by Rev. Dr. Marilyn Sewell

A sermon given March 19, 2006
First Unitarian Church
Portland, Oregon


CALL TO WORSHIP

Good morning!

We come this morning,

thankful for the greening of the earth,

the springing up flowers,

the buds upon the trees. 

As new life comes to the earth,

May we open also to newness of life—

Come now, and let us worship together!

Many of you have probably seen the memorable film Lawrence of Arabia, in which Peter O’Toole plays Lawrence, the Englishman who took on an Arab identity and fought with Arabs as kinsmen during the First World War.  For me, one of the most haunting scenes in that film comes when Lawrence saves one of the Arabs who is lost in the desert.  He rides out alone, against the best advice, and he finds the man, near death from thirst and exhaustion.  He puts him on the camel and brings him back to the camp. 

Flash forward:  that same man is caught stealing, and is dragged in on his knees and put before Lawrence.  According to tribal law, he must be put to death.  Lawrence realizes that as the leader, he must follow the law, and that he himself must carry out the execution.  So he pulls out his revolver, aims it at the craven man, and shoots him to death.  He kills the one he has just risked his own life to save.

Later Lawrence is talking with someone about his wanting to be done with war, and he recounts this incident.  “You had to do it,” the other man says.  And Lawrence answers ruefully, “Yes, but I enjoyed it.”

Human beings are complex creatures, made up of all kinds of conflicting emotions and inclinations.  All of us are.  We have to ask ourselves, is there a part of us that feeds on power over—even holding the power of life and death over another?  Is there some perverse side, some unspeakable shadow in our very nature that allows “good” people to torture and kill?  Well, we can be turned that way, but it’s not the way we’re inclined.

You have probably heard about the famous Christmas Truce that took place on the Western Front in 1914.  In the midst of brutal trench warfare, the fighting stopped, and enemy shook hands with enemy.  They sang “Silent Night,” exchanged souvenirs, even played soccer.  And this was not just a brief interlude in one small area—it extended over at least two-thirds of the British line, and similar ceasefires happened in French and Belgian sectors.  “Just you think,” wrote home one British soldier, “that while you were eating your turkey, etc., I was out talking and shaking hands with the very men I had been trying to kill a few hours before!!  It was astounding!”  And it was not just ordinary soldiers who took part—also non-commissioned officers and captains and majors.

And it should be said that this is not a unique event in the history of war.  During the Crimean War, British, French, and Russians gathered together at times around the same fire, keeping warm.  In our own Civil War soldiers from the North and South “traded tobacco, coffee and newspapers . . . , fished peacefully on opposite sides of the same stream, and even collected wild blackberries together.”  During the Boer War, opposing armies joined in a friendly game of soccer.  Many other wars include similar accounts.  In short, when left to their own devices, soldiers find it much more satisfying to share food with another human being than to try to kill him.

Soldiers in wars before Viet Nam showed a reluctance to fire on the enemy.  Army Brigadier General S. L. A. Marshall, an army historian, asked average soldiers during World War II what they did in battle.  His wholly unexpected discovery was that, of every hundred men along the line of fire during a battle, only 15 to 20 percent would fire their weapons.  He based his findings on individual and mass interviews with thousands of soldiers in more than 400 infantry companies in Europe and in the Pacific.  Those who did not fire did not run away from battle—in fact, in many cases they risked their own lives to rescue comrades, to get ammunition, or to take messages—but they simply would not fire their weapons.   

What made the difference, then, in Vietnam, where the firing rate was 90 to 95 per cent?  Well, the army took Marshall’s findings seriously and began to use training methods to program or to condition the soldiers—a la Pavlov’s dog—to overcome their natural, human inclination not to kill.  In military-speak, the language is revealing: a repugnance toward killing is called “acute combat reaction”; psychological trauma resulting from killing another human being is called “stress,” as if this were someone talking about a long day at the office.  People have to be trained to kill, have to be conditioned to overcome their natural tendency towards benevolence and kindness.

Why, then, would anyone go to war?  I mean, why would anyone be willing to join up?  I’ve got to say at this point that I’m not a pacifist.  War is the most horrible invention of humankind, and yet there are times when we have to fight.  I think the rise of the Nazis in Germany was one of those times.  I shudder to think what would have happened had Hitler not been defeated.  But now?  Why would anyone join up now?

