When I saw the title of the recent movie "Machine Gun Preacher," I immediately assumed that it might be an interesting study in religious violence. From what I understand, it tells the true story of a Pennsylvanian ex-con & Hell's Angel, Sam Childers, who converted to Evangelical Christianity, got his life together, and became a preacher. On a relief trip to Uganda and Sudan, he witnesses the atrocities of the Lord's Resistance Army (LRA) and decides that he can't simply return to life in the US. From then on, he spends most of his time living in Sudan, building orphanages, rounding up abducted children, and gunning down the LRA. A Christian preacher who kills to protect children, and is motivated to do all this by Jesus Christ? Childers was quoted as saying "I found God in 1992, but I found Satan in 1998 in Sudan," by which he means Joseph Levy. (www.emmanuellevy.com)
The movie briefly addresses the question of using violence to stop violence, and in one scene a character suggests that Childers must be aware of the fine line between his actions and the violence perpetrated by LRA leader Joseph Kony. On the other hand, many laud Childers as the only group that holds their ground when the LRA moves into the area. They are currently the only NGO who conducts armed rescue missions into LRA territory.
The LRA itself is a much more complicated study of religious violence. It is a movement led by charismatic leader Joseph Kony that directly copies a failed earlier movement by Ugandan traditional healer and "Messenger" Alice Lakwena. Both movements are motivated by "the Holy Spirit" to use whatever means necessary to instate a new government based on the Ten Commandments. But in order to do this, the LRA kidnaps children and forces them to be child soldiers (killing other children and their parents), commits mass rapes, and forces little girls to be sex slaves.
On the LRA's side, it's difficult to say how much religion plays a role, since their actions are so mixed up in nationalism and geopolitics. I think that for them, religion provides Kony with a means to pull his army together, and an "unselfish" reason to fight and pillage. But in all I think it's a complicated issue that merits further enquiry. Here are some links related to the movie, Sam Childers, and the LRA. The user comments on the last one are particularly interesting.
http://www.emanuellevy.com/comment/machine-gun-preacher-true-story-of-sam-childers/
http://www.rfi.fr/actuen/articles/106/article_1807.asp
http://www.christianpost.com/news/machine-gun-preacher-real-life-sam-childers-more-unbelievable-55857/
25 September 2011
18 September 2011
Religious violence & communities
"No man is an island."-- Each person is connected to others through social links, and through these links to a larger community.
In the first chapter of his book Terror in the Mind of God, Mark Juergensmeyer highlights what seems to be a surprising fact: terrorists, like everyone else, are part of communities. Often, their communities tacitly or explicitly condone the acts of violence that they commit.
I'm part of several communities (my church community, or my college community, for example) that help me to understand what a powerful support community can be. I rely on their support and approval for many things that I do, and I extend my support to them as well. I have no problem understanding the power of community. But it's difficult to imagine a community condoning violent acts like the 9/11 attacks, Hamas suicide bombings, or IRA strikes. These acts are not committed by isolated individuals but are made possible by support from a broader community.
Reading from Jack Eller's Cruel Creeds, Virtuous Violence helped me to understand how these groups can form. "Ethnoreligious" groups congeal around a perceived cultural difference, using religion, class, language, etc. as a marker that separates their group from another. In times of conflict, people group together to stand against an enemy. When they form ethnoreligious groups, the conflict can have cosmic implications and can grow in to a battle of good versus evil. When the definition of a community becomes a religion and this community feels that they are under attack, this is the type of group that could be more willing to "reinterpret" moral codes and to offer support to actors in religious violence.
In our readings for this past week, we saw how naturally and easily this type of ethnoreligious group can form in the right circumstances. Reading about conflict in Lebanon, Northern Ireland, Sri Lanka, and (closer to home) in the US has made me think about how readily and naturally conflict seems to start. How can we work to prevent it? As a member of a community, I have a responsibility to withdraw my support from any violent or destructive activities. That definitely gives me something to think about.
