15 Methodist Bishops, 5 Clergy on Petition to Reject Bush SMU Library

2 Comments

1. Brian,

   You bring up a good question: When should clergy make a stand on topics of political or social problems or issues?

   It is clear that clergy often make strong moral stands on what are perceived to be political topics on the basis that social issues are the concerns of the church. Others choose not to cross that line at all. One who chooses not to at a church local to me in Minnesota, Gregory Boyd, had a New York Times article written on this topic that I think you’ll appreciate:

   http://www.nytimes.com/2006/07/30/us/30pastor.html?_r=1&ref=us&oref=slogin

   I actually worked briefly with Pastor Boyd while involved with a Minnesota-based youth mission organization years ago.

   There were times during history when clergy has stood up against slavery, chauvinism, child pornography, genocide, pollution, war, persecution and poverty as well as on other issues of civil liberties and social injustice.

   Do you really feel that clergy should never do this? There are examples of Jesus spending time with outcasts, lepers, prostitutes and tax collectors which spat straight in the face of social mores of his day. Healing on the Sabbath? Speaking out against the Pharisees, Sadducees as well as many other religious figures. Jesus was many things, but one certainly is that he was a social and religious reformer, an angry rebel tossing the moneychangers out of the temple even – consistently and persistently calling his listeners to follow God’s eternal laws rather than the transient laws of the church or the state.

   If you were a pastor in Germany during World War II would you have sided with most of the church which supported Hitler’s rise to power, persecution of gypsies, gays, communists and eventually Jews as well as the early military invasions and occupations of nations who posed no threat against Germany such as Poland and Czechoslovakia? Would you have turned a blind eye to the tossing aside of all laws and human values in the building and use of torture camps at Dachau, Auschwitz, etc.? Or would you have joined with Dietrich Boenhoeffer in opposing Hitler vehemently from the pulpit? Would you have supported Boenhoeffer in his attempt to assassinate Hitler or exposed the plot as some did – leading to Boenhoeffer’s arrest and eventual execution?

   If you were a pastor over the last seven years would you have supported Bush’s persecution of gays, muslims, Arabs and nations that didn’t share his pseudo-christian values as well as his invasions and occupations of a nation that posed no threat to us (Iraq) with another one (Iran) in his sites? Would you have turned a blind eye to the tossing aside of all laws and human values in building and use of torture camps at Bahgram AFB in Afghanistan, Guantanamo Bay in Cuba, Abu Gahrib in Iraq and the rendition of prisoners around the world to be tortured and put to death in former Soviet gulags and other locations in Syria, Saudi Arabia and other locations unknown? If a ‘false flag’ operation such as the one in the Gulf of Tonkin which got us into the Vietnam War occurred again and Bush declared martial law and suspended the November elections, would you support him in doing so?

   U.S. ‘False Flag’ history: http://www.saunalahti.fi/wtc2001/false%20flag%20operations.htm

   Tough questions, yes. Many Methodist clergy and other leaders are divided on making a tough choice on whether or not to support locating the Bush Library at SMU. It is going to happen, and the leadership of SMU has signed over 100% of the decision-making power over what is in the library and what is not, as well as what is to be said about the Bush years – true or false.

   The lies and obfuscations that this library is sure to contain as well as the huge gaps in the historical record because of the Bush Administration’s obsession with secrecy will most certainly reflect very badly upon SMU, Methodism, the Church at large and even Jesus Christ himself – just as the NeoCons, having co-opted Jesus for their own purposes have done in deceiving the evangelical community and much of the rest of the church into supporting such atrocities as listed above.

   I support these Methodist pastors 100% and when I speak at churches – which I do about a dozen times a year – I speak out against government-sponsored torture. I will not stand idly by and let the Bush Administration atrocities go unopposed. I would be violating my covenant with God to stand with the weak, the persecuted, the poor and the other “the lesser” members of my world community.

   “Then they ran off with Jesus, while he was preachin’ to the poor
   They dressed him up in their ‘so-called’ family values, then send his children off to war”

   ~ Donal Hinely “Blue State Boy” (soon to be released on Scuffletown Records)

2. I’ve been looking around for a church for my family and thought I’d briefly reasearch the Methodists. I’m so glad I found this information page. When I see the clergy of a church more interested in promoting a political view instead of doing things like, oh, let’s say being a minister, that’s not a church I’m interested in. I’m sure you’re all relieved.

   You all look absolutely ridiculous, especially when you talk about how you can split the church by ‘progressives’ and moderates versus everyone else in the church. I can’t even believe how you can violate the fundamental ideas of what a church even is and then call yourselves ‘leaders’. What a joke.

   A church is supposed to be a place to bring people togther. You’re using it for your personal glorification. Justify it in your mind with whatever little tricks you have to play, but you should be ashamed.

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