U.S. Church Alliance Denounces Iraq War

Sat Feb 18

A coalition of American churches sharply denounced the
U.S.-led war in Iraq on Saturday, accusing Washington of
"raining down terror" and apologizing to other nations for
"the violence, degradation and poverty our nation has
sown."

The statement, issued at the largest gathering of Christian
churches in nearly a decade, also warned the United States
was pushing the world toward environmental catastrophe
with a "culture of consumption" and its refusal to back
international accords seeking to battle global warming.

"We lament with special anguish the war in Iraq, launched in
deception and violating global norms of justice and human
rights," said the statement from representatives of the 34
U.S. members of World Council of Churches. "We mourn all
who have died or been injured in this war. We acknowledge
with shame abuses carried out in our name."

The World Council of Churches includes more than 350
mainstream Protestant, Anglican and Orthodox churches; the
Roman Catholic Church is not a member. The U.S. groups in
the WCC include the Episcopal Church, the Presbyterian
Church (USA), the United Methodist Church, several
Orthodox churches and Baptist denominations, among
others.

The statement is part of widening religious pressure on the
Bush administration, which still counts on the support of
evangelical churches and other conservative denominations
but is widely unpopular with liberal-minded Protestant
congregations.

The Very Rev. Leonid Kishkovsky, the moderator for the U.S.
group of WCC members, said the letter was backed by the
leaders of the churches but was not cleared by lower-level
bodies. He predicted friction within congregations about the
tone of the message.

"There is much internal anguish and there is division," said
Kishkovsky, ecumenical officer of the Orthodox Church of
America. "I believe church leaders and communities are
wrestling with the moral questions that this letter is
addressing."

On Friday, the U.S. National Council of Churches — which
includes many WCC members — released a letter appealing
to Washington to close the Guantanamo Bay detention
facility and saying reports of alleged torture violated "the
fundamental Christian belief in the dignity of the human
person."

The two-page statement from the WCC group came at the
midpoint of a 10-day meeting of more than 4,000 religious
leaders, scholars and activists discussing trends and goals
for major Christian denominations for the coming decades.
The WCC's last global assembly was in 1998 in Zimbabwe —
just four months after al-Qaida staged twin bombings at U.S.
embassies in Kenya and Tanzania.

"Our country responded (to the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks) by
seeking to reclaim a privileged and secure place in the world,
raining down terror on the truly vulnerable among our global
neighbors ... entering into imperial projects that seek to
dominate and control for the sake of national interests," said
the statement. "Nations have been demonized and God has
been enlisted in national agendas that are nothing short of
idolatrous."

The Rev. Sharon Watkins, president of the Christian Church
(Disciples of Christ), worried that some may interpret the
statement as undermining U.S. troops in Iraq.

"We honor their courage and sense of duty, but ... we, as
people of faith, have to say to our brothers and sisters, `We
are so profoundly sorry,'" Watkins said.

The message also accused U.S. officials of ignoring warnings
about climate change and treating the world's "finite
resources as if they are private possessions." It went on to
criticize U.S. domestic policies for refusing to confront racism
and poverty.

"Hurricane Katrina revealed to the world those left behind in
our own nation by the rupture of our social contract," said
the statement.

The churches said they had "grown heavy with guilt" for not
doing enough to speak out against the Iraq war and other
issues. The statement asked forgiveness for a world that's
"grown weary from the violence, degradation and poverty
our nation has sown."
___

On the Net:

World Council of Churches: http://www.wcc-coe.org
World Council of Churches, US: http://www.wcc-usa.org
National Council of Churches USA: http://www.ncccusa.org/








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