Troubling Rhetoric On Iran



Every day, it seems, the rhetoric about Iran gets ratcheted up. There was that Congressional resolution about the Republican Guard. There were statements from the Veep on making sure Iran doesn't get its hands on nuclear weaponry (stated in ways reminiscent of statements made about Iraq prior to an earlier unwarranted invasion), and then the President's eerie warnings about preventing WW III -- ironically by starting it, if we read between the lines correctly -- then there were the statements of policy most recently by the Secretary of State.
Taken together the statements are ominous. Hopefully Congress is awake and not asleep at the wheel. "Pre-emptive" war against Iran will only inflame the region and drive a wedge more fully between the US and any allies it has left. That "coalition of the willing" will be indeed small.
Brian McLaren writes a strongly worded response in God's Politics, that needs a good hearing. He writes:


I am disgusted, concerned, appalled, and furious about the current saber-rattling of our government - so reminiscent of the buildup to the invasion of Iraq. My feelings intensify in many of our presidential candidates' forums, where each candidate seems to be in a hissing contest, declaring that he or she is the loudest hisser against terrorism - as if the only danger in the world is posed by an evil "them" and not by evil resident within us. Our Congress' bipartisan vote last month, which labeled the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps a terrorist organization, seems to me to be handing our president a "go to war free" card, another rather frightening development.

He writes further:

On top of these fears, I suspect that many of my fellow Christians will, in the name of God and Jesus and Christianity and the Bible, support and justify a preemptive war on Iran before and after it happens - no matter how unprovoked, no matter how brutal, and no matter how foolish and costly, both financially and morally.


As the church we must say no and do so on the basis of a faith committed to peace.


Politically we must also say no to a President out of control. I think I'm in agreement with the assessment of LA Times columnist Rosa Brooks, Bush and Cheney shouldn't be impeached, they need to be committed for they are acting as if they're MAD. To expand the war, which we don't have resources enough now to complete, is insane.
The poster is from Sojonet.

Comments

Anonymous said…
Bob, you continue to comment on a broad range of topics that inform and entertain us. Though diverse in topic, they end up helping us see our world through the eyes of faith. Keep up the good, and I know, hard work.

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