Must the stones cry out? Swords into Plowshares
By | May 5, 2008
At a time when the Anglican Church is looking carefully into supporting a centre for peace and justice studies, it (and all of us) might do well to reflect upon the tradition of peace building and justice living which the Plowshares/Ploughshares movement represents.
It’s no ‘mindless vandalism’ nor even is it an ‘attack’. It warrants our understanding, not our scorn. And what on earth is a plowshare anyhow? And why do people call themselves that? Three passages from the Bible offer a clue:
Isaiah 2:4 “And He will judge between the nations, And will render decisions for many peoples; And they will hammer their swords into plowshares and their spears into pruning hooks. Nation will not lift up sword against nation, And never again will they learn war.”
Micah 4:3 “And He will judge between many peoples And render decisions for mighty, distant nations. Then they will hammer their swords into plowshares And their spears into pruning hooks; Nation will not lift up sword against nation, And never again will they train for war.”
If you aren’t going to train for war, it seems you should really be…training for peace? Well that’s certainly been the feeling of Otago University, the Anglican Church, and the Government. Otago University have established the Aotearoa Centre for Peace and Conflict Studies. Not only was the centre launched by the PM, but the Chair is also funded in part by the Government sponsored “Leading Thinkers” programme. And rightly so. It’s an excellent initiative, which was brought into being by the work of many people, most notably the four who now sit as trustees on the Trust behind the centre’s development. One of those is Margaret Bedggood. Interestingly, her’s seems to have become the voice of the church in response to the action of the ANZAC Plowshares. Seems like a good voice to me. In a recent press statement Margaret, a former Human Rights Commissioner, said:
“Jesus was hardly law abiding. Causing a certain amount of furore in the cause of peace is hardly pointless. The cost to patch a balloon concealing our cooperation with those waging war is dear, but so are the lives Ploughshares seeks to save. Heightening consciousness and emboldening others to seek peace has a price.”
Christians have a long history of taking direct, non-violent action against war. The preservation of all human life is fundamental to our beliefs. Professor Bedggood concludes, “While it is an inconvenient truth to remember, war, and all that aids and abets it, is anathema to our faith.”
Indeed, Christian’s do have a long history of taking direct, non-violent action - it goes back about 2000 years to Jesus own ministry. He and his followers coined something of a saying: that you can’t serve God and Empire. Actions like those of ANZAC Plowshares help remind us of who we are called in Christ to be, to follow, and to serve, and expose the mythology we call ‘real life’ for what it is.
Must the stones cry out?
For more information about Plowshares and non-violent action try looking here:
http://ploughshares.org.nz/
http://www.plowsharesactions.org
http://www.tridentploughshares.org/
And for an up to date chronology of actions, go here:
http://www.jonahhouse.org/actions.htm
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Comments
Robert Ashe
May 5th, 2008 at 5:07 pm
Why is our Church standing silent while these Christian activists are crucified in the media? Have we absolutely nothing to say?
01guinness
May 7th, 2008 at 2:10 pm
comments from the sidelines: as a German I am reminded of my countries history. And how Ditriech Bonhoeffer is hailed as the one to stand up for Justice. Well, the church at the time did not appreciate his activism! Only with hindsight of history does the church claim his actions as part of their own…… interesting…
Ana
May 13th, 2008 at 2:00 pm
I’ve just had a look at the website of the NZ Government Communications Security Bureau, (GCSB) which runs the Waihopai spybase. It states that “… Governments have a duty to ensure that all their official information is protected from disclosure to, or tampering by, inappropriate individuals or organisations…” Perhaps it is worth questioning whether a government such as the US, which wages illegal war under demonstrably false pretences, detains people indefinitely without due process, regularly uses torture during interrogation and overthrows democratically elected national governments could be considered an “inappropriate organisation” to feed information to??
The PM’s comments that this action is “senseless vandalism” shows that she has no understanding whatsoever of the purpose of the action. It is anything but senseless. The purported $1million worth of damage that so many people are making a big fuss over is but a small percentage of the $40 million of taxpayer money that funds the GCSB each year, and that with practically no accountability or opportunity for public scrutiny of what goes on at the spybase, and exactly what the information collected is used for.
It is shameful that there has been so little reaction from the church in support of this action. Where is Jesus in the church today? Often seems like the church is more of a lame, conformist middle-class duck than the revolutionary calling institutional society to account that Jesus was.