The Great Experiment and the Great Commandment (by Phyllis Tickle)
Tomorrow is Bastille Day. We Americans don't take much notice of that these days, but once there was a time when we did. Once was the time, especially as the storm clouds of World War II were gathering over us, when school children and working folk alike stopped to acknowledge a deep and compelling affinity between America and France. Not only had France, historically speaking, always been our most faithful and dependable ally, but she was also seen, politically speaking, as the other half of the Great Experiment.
Both of us had fought wars of ferocious and egalitarian intensity against the armies of kings and of the scabrous nobility that fawned upon them. We, the people, had won those wars, the French on their side of the Atlantic and we on ours; but we had done so with a great deal of mutual help and encouragement, one from another. And we had--the French too--done all of this in the name of a shared vision, in the name of democracy.
We had fought because of our belief in government by the consent of the governed; and in both cases, we were convinced we had won our battles because of the justness and righteousness of that cause. It followed then, especially in the 1930's and 1940's of my own childhood and adolescence, that sheer patriotism required a great celebration on July 4th each summer and, ten days later, at the very least, a rousing public rendition or two of the Marseillaise, a lifting of the hat at noon, and a waving about of France's blue, white, and red in acknowledgment that together, united in principle and vision, even if separated by oceans and language, we had each secured democracy for the world and were determined to secure it still. We had established by mutual example and history, democracy's feasibility, its great utility, its role as benefactor for all people. Long live the rule of law and democratic principles in both our houses.
The first Fourth of July was two hundred and thirty-two years ago; the storming of the Bastille on
I am not a politician. God knows, it is enough in this day and age just to be Christian at some kind of serious and functional level. To the extent that I am Christian, though, it follows of necessity that what I write and what I say and the actions I take have political repercussions or consequences, for better or worse. I am not naïve enough to think otherwise. When I say I am not a politician, in other words, I simply mean to say that I have no knowledge of how to resolve all the contradictions and conflicts of interest that impede the easy execution of our common life, both domestic and foreign. I don't pretend, either, to have a professional's grasp of what all of those opposing forces are. I certainly don't claim the expertise that would be able to calculate accurately what the consequences might be of restraining any or all of those opposing forces for the sake of the common good of humanity and the on-going health of the Great Experiment.
What I do know, however, is that this July I am reading more and more about Guantanamo Bay and what we have done there. I can view again on the net pictures that have been taken in that place and understand to the depths of my soul, all over again, that something died there, that the Great Experiment was dealt something close to a fatal blow there, that the hope which birthed both the Marseillaise and the Star-Spangled Banner was mocked into impotence there.
I doubt seriously that I will hum the national anthem of France tomorrow, unless inadvertently. I certainly won't tip my hat at
That ultimately is the dark side of the Great Experiment, isn't it? That in a democracy, it is not ever some "other" or some "they" who have permitted and empowered. It is we who have done so. It is we who at Guantanamo have desecrated within a single decade the hope of two centuries and, for the Christians among us, shattered completely the second half of the Great Commandment.
Gitmo and all its kind will not undo, nor will they ever be undone. That is our truth this Summer Sunday. But, by the grace of God, there is another and redeeming truth: Gitmo and all its kind can be repented of.
May that be done in all our houses this Bastille Day and every day thereafter, for so long as we who live now, shall live.
Phyllis Tickle (www.phyllistickle.com) is the founding editor of the religion department of Publishers Weekly and author of The Words of Jesus: A Gospel of the Sayings of Our Lord and the forthcoming fall release, The Great Emergence: How Christianity Is Changing and Why. Listen, Lord - A Prayer is from God's Trombones, by James Weldon Johnson.
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Comments
"That in a democracy, it is not ever some "other" or some "they" who have permitted and empowered. It is we who have done so. It is we who at Guantanamo have desecrated within a single decade the hope of two centuries and, for the Christians among us, shattered completely the second half of the Great Commandment."
