Living Theology
in the Metropolitan Chicago Synod
Evangelical Lutheran Church
In America
Vol. 7 No. 1
Summer 2002
Doing justice in the face of evil:
Reflections after the World Trade Center
Leon Spencer
This reflection was originally published by The Washington
Office on Africa, 212 East Capitol Street, Washington, DC 20003 on September
18, 2001. Used by permission.
Evil
was done last week. The death and
massive destruction mark a tragedy that has caused suffering and pain far
beyond the confines of New York and Washington. My heart goes out to all who have been touched directly by this
act of violence, and to all of us, here in the United States and around the
world, who grieve the losses—the loss of human life, and more—that this
violence created.
But
to say that evil triumphed is to ignore other images of the past week, of
compassion, generosity, bravery and courage.
My heart goes out too to those who have found the strength to celebrate
the human spirit and to affirm hope, by action and by that pervasive feeling
that we are bonded to one another in support and care.
Both
of these emotions—of grieving and, yes, of celebration of the human spirit in
the face of evil and crisis and grief—our world faiths well understand. What we have seen this past week profoundly
captures God’s revelation about the human experience of good and evil, and
God’s sustaining love for us as we struggle with living out humanity’s journey.
The
experience of last week confronts us with a grave challenge as we seek to live,
and respond, faithfully, and I want to reflect upon two aspects of that
challenge that have repeatedly spoken to me in these recent days. The first has to do with evil. The second has to do with unity in the face
of evil.
To
say that evil was done last week is true.
To explain the evil by saying that it was done by evil people is
simplistic and ultimately unhelpful. To
take the next step, by saying that since “they” are evil, we are righteous, is
similarly unproductive and, ultimately, wrong.
The issue here is not accountability; those who undertook to cause such
harm and pain to so many are rightly to be held responsible for their actions. Nor is the intent to transfer responsibility
to the victims, to us; it is not the fault of the United States that the
terrorists did what they did. I
strongly affirm these shared understandings about accountability and
responsibility. But I know, too, that
in times of crisis and, especially, in times of anger, alternative
voices—including those from faith communities—are often condemned on the
grounds that we are saying just that.
Evil
is most often done, I believe, by people whose own circumstances, or whose
causes they care about deeply, have left them with a sense of alienation and
despair, where remedies seem hopeless and non-existent, where those with the
power to bring change seem to be unhearing and hostile. This does not justify terrorism. What it does mean is that if we convince
ourselves that it is sufficient for us to attack “evil people,” then whatever
success we have with that narrow agenda, we will not have moved toward
addressing the context of alienation and hopelessness in the world, a context
that promises more terrorism in the future.
We
are not innocent. Yes, I will say again
that we are not to blame for the tragedy of last week. Terrorists did that, and terrorists alone
are responsible. My point is that there
is a context in which both good and evil happen in our world, and when we react
to last week by wondering why anyone would want to attack us, or by claiming
that we were attacked because we stand for freedom and democracy, we are
naively isolating ourselves from the realities of much of the rest of the
world, and from the impact—sometimes good, sometimes evil—that our national
policies and actions have upon the rest of the world.
We
have been, and are, a nation of wonderful generosity and compassion. We have shown openness to those who sought,
and seek, new opportunities. We have offered a vision of freedom that has
inspired many throughout the world. But
we have also, in the name of national self-interest, undermined legitimate governments
and bolstered up corrupt dictators. We
look the other way when our allies oppress people, pour billions into their
government coffers without hesitation, dismiss the cries of oppression, then
lash out at the oppressed when they react in anger. We undermine international efforts to confront environmental
disaster, racism and intolerance, small arms that sustain so many regional
conflicts, and nuclear holocaust. In
the name of “free” trade we seek to impose our economic policies upon the
Global South, then restrict access of their most competitive products into our
markets. Even this week, almost alone,
we are fighting in Geneva to protect the interests of pharmaceutical companies
against the cry for affordable AIDS medicines for Africa, where some 6,000
African men, women and children die every day from AIDS-related causes—a number
likely to reach 13,000 deaths per day by 2010.
As for development aid—funds that help to address the struggles of a
world where nearly a fourth of the world’s population live on less than a
dollar a day, and another one billion people on less than two dollars per
day—we have become the least generous donor nation in the world.
If
we are to find peace—a peace that is more than the absence of war and violence
and terrorism, but a peace that provides us with a sense of security and
confidence and hope—then we need first to do justice. This is an old saying, but our leadership has rarely given it
priority. It deserves priority now, for
it offers a future far more promising than one secured by the elimination of “evil people.”
There
has been much talk, in recent days, about unity in the face of evil. If we are speaking of a sense of being
community together, unified both in our grief and in our compassion, then our
talk about unity is well justified. But
here too we need to be cautious.
The
press has repeatedly reported on a new bipartisan spirit in Congress and an end
to “bickering” and “petty partisanship.”
I readily acknowledge that bickering and pettiness often characterize
congressional debate. And yet,
partisanship is not in itself evil. It
reflects a reality that people hold strikingly differing visions of the place
of our nation in the world. It reflects
a reality that there are genuine, often major, differences about where our
priorities lie. To suggest that we
should set aside these differences—that we should accede to an expensive and
dubious missile defense shield, or to environmental destruction in the interest
of domestic oil, or to another tax cut for the wealthiest 2%, or that we should
set aside our financial commitments to confront the global AIDS pandemic or
development aid or debt reduction in the interest of military spending—is an
unjust response to the call for unity. These are matters of grave substance,
not petty bickering, and if we value democracy and the possibilities for
thoughtful debate that democracy provides, then in sensitive and humane ways,
these debates must continue.
We
should not, then, yield to the suggestion that debates over vision and
priorities undermine our unity. They
are debates that celebrate our unity.
To be united, to be true community together, we need to stand behind our
government in a time of crisis, yes, but our standing is not a mindless
act. It is instead a prayerful act that
our government will seek to do justice, and it is a prophetic act when it does
not. Times of crisis are dangerous
times for both liberty and justice. If
at this time we seek true unity, I believe it will be found when we show
solidarity with our leadership, solidarity expressed through encouragement and
caring, and expressed too by holding them accountable to our visions of what is
right and just for our nation as it lives out its powerful place in our world.
The
Rev. Leon Spencer
Washington Office on Africa