Dr. Robin Meyers Speech

Dr. Robin Meyers
Oklahoma University Peace Rally
November 14, 2004
As some of you know, I am minister of Mayflower Congregational Churchin Oklahoma City, an Open and Affirming, Peace and Justice church innorthwest Oklahoma City, and professor of Rhetoric at Oklahoma CityUniversity.But you would most likely have encountered me on thepages of the Oklahoma Gazette, where I have been a columnist for six years,and hold the record for the most number of angry letters to the editor.Tonight, I join ranks of those who are angry, because Ihave watched as the faith I love has been taken over by fundamentalists whoclaim to speak for Jesus, but whose actions are anything but Christian.We've heard a lot lately about so-called "moral values"as having swung the election to President Bush. Well, I'm a great believerin moral values, but we need to have a discussion, all over this country,about exactly what constitutes a moral value -- I mean what are we talkingabout?Because we don't get to make them up as we go along,especially not if we are people of faith. We have an inherited tradition ofwhat is right and wrong, and moral is as moral does. Let me give you just afew of the reasons why I take issue with those in power who claim moralvalues are on their side:When you start a war on false pretenses, and then act asif your deceptions are justified because you are doing God's will, and thatyour critics are either unpatriotic or lacking in faith, there are some ofus who have given our lives to teaching and preaching the faith who believethat this is not only not moral, but immoral.When you live in a country that has establishedinternational rules for waging a just war, build the United Nations on yourown soil to enforce them, and then arrogantly break the very rules you setdown for the rest of the world, you are doing something immoral.When you claim that Jesus is the Lord of your life, andyet fail to acknowledge that your policies ignore his essential teaching, orturn them on their head (you know, Sermon on the Mount stuff like that wemust never return violence for violence and that those who live by the swordwill die by the sword), you are doing something immoral.When you act as if the lives of Iraqi civilians are notas important as the lives of American soldiers, and refuse to even countthem, you are doing something immoral.When you find a way to avoid combat in Vietnam, and thenquestion the patriotism of someone who volunteered to fight, and came homea hero, you are doing something immoral.When you ignore the fundamental teachings of the gospel,which says that the way the strong treat the weak is the ultimate ethicaltest, by giving tax breaks to the wealthiest among us so the strong will getstronger and the weak will get weaker, you are doing something immoral.When you wink at the torture of prisoners, and depriveso-called "enemy combatants" of the rules of the Geneva convention, whichyour own country helped to establish and insists that other countriesfollow you are doing something immoral.When you claim that the world can be divided up into thegood guys and the evil doers, slice up your own nation into those who arewith you, or with the terrorist -- and then launch a war which enriches yourown friends and seizes control of the oil to which we are addicted, insteadof helping us to kick the habit, you are doing something immoral.When you fail to veto a single spending bill, but ask usto pay for a war with no exit strategy and no end in sight, creating anenormous deficit that hangs like a great millstone around the necks of ourchildren, you are doing something immoral.When you cause most of the rest of the world to hate acountry that was once the most loved country in the world, and act like itdoesn't matter what others think of us, only what God thinks of you, youhave done something immoral.When you use hatred of homosexuals as a wedge issue to turnout record numbers of evangelical voters, and use the Constitution as atool of discrimination, you are doing something immoral.When you favor the death penalty, and yet claim to be afollower of Jesus, who said an eye for an eye was the old way, not the wayof the kingdom, you are doing something immoral.When you dismantle countless environmental laws designedto protect the earth which is God's gift to us all, so that the corporationsthat bought you and paid for your favors will make higher profits while ourchildren breathe dirty air and live in a toxic world, you have donesomething immoral. The earth belongs to the Lord, not Halliburton.When you claim that our God is bigger than their God, andthat our killing is righteous, while theirs is evil, we have begun toresemble the enemy we claim to be fighting, and that is immoral. We havemet the enemy, and the enemy is us.When you tell people that you intend to run and govern asa "compassionate conservative," using the word which is the essence of allreligious faith-compassion, and then show no compassion for anyone whodisagrees with you, and no patience with those who cry to you for help, youare doing something immoral.When you talk about Jesus constantly, who was a healer ofthe sick, but do nothing to make sure that anyone who is sick can go to seea doctor, even if she doesn't have a penny in her pocket, you are doingsomething immoral.When you put judges on the bench who are racist, and willset women back a hundred years, and when you surround yourself withpreachers who say gays ought to be killed, you are doing something immoral.I'm tired of people thinking that because I'm a ChristianI must be a supporter of President Bush, or that because I favor civilrights and gay rights I must not be a person of faith.I'm tired of people saying that I can't support thetroops but oppose the war -- I heard that when I was your age, when theVietnam war was raging. We knew that that war was wrong, and you know thatthis war is wrong--the only question is how many people are going to diebefore these make-believe Christians are removed from power?This country is bankrupt. The war is morally bankrupt.The claim of this administration to be Christian is bankrupt. And the onlypeople who can turn things around are people like you--young people who arejust beginning to wake up to what is happening to them. It's your country totake back. Its your faith to take back. It's your future to take back.Don't be afraid to speak out. Don't back down when yourfriends begin to tell you that the cause is righteous and that the flagshould be wrapped around the cross, while the rest of us keep our mouthsshut. Real Christians take chances for peace. So do real Jews, and realMuslims, and real Hindus, and real Buddhists--so do all the faith traditionsof the world at their heart believe one thing: life is precious. Every humanbeing is precious. Arrogance is the opposite of faith. Greed is the oppositeof charity. And believing that one has never made a mistake is the mark ofa deluded man, not a man of faith.And war -- war is the greatest failure of the human race-- and thus the greatest failure of faith.There's an old rock and roll song, whose lyrics say it all:War, what is it good for? Absolutely nothing.And what is the dream of the prophets?That we should study war no more,that we should beat our swords intoplowshares and our spears into pruning hooks.Who would Jesus bomb, indeed?How many wars does it take to knowthat too many people have died?What if they gave a war and nobody came?Maybe one day we will find out.Time to march again my friends. Time to commit acts ofcivil disobedience. Time to sing, and to pray, and refuse to participate inthe madness. My generation finally stopped a tragic war. You can too!
Published with permission from Dr. Robin Meyers.