We are citizens of the most powerful country in the world. Do you believe that citizens of so powerful a country should lead their lives with certain guiding values or principles as a foundation so that they, we, can be sure that we are doing the right thing? We elect local officials to promote the well being of the people of our community and we assume they will make their decisions based on good values and solid principles. If the officials misuse the power we entrust to them, we vote them out and sometimes recall them if their behavior is grossly neglectful, incompetent, or corrupt. When local government is corrupt, we feel the effects directly. One example is the Plunderdome affair in Rhode Island where people had to pay thousands to get a job as a police offers. This resulted recently in the mayor of Providence and several of his cronies being fined and jailed.

         Even at the state level, we can still feel how effective our elected officials are. This is often because our press keeps us informed and it is easy to understand because it is still focused on our well being. Our poor Governor Jane Swift often has to explain some awful mistake or defend an unpopular decision. However, once we get to the national political level, it is a more complex task to assess the performance of a President or our Senators and Congresspersons, especially when it comes to international activities and relations. At the international level, our leaders' focus is still on the well being of Americans but also strongly on their economic interests abroad. Should our economic interests take precedence over the well being of the people of other countries? Should we go to war to protect our economic interests?

         We have lived through an intense and anxious year following September 11, 2001. What helped to alleviate my anxiety and gave me hope were the numerous acts that showed how Americans reached out to people of other faiths. When a Sikh man in Mesa, Arizona was murdered, hundreds of people came to his gas station and left flowers and candles and more than two thousand came to his memorial service in one of the big auditoriums in Phoenix. Most people knew nothing of what a Sikh was; they just have a sense of caring for others in a pluralistic nation.

         There were reports of people forming a human chain around a mosque to protect it. There were numerous interfaith education programs and services; there was even one in New Bedford at Thanksgiving last year, which some of us attended. These and so many more were people who were claiming our considerable power to act in favor of their understanding of a pluralistic nation. At the same time, conservative Christian clergy were calling all Muslims "evil". This just shows that there are extremists in all religions.

         Extremists are very confused people. Moderates in all religions must engage their ultra-conservative people in conversations and challenge their theology! Islamic scholars have said for years that Islam should challenge extremists. (Eck) Last Sunday, at the Whaling Museum, Sheikh Mahmoud said that the Koran said that Muslims should fight only to defend themselves or to lift the yoke of oppression. He says that the terrorists are criminals just like any other common criminal. Overall, there are far more good signs in our country than bad and I think they will continue to grow.

         Personally, I breathed a sigh of relief last week when September 11th passed without incident. But my own anxiety increased a few months ago when our President announced that we would invade Iraq in a preemptive strike. I did support our going into Afghanistan last year. Sometimes there is no other way. But a strike against Iraq is wrong and may well lead to making a poor and miserable people worse, drive more young men into refugee camps to be radicalized, and destabilize the entire Middle East, as well as to alienate most of our allies. Saddam Hussein probably does have many chemical weapons of mass destruction, but so do other countries, including us. Besides, our military bases surround Iraq and Iran (in Saudi Arabia, Pakistan, Afghanistan, Kuwait, Bahrain, Quatar, Oman, United Arab Emirates, turkey, Tajikistan, Uzbekistan). We've got them surrounded! And we occupy Northern and Southern Iraq and have been bombing them since the Gulf War, including the bombing last week.

         It is unlikely that Hussein would use chemical weapons against us because the reprisal would be swift and devastating. We should go through the United Nations to press for aggressive weapons inspections. We must work in concert with the rest of the world. So why are we considering striking at Iraq? Why? Is it for revenge, for economic greed?

         On September 12th, the President of the Unitarian Universalist Association, Bill Sinkford, put his signature, along with 47 other clergy and other religious leaders, to a letter to President George W. Bush. Here are a few excerpts from the letter:

         ". . . .We applaud your leadership in bringing peoples of disparate faiths together to worship, to mourn, and to move on boldly with our lives. . .However, . . . .We, leaders of American churches and church related organizations, are alarmed by recent statements by yourself and others in the Administration about pre-emptive military action against Iraq. . .Understanding that Mr. Hussein poses a threat to his neighbors and to his own people, we nevertheless believe it is wrong, as well as detrimental to U.S. interest, to take such action. We oppose [this] on moral grounds. . ."

         A copy of this letter is on a table in the Parish House. I did not intend to speak against our President with this sermon or offend those of you who hold other opinions than mine. By the words I have spoken today, I was claiming my own power and the power of a free pulpit with the confidence that I am speaking to a liberal though diverse people. After the service, I will come to the Discussion Table in the Parish House so that, if you wish, we can talk and listen carefully and peacefully to one another and claim our power to do that.

