Posted by Benjamin on: 10.24.2007 /
My lovely mum posted this on her blog recently. For some context, Papaw and Mamaw were the pastor and pastor’s wife of what was basically the first ever Christian church that my family was involved with, when I was 10, 11, and 12 years old, ‘84 through ‘87.
Papaw told us an encouraging story when we visited him and Mamaw. He said that the church he fellowships with — I think it was called Cornerstone Baptist Church — began to fly not only the American flag and the Texas flag but also the Israeli flag. Since the Bible does speak a lot about Israel and the Jewish people being God’s chosen nation/people — they wanted to identify with/promote that Biblical idea. One day, though, someone burned their Israeli flag. This prompted all kinds of national and international media attention and the church was thus able to explain/expand on their position to an ever-widening circle of people. One person called and told them he would love to send them another Israeli flag, and yet another if the first one he sends gets burned.
According to the church’s pastor, the Rev. Bobby Herrel, Cornerstone Baptist began flying the Israeli flag last July to support the Israeli people during its conflict with Lebanon
How best to communicate to my lovely mum that the international community was outraged, in that particular Israel/Lebanon conflict, by Israel’s use of U.S. made cluster weapons, the use of which amounts to wide scale land mining of your enemies’ land, leading to large numbers of civilian casualties, especially of children, long after the hot conflict is over (40 years!!)? Yes, of course Hezbollah *also* failed to follow international law in that conflict. That hardly seems like a good reason to come out as pro Israel during the conflict. Most of the civilian casualties even during the hot conflict were Lebanese ~1000 dead Lebanese civilians, ~43 dead Israeli civlians. Wow this is a gruesome math. How can a Christian church be in favor of any of this? And if they must take sides, how is it that they take the side of the nation which was apparently far less careful about civilian deaths, both during and after the conflict? I’m guessing that the people in this church are … relatively normal, compassionate, people. How could they take such a position? How does the Muslim community in their town (Fort Worth, Texas) feel about them flying that Israeli flag, especially as it was in response to that particular Lebanese/Israeli conflict? I’m guessing that as a minority in a predominately white, Christian, American community, the Muslim community feels marginalized and put down in really painful ways all the time. Don’t the people of Cornerstone Baptist care about this? Do they know?
I really love my mum. And she represents some really big chunk of the American populace. Can they see this stuff? Can you see it? How to share it without automatically raising a wall? Maybe it’s impossible. Maybe I lack the social intelligence to accomplish it. Your thoughts, answers, questions, comments?
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Comment by: Sharon
1 10/24/07 4:15 AM | Comment Link |Benjamin- it’s not just Americans. It seems to be a particularly narrow set of blinkers that most fundamentalist Christians use whereever they are.
My father subscribes to a pro-Israel Christian newspaper that really makes my skin crawl. I’ve got nothing against Israelis or Jews, but the one-sided view most Christians are given is worrying. I’ve tried to talk to my Dad- in fact I think it was at the time of the Lebanese conflict, but didn’t really feel like I was being heard. Now my father is a very intellegent man- my intellectual streak probably comes from him- but he tends to only read books and publications that support the traditional Christian point of view. Anything else is suspect. So frustrating. And you are right, attempting to address it seems to just raise a wall, one reason why I have not tried to repeat the conversation.
I’m not sure it is social intellengence that is needed, at least in a family situation. I think sometimes for me the problem is the emotional involvement (along with our unique family ways of communicating) that makes these sorts of conversations so difficult. That said, I’m not much good at talking about these things outside the family either, except on blogs! For me good conversations seem to come from a combination of good timing, being well prepared (having evidence!) and confidence in my point of view. That particular set of circumstances does not seem to come along very often though!
So I don’t think I am very much help to you, and I’ll be watching the comments here too. Hopefully others have some ideas.
Comment by: joe
2 10/24/07 5:48 AM | Comment Link |I’m not saying this would work, but you could try pointing her in the direction of several peaceful Christian organisations in Palestine. People often forget that the Christian community in Bethlehem.
