Belonging in Time of War
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When an attack has been started by a bully on a playground, a group of tormentors in high school, malicious coworkers, local hate groups, media hosts, or national political leaders---where does one belong?
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How did we even come to the place of constant local and global unjust attacks? Mother Teresa said it is because we forget we belong to one another.
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The world is more interconnected than ever before; any attack on any will affect all much more than in any other century. Reverend Martin Luther King Jr. said, "Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere. We are caught in an inescapable network of mutuality, tied in a single garment of destiny. Whatever affects one directly, affects all indirectly." Dante Alighieri believed, “The hottest places in hell are reserved for those who, in times of great moral crisis, maintain their neutrality.” We are in this world and where do we choose to belong? Sitting on the fence may look like an option but it aids the bully.
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The world has long seen America as a land of hope and opportunity. Sadly, in the 21st-century growth of doubts, deep divisions, discontent, dishonesty, deception, and blatant demagoguery has eroded crucial elements of belonging in a unified democratic society. The country has citizens too young to even remember President Reagan’s warning against the dangers of tolerating the Soviet/Russian build-up of weapons and infiltration of third-world countries. President Reagan said the Soviets "must be made to understand we will never compromise our principles and standards [nor] ignore the facts of history and the aggressive impulses of an evil empire. To do so would mean abandoning the struggle between right and wrong and good and evil."
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Americans in the time of President Reagan did not have a leader who admired the power of dictators or who called them friends, savvy geniuses, or made other admiring comments for the Russian leaders to use as propaganda. Until 2016, the leaders of America did not show flagrant disregard for the values of democracy and helping others remain free from oppression. Admiring powerful dictators who use might over right does not foster belonging to people who would do unto others as they would have people do unto them.
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Desmond Tutu said, “If you are neutral in situations of injustice, you have chosen the side of the oppressor. If an elephant has its foot on the tail of a mouse, and you say that you are neutral, the mouse will not appreciate your neutrality.”
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In this time of the attack on Ukraine by Putin’s people, and we should not say Russian people, because many Russians have risked imprisonment, ruin, and death in protesting going to war, consider the source and objective(s) of the attack(s) on Ukraine. Vladimir Putin is 67 and has been president/prime minister of Russia for 21 years. Only Joseph Stalin was the leader there longer. Putin was a KGB agent who learned to use power ruthlessly and suffered the downturn and then dismantling of the United Soviet Socialist Republic. He wants to return to that and gain more power over land and people. Under Putin cronyism, repression, and military aggression have grown. This has caused disruption and destruction. Putin has promoted himself as macho, a puppet master, a warlord who will help other dictators he supports or controls. Does the support of such a person connect to any aspects of building healthy belonging for all people?
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Paulo Freire said, “Washing one's hands of the conflict between the powerful and the powerless means to side with the powerful, not to be neutral.” Americans, indeed North America which looks remote from Europe, need to choose to see that Ukraine is but one more bit of land grabbing by a bully dictator that causes people to suffer. Putin’s actions and goals, his effective use of foolish leaders and media who contribute to disunity in support for democracy will have repercussions for people who do not belong to the group that would aid the people unjustly under attack.
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“Indeed, it is impossible to be neutral. In a world already moving in certain directions, where wealth and power are already distributed in certain ways, neutrality means accepting the way things are now. It is a world of clashing interests – war against peace, nationalism against internationalism, equality against greed, and democracy against elitism – and it seems to me both impossible and undesirable to be neutral in those conflicts.” warned historian and writer Howard Zinn.
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Belonging requires knowing oneself, one’s values, and facing difficult decisions. When one sees the choices to overcome injustice, the answer is not just in payment. Caring requires action. If we choose to belong to a set of values that says people need to love one another more, tough love requires standing against dictators and selfish, ignorant, or fearful people who support them. But no one is pure in all thoughts and motives--so should that fact keep people from standing up to dictators and anyone else who destroys the safety and trust needed in belonging? No. We can find the grace and courage to aid oppressed people. It is not just rational thinking that moves me to care about helping the oppressed but the core of my faith consistently advocates for overcoming injustice and standing for oppressed people.
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Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn reminded anyone who cared to think, “If only it were all so simple! If only there were evil people somewhere insidiously committing evil deeds, and it were necessary only to separate them from the rest of us and destroy them. But the line dividing good and evil cuts through the heart of every human being. And who is willing to destroy a piece of his own heart?... “In keeping silent about evil, in burying it so deep within us that no sign of it appears on the surface, we are implanting it, and it will rise up a thousand-fold in the future. When we neither punish nor reproach evildoers, we are not simply protecting their trivial old age, we are thereby ripping the foundations of justice from beneath new generations.”
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