Well, my son Kash joined the army, and I can tell you why he did.  Several reasons.  Well, first of all, a recruiter got his hands on him—the recruiter’s name was Sergeant Roach (and I’m not making this up!).   But the fact is, my boy is idealistic, as are many young people.  He said to me many times in his growing up years, “Mom, I think everyone should serve their country.” 

Does that sound simplistic?  Well, maybe so.  But you know what?  A lot of these kids that sign up do so because they want to serve others. They want to give themselves to something larger than themselves.  They want their lives to count.  They know there’s something more important than buying that new pair of Nike’s. They are, in fact, willing to put their lives at risk for their country.  And you know what?  We grown-ups should be giving them a country that they can be proud of defending, a country that would go to war only for good and honorable reasons.  Our children should not have to develop an early cynicism.  Our sons and daughters should be able to trust our President when he says we must go to war.  We all should be able to trust our President.

And then another reason Kash signed up is that Sergeant Roach told him he could be an officer, which was a lie, and told him that he could get his school debt paid for, which was true.  Lots of young people sign up for the service because that is best economic alternative they have.  The army seems a leg up from a life that offers little opportunity.  In Kash’s company, there was only one other person with a college degree.  That happened to be a woman, and he married her.

This is not an equal opportunity army.  And if the privileged sons and daughters of our Congress people were among the 2,311 U.S. soldiers killed so far in Iraq, if their sons and daughters were lost to war, or being fitted with artificial limbs, I doubt if we would still be at war. 

I have never had the experience of being in a war zone.  And those who have experienced combat mostly don’t want to talk about it, perhaps can’t talk about it.  Perhaps they know that we—those of us untouched by these horrendous experiences— we could never understand, and in the telling, they would be left even more alone. 

A few weeks ago a member of our congregation shared with me a very moving story that she has graciously agreed to let me share with you this morning.  She was in a battle zone, as a young nurse in Viet Nam.  I wanted you to know something about what she went through, and how it affected her.  I will use her own powerful words to tell her story.

She writes, “I ended up in Vietnam because I benefited from military financial assistance during college.  I was 22, and knew nothing of war.  I was naïve, idealistic, and adventurous.  At the time I believed in my country and our elected leaders.  By this time I had developed a personal identity and a set of values I believed would hold me well throughout my life.  I had tremendous faith in the goodness of people and faith in God. 

“In all of my life before and after there is nothing to equal the sheer mental terror of that year in Viet Nam.  Something very hard and cold formed inside my chest, where I used to feel a heart.  Something said to me: I am alone.  I, in all the world, stand between myself and destruction.  I only.  There are certain things which seemed to go out of me forever: softness, love, and dependency.  I looked at death without fear.  I doubted the existence of anything beyond myself, but more than ever, I needed something.  My only sign of something beyond was my constant search and desire for it.”   

                                                . . . .

“I am serving here in this small MASH hospital, where the wounded are triaged into categories—those who can be helped, and those who cannot.  Our primary purpose is resuscitative surgery.

“I can hear firing—off in the jungle a terrible battle is taking place.  Many of our guys die.  I receive about 30 who are critically wounded.  I go from one young face to the next, bring blood, morphine, dressings.  These kids here under my care were ambushed; they still think they are out in the bush under fire.  Two are crying out names of buddies.  One is asking about his arm, another about his legs.  I have to tell them.

“Now suddenly a 5-month-old Vietnamese baby girl is brought to me.  We are not equipped to take pediatric cases.  We do not have a pediatric surgeon, pediatric surgical instruments, medications, or supplies. No one listens to me.  The chopper crew says they are sorry but there is no place else to go.  Now she, too, is my responsibility.  She is bleeding and hardly breathing.  How do I care for this little one?  I don’t know how.

“Now we are under fire.  Hurry.  Get all the GI’s down on the floor.  Now I’m crawling between them.  The shooting goes on for at least two hours.  I’m so scared.  Now I hear one of the medics calling me.  It’s the baby.  Her breathing is worse.  I crawl to her.  She is unconscious.  I turn her a bit, please let this help her.  Every patient here needs me.  I can’t get to all of them.  I can’t help this baby.  I hate her for that.  I hate her for that.

