God’s Redemptive Love vs. The Myth of Redemptive Violence

Ray Gingrich and Norman Stolpe on

The Good Samaritan (Luke 9:51-56; 10:25-37)

A little more detail on my journey and an exploration of the biblical, theological, and historical factors that convinced me to seek conscientious objector classification is available at http://nstolpepilgrim.blogspot.com/2018/06/my-conscientious-objector-journey-and.html 
Norm

In the video Ben identifies examples of the myth of redemptive violence. https://mcc.org/media/resources/3534 In this brief video he can’t explore the presuppositions and even theological rationales that prompt invoking redemptive violence in the admittedly challenging and threatening conditions of our world. For me, the juxtaposition of these two Samaritan stories in Luke brings rich illumination.

Even though the disciples had observed Jesus’ compassionate, counter-cultural interaction with Samaritan people before, (John 4) they were probably a little uneasy in this Samaritan village, which was accentuated when the people there rejected Jesus because he was on his way to Jerusalem. James and John were offended and indignant and bent on vengeful pay back. I am amused that they thought they could call down fire from heaven to consume the people of this village. They don’t ask Jesus to do it; they ask for his permission for them to do it.

A lot of the myth of redemptive violence arises from wanting people who have offended us to pay a penalty, as though that works justice. When we hear arguments that those who have caused injury only understand violence, therefore we must respond with force, we are betraying our failure of imagination to find not only non-violent but more effective ways of responding. Admittedly that is risky, hard work.

This occurred when Jesus was making his final trip to Jerusalem, knowing what fate awaited him, so that the story we call the Good Samaritan is so close to it is not accidental. It was shocking not only to the lawyer who questioned Jesus, but to the disciples as well. Having recently been rebuked by Jesus for asking revenge on Samaritans, for Jesus to make a Samaritan the hero of his story stung. In that sting is the antidote to the myth of redemptive violence.

I am pleased and delighted that Ray and I can share our conscientious objector journeys with you. We both faced the military draft at the height of the Vietnam War. Ray came to this from within Mennonite tradition and did alternative service. I did not come from an historic peace church. At first I felt that may have disqualified me from speaking today. What could I say to you who have been steeped in this tradition for centuries? As we talked, I think we both came to see that the juxtaposition of our stories is enriching as are the juxtaposition of the stories we have read in Luke and the journey Ben has been relating to us.

Ray Gingrich                        One “Draft Dodger:” A Chronology

1944-61: When I was 8 months old, my dad was drafted and served as a CO in Belton, Montana. Even though pacifism was preached my church, Zion Mennonite, Whiskey Hill, Oregon, about half of the 20 or so men who were drafted went into the military, the others into Civilian Public Service camps. My church and my parents talked and taught a lot about the wrongfulness of Christians participating in war. The Mennonite boys didn’t play with toy guns at Whiskey Hill grade school. They wrestled and played football at Canby High School to prove their masculinity. Gene Autry was singing, “At Mail Call Today” on the radio.

1961: The ministers of Zion Mennonite Church, conducted a Sunday-morning prep for the 17-year old boys who would be registering with the Selective Service. Started with a Bible-study of relevant passages: Gideon and a few others from the OT and many from the NT, the SOM, Romans 12, and the crucifixion most prominent. The last few sessions were prep for facing interrogation at the draft board: they will ask you about Hitler. A possible answer: “If I were a German youth and facing Hitler’s draft, I would probably have joined up like all of my other Christian friends.” Q: “No, what if you were an American youth in WW2?” A: “Well, hopefully, I would have been opposed to America doing business with Hitler during the 30’s, and like most Americans at the beginning of the war, I would have been opposed to going to war.” Q: “No, what about after the war started?” A: “Well, like my father before me, hopefully, I would have chosen to serve by binding up wounds rather than causing them.” Q: “What if our country was invaded?” A: “I trust that God and my church would show me the way at that time.” Pete Seeger was singing, “Where have all the Flowers Gone?” on the radio.