For example, the interestingly named Zoughbi Zoughbi from the organisation Wi’am , Rev Mitri Raheb from the Lutheran church in Bethlehem the YMCA in Ramallah and East Jerusalem, and others.
These people aren’t terrorists.
Comment by: David H
3 10/24/07 10:34 AM | Comment Link |I get similar things about this from my parents. They were outraged at me when I passed on a note from a Mennonite couple that detailed how they and a group of Israeli’s and Palestinians were attacked by the military for protesting a Jewish settler land grab. An American woman, attempting to be the spokesman for the group because she was American, level-headed, and a complete pacifist attempted to address the troop commander when they arrived and he instructed one of his men to cuff her and break her arm in the process. Several Americans were clubbed during the ensuing action and about 50 people went to jail. I scoured the internet for stories and found nothing in the American press. But my parents were upset with me for believing this until I found some stories on the BBC web site that supported the eyewitness version of events.
I used to try and talk reasonably with my brother, sisters and parents about these sorts of things, but I got frustrated with the walls. Now I warn them that if they start into one of these things — pro-Israel, dominion theology, the evils of public schools, the role of Iraq in 9/11, the need for government to protect Christian interests, etc. etc. — then I will club them with facts and figures. Funny thing is, many times they just can’t stop themselves.
I try the kinder/gentler approach when speaking with others. But at a certain point on some of these things it becomes too important to just let it go.
I was raised in a conflict-free home (at least that is how it was portrayed to everyone outside). More importantly, we never approached the hard things going on inside our house. We never told the truth to each other, we always skirted the difficult things. When I became an adult and realized how screwed up that had made me, I eventually went to a head-shrinker. One of the things she told me, and it made a profound difference in my life, was that if I allow an untruth to go unchallenged then I passively tell the speaker I agree with them. If I believe what someone is saying is wrong, then I need to make clear that I don’t agree with them. That may be the end of the conversation. It frequently is in my family and even people who I meet in church circles (most of my chief irritants are exactly about how Christians should be in the world). But sometimes it isn’t about changing the other person — which isn’t my job. It is about not allowing them to change me.
Comment by: Rachel
4 10/24/07 1:51 PM | Comment Link |Here is an excellent column that was posted a few days ago on the God’s Politics blog: Condi and the Holy Land Christians
Comment by: Staci
5 10/24/07 4:48 PM | Comment Link |I’ve found this a case of not reading all the parts of the bible - it is such a long book and the cliffs notes are much easier.
I find it strange when churches fly any nation/state/political flag. I know many do, but it always seems really weird to me.
Comment by: benjamin ady
6 10/24/07 11:36 PM | Comment Link |Sharon, Staci, Rachel, David, Joe
thankyou all mega yotta bunches for your responses. You are all so encouraging. You rock.
I actually had a really good talk with my mom this afternoon on the phone about this. She actually kinda sees where I’m coming from. Which kinda surprised me in this delightful way.
I also invited the whole staff at cornerstone baptist to join us here for conversation. I am still somewhat hoping perhaps at least one or two of them will do so. that would be yotta kewl.
Joe–it seems to me that it’s more of a belief that somehow *by definition* Christians should support israel and israelites because “the bible clearly indicates that (the christian) god especially favors israel and the israelites” Staci kind of nailed it. I mean it looks to me like the N.T. fairly clearly does away with that.
Staci–yeah–I find that yotta strange too. but then a lot of people find me yotta strange.
I love the way y’all identified with the difficult maze of communicating with parents who think the opposite. I’m kind of thinking to myself “If I can learn to communicate effectively, genuinely, honeslty, openly, graciously–in a word, humanly–with my parents, then by god I can learn to communicate with anybody”
Keep your eyes peeled for a really fascinating post tomorrow from a guest poster who, I’m thinking, perhaps thinks a lot more like my parents than I do. I’m stoked that he wants to engage with us here. I’m hoping he will feel welcome and listened to while we engage with his essay.