Thinking about Gaza

The news today is not encouraging. Israel dropped leaflets to warn the people of Gaza that things are going to get worse. Frankly, I don't know how things could get worse for the average resident of the region. Israel has controlled trade and access to Gaza for years, so health crises and food shortages are common. The economy of Gaza has been dying for years, so there are no jobs. Relief workers, even during the current war, are turned away at the borders of Gaza by the Israelis or hampered in their work. When people are wounded or trapped in the rubble of a bombed building, rescue workers are denied access or delayed in their response to try to help. According to UN reports, more than a third of the dead and wounded are clearly civilans - many of them children. And, Israel started this attack with the vow to destroy Hamas forever. I wonder whether this round of leaflet dropping was not an attempt by Israel to justify whatever happens to the civilan population in the days ahead - kind of a pre-emptive response to any further bombings of schools or police facilities or whatever else.

The complexities of the Palestinian-Israeli situation are overwhelming. There are no easy or quick answers. No one can argue that either side is completely innocent. Yet, I wonder if Israel will consider this current action successful unless they kill everyone who lives in Gaza. If the trigger for this military action was the on-going rocket attacks into Israeli territory by Hamas, how can the Israeli government be confident that those attacks will cease as long as anyone remains alive in Gaza? If it moves to that final answer to the Hamas problem, then what will the world say? At what point will there be enough death to force the world's leaders to force Israel to halt the military action? At what point will leaders in the Muslim world try to broker a just living situation for the people of Gaza?

One common charge I have read and heard from some pundits in the West is, "Why don't Muslims condemn attacks by terrorists and suicide bombers?" It seems that the perceived lack of response was a justification for whatever happened to Muslims. It was almost a "well, they are getting what they deserve since they are not willing to condemn the suicide bombers" attitude. At the time of the attacks in Mumbai, Hussein Rashid, on the website www.islamicate.com, posted a lengthy reply to answer such a charge. The piece is too long to be included here, but you can see it in its entirety there, if you care to do so. Let me quote just a snippet here,
Part of moving beyond this simplistic idea of Muslims is to move beyond simplistic pronouncements. Muslims are constantly condemning the violent acts committed in the name of Islam. The reality is most Muslims do not communicate in European languages, and those that do are fragmented over the various European languages.

While there have been English language condemnations of terrorist attacks and suicide bombers, they have largely been ignored by western news outlets. The overwhelming majority of the condemnations for such attacks have been in the languages of the Muslim people around the world, of which there are about 100. That is where they will do the most good and how they will do the most good.

I hope, for the sake of the citizens of Gaza, that there is a miracle and the killings will cease - for the sake of all people.

Roger Williams and Church-State Relations

I recently finished reading a book, The Wordy Shipmates written by Sarah Vowell, loaned to me by a member of First Congregational Chuch. It is a delightful perspective on the story of the Puritans and, in particular, John Winthrop.

One of Winthrop's challenges as governor of the colony was what to do with Roger Williams. Williams was a thorn in the side to the colony. Eventually, Roger Williams was forced to leave Massachusetts. He, and other like-minded individuals, founded Providence, Rhode Island. Williams became a Baptist and started the first Baptist church in America, which I have visited.

When the small party agreed to live together in community, they agreed to what is known as the Providence Agreement. This covenant outlined how they would be in relationship with each other -

We whose names are hereunder, desirous to inhabit in the town of Providence, do promise to subject ourselves in active and passive obedience to all such orders or agreements as shall be made for the public good of the body in an orderly way, by the major consent of present inhabitants, masters of families, incorporated together in a Towne fellowship, and others whom they shall admit unto them only in civil things.

One of the important things about this agreement was the defined separation of state and church responsibilities. You note that this covenant specified the agreements or orders made by the governing councils in Providence would only deal with civil things and not religious things. Thus, for example, the government of Providence could not punish a person for missing Sunday services as would happen in Massachusetts.

So, on August 20, 1637, a group of colonists on American soil clearly delineated between the civil sphere and the religious sphere. Long before Jefferson's famous letter of 1802 to the Baptists in Danbury Connecticut in which Jefferson wrote: Believing with you that religion is a matter which lies solely between man & his god, that he owes account to none other for his faith or his worship, that the legitimate powers of government reach actions only, and not opinions, I contemplate with sovereign reverence that act of the whole American people which declared that their legislature should make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof, thus building a wall of separation between church and state., Roger Williams put forth the principle.

An Easy Way To Do Good

Perhaps with the Puritan heritage behind both Congregationalism and Baptist life, my ecclesial homes, I should be thinking about strenuous ways to do good and not easy ones. Nonetheless, there are three sites I would recommend to all who resolved to "do good" in 2009" or who should have resolved that:
1) the website family at - www.hungersite.com
2) www.redjellyfish.com
3) http://freerice.com

You will probably have to register an e-mail address at the first two, but I have been clicking on them for 5+ years and never had them use my e-mail in any bad way. I would hope that everyone who looks at this blog will start using them and encourage their friends to do so as well.