         "Claiming our power," means to take action. We make telephone calls or write letters to our President, Senators, and Representatives. Their names and addresses and telephone numbers are on tables in the Parish House. This is a powerful action that can bring results. We can reach out to peoples of other faiths by learning about them and attending their services. We can also say prayers of peace and meditate on peace; think of peace, read books on peace, and participate in peace walks.

         My daughter tells me she is attending peace conferences and gatherings wherever they are taking place in San Francisco and yesterday she emailed me a letter she has sent to Senators and Representatives. She says that it feels so good to be pouring her energy into peacemaking. I'm sure it does. I'm sure she feels the blessings of the Peacemakers!

         So perhaps we naturally come to whether we should have philosophical or religious underpinnings to the acts in which we participate? I believe that if we have great clarity about what we believe, it will help us gather our power to act according to deeply held beliefs.

         Before the reading, we looked at some of Jesus' teachings. He counsels us to 'turn the other cheek.' This doesn't mean that we should take abuse. It means that we should set appropriate boundaries but try to not respond to hostility with more hostility. And in the reading, the author suggests that the Israelis might say that they should grieve instead of striking back. The other teaching, 'Love your enemies' is part of a favorite bumper sticker of mine. It reads: "Love your enemies; it makes them crazy!"

         I think of the miserable lives that young men lived in crowded refugee camps in Pakistan where there was no hope for jobs. They were ripe for being recruited into Bin Laden's ranks. What a miserable existence it is to live with hate in your heart. Love these miserable enemies by sending them prayers and meditations of love, everyday.

         So these are Jesus' teachings. What about our own Principles? For people who are new to us, we have printed in today's Order of Service the Seven Principles of Unitarian Universalism. They have a box surrounding them. Three of our Principles call us to engage peace if we possibly can. The Second Principle calls us to promote "justice, equity and compassion in human relations." Surely we do not want to create more refugee camps. The Sixth Principle calls us to promote "the goal of world community with peace, liberty and justice for all." Surely it is better to work for a diplomatic solution with the United Nations. The Seventh Principle calls us to promote "respect for the interdependent web of all existence, of which we are a part."

         For some time now we have been economically and environmentally interdependent. The well being of the whole depends upon the well being of the parts. We, the most powerful country on earth cannot act unilaterally and expect others to love us. We have felt the force of hatred. Let our country act, informed by the knowledge that we must not protect American financial interests, but the interests of all those who would promote the well being of all the peoples of this great and beautiful earth.

         The words of our last hymn are particularly significant today. They begin, "This is my song, O God of all the nations, a song of peace for lands afar and mine. This is my home, the country where my heart is, here are my hopes, my dreams, my holy shrine; but other hearts in other lands are beating with hopes and dreams as true and high as mine."

         May we claim our power to act, informed by beliefs and principles that guide our lives.

References

The following informed and inspired this sermon:

Buchanan, John. "Time Out," an article in The Christian Century, August 14-27, 2002.

Eck, Diana. "Our Religions, Our Neighbors, Our Selves," from Frontline: Faith and Doubt at Ground Zero: PBS,

www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/faith/neighbors

Grossman, Zoltan. "New U.S. Military Bases: Side Effects or Causes of War" from Our of Bounds Magazine, February 2, 2002.

Kingsolver, Barbara. "God's Wife's Measuring Spoon" from Small Wonder, New York, N.Y.: HarperCollins Publishers, 2002.

Prattis, Ian. The Essential Spiral, New York and Oxford: University Press of America, 2002.

Sinkford, William and other religious leaders. A letter to the President of the United States dated September 12, 2002,

www.cmep.org/iraqletter.html

Reading

Minister's Comment: Before the reading, I remind us of three teachings about peace from Jesus of Nazareth's Sermon on the Mount. These particular ones are from the Gospel of Matthew:

"Blessed are the peacemakers for these shall be called the sons of God. (Mat 5:9).

"If anyone strikes you on the right cheek, turn to him the other one also." (Mat. 5:39)

"Love your enemies…" (Mat. 5:44)

Now let us see whether this reading incorporates any of these teachings.

Excerpt from the article "Time Out" by John M. Buchanan
The Christian Century, Aug. 14-27, 2002

         Peacemaking requires the very best of us. It requires a strong military and the willingness to use it. But it also requires tenacity, courage and hope. My personal prayer is that Israel will not respond militarily to the next attack but instead will say something like this: "To honor our innocent victims, to consecrate the precious lives of our young people who have died, we will not respond by killing your innocent civilians. This time we will do nothing but grieve-and we invite you to join us in our grief."

         Military types will laugh at the naivete and weakness of that response. But I sense that I am not at all alone in concluding that it is perhaps the only realistically hopeful response left.