Global Engagement Initiative
page 3

Well, no, he wouldn’t call it an attack. It’s a brotherly “correction.”

A comment by Doug King, Witherspoon's WebWeaver    [3-5-08]

For responses to this essay >>

Shannon O’Donnell, who has been serving for the past couple years as a Presbyterian long-term mission volunteer on the staff of the Sabeel Ecumenical Liberation Theology Center in Jerusalem, has recently drawn the attention of the Rev. Jim Berkley, the Director of Presbyterian Action, which is one section of the Institute on Religion and Democracy.  Read his blog >>

The Institute on Religion and Democracy (IRD) affirms as its primary value the Lordship of Christ, which “is the first and final assertion Christians make about all of reality, including politics.”

Beyond that (or better, reflecting that), the Institute’s basic statement on “Christianity and Democracy,” which was authored by the Rev. Richard John Neuhaus, affirms democracy, human freedom, and the capitalist or market economy. And they are dedicated to correcting the social witness of the ecumenical churches that have strayed from these principles by their over-emphasis on justice and equality. [This is my effort to give a fair summary of the long paper by Neuhaus. I’m open to correction, and fairly confident that I’ll receive it.]

The Witherspoon Society has been privileged to provide modest financial support over the past couple years for Shannon O’Donnell’s work. She in turn has provided us with occasional – and very helpful – reports on her work, giving us new insights into the situation of Palestinian Christians (and others) living in and around Jerusalem.

Click here for some of her reports, and links to more of them >>

We were fortunate to have her as a participant and speaker at our conference on global mission and justice in September, 2007. Click here for her presentation to the conference >>

Out of our respect for Shannon O’Donnell, and out of concern for understanding the work of our Presbyterian Church in a tragically divided and violent part of the world, I would like to offer just a few reflections on Mr. Berkley’s blog.

I’d like to summarize the errors of which he is accusing Ms. O’Donnell, and offer just a brief comment on each of them.  Rev. Berkley lists a number of her “questionable behaviors,” but the major ones seem to be:

1.         Charge: She acknowledges that she thought about concealing some information about her identity (“lying”), because she was afraid of how the Jewish staff of the YMCA might react to her, as one who lives and works with Palestinians. She decided to tell the truth, however, and was pleased to find she was accepted in spite of the suspicions that cloud life in that divided land. So her error, in Mr. Berkley’s view, seems to be either that she considered lying (though she didn’t do it), or that she acknowledges considering it.  

Comment: But let’s recognize that she just might have been anxious about the tensions that are a huge part of life in Jerusalem, especially for Palestinians and their friends. She is surely aware that in such a difficult situation, members of one group can sometimes be rude, hostile, even threatening to members of a group they perceive as the “enemy.”  

2.         Charge: She was being “petty, self-centered, and inane” because she decided not to endure the extra security measures around the area where President Bush was staying.  

Comment: I wonder whether Mr. Berkley has traveled much through Palestine, not on the free-flowing “Jewish” roads, but along the often impassible “Palestinian” roads, with all the security barriers at which Palestinians must submit to searches, and often to hours of delays, not to mention the humiliation. 

3.         Charge: She shows “prejudice” toward Jews when she says she “didn’t expect to feel accepted at such a place on the west [Jewish] side of town,” but she also says it is important not to judge others.  

Comment: I wonder whether Mr. Berkley has ever lived in a situation where he has been an object of prejudice on the part of the dominant population. Sometimes we must simply be realistic about the attitudes and behavior of a dominant and hostile majority, even if one also struggles to keep an open mind ... which was precisely what Ms. O’Donnell seemed to be doing very well. 

4.         Charge: She fails to show enough love “for George W. Bush, for her own country, and ... for the Jewish people and the government of Israel.” Here may be her greatest failure in Mr. Berkley’s view, and greatest need for his kindly correction.  

Comment: To doubt the success of the President’s peace-making efforts (though they are not looking terribly successful right now – not entirely through the fault of Hamas), to care deeply about the Palestinian people and to have some critical views on Israel’s policies and actions toward them, may in reality be far more deeply loving than a pious waving of American and Israeli banners.

There’s more to be said, but for now I would simply hope that we might try to respect and understand people, before we offer them too quickly our “correction” and “discipline.”

Dr. Neuhaus, in his foundational essay for the IRD, offers a helpful thought toward the end of the paper: “The issues are not simple. Our answers are not infallible. We are prone to err and we live by forgiveness.” Sounds pretty good to me. Might even be a good model for us Presbyterians.

