What would Jesus do about Iraq?

Mahatma Gandhi once said that everyone knows what Jesus taught-except for Christians. Sadly, this is far too true for far too many Christians, and especially for those who constitute the Religious Right. Nowhere do we get better evidence of this than when we examine the attitudes of most Christians toward what has been happening in Iraq.

Recently, at Eastern University, I had a debate with Frank Gaffney of the Center for Strategic Studies concerning America's policies for the Middle East. As part of the program, there was an opportunity for questions to be raised from the audience. One of the questions asked was, "If Jesus were determining what America does in Iraq, how would it be different from what America is presently doing there?"

Among the points I tried to make in answering that question, I cited Jesus' teaching that what we would not want others to do to us, we ought not to do to them (Matthew 7:12). Therefore, I explained, "It is safe to say that Jesus would not make torture an acceptable policy in the interrogation of prisoners."

Dr. Gaffney responded to my comments by saying that while he had no expertise in answering this question, in his opinion America has to pursue policies that are practical, suggesting that torture might be a necessary evil in a world in which torturing a prisoner might glean information that could save thousands of lives.

Unfortunately, it was no surprise to me that most of the Christians in the audience agreed with Dr. Gaffney. Practical realities, for them, took precedence over the teachings of Jesus. Gandhi was proved right!

When it comes to war, you don't have to be a Christian to recognize that any reading of the Sermon on the Mount should require followers of Jesus to be non-violent resisters. In this passage of the Christian Bible, Jesus directs his disciples to love their enemies. So far as I am concerned, that undoubtedly means that we shouldn't kill them!

When Jesus preaches that when we are attacked we are to "turn the other cheek," we might not consider that to be a practical thing to do-but then, Jesus never was much for pragmatic solutions to the horrendous problems and threats that we must face in life. When he rejected the kind of justice that prescribes an eye for an eye, and a tooth for a tooth, and taught instead that we must return good for evil and overcome evil with good (Matthew 5:38-42) he wasn't fitting into the scheme of realistic politics. But then, Jesus was never into realistic politics. He told his disciples that, unless they were willing to "deny themselves" and be willing to be crucified rather than live contrary to this new ethic he was prescribing, they could not be part of his kingdom (Matthew 10:38).

Even the Apostle Paul, who some liberal theologians contend departed somewhat from the radical ethics of Jesus, supported non-violent resistance. In his Epistle to the Romans, he wrote: "Dearly beloved, avenge not yourselves, but rather give place unto wrath: for it is written, Vengeance is mine; I will repay, saith the Lord" (Romans 12:19).

Before these words are written off as unrealistic for foreign policy, consider what might have happened if Christians had embraced them and did for the Iraqi people what Paul suggested that we should have done. For ten years, following the first Gulf War, America placed an embargo on Iraq, and the Red Cross estimates that this embargo affected the food supply and the availability of medicines in that country. This, in turn, was indirectly responsible for the deaths of hundreds of thousands of children among Iraq's poorest oft he poor.

Suppose Christians of America had done what their Bible told them to do for their enemies. Imagine what might have been if our churches, using their vast resources, had purchased medicines and food for the Iraqi people, shipped them to Jordan, and, from there, transported them to the desperate people in Iraq. Might the invading American soldiers then have been greeted with roses thrown at their feet, as Vice President Cheney had predicted? The Apostle Paul suggested that that kind of response to Saddam Hussein might have brought down that evil dictator. That is what Paul predicted when he said that through such loving acts of kindness we would "bring down coals of fire" on our enemy's head (Romans 12:20).

G. K. Chesterton, the British author, once said, "It is not that Christianity has been tried and failed. It is that it has never been tried."

On the eve of this present war in Iraq, a group of my students, along with some other Christians, decided that their commitment to Jesus required that they should put his teachings into practice in Iraq. They flew to Jordan, hired a couple of vans, and, with limited financial resources, bought some desperately needed medical supplies which they loaded into the vans. They then traveled across the desert to deliver them to the people of Baghdad. When the bombs started to fall on Baghdad, they wanted to be there, volunteering in the hospitals, helping the Iraqi doctors and nurses to do their ministries of healing for the wounded. These young people were able to stay there until the American troops occupied the city. Then they were forced to leave.

As this group of Christian peacemakers traveled back toward Jordan, one of their vans had a blowout on one of its front tires, resulting in a devastating crash. Several of these young heroes needed hospital care. The good news is that some Muslim Iraqis, who were even then engaged in battle and under attack, took these injured Christians to a hospital in a nearby town and arranged care for them without asking for any kind of payment in return. They recognized in these young Christians what their prophet Jesus had taught his disciples about caring for those in need, regardless of who they are.

On another subject, Jesus would have had something to say about capital punishment. When Saddam Hussein was put to death, most of my Evangelical sisters and brothers were horrified at the grisly videos of the hanging that were broadcast on television, but they had little objection to the concept of capital punishment. How do they think that it is possible to reconcile that hanging with Christ's teachings about being merciful? Jesus said: "Blessed are the merciful: for they shall obtain mercy" (Matthew 6:7).

Any survey of the Religious Right will reveal that these Christian brothers and sisters support capital punishment more readily than does the general population. Without hesitation, they stood behind the executions that President Bush ordered when he was governor of Texas. The New Testament teaches that it is never too late to repent and to make a commitment to live out the teachings of Jesus, but it should be done now! Our scriptures say: "Now is the accepted time; behold, now is the day of salvation" (II Corinthians 6:2).

Jesus taught, "Blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall be called the children of God" (Matthew 5:9). Now is the time for Christians, especially for those fundamentalist Christian brothers and sisters who insist on taking the Bible literally-to literally live out the words of the one whom they call Lord!

Also, it is time for Muslims to give attention to the teachings of the one they acknowledge as "prophet." And for Jews to consider the teachings of the one they themselves call "Rabbi." Of course, this can only happen if Christians begin to obey the commandments of the one who taught us to love our neighbors as we love ourselves (Matthew 22:39). 

Anthony Campolo, Ph.D., professor emeritus at Eastern University, is the founder of the Evangelical Association for the Promotion of Education, an organization that develops schools and social programs in various third world countries and in cities across North America. He is the author of thirty-four books, including his most recent two, Letters to a Young Evangelical and The God of Intimacy and Action.

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