1964-66. Goshen College, majoring in Social Work. The Vietnam War was gearing up. My resident mates in Yoder Hall, 3^rd and 4^th floors had all-night debates on the legitimacy of pacifism. I was dating Lisa’s mom. Dr. Lester Glick was my social work professor. In March of 66, Operation Masher had just completed in Vietnam with 288 American Soldiers killed, 880 wounded; 1342 Viet Cong killed; more than 10,000 Vietnamese civilians with 125,000 left homeless. President Johnson changed the name of Operation Masher to Operation White Wing to sound more benign. Johnson said it was a success. The group of 7 Whiskey Hill kids at Goshen College met with our former Zion pastor each week to study Gandhi, Dietrich Bonhoeffer and Martin Luther King.  The war was just getting into “full swing.” Phil Ochs was singing “What Are You Fighting For” on the radio.

Spring 1966: The first Goshen College student caught smoking pot was disciplined by the school. Joan Baez was just cancelled by GC because she didn’t agree to wear shoes. We pacifists watched Hogan’s Heroes on TV: sure, Nazis were funny, stupid and continually outsmarted by their American POWs. In April, I got my orders from the Selective Service to report for my physical for the draft within 30 days of my graduation on June 6. I informed my draft board that I was registered as a CO. My draft board sent me a list of potential sites for me to do my alternative service. A dorm-mate decided that alternative service was too much cooperation with the government and was heading for Canada. Pete Seeger was singing, “Bring them Home” on the radio.

June 1966: Lisa’s mom and I were married at Iglesia Menonita de Milwaukee on June 11.  We had our wedding date set for June 11 so my parents could attend my graduation and our wedding on the same trip to the Midwest from Oregon. We had a one-day honeymoon in Door County on June 12. The following day, I reported for my alternative service assignment at Mt. Sinai Hospital. The personnel director welcomed me with a somewhat derisive, “Oh, you’re the draft dodger.” As hospital patients watched the news on TV of coffins being unloaded from C-130 cargo planes, I felt some guilt at safely prepping patients for surgery, inserting urinary catheters, emptying bed pans, prepping deceased patients for and transporting them to the morgue and the various other tasks of a hospital orderly while kids my age were dying in the war. Senator J. William Fulbright was holding hearings on the legitimacy of the war. My senators from Oregon, Dem. Wayne Morse and GOP Mark Hatfield both opposed the war. The draft resistance was just beginning. The draft lottery wouldn’t begin for another 2 years. I read Senator Fulbright’s book, Arrogance of Power, during breaks at the hospital. That Christmas, Simon and Garfunkel were singing, “Seven O’clock News/Silent Night” on the radio.

July 30, 1967 a “race riot” broke out in Milwaukee, 1 of 159 in the U.S. that summer. A 24-hour curfew was imposed except for critical needs workers which included hospital workers like me. National Guard troops were stationed on the corner of 20^th and State where we lived. I began walking the 8 blocks to the hospital on July 31, only to be picked up and transported by guardsmen. Four people died, many were injured and 1740 were arrested.  Arlo Guthrie sang “Alice’s Restaurant Massacre” on the radio.

1966-68: The war raged on. I marched in many of the Milwaukee peace rallies and open-housing marches. Martin Luther King was assassinated on April 4, 1968, Robert Kennedy on June 5. In August, the Democratic National Convention was more of a riot than a convention. The protest movement was split between Eugene McCarthy and George McGovern resulting in the nomination of establishmentarian Hubert Humphrey. November 2, 1968. Personnel office. Mt. Sinai Hospital: Same personnel director as 27 months earlier, with a hint of affection: “Oh, the draft dodger, if you know any others like you, send them our way.” The war raged on. Joan Baez sang “Saigon Bride” on the radio.

