Blessed are the peacemakers

I posted that bit of silliness Saturday because I didn't feel ready to deal with two far more serious events this week.

Last Thursday night I went to hear Medea Benjamin, cofounder of Code Pink, and Eman Ahmad Khamas, an Iraqi journalist from Baghdad, speak on US involvement in the war in Iraq. Code Pink is committed to nonviolent protests and petitions for peace. Medea started with the story of how she and three other women went to the US embassy to the UN a couple of days before to present a petition to end US military involvement (she believes in the US continuing reconstruction). They were not permitted to even go into the office, and no one in the embassy would come to accept the petition. She asked the security guard if he could deliver it. He went up to ask, and came back to say he could not, and the police had been called. Yes, the four women were arrested and held for 22 hours. Apparently our government is threatened by four unarmed American women with a known nonviolent organization with a piece of paper. I've heard stories like this before, but on the news. This was straight from a participant.

Eman spoke mostly of corruption--so much reconstruction money has disappeared, and so little reconstruction is being done--and even more about the people who have been arrested with no trace left of them, and no record of where they are or what happened to them. One US general offered to bring her some records--he didn't arrive at their meeting time and place and was transferred out of Iraq soon afterward.

What impressed me the most about Medea was her manner, especially her pleasant manner toward a group who came to refute what they termed her lies. She and Eman both answered them calmly and as fully as they could. I had gone to learn ways to "prevent the next war"-- a subtitle of the talk--and learned something just as important: treat those who oppose you not only with politeness but with friendliness and respect, while speaking your own truth. Moved by her example, I went to speak with "the opposition" and got the URL for their website (I like to get both sides of the story and check both sides' sources for reliability). Then I spoke with Medea for a moment (Eman was busily conversing with two other people already). I loaned her a pen so she could write information for a young woman talking with her. Many students attended for a class, and had detailed questions--one could hear their minds working as they formed their questions.

Saturday, the day I posted my previous post, I was at work showing a colleague how to get to the BBC international news site, which I find to be a good source for international news. There on the homepage was the announcement that Tom Fox, the US and Quaker member of the Christian Peacemaker Team abducted late last year, was found dead in Baghdad. I hadn't held much hope that they all would be returned safely, even though many groups one would expect to be sympathetic to their abductors (such as Hamas) were asking for the CPT members' release. They were in Iraq primarily to work on behalf of detainees who were being mistreated. In Tom's own words, "We hope that in loving both friends and enemies and by intervening nonviolently to aid those who are systematically oppressed, we can contribute in some small way to transforming this volatile situation."

Tom Fox's Quaker ministry before his CPT involvement was mostly with the Young Friends. He was a Friendly Adult Presence (that's Quaker for "chaperone") at many Quaker youth events locally and nationally. One of the young women I met on retreat (see my previous blog "Noisy Quaker Women...") recalled him coming to pick up young people for an event wearing a screaming-yellow shirt. The Sunday Washington Post interview with members of his meeting (Langley Hills Friends Meeting) concluded with young Sean Wilner recalling another teen asking Tom why he was going back to Iraq. He replied "there were plenty of people out there willing to die for war but few willing to die for peace."

Someone at our meeting Sunday reminded us that while we were calling Tom Fox a hero and a martyr we also needed to remember he was a human being. As we are all human beings. Any of us can choose to die--or live--for peace. It can be as simple--and as hard-- as being friendly and respectful to "the opposition," whoever we believe they are.