Blase's Blog

Christian Zionism

Welcome to Christian Zionism. This is a unique form of idol worship. It was born from the same people who made an idol of U.S. foreign policy and who identified that policy with the will of God. Call it manifest destiny if you wish. But the first commandment of God is that we should not have weird gods before us. And this one is really weird.

Using the name of the man who said, "This is my commandment, that you love one another," and who spoke of the Spirit reaching all of humankind including the Syrians and Samaritans, on October 21st of this year, Texas pastor and evangelist John Hagee had a special rally at the Church of the Cornerstone in San Antonio. You might remember the Reverend Hagee from his 1981 approval of Israel's bombing the nuclear reactor at Osirak in Iraq. Featured speakers at this year's rally were:
Former CIA director James Woolsey, former chief of staff for the Israeli Defense Forces, Lieutenant General Moshe Yaalon, and Joseph Ginat, director of the Strategic Dialogue Center at the Netanya Academic College in Israel. Woolsey in his wisdom told the congregation that the United States is hated because of its freedom. Ginat told the congregation that the west has only six to ten months to take military action against Iran and he spoke of the culture of lies in the Arab world. Yalalon expressed his belief that an ongoing war had already started between the West and radical Islam and argued that opposition to Israel has little to do with the occupation of the Palestinian territories.

Brigitte Gabriel an Arab and former TV anchor for "world News" on the Middle East Television network said, "Our enemy is in the Islamic mosques throughout the United States." Messages thanking the Rev. Hagee and the congregation came from Israeli deputy prime minister Shimon Peres and former prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu and were broadcast over two large video screens.

So here we have a nineteenth century millennial misinterpretation of the New Testament linked with the nineteenth century ideology of Zionism.

The only message I see revealed in such a gathering is the commonality of fundamentalist behavior. British historian Arnold Toynbee identified the problem over fifty years ago and warned us that once people are in an absolutist posture, they will kill. The goals of such behavior are void of any spiritual content. But the bastardization of religion is frequently rewarded by lucrative government funding.

What is obvious here is that the name of our religion has very little to do with our performance as human beings. The name of our religion, can be used to foster a humane future or an insane future. There is no authentic spirituality which can be based on hatred, racism, and perpetual war.

Thanks to Margot Patterson from San Antonio for her article on this Christian Zionist Rally.

Appeal For Redress

Aside from the parade of troops who are defying orders and leaving the Iraq disaster on a daily basis, there is a group of one hundred active duty military personnel who have signed an appeal urging Congress to support the prompt withdrawal of all U.S. troops and bases from Iraq. This is called the Appeal for Redress and is endorsed and sponsored by Iraq Veterans Against the War, Veterans for Peace and Military Families Speak Out.

Do you think we made any friends by breaking in to 95,000 homes in Baghdad recently? Put yourself in the shoes of those who were following orders. Put yourself in the shoes of the families who live in those 95,000 homes as they are terrorized by heavily armed troops screaming at them in English.

Our Head Torturer and his Vice Torturer are directly responsible for every wound, every death, every mental illness that has resulted from this ill advised, morally bankrupt, and intellectually depraved and absolutely unnecessary military failure.

The time has come for our Supreme Court to engage in judicial review of such blatant crimes. The fact that the Court has remained nationally isolated in its jurisprudence does not mean that it must declare itself impotent in matters of foreign policy.

Here is a quote from my father, Judge Blase Bonpane's winning oration given on January 16, 1914 when he was a Freshman at Ohio Northern University:

Public opinion has enacted a law against murder; so should international public opinion demand a law against war, which is merely organized murder. Shall we execute a man for taking a single life, and glorify nations for slaughtering thousands? To protect justice, police powers are instituted in all realms. Why not go beyond the transitory interest of a nation and establish an international police power? Let the representatives of the world powers meet in one body! Let a world code be compiled!

My father gave that oration some 92 years ago.

Congratulations to young troops today who understand the urgency of a speedy departure from Iraq. And today we add to their ranks two new groups, West Point Graduates Against the War and Service Academy Graduates Against the War (U.S. Air Force Academy).

These troops are the realists in our midst. Are we to carry on this war simply to save the face of the criminals who started it?

Voices for peace and outlawing war are the voices of reason. War mongers are not realists at all, on the contrary, as Bob Woodward says, they are living in a "State of Denial."

Please show your solidarity with the troops who have designed the Appeal for Redress for the prompt withdrawal of all troops and bases from Iraq.