Dear Doug,

I’ve written to you on other issues and hope you know me to be a kind and fair minded evangelical. I have a few things to say about your article about Jim Berkley and Shannon O’Donnell.

I don’t know Shannon O’Donnell at all so I can’t comment on her as a person. I do know Jim Berkley. I find him to be an honorable man. To be honest and clear, Jim is a friend of mine. As to your points:

1.         I agree Israel/Palestine is a tough place. And while Shannon might have received some negative reactions from people at the YMCA I doubt that would have extended to violence. Now, if she walked up to the Western Wall on the men’s side I wouldn’t guarantee her safety, but that is true for Jewish women as well.

2.         I was in Israel/Palestine a month ago. I agree that life for Palestinians in the occupied territories is tough. But I don’t think that had anything to do with getting near George Bush. I suspect any American would have a problem getting near George Bush if he wasn’t out shaking hands. It’s part of the reality of presidential protection. I think you compared apples and oranges here.

3.         As to Shannon being accepted in the Jewish Quarter of Jerusalem (Old City) or in the Jewish areas of the city outside of the Old City I suspect that very few people know who she is and therefore she would receive a friendly welcome as long as she wasn’t waving a Palestinian flag or telling people she supported Hamas. As for Jim Berkley being in a situation where he experiences prejudice I know he’s been in those situations quite a bit. It’s part of being an evangelical in the PCUSA. To be fair, I suspect you have felt the same prejudice from evangelicals.

4.         As to your last point, I have some real problems with some of George Bush’s policies. I support some of the policies of Israel and oppose others. Examples: I support Israel’s right to exist as a Jewish state. I also support the establishment of a Palestinian state within the lines of the pre 1967 West Bank and Gaza but I worry about my Christian brothers and sisters in that state given the violence of some Muslims against Christians. I oppose all settlements in the West Bank and the way the security barrier (fence/wall) has been drawn across Palestinian land and to enclose certain settlements. To be fair, the Supreme Court of Israel recently said that the barrier had to be moved. While the Supreme Court didn’t go as far as I wanted it was a start and shows an independent judiciary.

5.         A point not mentioned: Fatah is corrupt. The money meant for economic development in Palestine lined the pockets of the Fatah elite. Just ask how much money Arafat’s widow has salted away. Abbas’ government was not an improvement. That’s a large part of the reason Hamas won the election. But Hamas is committed to the destruction of Israel. Just what IS Israel to do? Negotiating with Abbas won’t provide any lasting peace. He doesn’t have the support of enough of the Palestinian people to enforce a peace. And how does Israel negotiate with Hamas? (But I do think that Israel should try and talk with Hamas)

My experience in Israel/Palestine showed me that the situation is extremely complicated. I felt the despair and saw the poverty in Bethlehem. I also was forced to ask myself the question, just what IS Israel to do when people shoot rockets out of Gaza toward Israeli towns?

I support a just peace for both Israelis and Palestinians but recognize that it’s easy to sit in America and suggest solutions. The Israelis and Palestinians have to come to their own peace. And since rockets fly and tanks roll in I’m afraid that won’t happen soon.

May the peace of Jesus reign in the land of his birth, life death and resurrection, soon!

Bob Campbell

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Is "attacked" the right word to describe Jim Berkley's blog? Isn't that a little melodramatic? She came in for his criticism, to be sure. But "attacked" does nothing but sensationalize the story. Was she injured in the attack?

[3-7-08]

In her book Speaking of Faith, Krista Tippett writes "The precarious collusion of political and spiritual frailty is quintessentially, tragically embodied in the intractable conflict in the common Holy Land of Christians, Muslims, and Jews. This is a root crisis of the contemporary world." She states that after interviewing an American Israeli journalist and two Palestinians, she quickly found herself "entangled in the knot that Palestinians and Israelis describe alike, of two distinct narratives for the same lived history. One man’s ‘independence’ is another man's ‘catastrophe.’ One man's ‘hero’ is another man's ‘terrorist.’ One man's ‘emigrant’ is another man's ‘refugee.’ These are not merely contrasts of vocabulary but of experience, imagination, and possibility."    

Could it be that James D. Berkley, in his criticism of Shannon O’Donnell, and Shannon, in her letter from the mission field, offer two distinct narratives for the same lived history? Berkley is an older male Minister of the Word and Sacrament and Director of Presbyterian Action for Faith and Freedom, a committee of the Institute on Religion and Democracy. The institute on Religion and Democracy is a promoter of standard “religious right” fare. He writes from Belleview, Washington, hardly a land of intractable conflict.

