to take seriously the current registration of young men for an eventual draft. At their request Rev. Jim Nielsen, WSU Campus Minister, and I have been assisting high school administrators and counselors in refurbishing their knowledge about this matter . . . For Christian people the prospect of conscription and participation in war raises moral issues we may well help each other think through” (January 13, 1981, newsletter).
David Richard, where are you? I hope your work remains conscientious and community oriented. Thanks for being a witness to peace!
“Good Morning, Vietnam!”
Certainly before, and afterwards as well, the expensive to treasure and blood conflict in Vietnam occupied our attention in 1972 and 1973. Serving in my second and third years of ministry in Pullman, Washington, adjoined to WSU, I was pleased to be located in a congregation that took seriously the social dimension of the Christian faith.
On January 4, 1972, I wrote in “The Communicator,” the weekly newsletter from our congregation:
Christian people everywhere cannot help but be reduced to profound sadness on account of the recent extensive bombing of North Vietnam. Some will find it necessary to defend this action as a necessary evil. I understand that rationale but I am not able to accept it for myself. Let each of us allow our thoughts/feelings to be influenced in depth by the truth as it is in Christ and then express ourselves in appropriate ways. Now is no time to be quiet. If we keep silence the rocks themselves will cry out.
Having come to the conclusion a decade earlier that I did not want to be associated with a denomination that hid out from the issues of poverty, racism and war, concerned only with personal piety, I at that time found the UCC a body amenable to a socially sensitive point of view.
Early in 1973 UCC President Robert V. Moss wrote: “My own view is that the U.S. Armed Forces should withdraw from Southeast Asia immediately only conditioned on the return of American prisoners of war.” He urged UCC members “whatever their views” to communicate with the Nixon administration and Congress on the matter.
On January 17, 1973, “The Communicator” reported actions in support of a petition entitled, “Concerned Voters to End the War.” We wrote to Representative Tom Foley, Washington State Fifth District Representative:
The undersigned support this petition urging Congress to take a more active role in ending the Vietnam War. Specifically, we urge Congress to enact legislation terminating funding for military operations in Vietnam if a peace agreement is not signed by January 20, 1973.
The eight–member committee placed the petition at the entrance to the Student Union Building on the WSU campus in order to obtain further signatures.
One of my political heroes at the time, Senator Mark O. Hatfield, Republican from Oregon, addressed the National Prayer Breakfast on February 1, 1983. Seldom have pertinent prayer and proper politics been better welded together. In part, he said:
If we as leaders appeal to the god of civil religion, our faith is in a small and exclusive deity, a loyal spiritual Advisor to power and prestige, a Defender of only the American nation, the object of a national folk religion devoid of moral content. But if we pray to the Biblical God of justice and righteousness, we fall under God’s judgment for calling upon His name, but failing to obey His commands.
We sit here today, as the wealthy and the powerful. But let us not forget that those who follow Christ will more often find themselves not with comfortable majorities, but with miserable minorities.
Today our prayers must begin with repentance. Individually, we must seek forgiveness for the exile of love from our hearts. And corporately, as a people, we must turn in repentance from the sin that has scarred our national soul.14
Senator Hatfield made no explicit reference to the Vietnam conflict. But when he spoke of “the sin that has scarred our national soul” there could not have been anyone in the room to mistake his reference.
Eventually the voices in the pews and the streets were heard. With agonized withdrawal the conflict ceased, but only after massive loss of life and treasure. The guns fell silent. From the silence came the sounds of sorrow.
Clergy Day at Trident
The Naval Submarine Base Bangor, the west coast Trident nuclear submarine base, lies to the west of Seattle and Tacoma near Bremerton, Washington, on the Hood Canal. One day I received word that a “clergy day” would take place at the base to which we were all invited. I went.
I remember climbing onto a bus along with other clergy. Ironically enough, our tour guide proved to be a young Japanese–American officer. As we began to wind our way around the base he pointed out the wild turkey and the white–tailed deer inhabiting, what one could soon see, a piece of God’s good earth worthy of national park designation.
Only one difference. Along the base road ran a continual fence of thick barbed wire. Then behind that a few yards another similar fence. And behind that, at regular intervals, turrets imbedded in the earth with large caliber guns projecting from the emplacements.
The tour continued. At length, we arrived at the center of the base where stood an impressive chapel and related buildings. We were introduced to five chaplains, each of whom occupied impressive offices staffed by his own private secretary. One had the impression that these chaplains felt they had reached the pinnacle of their religious profession
We then were ushered into an auditorium where the captain of the base was introduced. He taught Sunday School each week, we were informed. He spoke to us about the base operation.
When the captain concluded his welcome and remarks, he asked for questions. I raised my hand and when recognized I asked, “If a chaplain on Sunday morning from the chapel pulpit were to raise some question about what goes on at this base, how would that be handled?” The captain did not hesitate. I remember distinctly to this day what he said. Matter of factly he replied, “That chaplain would be down the road the next day.” So much for the Protestant tradition of freedom of the pulpit.
This incident confirmed in me a long–standing opinion that military chaplains, no matter how much good they do, are “kept persons.” Just as journalists in the Afghanistan conflict “imbedded” with the troops on the ground where objectivity lost its grounding, so with the military chaplains. How much better for all concerned if the clergy were able to maintain their civilian identity, operating independently as did journalists during the Vietnam conflict, when the public received objective reportage.
During my ministry in Tacoma I participated several times in silent protest demonstrations along the Burlington Northern Railroad at the entrance to the base. These protests took place as train loads of parts entered the base to build or resupply the Trident submarines of genocidal potential. In leadership, James and Shelley Douglass, founders of the Ground Zero community, whose house was situated near that entrance. A noteworthy participant at times in these protests, Archbishop Raymond Hunthausen, Bishop of the Seattle diocese.
On a Sunday following the “clergy day” at the Bangor base, I used a good portion of the pulpit word time to tell of the clergy tour and of my repartee with the camp chaplain. During the discourse one of the church members rose from his pew and noisily walked out. I had conversation with him at his home in the week following. We agreed to disagree agreeably.
In his book, The Nonviolent Coming of God, James Douglass refers to a speech Seattle Archbishop gave at the University of Notre Dame, in which he said, “Our nuclear weapons are the final crucifixion of Jesus, in the extermination of the human family with whom he is one.”15
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