| An Open Letter to President
Bush by Gloria Davis I understand your thinking. My father was a minister and an adamant Republican. I married a theologian and put him through six years of post-graduate studies and stood by his side in the ministry for 30 years. I do not understand your thinking. I see that the church has not fully distinguished itself from the ways of the Old Testament. While they preach Jesus Christ, our ministers often fail to practice or to preach what Christ actually taught. Christ teaches that the Kingdom is within, and yet we continue to build kingdoms without and attach His name to our conquests. Christ teaches that the greatest commandment is to find your neighbor as worthy as you find yourself. Three years ago, I rode on a train in the heart of China and found my white face surrounded by curious Chinese people. The two young teachers with me taught our new friends to sing "Row, Row, Row Your Boat" and they in turn taught us their national anthem. We sang lustily and hugged as we laughed together. We tore down a large wall that day. Perhaps a thousand such smiles and songs could shatter the greatest walls of China. For centuries, our country has fought against those who perpetuate evil onto the world, but it was not war that brought down Communism. With the blessings of former Soviet president Mikhail Gorbachev and President Ronald Reagan, a friend of mine directed a 20,000-voice peace choir in the former Soviet Union. The people of that chorale represented more than a dozen countries. When John first wrote to President Reagan about his proposal, the president's response was, "If you can pull this off, I will be there with my boots on." He did and he was. How beautiful when a president is willing to listen to the ideas of the common man who may often present a path to peace which winds it way between the machines of war. Those voices weakened the Iron Curtain, which soon thereafter came down. That mighty Communist state slowly dissolved, not by war but by understanding. They could not declare their system better than the integrity that was at the core of our strength. We feared the strength of Japan. They were buying up our business and our land. We feared their competition, but instead of going to war we remained internally strong and in the end they faltered and we grew even stronger. I was in the mosque of Sophia in Istanbul soon after our country went to war in Iraq. Our enemy was the fanatical Islamic. As I wandered through that great mosque, I was approached by three officials. I was introduced to their great teacher, who offered to answer any questions I might have about the Koran. As he spoke to me, I was struck by the great love this man had for his religion. I did not see a ranting fanatic. Rather, he exuded love of such intensity that I was mesmerized by the radiance of his being. Suddenly the teacher stopped speaking and a smile spread across his face. "You are first Christian I speak to." We stared at each other with the joy of new understanding, kindness, acceptance and love, which transformed my old paradigms and in turn showed him a flicker of the true face of America. Jesus' death put an end to animal sacrifice, and yet by the hundreds our precious sons and daughters are being laid on the altar in sacrifice to the God of War. President Bush, in utter sincerity, let me explain what I have come to know of God. He is a God of life and not of death. He is a God of Love and not of war. You see, there is a power greater than war. That power comes directly from the heart of God. The greatest power on earth, the most transformative power on earth, is not found in WMD. It is found in love. No darkness in the world can win when Love is the "enemy." Mr. Bush, were I to denigrate your policies and your thinking, I would cover all that is beautiful and brilliant within you. That part of you would find it harder and harder to seek its highest expression. In the act of declaring our truth above another's, we desecrate the "temple within" where they worship God with their full heart. Their understanding of God is not complete. My understanding of God is not complete. Lack of full understanding does not give one license to declare the other worthy of death in the name of God. The time is long past that one can innocently declare war as a means to bring the world into alignment with our philosophies. Now is the moment that we must begin to lead the way in peace. History has repeatedly proven that when placed in the context of war, all our good intentions cause only more bitterness, suffering and confusion. In our clumsy efforts to bring better government to the rest of the world, we serve only to bring division, which allows darkness to move into the gap and wreak havoc with those people. The question remains: "What is the better way? What can we do when we see innocent people suffer?" How can our country make a difference in the world without waging war? We are taken back again and again to the Kingdom of God within. We are exhorted to remove the log from our own eye before removing the beam from our neighbors. When we try to cure the ills of another while ignoring that our own the world holds us suspect, our valiant efforts smack of self-serving. Let us go back to the message of Christ, for that message speaks of the end of blood sacrifice. We can no longer consider it a sacrifice. Look fully into the face of truth. To kill another to bring our message of peace is simply murder. Christ's message is too simple for most to comprehend. Does he not teach us in the Sermon on the Mount to begin the work of the Spirit within our own selves? The temple of God is within. President Bush, I ask you to see the beam in our own eye. As a nation, we are in desperate need to work on the evil within our own population. I invite you to seek out non-patrician intellectuals and allow them to develop and implement a plan to address the needs within our country. Those needs beg for our attention and fuel the campaign of your opponents. Do not let the work of our own inner cleansing be a political invitation to controversy. When the world sees that we love one another and when the world sees a system that has attended to its own inner turmoil, we will have become the standard by which they will find their way out of the darkness. We cannot remain a country of war, abiding by the tenets of the Old Testament, which Christ came to abolish. The greatest transformative power on earth is understanding, acceptance and the work of love from a heart filled with the Holy Spirit. Can you imagine a nation thus led? Gloria Davis, BSRN, CRNA, is with the healing heART therapeutic center in Rochester, Minn. To contact her write theglowingheart@yahoo.com or call (507) 286-8912. Copyright © 2004 Gloria Davis |
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Aug 2004 |
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