Shannon O’Donnell is a young female with a bachelor’s degree in communications serving as a long-term volunteer Webmaster and an information technology specialist in the Sabeel Liberation Theology Center in Jerusalem. Sabeel is an ecumenical grassroots liberation theology movement among Palestinian Christians which encourages women, men, and youth to discern what God is saying to them as their faith connects with the hard realities of their daily life: occupation, violence, discrimination and human rights violations. She writes from Jerusalem, were recently a gunman entered a prominent Jewish seminary, killing at least eight students and wounding at least nine others, three of them seriously, hardly a land of middle class American safety.

I experienced O’Donnell’s January letter as that of a young Christian woman attempting to reflect on her experience. I experienced Berkley’s criticisms of O’Donnell’s letter as a right wing personal attack by a paid conservative hack.

Shannon O’Donnell is a Presbyterian Mission Volunteer, serving with the Sabeel Ecumenical Liberation Theology Center in Jerusalem.  A recent visit to Germany led her to reflect on the courageous Germans who chose the dangerous path of peaceful resistance to Nazism. She says, “I have been thinking of the many ways that people can break away from the mainstream crowd when it is not quite headed in the right direction.”

The Witherspoon Society is proud to be providing a portion of her support.

You might want to look at Shannon’s presentation to the Witherspoon conference on global mission for peace and justice, in Louisville, September 2007.

And just scroll down on this page for some of her earlier reports from Jerusalem.
 

The Israeli lady in the locker room said it plainly: “He freezes the whole city when he comes … is it worth it?”  It’s all the chatter in the gym: he’s coming this week. No, not some sports hero or fitness guru, but a man who is well known all across the Middle East. His reputation is littered with bitterness from many who live here. People will either speak favorably about him, or spit on the ground upon the mere mentioning of his name. All this is from one man’s visit to Israel/Palestine: President George W. Bush.

Today I noticed that there are American flags now waving from the streetlamps. There will be extra security throughout the city. I don’t know what Bush’s visit will accomplish, but I do know for certain that it will cause daily traffic jams, and headaches for the residents of Jerusalem. And I will not be going to my yoga class at the YMCA, which is located across the street from the King David Hotel, where Bush is staying, because of all the extra security checks in the area.

For several months now I have intentionally been exploring more in West Jerusalem, the Jewish side of town. One afternoon last month, I stumbled into the YMCA, and spontaneously joined in on a hip-hop dance class. I was hooked, and decided to get a temporary membership to take more dance and yoga classes. But I was also hesitant to join because of all the questions I’d have to answer: where do I live? Where do I work? At first I was going to lie my way through the gym application process, because I wasn’t sure how the Israeli staff would react to someone who is “pro-Palestine”. Would they understand that being “pro-Palestine” doesn’t mean I am “anti-Israel?” Luckily, the dance instructor sensed my initial hesitation and said that this is a very open minded place, so I told the truth and have been going regularly ever since. I am grateful for such institutions, like the YMCA. The quote on the plaque outside the beautiful building reads:

“Here is a place whose atmosphere is peace where political and religious jealousies can be forgotten and international unity be fostered and developed”

–From Lord Allenby’s dedication address, April 1933

I admit I didn’t expect to feel accepted at such a place on the West side of town, but I often see Palestinians at the gym, and am glad that there are such resources available. I am also finally making some sense of the Hebrew language, because the yoga classes are mostly all in Hebrew. There is also a YMCA in East Jerusalem, the Arab side of town. Unfortunately, their gym is not so good, and there are no yoga or dance classes there.

Paths of Peaceful Resistance

I have been thinking of the many ways that people can break away from the mainstream crowd when it is not quite headed in the right direction. Some situations people appear outwardly to just accept, others stimulate a reaction. Sometimes that reaction is violent, or unjust, or loud, or peaceful, or silent.

On a recent trip to Germany, I visited Munich and saw the places where Hitler’s rise to power began. The Nazis' effort to take over the Bavarian State is referred to as the “Beer Hall Putsch.” The Nazi party was marching from the beer hall to the Bavarian Ministry building, and chaos broke out, leaving 17 people killed. After Hitler came to power, he had a memorial plaque placed on the corner where this event took place. Everyone who walked past it had to give the Nazi salute; those who didn’t were shot on the spot.