“This horror has gone on for hours now.  Tighten your throat!  Don’t let the medics and the patients see you crying.  Let the baby die.  You can’t help her.  Do what needs to be done for the rest.

“The medic calls out, ‘The baby is not breathing!’  The baby dies.”

                                                . . . .

This experience and experiences like this are still alive in this woman, and always will be, and she has had to struggle back to normalcy—had to struggle to love, to trust, to be vulnerable.  She says that she has learned to stay with the uncertainty that all of life is; she has developed a knack for relaxing in the midst of chaos.  The unanswerable questions of war have become her greatest teachers.

She is now retired from nursing.  Some days she volunteers at Doernbecher Children’s Hospital.  Just a couple of days ago, as a follow-up to her story, she told me that last week she found herself holding and nurturing a small Vietnamese baby who was recovering from successful heart surgery.  He was robust, pink and smiling, and playful.  After a warm bottle, a lullaby, and rocking, he went to sleep in her arms.  He is only four months old, but in this little one, she has somehow found a measure of healing and love and goodness again. 

Last week I heard someone—not a member of our church—I heard someone say about the war in Iraq, he said he really didn’t think about it very much, that it really didn’t affect him.  The only reason, the only reason war doesn’t affect us is that we’re comfortably removed from it—no blood and guts for us, no lost limbs, no dead babies.  How can we let a day go by when we don’t grieve this war, when we don’t grieve the loss of human life, both ours and theirs, and the loss of the billions of dollars of resources that could be used saving lives?

There is a march today, a march for peace.  Tom and I will be there as part of this church’s witness.  Those of us marching are totally supportive of our troops: we want to bring them home safely as soon as we possibly can.  Our wonderful Peace Action Task Force that has been so active in the peace movement will be calling us together at 1:00 p.m. to leave from the church as a group, and I hope that many of you will join us.

The United States is the only super power in the world, and because of our stature, we should be leading the world in the responsible use of power, and we’re of course doing just the opposite.  We should follow international law that prohibits “pre-emptive war”; we should follow the agreements of the Geneva Convention for the treatment of prisoners; we should sign international agreements against land mines.  We should not only ask other nations to give up their nuclear capability, we should insist on disarming all of the world, including ourselves, of nuclear weapons.  I think the international community should pass a law against any kind of bombing at all. This killing at a distance makes it all too easy, and who knows where those bombs are going to fall, anyway?  There is no such thing as a smart bomb.

As for the war in Iraq, it has descended into an impossible situation, and is nearing civil war, a danger that was anticipated by many before the war started.  What to do now, in this complex situation?  I think we should insist on serious negotiations among the competing tribal interests, set a time line for withdrawal, and ask the Security Council of the United Nations to bring in a peacekeeping presence.  And if we are really planning to leave, as we say we are, this Administration should explain to the American people about the 14 permanent military bases that are being set up in Iraq.

I don’t believe that warring is natural, and I don’t believe that any sane person would choose war over peace and harmony.  But I do believe fiercely in the existence of evil.  I believe that there will always be people who will try to exercise power over other people for their own benefit.  There will always be those who will send the sons and daughters of less fortunate people to war for dubious reasons—and the only thing that will stop the war machine is when the people say no, over and over again, no.  You know, the army is having trouble recruiting now.  And there are veterans speaking out strongly against this war.  The people are saying no.  We won’t go.  Fly your flags of war.  Wave your banners.  Tell your lies.  We can choose, and we choose peace.  We choose peace.  So be it.  Amen.

PRAYER

Spirit of Life, we ask this day that we could soon find a way to bring this war to a close.  We pray for the men and women in uniform, that they might be safe and that they might return home soon.  We pray for the innocent Iraqi people who are frightened to step out of their homes, and we pray for the ones who are trying to negotiate in good faith, that they might be led somehow to reconciliation and peace.  And we ask that as citizens, give us hope, give us courage, that we might do our part to make our country a moral and righteous force in this troubled world.  Amen.

BENEDICTION

Give us hope, give us courage, as we continue to work for peace, in our country, and in our own hearts and minds.  Go now in love, and go always in peace.