Two consecutive Sundays. Two different Monthly Meetings. Two
different states. One remarkably similar message reflecting on the popular
Quaker query making the rounds: “How does your life help to remove the causes
of war?” followed by a reference to “War is not the Answer.”
Increasingly, I wonder how useful these ruminations serve
Quakerism, especially as they seem to become an increasing part of congregational
vernacular. And when these messages are also proudly displayed to the public, I
wonder whether they are an admonition to others that they should be like us,
and then how much does that help us live our faith. The “causes of war” are so vast and complex,
but war is really, in my mind, simply a part of the spectrum of violence that
includes greed, power, fear, hunger, faith, love, education,
institutionalization, nationalism, rigidity, and religion, just to name a few.
A better query might be something like “What can I do today to break the cycles
of violence?”
The focus on “war” in these messages raises two thoughts
for me. First, in Quaker circles, the action that often follows is a call to
cut military spending. It is an over-simplification that ignores some of the
realities of our society. If you visit many of the neglected parts of our
country – rural areas as well as urban – you will hear many people say they
want to join the military. This is not because they love war, but because the
military is one of the few legal options many people have to get out of
otherwise dire circumstances where employment and education are scarce and
violence and drugs are rampant. As manufacturing jobs continue to disappear,
there is little else currently on the horizon that is a viable option. In
addition, we should recognize that the military also engages in many
peace-making and emergency rescue operations. Given the small numbers of
Quakers, we might want to engage in building an infrastructure to replace some
of these rather than spending a lot of time, energy, faith and money on the
notion that we can get the politicians running the massive bureaucracy to do
the right thing. It’s a bottom-up approach, but when numbers are small,
sometimes bridge-building and doing the small things can have the greatest
impact.
Then there is the word “war” itself. It is a word that
evokes negative imagery and energy, but in doing so allows us to gloss over all
the ways that we participate in the cultural, environmental and economic
injustices that perpetuate the cycles of violence. “War” is something that is
easy to say others do. Focusing on war has a way of externalizing and,
subsequently, absolving us from our culpability.
Often I hear Quakers being described (at times
self-described) as “against war” or, more interesting to me, “not believing in
war.” As a pacifist, I have come to appreciate that we have to not only
think but act deeper. I do believe in violence. I see it every day, and I abhor
it. The power of Quakerism is not in our stance against war but in the oft-cited belief that “there is that of
God in All”. When we can use this to steel ourselves to compassionately break
down the barriers of classification that serve to divide us from our neighbors
and fellow global community members, we are getting more to the root causes of
violence – the real work of pacifism. Instead of the harsh messages full of
words like “not”, “don’t”, and “war” that affirm little but evoke violent
images, having positive words that invite positive energy and imagery would be
a nice change. Words do matter.