There were many who chose to resist non-violently. They simply went down an alley that took them a slightly longer route around the memorial area. This small road became known as “Dodgers' Alley.” However, once the Nazis noticed their actions, they stopped people utilizing the alley, and people died as a result of resistance. A small gold-colored strip of stones is the only memorial for those who utilized Dodgers' Alley, but still, I wonder what it must have been like for those people who chose a different path to avoid an unjust regime. How many hearts were beating fast as they moved down that alley? How many hearts gave into injustice to save their own lives? Which path would I chose?

I think no matter what cause God places upon our hearts, there are simple acts of non-violence that can powerfully spark the soul. It may be boycotting a product or company, protesting, going down Dodger’s Alley, or wearing a “Free Palestine” t-shirt to yoga class. We all have an important contribution towards raising awareness. I have also found that it is equally important not to judge others as we attempt such a task.

We all have to start somewhere, as awareness is often not earned, but gained. I don’t see it as a prize we parade in the streets, or a flag we fly from streetlamps. It is a burden that makes your heart heavy, especially if the situation remains unresolved. It is a form of love that causes you to reach out from the accumulation of awareness which has cracked and broken your heart wide open. Mother Teresa once said: “It is very important for us to realize that love, to be true, has to hurt. I must be willing to give whatever it takes not to harm other people and, in fact, to do good to them. This requires that I be willing to give until it hurts. Otherwise there is no true love in me and I bring injustice, not peace, to those around me.”

I take heart in knowing that God gave until it hurt, that Christ prayed until he bled. That God continues today to give, even though it hurts, and we are called to do the same. We are to love people, even when it hurts. There is freedom in such love, and perhaps the only way to develop a deeper awareness of God’s heart.

May we learn to pray with our hearts, minds, and even our eyes wide open.

Small steps toward a just peace

a report from Shannon O’Donnell

Shannon O’Donnell is a Presbyterian Volunteer in Mission, serving in Jerusalem with the Sabeel Ecumenical Liberation Theology Center. The Witherspoon Society is providing partial support for her work as part of our commitment to global mission for peace and justice.

For her earlier reports >>

"Just peace: An orientation toward conflict transformation characterized by approaches that reduce violence and destructive cycles of social interaction and at the same time increase justice in any human relationship."

–from The Moral Imagination: The Art and Soul of Building Peace, by John Paul Lederach

This past month I’ve had a number of experiences that continue to shape my thoughts, faith, and point of view. I was able to help rebuild some houses that had been destroyed, serve as an Ecumenical Accompanier in Yanoun, and participate in a protest in Bil’in. Each experience taught me something about what it means to work for peace, how to live out my beliefs, how to put actions behind my words, and when to rest within silence.

One weekend, I went with the Ta’ayush group to a village south of Hebron to rebuild some structures that had been destroyed by the Israeli Army. Ta’ayush (Arabic for "life in common") is a grassroots movement of Arab and Jewish citizens of Israel that began in the fall of 2000. In their purpose statement, Ta’ayush says that a future of equality, justice and peace begins today, between us, through concrete daily actions of solidarity to end the Israeli occupation of the Palestinian territories and to achieve full civil equality for all. Dozens of Israelis, internationals, and Palestinians came together to build foundations, stone walls, and rooftops. We mixed cement, formed assembly lines, and broke bread together throughout the beautiful exhausting day.

I found it strange that the Army would bulldoze one house but not another. It was like visiting the scene after a tornado, a seemingly random occurrence of destruction. People in the village did not have a permit to build, because permits are very expensive and difficult to obtain. A villager cannot build without knowing that retribution will likely occur, yet a settlement outpost was illegally built nearby, and the legal system doesn’t seem to care about that. The villagers were quite capable of rebuilding on their own, but they requested that the Ta’ayush group come, to make their struggle known to the outside world. I asked one of the Israeli group leaders if this would merely provoke the Army to destroy the building after we were finished working on it. He said that is possible, and a risk that the villagers are aware of, but the point of the task was to provide a presence, to build in solidarity with the people. "Besides," he said, "if the building is destroyed again, then we will return and rebuild again."

Yanoun

In 2002, the residents of Yanoun reached their breaking point, and the entire village packed up and fled to the nearby town of Aqraba. This was the first instance in which an entire Palestinian town was emptied due to settler violence. With the help of international and Israeli peace activists, who also moved to Yanoun for extended periods, the villagers eventually moved back. The Ecumenical Accompaniment Program of Israel/Palestine (EAPPI) has been providing a presence in the village since 2003.

