DISQUS

mountainguy · 1 year ago

As a colombian I am I just want to send you some blessings because of the work CPT is doing here.

Nathan · 1 year ago

"Both our lives could be placed in risky situations for causes we care about."

To me, this is one of the biggest differences between the 'peaceniks' and the soldiers; they are at least willing to die for what they believe in. Too many of us on the other side of that fence are willing to protest, to write letters, to try to persuade others of the reality of Christ, but not die. Its a reflection of our culture, but we count our lives as too valuable. Thank God the earliest Christians did not feel the same way!

markvans · 1 year ago

Just to push back ever-so-gently...

I don't think our problem is that we count our lives as too valuable. The problem is that we don't count the lives of others as valuable enough.

Char · 1 year ago

Right, the earliest Christians lived in a context of the fearful Roman Empire. But they preached, and met and ate together as if they didn't fear death. Resurrection life is a completely different paradigm. We live in hope in face of all the threats of the world's reality surrounding us.

hewhocutsdown · 1 year ago

Thought: if all of us began to stop paying taxes to the military complex, how many CPT workers could we support?

Mark, you still needing some cash for that?

markvans · 1 year ago

I certainly like the idea of having a massive amount of people withholding the military portion of their taxes to support CPT. Has anyone out there done any articles about that sort of idea…justifying tax evasion for that sort of purpose? I know folks like Peter Maurin have written about that in the past, but it would be very interesting to have an article of that nature on JM.

I am, but in light of the coming house purchase for Missio Dei, I'm going to apply for January's delegation to Colombia, rather than September/October.

Maria Kirby · 1 year ago

You said "For nonviolent accompaniers, our sources of security come in more vulnerable forms through connection to local partners, through being known, through recognition of our work for peace, through our watching eyes and communication to international channels. We are not a threat, except perhaps to the status quo, but those who would harm us count the cost of doing so when our organization and partners would raise an international stink as we would do for Colombians. It is through connection, not power over others, that brings us security."

If the international stink weren't raised with agencies who do resort to violence (like the US government) I wonder how effective CPT would be? I seem to recall that the release of the three CPTers had a lot to do with negotiations on the part of the US government.

Don't get me wrong, I am in full support of what CPT does. I just don't want to delude myself into thinking that it is ONLY the peaceful methods that CPT uses that provide the positive results that we see and that the stick behind the carrot doesn't matter. It seems to me that heaven might not be so attractive if there wasn't a hell.

Char · 1 year ago

Maria, I recommend the newly released book about the CPT hostage crisis, 118 Days: Christian Peacemaker Teams held hostage in Iraq.

There certainly was a role for negotiations with the US, and CPTers think a lot about the role of US privilege. We were freed by a violent force (despite our concern that violence would not be used on our behalf) but with no shots fired! Our captors had abandoned post just prior to the rescue. We are thankful for being rescued and for God's protection.

At the same time that I acknowledge the role of military in this rescue, I want to emphasize the role of massive support we got from partner organizations. We were rescued by military, but we were kept alive by international support including many Muslim groups we can accompanied. That's part of the security through vulnerability I'm writing about. But you're right to acknowledge the tricky role of citizenship privileges here.

How do we live as citizens of heaven in a world that requires a country-specific passport?