Thank you, Phyllis, for reminding us that we "the government" is not other but we. It's one of my pet peeves when folks rail against, for example, the failure of "big government" to help in the relief of poverty, while praising our military might and efficiency. The government is equally effective at justice issues and war-making, a scary thought for both sides of the aisle. "We'll never have a Savior up on Capitol Hill"-Derek Webb
Pastor Jeff
Posted by: Pastor Jeff Staples | July 13, 2008 12:46 PM
America and them,
I understand your speech to be nationalist and pro-American. However, I do not see how it is in any way in the Spirit of the Crucified and Risen Lord.
In the Lord's prayer we pray, "your kingdom and will be done on earth as in heaven." My understanding is that the kingdom of God is greater and transcends all nations, including ours.
We also pray, "Give us this day our daily bread." Do you propose eliminating this line from the Lord's prayer, or an adaptation? It sounds to me like, "Give bread to America and everyone who goes along with us."
Is the Lord we worship not the one who sends rain upon the just and the unjust?
In the spirit of the first reading in Lutheran churches for Sunday, July 20-- are you not worshiping a fraud god created by you? I love the USA, but she is not God. I ask God to bless America, and to keep all nations under his care. I pray for the day when the kingdoms of this world will become the kingdom of Christ our Lord.
Please re-read the New Testament and return to Christ.
Duh---sciple
Posted by: Duh-sciple | July 14, 2008 10:05 AM
Dear GP readers:
How do you feel about the decision, by the five Roman Catholic Republican Supreme Court Justices, which will make our streets more violent? (Guns ok in Washington, D.C.)
Posted by: L. Huguen | July 14, 2008 10:40 AM
Duh-sciple:
The rant posted by "America and them" is an anonymous e-mail circular that has been making the rounds for the past year or so (at least) and that has also been posted on right-wing blogs and Web sites.
D
Posted by: Don | July 14, 2008 11:12 AM
The America and them speech, even though a mass email type thing, and in addition to being rank idolatry and fully, I mean FULLY anti-Christ, nevertheless underscores how far from the kingdom Christianity lies.
As long as flags and crosses are held together, the kingdom Jesus taught is but a dream. Jesus, our Lord, was not American, not a democrat or republican, and not a capatilist. He did not favor war, but peace, and his kingdom was not populated by childish triumphalism, but by the poor, destitute, sinner, prostitute, the expendables that society then (and now) disregards. He would look upon most of us as part of the problem, and not the solution. And, Gitmo, as Ms. Tickle so eloquently pointed out, stands as merely one example of why that is.
God's Kingdom Now!
Posted by: inthekingdom | July 14, 2008 11:50 AM
So Mod,
You prefer an eye for an eye? It seems as if your belief is that ungodly treatment of our captured soldiers warrants ungodly treatment of people we suspect to be terrorists, and that such tit-for-tat equivalence is ok. But did not Jesus say directly that an eye for an eye is not good enough? Instead direct violence is to be countered by militant combative NON-VIOLENCE by offering the other cheek. Hmmm. How does a Christian justify war and horrendous acts of violence anyway? Where is the kingdom here?
Posted by: inthekingdom | July 14, 2008 12:28 PM
Moderatelad: So if we treat them nice, we can deprive them of human rights?
Pastor Jeff
Posted by: Pastor Jeff Staples | July 14, 2008 12:57 PM
Moderatelad: Some of these "enemy combatants" (a fabricated and illegal term void of definition in reality)are innocent and all of them are being held against their will without knowledge of charges against them. One of the few cases being brought involves charges based upon a confession obtained through torture. How would you vote as a jury member if that was the case you were presented? If there was a war, then these persons may be classified as POWS (as is the case for the Nazis) and then your Geneva convention argument may be relevant.
"This war as far as I can see will never be 'over' as there will always be a fraction that will be attacking the west." You may yet have the opportunity to experience the pleasures of Gitmo if the President deems your kind to be "enemies of the West". Then you may know what they are being deprived of (hint: "with liberty and justice for all"). How shocking that, after a stay at hotel gitmo with it's attending inconveniences, you would find them opposing the US in their homeland. They are probably trying to ensure the eradication of the gitmo mentality from their homeland.
