Tortured Faith

The photo barrage will continue soon, but first this brief interruption for some text blogging.
I was back in front of the White House today for another witness, joining friends from the National Religious Campaign Against Torture to call on the Obama Administration to create a truth commission to investigate the use of torture by American forces in various aspects of the terror war.
There are all kinds of good reasons to participate in NRCAT's call, but for me one reason stands out: people who go to church are more likely to support the use of torture than those who do not.
The church has utterly failed on this crucial moral and theological issue. We have failed to teach clearly that torture violates the teachings that flow forth from the creation story. If all of us are created in the image of God, then torture of any creature debases the Creator.
Now the Obama Administration, saying it wants to look forward and not back, wants to compound the failing of the church -- or, at least, to take advantage of it by avoiding a politically costly investigation.
Truth commissions in other countries -- countries who have faced far more difficult and divisive challenges than do we -- have led to authentic reconciliation and allowed countries to move forward honestly. If we do not move forward honestly we will have failed to learn our own history.
It is only a matter of time until we repeat it.

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