Revenge. And so it seems to me that in some ways the behavior of our nation's children foreshadowed the events that were to come on September 11.

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June 18, 2002
Chris Bowman, pastor, Martinsburg Memorial Church of the Brethren, Martinsburg, PA mburgcob@nb.net:

The attack on America's symbols of financial and military power by a ragtag group of Islamic militants and the respondent attack on Afghanistan by the US Military and CIA are cause for deep sorrow and confession. Our sorrow is born in the sense of loss--- the loss of life, the loss of imagined safety, and the recognition of the enormous gap between our wealth and the extreme poverty in much of the world.

There is also a call for confession. Our complicity in the financing and social acceptance of a military-industrial complex, the ambiguity of our institutional church in the face of evil and violence, and even our acceptance of a national mind set that says "protect me at all costs" all cry out for confession and repentance.

The Spirit of God seems to call for bravery to respond to such times of violence and crookedness with peace and "straightness". It is a bravery I often lack since my reactive response to violence seems to be a violence (emotional or intellectual) of its own.

I pray for strength to be honest and peace-centered in responding.

Aristotle wrote "Honesty is speaking the right truth to the right person at the right time in the right way for the right reason." And on responding to violence, Walter Wink notes "Killing the terrorist may be the lesser evil, but it is still, for all that, evil. Violence, even in the hands of duly constituted authorities, is still violence, and we must begin to wean ourselves from dependency on it" (Engaging the Powers, 237). The Jesus-way of giving peace is not the same as the world's way (John 14:27).

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January 10, 2002
Dale W. Brown (Elizabethtown, PA):

Both wars, the Vietnam war and the one today, began with strong support of the American people. Substitute “terrorists” for “communists” and you discern a prevailing atmosphere of hate. The longer the previous war continued, the more the anti-war movement grew. We are promised now that the present war may be with us for many years. In both wars, the counter-culture movements fight for civil liberties as a part of peace and justice movements. (The producers of movies like Majestic prophetically see this connection.) Both wars have involved terrorist acts like death from the skies. But unique in recent history is the phenomenon that American people are victims as well as perpetuators of such terrorist acts. In both wars (Vietnam and this one), Christians who take Jesus’ nonviolent teachings seriously understand more existentially the radical nonconformity of our forebears in the faith.

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December 17, 2001
Gene Roop, president, Bethany Theological Seminary (Richmond, IN):

There has been a sense that there is no peace witness if we don't all agree what it is. But between generations, there are many different ways to bear witness to the fact that God's direction in the world is toward shalom, and that violence is not the way.

I think of my grandfather, with whom I did not agree about peace witness. He was a classical Anabaptist, held the strict sense of two kingdoms theology. He couldn't understand his grandson, formed in the 1960s, who wanted to write letters, try to influence the political process, etc.

I think also of Andrew Cordier, who tried to be a part of bringing justice and peace to the world through his work with the United Nations– he was part of the executive department in charge of peacemaking. Many members of the church disowned him entirely! He thought he was living out his heritage and others thought he was betraying it.

Is my grandfather irrelevant, and is Andrew Cordier a betrayal? Or are both a part of the living tradition? (And I'm not at the same place as either one!)

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November 14, 2001
Kres Lipscomb, pastor, Springfield First Church of the Brethren (Springfield, IL):

I don't think the attack and now the war has changed the overall focus of our lives as Christians, but it has given it a different specific. If we are about our business of following the Prince of Peace in whatever that means to us, then there is always a specific focus. This is a new specific focus, closer to home, that touches us more directly again. In times when we "weren't at war" I have been to Ft. Benning (in Columbus, GA) for the witness against the School of the Americas and to the Capitol for other peace-related events. We are never without a specific focus if we are willing to take a look at what is going on around the world. When your own country is involved in various ways, you respond to it with eyes wide open. In this day and age, whatever people say about peace, I hope they say it with their eyes wide open because it is not going to received well by some people.

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November 7, 2001
Erin Matteson, pastor, Faith Church of the Brethren (Batavia, IL):

We must begin with education and dialogue, and not underestimate the need for that. We must create the atmosphere and the foundation for that communication. The yearning and the need for it are very great.

I am finding community-wide that there is a great desire and a yearning to reach out to other people, to commune or connect on a human level. For me as a person of faith, this is the place for us to begin so that people can be further led or nurtured in their faith. We need opportunities to talk about every aspect of what's going on right now. Opportunities to reflect and to make decisions. We must not shirk from our role in providing a forum for this. That is where I am at personally in terms of the peace witness.

I am reminded again and again by how rich and deep and multifaceted our peace witness truly is. We can celebrate this. For me, these events have solidified, brought home, made me more committed to who we are as a peace church than anything else ever could have. I could hear others who came before feeling so passionate and committed to the peace church, but now for me in my generation these events really give me the opportunity to say "Yes, it is important." I am already more connected and convicted.

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October 29, 2001
Shirley Boyer a member of the La Verne Church of the Brethren, who was a main organizer for that community's accompaniment of Muslim schoolchildren in the area, shares:

Never in my wildest dreams did I think how this would blossom and be such a blessing. We weren't there for protection so much as to be a presence, expressing our solidarity. I thought it was going to be a 1-2 day stint. We had actually begun to wean away from accompanying but once the bombing started, we found ourselves back there.

A big thing that I realize is how much I judged people by their clothing and outer appearance because I was surprised to see how much they are like me. We do worship one God. We have come together as human beings one to another. We forget to get out of the box sometimes, because we let what they wear stop us. It was a big revelation in my life to see how similar we were.

All we were doing was standing out there smiling, waving, greeting, as the children arrived in the morning. I never dreamed how much they would appreciate our being there. It gave the kids confidence to return.

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Last updated: October 1, 2002

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