I went to Yanoun with no idea what to expect. It felt like I was stepping back in time to the way things were centuries ago. People earn a living by raising sheep and goats. As one of the shepherds was returning with his flock in the evening, he invited my friend and me over for dinner. That was the first dinner invitation I’d ever received from someone riding a donkey. Imhani, the mother of the family that we had dinner with, invited us back the next day to help make bread in an outdoor oven, and cheese from sheep’s milk. So, after the morning walk through the village, we went back to Imhani’s house for our first lesson in bread and cheese making. Mostly we sat and chatted about the recent news from an Israeli soldier who said that the separation wall would be built between Yanoun and Aqraba.

This news weighed heavily upon the family, because it threatens their whole livelihood. Aqraba is where they sell their goods, and where they buy items that they cannot make. I loved seeing people live off the land. Nearly everything in Yanoun is used and reused, that it made me rethink our modern standards of recycling. Plastic containers are used until they fall apart, food scraps are fed to the animals, cardboard makes a good potholder, rain water is conserved and used to the last drop. Still, the relationship between the people of Yanoun and Aqraba is extensive. Many times during our Arabic conversations with Imhani, we would just pause and look at the peaceful scenery. I was finding it difficult to imagine the gray separation wall intruding on the beauty of the area.

Bil’in

Every Friday, the people of Bil’in, and usually some internationals, hold a demonstration protesting the building of the separation wall. Close to 60% of Bil’in land has been confiscated for the building of Israeli settlements and construction of the wall. I went to the protest, which promoted a non-violent resistance to the situation.

However, the reaction from the Israeli Army was anything but non-violent. The whole demonstration at Bil’in made me wonder: Is this the solution? The theory of non-violent protests is something that many people will commend, yet the situation seemed to prohibit a peaceful outcome. I am still questioning the actions of both sides. It felt like we were poking a bee’s nest, and expecting not to get stung. I did feel the sting of the tear gas that day, and it was something that I hope never to experience again. I wonder what would have happened if the Army hadn’t show up for our protest. We’d probably have had our demonstration and left in a couple of hours. What would the harm have been? I also wonder what would happen if the demonstration didn’t occur where the Army was expecting it to take place. They would be waiting, with all their ammunition, and have nobody to use it on.

One of the participants in Friday’s protest was Mairead Maguire, who received the Nobel Peace Prize in 1976 for her peace efforts in Northern Ireland. She is the cofounder of the Community for Peace People, and a member of the Fellowship of Reconciliation. Here is her take on the demonstration that day:

"We were then tear gassed, and as I helped a French woman to retreat, I was shot in the leg with a rubber bullet. Two young women, one from the USA and one from New Zealand, helped me towards an ambulance. I saw an elderly Palestinian mother carried on a stretcher into the ambulance, as she was shot in the back with a plastic bullet. I saw a man whose face was covered in blood and a Palestinian youth overcome with the gas. About 20 people were injured. I was overcome with gas and had a nose bleed, which resulted in being carried to ambulance for treatment.

"On the road towards the village we watched two children playing in their garden, oblivious to the nerve gas floating down on the wind towards their home. This permeates their clothes and their lungs, and the question has to be asked: What will the health of these children be like in a few years’ time?

"This is not only a question of the abuse of human rights and international laws by the Israeli government; it is a health and environmental issue. We were all traumatized by our experience, and with the gas on the air came the words flowing back to me of Palestinian doctor who said, ‘The whole Palestinian people – after 40 years of occupation, the whole people of Palestine are traumatized. It is time the international community acted to put a stop to this suffering and injustice of our people.’ "

I agree: enough is enough. It is time for action to force the Israeli government to enter into unconditional talks to end this tragedy of tragedies of good and gentle Palestinian people."

As I am learning more about the situation here in Israel/Palestine, I see that there is no easy solution. I also see people continue to work for a just peace, for a constructive change. I am seeking to understand what those concepts mean and how they can be implemented in every day life. Without faith in the life, death, and resurrection of Christ, these would remain to be only unreachable concepts.

I pray that Christ may continue to work in the hearts and minds of people here and everywhere.

"Constructive Change: The pursuit of shifting relationships from those defined by fear, mutual recrimination, and violence toward those characterized by love, mutual respect, and proactive engagement. Constructive social change seeks to move the flow of interaction in human conflict from cycles of destructive relational patterns toward cycles of relational dignity and respectful engagement."

–from The Moral Imagination, by John Paul Lederach

A major
Ghost Ranch event this summer!

July 28 - August 3, 2008

Paths toward Peace and Justice:
Spirituality, Earth-Care, and the Prophetic Word in a time of Violence

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