Categories: uncategorized
Date: 09 August 2007 10:34:31
Earlier in the week I referred to this service I attended on Sunday evening which was led by Canon Andrew White .
As a follow up I have just finished his book Iraq Searching for Hope . I have to say that this is an interesting an informative book, whilst clearly written walking tight rope. As somebody who has always come from a broadly pacifist perspectvie on the issue of Iraq & marched against the war I found it useful to read this book. It gives a different slant on the issue from the general "progressive evangelical" or left-wing socialist ones I am used to being put forward. (At this point I would stress whilst I disagree with the war and some of the actions which have taken place I do respect the role of the majority of the individual service personnel who risk their lives, doing a professional job to the best of their ability in difficult circumstances).
I'm not sure how much my whole view has changed, but I have certainly been challenged to think through the issues again reading this book. What I did find slightly difficult though, was his decision to remain silent about the alternative package being promoted in the run up to the last war by prominent religious leaders in the US and UK (which is most fully discussed in God's Politics by Jim Wallis). It would have been interesting to know what he saw as the holes in this alternative which led him to believe, certainly at the beginning of the book, that military intervention was the only answer. His analysis of the situation against a summary of the main points of Just War Theory perhaps went part of the way to answering this question, but only partly.
As I say I'd thoroughly recommend this book to be read, what ever your view. To me the key lesson which comes from the book is that we need to communicate with those we struggle to understand because only then can progress be made. Fear and courage come in different forms as do the reactions that flow from those things.