Pastor Jeff
Posted by: Pastor Jeff Staples | July 14, 2008 3:49 PM
Is the French Revolution really something to be celebrated? Many educated people of the time period felt it most certainly wasn’t and shouldn’t be compared to the American Revolution.* They argued that, unlike the Americans, the French simply swept away a flawed but established order, and, in the end, replaced it with nothing but anarchy and chaos.
Here’s Edmund Burke giving his thoughts on the newfound “liberty” in France.
“When I see the spirit of liberty in action, I see a strong principle at work; and this, for a while, is all I can possibly know of it. The wild gas, the fixed air, is plainly broke loose; but we ought to suspend our judgment until the first effervescence is a little subsided, till the liquor is cleared, and until we see something deeper than the agitation of a troubled and frothy surface. I must be tolerably sure, before I venture publicly to congratulate men upon a blessing, that they have really received one…I should, therefore, suspend my congratulations on the new liberty of
France until I was informed how it had been combined with government, with public force, with the discipline and obedience of armies, with the collection of an effective and well-distributed revenue, with morality and religion, with the solidity of property, with peace and order, with civil and social manners. All these (in their way) are good things, too, and without them liberty is not a benefit whilst it lasts, and is not likely to continue long. The effect of liberty to individuals is that they may do what they please; we ought to see what it will please them to do, before we risk congratulations which may be soon turned into complaints…Considerate people, before they declare themselves, will observe the use which is made of power and particularly of so trying a thing as new power in new persons of whose principles, tempers, and dispositions they have little or no experience, and in situations where those who appear the most stirring in the scene may possibly not be the real movers.”
By the time it was over, the French Revolution was a colossal failure and huge waste of life, setting back the cause of liberty for decades in that country. The author of this Sojourners commentary has lived longer than I have and perhaps knows of a time when Americans celebrated on the 14th. I’ve never known anyone to celebrate Bastille Day, but perhaps over the years Americans have read a little Burke, Adams, Hamilton, Madison and other who recognized, even in that day, the disaster that the French Revolution really was and have decided to abstained from whistling the Marseillaise.
*Yes, I’m well aware that there were negative ramifications of the American Revolution and that the system set up afterwards was far from perfect. There’s no need to respond with cries of “But what about slavery/Abu Ghraib/Carrot Top/etc?!!”
Posted by: Eric | July 14, 2008 4:48 PM
Eric, you raise interesting points that should be taken seriously. There were many Americans, almost certainly a majority, who _initially_ welcomed the French Revolution. The most ardent were members of what was then called the Democratic-Republican party, led by Jefferson and Madison. Indeed, Jefferson wrote, foolishly in my opinion, "rather than it [the French Revolution] should have failed I would have seen the half the earth desolated; were there but an Adam and Eve left in every country, and left free, it would be better than it now is." (Aaron Burr stated that, if Jefferson really believed the latter, he was either "a fool or a madman.")
At first, even conservative Federalists applauded the Revolution: John Jay, John Marshall, Alexander Hamilton, George Washington (see Stanley Elkins and Eric McKitrick, The Age of Federalism, esp. 309-310).
Most of those same Americans, including the Jeffersonians, turned against the Revolution when it entered the Jacobin phase and the guillotine started running 24-7 (James Monroe, a young Republican hothead, was a notable exception). As one observer put it, "The Revolution, like Saturn [in ancient Greco-Roman mythology], devours its own children."
Thereafter, for Americans the French Revolution remained an object lesson in how a political revolution can go wrong. It was often contrasted with the more "moderate" American revolution.
Crane Brinton's classic Anatomy of Revolution (1938; rev. in the mid-1960s), which compares the English, American, French, and Russian revolutions, is still worth reading for those interested.
