Anthony McIntyre ☠ In less than an hour Drogheda Stands With Palestine will gather in West Street, tense and apprehensive.
A ceasefire is in place over Gaza but the desire of Israel’s far right government to wreck it is not to be underestimated. Their blood lust is insatiable right to the bitter end. Much as it was in the closing days of WW2
Many years ago I read about the execution of the anti-Nazi activist Pastor Dietrich Bonhoeffer. When he was being led to the gallows his SS guards - a month short of their own defeat - jeered, mocked, tooted and hooted. If witness reports are correct Bonhoeffer simply prayed, his faith stronger than his fear.
His love for humanity was not the sickly sweet sentimental guff of the kind we might find in a Mills and Boon novel. He took the action he wrote about. His compassion stands out in stark contrast to the pastors of hate theology who delight in the Israeli perpetrated genocide and the mass murder of children. Listening to these monstrous men of god it is easy to subscribe to the view that there is no hate like Christian love. Bonhoeffer's steadfastness also runs against the grain of those other pastors who while not endorsing the genocide nevertheless lack the moral fortitude to preach against it. For them the ill treatment of gays by theocrats in Iran is of much more concern than thousands of murdered children.
Amongst clerics I find more pastords than pastors. They remind me of the Annie Lamont observation that you know god is on your side when he hates the same people you do. Bonhoeffer, a man of deep Christian love, was an exception to the pastords rule.
During the two years he was confined in prison prior to his death Bonhoeffer wrote:
During the two years he was confined in prison prior to his death Bonhoeffer wrote:
Inactive waiting and dully looking on are not Christian responses. Christians are called to action and sympathy not through their own firsthand experiences but by the immediate experience of their brothers, for whose sake Christ suffered.
His love for humanity was not the sickly sweet sentimental guff of the kind we might find in a Mills and Boon novel. He took the action he wrote about. His compassion stands out in stark contrast to the pastors of hate theology who delight in the Israeli perpetrated genocide and the mass murder of children. Listening to these monstrous men of god it is easy to subscribe to the view that there is no hate like Christian love. Bonhoeffer's steadfastness also runs against the grain of those other pastors who while not endorsing the genocide nevertheless lack the moral fortitude to preach against it. For them the ill treatment of gays by theocrats in Iran is of much more concern than thousands of murdered children.
None of them have the rectitude to proclaim as Pastor Chris Hedges does that:
In fact they would look at Chris Hedges aghast for having the temerity to state what is.
This week as those hostages seized by the IDF from the flotilla of ships seeking to break the Israeli starvation siege of Gaza, returned from captivity, they provided accounts which so eerily echo the experience of Dietrich Bonhoeffer as he walked from his cell and then across the prison courtyard to the noose. They were confined in bug infested cells, deprived of sleep, kicked, mocked, denied food, water, medicine, forced to kneel in the torture position, zip tied and compelled to endure the blistering sun for hours, and strip searched. A man of Muslim faith told how he was relentlessly mocked because of his beard. Again, the imagery of Jews being humiliated by SS guards while their beards were set on fire looms so large upon being confronted with these accounts.
They serve to remind us that the words of Bertolt Brecht have a current meaning: “For though the world has stood up and stopped the bastard, the bitch that bore him is in heat again.”
Children have been shot in other conflicts I have covered. But never before have I watched as soldiers enticed children like mice into a trap and murdered them for sport.
In fact they would look at Chris Hedges aghast for having the temerity to state what is.
This week as those hostages seized by the IDF from the flotilla of ships seeking to break the Israeli starvation siege of Gaza, returned from captivity, they provided accounts which so eerily echo the experience of Dietrich Bonhoeffer as he walked from his cell and then across the prison courtyard to the noose. They were confined in bug infested cells, deprived of sleep, kicked, mocked, denied food, water, medicine, forced to kneel in the torture position, zip tied and compelled to endure the blistering sun for hours, and strip searched. A man of Muslim faith told how he was relentlessly mocked because of his beard. Again, the imagery of Jews being humiliated by SS guards while their beards were set on fire looms so large upon being confronted with these accounts.
They serve to remind us that the words of Bertolt Brecht have a current meaning: “For though the world has stood up and stopped the bastard, the bitch that bore him is in heat again.”
Don't expect those words to echo from the sermons of the pastords tomorrow, where Bonhoeffer and the Flotilla activists will be treated like a bad smell.
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