Longtime New York Times war correspondent Chris Hedges describes what he has observed about inter-ethnic conflicts that lead to war, ethnic cleansing and genocide in the book, War Is A Force That Gives Us Meaning. This book, despite the title, is one of the most powerful anti-war books I have ever read:

 "The ethnic conflicts and insurgencies of our time, whether between Serbs and Muslims or Hutus and Tutsis, are not religious wars.  They are not clashes between cultures or civilizations , nor are they the result of ancient ethnic hatreds.  They are manufactured wars, born out of the collapse of civil societies, perpetuated by fear, greed, and paranoia and they are run by gangsters, who rise up from the bottom of their own societies and terrorize all, including those they purport to protect"

All these wars are proceeded by years of "hate propaganda and lies"   I fear that there is a lot of hate propaganda in our civil and political life today as immigrants and Muslims are demonized by mainstream politicians, religious leaders, and media figures.  I think the motives are mixed, but mostly base.  Politicians use messages of hate to inflame and engage their voter base and call on people's fear for their votes.  Religious leaders can get national attention by saying, as some have, that Islam is a religion of hate or not a true religion at all.  Talk show hosts and public commentators seem to compete with each other to say more extreme and hateful things about Latinos and Muslims for a high stakes game of ratings, book sales and influence.  Lost in all of that are human beings who like the rest of us wish for peace, safety, economic security and the right to practice their faith and raise their families.  Laws like that in Arizona and the deliberate distortion of facts in the 9-11 Mosque controversy are having a corrosive effect on our civil discourse.  Hateful speech becomes more and more the norm and more and more acceptable.  It leads to the human rights abuses we are seeing in our country today....and it could lead to much worse. 

We are not immune from this hatred in San Diego.  In a previous blog I wrote about my dismay upon seeing news coverage of  expensively coiffed and dressed white people at an exclusive country club calling for undocumented immigrants to be shot.  In Temecula,  in the name of the Prince Of  Peace and under our nation's flag, people are bringing dogs to intimidate peaceful worshipers at a mosque. 

As people of faith we have some things we can do.  We must, kindly and forcefully, challenge stereotypes and false statements when we hear them.  We can refuse to vote for any candidate who tries to leverage fear and hate.  We can reach out to people in these groups to know and understand them.  Under this convulsion of hatred is fear.  We are called to love.  And "perfect love casts out fear."

These Are Human Beings!

 A very telling picture of the current debate on immigration appeared before our local (San Diego) television cameras on Tuesday.  Sheriff Joe Arpaio, of Maricopa County, Arizona, where Phoenix is located spoke to a sold out crowd at the Rancho Bernardo Country Club.  Arpaio proudly calls himself the "toughest sheriff in the nation" and is famous for his tent jail in the desert where inmates are "housed" in the 135 degree desert heat.  Even before SB1070 was passed, Arpaio was famous for sweeps in Hispanic neighborhoods where he would arrest people on the slightest pretext and check their immigration status.  This is blatant racial profiling. 

 Arpaio was greeted by many demonstrators who opposed him and his message.  I'm proud to say a lot of them were UUs whom I recognized.  I couldn't be there but I avidly watched the news reports that evening.  The sheriff rhetorically asked the audience inside what should be done with people who break the law by crossing the border without papers.  A woman from the audience yelled out, "Shoot 'em."  This outburst was greeted by laughter.  The sheriff said we shouldn't shoot them but put them in his jail under harsh condition, which he then described.  The camera panned the whole room.  Every person I saw was white.  Every person I saw had gray hair.

Contrary to what most people think, crossing the border without papers is not a crime under federal law, neither a misdemeanor nor a felony.  It is a civil infraction, in a class with jay walking.  The consequence is deportation.  This is not a capital offense!  These are human beings--husbands, wives, mothers, fathers who are seeking to feed their families and give them a better life.  How can this woman say we should shoot them!  How can people laugh!  The dictionary defines hate as "intense hostility and aversion usually deriving from fear, anger, or sense of injury."  This definition is too mild for the kind of insensitivity displayed at this exclusive country club, tended no doubt by immigrant labor.  Who deserves to live?  Who deserves to thrive in America? 

 As people of faith, it is our task to denounce hatred.  I'm very sure most of the people in the fancy room with Sheriff Arpaio called themselves Christian.  They haven't read 1 John  where it is written:   "If one says, 'I love God,' and hates his brother, he is a liar; for he who has does not love his brother, whom he has seen, cannot love God whom he has not seen."  The folks in that room claim to be better Americans than anyone else.  What about the poem on the statue of liberty, that welcomed my family to this country when I was in my mother's womb.

"Keep ancient lands, your storied pomp!" cries she
With silent lips. "Give me your tired, your poor,
Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,
The wretched refuse of your teeming shore.
Send these, the homeless, tempest-tost to me,
I lift my lamp beside the golden door!"

 It is not the undocumented immigrant that is creating the political chaos and the financial uncertainty that makes us all afraid.  It is not the law abiding Muslim neighbors who wish to build a house of worship, vilified in the name of Christ, the Prince Of Peace, who are making this a dangerous world.  It is not the committed same sex couple who want to seal their vows of love who are responsible for the turmoil in the lives of our families.  As people of faith and those who still hold the dream of America, we need to confront hatred wherever we find it--in public life, with relatives and friends, with our neighbors.  Without hating in return.  Without calling them names.  By calling people back to what they say they believe in.

Hi!  In this space I will be sharing from time to time some thoughts and impressions and welcoming your responses.  This will be especially fun when I am in Mexico starting next month.  I plan to blog so that you can share my sabbatical with me.