Reflections...

A radio talk by David Gill, delivered as the "Thought for the Week" programme on Hong Kong's RTHK on 23 February 2003, as events were moving towards war in Iraq. 


Truth, they say, is the first casualty of war.

Truth usually becomes a casualty even before the shooting starts, as each contending government sets out to persuade its own people and the world at large that it is on the side of the angels and its opponent, therefore, is the very devil incarnate.

That’s why, when the drums of war are beating, we should all cultivate the art of suspicion. We must become skeptics, doubters. We need to ask questions, lots of questions. And the heavier the flow of rhetoric from governments, the more searching our questions need to be.

When my government claims its stance is just, I will wonder, and I will suspect my country’s cause may not be quite as virtuous as the propaganda back home would have me believe. When it claims an opposing government deserves utter condemnation, to the point where even killing is justified, I will wonder again, suspecting that the so-called enemy may not be quite as demonic as they want the world to think.

Asking questions, of course, is no way to win friends. It can make you very unpopular when passions are running high. But it needs to be done – and now, not ten years hence, after the bloodbath, with the luxury of hindsight.

Sometimes, in what must come close to the ultimate blasphemy, even God gets dragged into the rhetoric of war. It is asserted, or more often hinted, that God is on one side, not the other. Or quasi-religious imagery is invoked, likening the conflict to the ultimate struggle between good and evil, between light and darkness, between God and Satan – and we’re left in no doubt which side is which.

It’s an old tactic, of course, and a clever one. As Bob Dylan sang during another war, over thirty years ago: “You don’t ask no questions, when God’s on your side”.

When even the Most High is made complicit in carnage, we must protest. Religious communities, in particular, will object when the name of God is taken in vain; when the merciful One, the compassionate One, is coopted by the politicians and exploited by their propaganda machines to serve partisan causes.

The true God carries no passport, wears no uniform, salutes no flag, and certainly supports no killing machine. The divine love embraces all people, all nations, all races, each and every human being, with no exclusions. All are God’s children. All therefore are, indelibly, brothers and sisters. Not even the worst fratricidal conflict can change that.

It has been encouraging, at this crucial time, to see Hong Kong’s religious leaders joining hands in prayers for peace, and committing themselves to work together for harmony within and between the nations.

As, once again, we hear the ominous beat of the drums of war, let us all pray that this madness may soon pass from us.

Meanwhile, remember that God does not cheer for one side or the other. He weeps for both.