Posted by: carl copas | July 14, 2008 5:58 PM
Is Modlad advocating that we treat people the way they are treated in the Mideast? Is that what he thinks is better than the way we normally handle criminal prosecutions in this country? If so, then he obviously does not think much of our system of justice. Or do we just treat people with fairness if they don't look like terrorist, aka Muslims? If we have a system we think the rest of the world should emulate, then we should demonstrate to the world that it does work and treat the so-called terrorists in Gitmo like any other criminal case. That means, first, bringing charges (complying with habeas corpus),then having a trial before declaring someone guilty of being a terrorist and only then punishing them.
Modlad seems to think the initial steps are just an inconvenient technicality.
If we start to behave more like "them" and less like us, we have already destroyed our way of life from within.
Posted by: JF | July 15, 2008 12:35 AM
They are not US citizans and therefore have no place in our courts.
I think the Supreme Court just ruled otherwise.
But besides that, it has to do more with demonstrating to the world that we are willing to honoring our own principles than anything else.
Peace,
Posted by: Don | July 15, 2008 6:14 AM
Wow! What a horribly constructed sentence. It should have read:
But besides that, it has to do more with demonstrating to the world that we are willing to honor our own principles than anything else.
D
Posted by: Don | July 15, 2008 6:40 AM
Carl, thanks for the tip on "Anatomy of Revolution". I'll look it up!
Posted by: Eric | July 15, 2008 9:37 AM
So you agree with everything that the Supreme Court has ruled on and there is no way to change or influence their decisions?
No, I don't, in fact. I think the recent gun case was wrongfully decided, for example.
But the principles that the accused has a right to his/her day in court, the right to counsel, and the right to know what he/she is accused of are foundational to our system of justice. To thwart those foundational principles, even in the case of non-citizens as has been done at Guantanamo, violates our principles and makes us hypocrites in the eyes of the world (especially since we're so big on preaching the virtues of democracy to them).
I believe that this is the first time in history that they have ruled on an issue that is part of a war prior to the conflict ending.
We are not legally at war. There has been no constitutionally-mandated Congressional declaration of war.
Peace,
Posted by: Don | July 15, 2008 11:24 AM
The Supreme Court gave them access to the federal court system. Whether that was a correct decision or not, the detainees were not being given access to counsel, were being held indefinitely without knowing the charges against them, and were not allowed to petition the court on the grounds of habeas corpus. Whether before a federal civilian judge or before a military court, do you really think that the mere fact of non-citizenship should have allowed the government to hold them without even a chance for them to learn why?
Posted by: Don | July 15, 2008 12:16 PM
OK - it is not a war...Bush had no right to start this illegal war - which is it?
Well, one of the reasons it was illegal was because we had no Congressional declaration. Two sides of the same coin.
D
Posted by: Don | July 15, 2008 12:18 PM
Following Modlad's reasoning, our constitutional system is just for US citizens, it will not work for non-citizens. And this is what we are trying to tell the world??? We are some kind of exclusive club that only the privileged are allowed to enter?? He seems to be looking for ways to avoid applying democratic laws of justice rather than ways of treating people fairly. In my view, that is neither an American or Christian way.
Posted by: JF | July 15, 2008 1:27 PM
So the standard of behaviour that we should use to measure our action is that of the "radicals"??
Posted by: JF | July 15, 2008 2:41 PM
Moderatelad: Are US citizens the only persons with human rights?
Pastor Jeff
Posted by: Pastor Jeff Staples | July 15, 2008 3:23 PM
Mod --
Who are the "they" who are the enemy? Who is so easily recognizable as guilty without a trial that you can justify destroying "them". You accuse "them" of wanton killing, yet you seem to advocate the same thing. That's why it never ends. No one seems to want to say it stops here.
It is not my standard I am referring to but yours. You seem to justify destroying others because they belong to a group that you despise. And because they have done evil things, then you seem to say that justifies us in doing evil in return. That is not what Christ preached. And that is not the foundation of our justice system, much as you might like to think so.
Posted by: JF | July 15, 2008 11:40 PM
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