Saturday, August 01, 2009

Tortured State of Affairs

My friend Ray McGovern wrote a piece this week on torture and the church. He is responding to survey data showing that Americans who attend church regularly are more likely than non-church goers to support the use of torture, and laying blame on the shoulders of church leadership that has failed to speak out clearly on the issue.
In particular, Ray chides local pastors for failing to speak out, even as he cites several denominational statements calling for clear abolition of torture and an accounting of what happened during the Bush years that led us down this dark path.
I wonder if I've made myself clear on this during the past five years or so. I don't speak often about the war or torture because, at my church, it is so much preaching to the choir.
Well, I'm off for two weeks as pastor-in-residence at the camp of the Presbytery of the James. I'll have some time to ponder -- broken up in mid stream by a couple of days at the Christian Peace Witness leadership planning retreat.
See you in a couple of weeks.