[Oe List ...] Why the Faithful Approve of Torture

Sun May 3 08:13:06 EDT 2009

I'm struck by the 'shocked, shocked I tell you!' response to the linkage
between church and torture.  Religious affiliation has long played a role in
community identity of the 'us vs. them' type.  From the Inquisition to
religious warfare to the 'pressing death' of witches, it has been part of
strengthening the ability to avoid seeing the humanity of those who are
considered a threat to the community.  Demonization of African-Americans was
a central theme in many religious groups - as was language debasing and
dehumanizing other ethnic groups from Hispanic to Asian and German.  

This is not to say that these themes are inherent in the language or formal
theology of religious traditions - often the opposite.  But group boundaries
are often in contradiction to the universality of most formal religious
understandings.  The use of national symbols in many places of worship
demonstrate the blurring of universal claims with boundaried identities.
Even the most universal of symbols can be claimed and used as the totemic
representation of a specific sub-group.

It is that sense of 'us vs. them' and the stream of thought that 'error has
no rights' that diminishes emotional restraints against torture.
Interestingly, one of the stronger resistances to torture comes from within
the boundary identity group of the U.S. Military - formally identified with
a sub-group of humanity.  It is the enlightened self-interest perspective
that such practices both degrade the quality of the information thus
obtained and invite retaliation.  

As was clear in the New Testament, the 'enemy' of the Jesus figure was not
the irreligious unbelievers, but the religious leadership.  

Bill Schlesinger
Project Vida
3607 Rivera Ave
El Paso, TX 79905
(915) 533-7057 x 207
(915) 490-6148 mobile
(915) 533-7158 fax
bschlesinger.pv at tachc.org

  _____  

From: oe-bounces at wedgeblade.net [mailto:oe-bounces at wedgeblade.net] On Behalf
Of Herman Greene
Sent: Sunday, May 03, 2009 5:35 AM
To: 'Order Ecumenical Community'
Subject: [Oe List ...] Why the Faithful Approve of Torture

http://newsweek.washingtonpost.com/onfaith/panelists/susan_brooks_thistlethw
aite/2009/05/why_the_faithful_approve_of_torture.html?hpid=talkbox1

Susan
<http://newsweek.washingtonpost.com/onfaith/panelists/susan_brooks_thistleth
waite/>  Brooks Thistlethwaite

Former president of Chicago Theological Seminary (1998-2008), Thistlethwaite
is a senior fellow at the Center for American Progress.

Why the Faithful Approve of Torture

The more often you go to church, the more you approve of torture. This is a
troubling finding of a new survey by the Pew Forum on Religion and Public
<http://pewforum.org/docs/?DocID=156>  Life. Shouldn't it be the opposite?
After all, who would Jesus torture? Since Jesus wouldn't even let Peter use
a sword and defend him from arrest, it would seem that those who follow
Jesus would strenuously oppose the violence of torture. But, not so in
America today.

Instead, more than half of people who attend worship at least once a week,
or 54%, said that using torture on suspected terrorists was "often" or
"sometimes" justified. White evangelical Protestants were the church-going
group most likely to approve of torture. By contrast, those who are
unaffiliated with a religious organization and didn't attend worship were
most opposed to torture -- only 42% of those people approved of using
torture.

One possible way to interpret this extraordinary Pew data is cultural. White
evangelical Protestants tend to be culturally conservative and they make up
a large percentage of the so-called Republican "base". Does the approval of
torture by this group demonstrate their continuing support for the previous
administration? That may be.

But I think it is possible, even likely, that this finding has a theological
root. The UN Convention Against Torture defines torture as "any act by which
severe pain or suffering, whether physical or mental, is intentionally
inflicted on a person..." White Evangelical theology bases its view of
Christian salvation on the severe pain and suffering undergone by Jesus in
his flogging and crucifixion by the Romans. This is called the "penal theory
of the atonement"--that is, the way Jesus paid for our sins is by this
extreme torture inflicted on him. 

For Christian conservatives, severe pain and suffering are central to their
theology. This is very clear in the 2002 Mel Gibson movie, The Passion of
the Christ. Evangelical Christians flocked to this movie, promoted it and
still show it in their churches, despite the fact that it is R-rated for the
extraordinary amount of violence in the film. It is, in fact, the highest
grossing R-rated movie in the history of film. The flogging of Jesus by the
Romans goes on for fully 40 minutes. It is truly the most violent film I
have ever seen. 

The message of the movie, and a message of a lot of conservative Christian
theology, is that severe pain and suffering are not foreign to Christian
faith, but central.

Of course, this is an interpretation of Jesus life, death and resurrection
that I reject. It is also an interpretation that I believe has done a lot of
harm through the centuries. I think it is impossible, yes, impossible, if
you read the Gospels, to make the case that God wanted Jesus tortured for
the sins of humanity. But that is an interpretation that has sometimes been
made in the history of Christianity and the social and political fallout has
been, and is today, that torture is OK, maybe even more than OK. This Pew
finding may just be another in a long line of horrible historical examples
of that. 

_____________________________________________

Herman F. Greene, Esq.

Greene Law, PLLC

2516 Winningham Drive

Chapel Hill, NC 27707

919-624-0579 (ph)

919-942-4358 (f)

hgreene at greenelawnc.com 

www.greenelawnc.com <http://www.greenelawnc.com/>  

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