In the first chapter of his book Terror in the Mind of God, Mark Juergensmeyer highlights what seems to be a surprising fact: terrorists, like everyone else, are part of communities. Often, their communities tacitly or explicitly condone the acts of violence that they commit.
I'm part of several communities (my church community, or my college community, for example) that help me to understand what a powerful support community can be. I rely on their support and approval for many things that I do, and I extend my support to them as well. I have no problem understanding the power of community. But it's difficult to imagine a community condoning violent acts like the 9/11 attacks, Hamas suicide bombings, or IRA strikes. These acts are not committed by isolated individuals but are made possible by support from a broader community.
Reading from Jack Eller's Cruel Creeds, Virtuous Violence helped me to understand how these groups can form. "Ethnoreligious" groups congeal around a perceived cultural difference, using religion, class, language, etc. as a marker that separates their group from another. In times of conflict, people group together to stand against an enemy. When they form ethnoreligious groups, the conflict can have cosmic implications and can grow in to a battle of good versus evil. When the definition of a community becomes a religion and this community feels that they are under attack, this is the type of group that could be more willing to "reinterpret" moral codes and to offer support to actors in religious violence.
In our readings for this past week, we saw how naturally and easily this type of ethnoreligious group can form in the right circumstances. Reading about conflict in Lebanon, Northern Ireland, Sri Lanka, and (closer to home) in the US has made me think about how readily and naturally conflict seems to start. How can we work to prevent it? As a member of a community, I have a responsibility to withdraw my support from any violent or destructive activities. That definitely gives me something to think about.
08 September 2011
"I have set before you life and death..." (Deut. 30:19)
In our readings from The Ambivalence of the Sacred by Scott Appleby, this paragraph leapt out at me as both very true and potentially frightening:
As human beings, we necessarily have a subjective view of the world. Our decisions are influenced by the social groups that we live in, but ultimately it is with the sum of our personal experiences and values that we make our choices.
Therefore, to really understand an act of religious violence, it is necessary to observe not only the religious beliefs in play, but also the social and political factors that may be affecting these individual choices. I feel that it's still too early in the course for me to posit any real solutions or preventative actions against religious violence, but it seems to me that such solutions are to be found by taking a holistic view of the causes of religious violence while remembering that ultimately the decision is set before an individual who must make the choice between life and death.
Now how to tip the balance in the way of life?
The unique dynamism of lived religion--its distinctive patterns of interaction not only with secular, nationalist, ethnic, and other elements of political or personal identity but also with its own sacred past-- means, among other things, that religious behavior cannot be confidently predicted merely on the basis of an individual's or group's affiliation with a specific religious tradition, especially if that tradition is conceptualized in the abstract. In this sense there is no "Islam," no "Christianity," no "Buddhism"--- only Muslims, Christians, and Buddhists living in specific contingent contexts, possessed of multiple and mixed motives, each of which might contribute to a particular action or decision taken.In other words, I've never met Christianity or Islam, but I have met Christians and Muslims living in the world and making decisions (even what they view as purely religious ones) based upon multiple factors. How they understand and apply the teachings of their religion can be shaped by personality, family environment, national identity and many other factors. This shouldn't be surprising. Isn't this how I make all my other decisions? Even as I try to make the most rational or just decision, my perception of what is rational or just is influenced by my past experiences, my values, and the attitudes of the communities that I live in.
As human beings, we necessarily have a subjective view of the world. Our decisions are influenced by the social groups that we live in, but ultimately it is with the sum of our personal experiences and values that we make our choices.
Therefore, to really understand an act of religious violence, it is necessary to observe not only the religious beliefs in play, but also the social and political factors that may be affecting these individual choices. I feel that it's still too early in the course for me to posit any real solutions or preventative actions against religious violence, but it seems to me that such solutions are to be found by taking a holistic view of the causes of religious violence while remembering that ultimately the decision is set before an individual who must make the choice between life and death.
Now how to tip the balance in the way of life?
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