Heya Seagoon,
First of all, I hope your son is doing fine.
As to your response, it's appreciated. Although it's a rare thing for me, it's nevertheless always nice to see you put the thought and effort into the posts you make.
As to the content of your response, I must say that my questions regarding your stances on these issues remain. Yes, you've explained how your religion justifies it, offering up this in another thread:
"Here is a brief outline of what general rules of just war Christian theologians have distilled from scripture."
It's amusing to note that in the seven points that follow, each can be soundly swatted down when applied to the current war in Iraq. Likewise, they can also be defended (dubiously, in my opinion.) That's fine. But what that leaves us with is theologians cherry picking the bible for a set of criteria that would justify war, and then a theologian (in this case you) coming down in support of a particular war based on what is clearly a questionable interpretation of how this war actually meets that criteria.
It seems to me that spiritual leaders, even if giving themselves a green light to support a war based on an interpretation of the bible, should then make sure that the criteria they bind themselves to be doubly, triply, and quadruply checked and met by the facts. In other words, spiritual leaders should error on the side of peace by default. That's just my opinion of course, and I don't wanna tell you guys how to do your jobs or anything.
Erhm, but here's what the guys who actually do your job said today:
"We lament with special anguish the war in Iraq, launched in deception and violating global norms of justice and human rights."
This came from a coalition of American churches representing the World Council of Churches and includes more than 350 mainstream Protestant, Anglican and Orthodox churches. It was the largest gathering of Christian churches in nearly a decade. They denounced the war, "accusing Washington of "raining down terror" and apologizing to other nations for "the violence, degradation and poverty our nation has sown."
Also, on Friday, "the U.S. National Council of Churches - which includes many WCC members - released a letter appealing to Washington to close the Guantanamo Bay detention facility and saying reports of alleged torture violated "the fundamental Christian belief in the dignity of the human person."
It goes on:
"Our country responded (to the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks) by seeking to reclaim a privileged and secure place in the world, raining down terror on the truly vulnerable among our global neighbors ... entering into imperial projects that seek to dominate and control for the sake of national interests," said the statement. "Nations have been demonized and God has been enlisted in national agendas that are nothing short of idolatrous."
....and on:
"The churches said they had "grown heavy with guilt" for not doing enough to speak out against the Iraq war and other issues. The statement asked forgiveness for a world that's "grown weary from the violence, degradation and poverty our nation has sown."
See.... Now this is more like it.
But I'm not sure how it squares with your approach to this. What you've done instead is to first point out that passages in the bible make war rational under certain circumstances, and when ambiguities clearly exist as applied to these rationales, you come down on the side of war. You choose to error on the side of war.
Then you don't denounce torture, but minimize it by saying "Korans flushed down a toilet" or "human pyramids" or "a few Brits put the boot in." Clearly you have no understanding of what's been taking place, or choose to downplay it for us by choosing to describe it in the ways you do. And... you go one further and support the curtailing constitutional freedoms in order that these things not be discussed.
I guess we have some disagreement here, so... well, there ya go.