January 1983, after having read Donald Kauffman’s What Belongs to Caesar, I was faced with paying income tax. For the first time ever, I owed more than was withheld because of all the consulting work I had done the previous year. Kauffman challenged the notion that Jesus’ was advocating paying taxes in his response to the Pharisee trap question regarding taxes of “give unto Caesar what is Caesar’s,” and examined the question: what belongs to Caesar and concludes that taxes for immoral purposes do not belong to Caesar. So, I was struggling with the possibility of war tax resistance. I was afraid to do it. I was in Austin, TX, and did not have a Mennonite community to struggle with me. Then, along came the motion picture Gandhi and challenged me still further—the movie that is. I saw the movie early in the week before my birthday and Gandhi’s courage challenged my cowardice. Then, a friend said she would like to surprise me for my birthday. I thought probably dinner. No, we were at a theater to see Gandhi. I didn’t tell her until sometime later that I had already seen it and I took it as a sign that I needed to do the war tax resistance. Which I did for four years until Barb and I got married and we bought a house and I didn’t owe taxes beyond withholding any more. When the IRS told me they might take my car or garnish my wages I thought I better tell my boss. I invited him to lunch. I failed to tell him that I wanted a confidential meeting and he brought a new employee, a former West Texas police officer with him. I decided to tell him anyway, in front of the new guy. My boss knew me fairly well by then and I knew he wouldn’t be shocked by my decision. He told the new guy, “Ray is a conscientious objector, so this a serious matter for him.” Finally, the new guy asked, “Vietnam?” I said, no, all war—I registered as a CO in high school before the war started. The new guy’s mouth dropped open and he said, “If that would have happened in my high school, the football captain would have beat the crap out of you.” My boss laughed. “Why are you laughing,” the new guy asked. “Because he was a state champion wrestler,” my boss said. “And, the football captain,” I added. Cognitive dissonance to the max. “You were a wrestler and the football captain AND a conscientious objector?” Then, he shut up—didn’t say a word all the way back to the office. The IRS garnished my wages. Randy Newman was singing, “Song of the Dead” radio.

I am grateful to all of those who went before and on whose shoulders I stood.  There’s more in my activist history but I better stop.

Norman Stolpe                      My Conscientious Objector Journey

My conscientious objector journey is integral to and inseparable from my journey to follow Jesus as his faithful disciple. Though I grew up in church, I mark the beginning of my adult faith with the reading of Job and Archibald MacLeish’s play JB in World Lit as a high school senior in 1964. I began to see that God understood and cared about the seemingly insoluble struggles of human experience.  My new awareness of God’s perspective on human reality and my growing aspiration to follow Jesus converged with the escalation of the war in Vietnam. Five years of student deferments during my college years gave me time to study and ponder how I would respond as a disciple of Jesus. By the time those deferments ran out, I had become convinced I could not live out my discipleship in the context of military service.

My wife, Candy, and I got married on January 25, 1969 and I headed to Wheaton Grad School and began my ministry in Christian education curriculum development. I began composing my letter to the draft board requesting conscientious objector classification. Then in December 1969, the first lottery was held for the Vietnam War draft. My lottery number was 315, making being drafted in 1970, the only year of my liability, highly unlikely.

At the time I was working on a Christian education youth curriculum project that was based on Elton Trueblood’s book The New Man for Our Time which had just been published based on the Quaker “saint” John Woolman (1720-1772) as the model of someone who could think, act, and pray. This prompted me to read John Woolman’s Journal a decade before I had any idea I would live and minister in Mt. Holly, New Jersey, his home town from 1980 to 1997. This confirmed my growing conviction that sending my letter to the draft board was an essential expression of my discipleship.

I had grown up, been educated, and was ministering in revivalist, pietistic evangelicalism. Conscientious objection to war was known but not widely affirmed in my circles. In the course of my investigations, I learned that Dwight L. Moody (yes, of Moody Bible Institute, Moody Press, Moody Church) had been a conscientious objector and refused service in the Union Army during the Civil War, describing himself as “a Quaker” in this respect. Moody made nine visits to the battlefields as a chaplain/evangelist to the wounded, insisting that Confederate soldiers be as well treated as Union soldiers. This anchored my conscientious objector convictions solidly in the evangelical tradition, of which I am an heir.

As a teen, I remember being challenged with the question, “If you were put on trial for being a Christian, would there be enough evidence to convict you?” I sensed that my letter requesting conscientious objector classification was such evidence. I knew of those who were not from historic peace churches whose conscientious objector requests were denied, and when they refused military induction were sent to prison. Just into the second year of our marriage and hoping to start a family, I struggled with the prospect of prison before submitting my letter and concluded I had to accept that as a possible consequence of acting on my convictions. The reply I received was that since my lottery number was so high, they would not process my request as they were fully occupied with other responsibilities.

When I was ordained for ministry in 1975, I wrote a paper for the ordination council presenting my faith journey and sense of call to ministry. I included my conscientious objector convictions in that paper. I also described the profound impact my father had had on my faith and sense of calling. At my ordination service, my father embraced me with tears in his eyes to tell me how wonderful he felt reading of his influence on me in my ordination paper.

My father had served as a medic with the Navy in World War II. When I was 10 or 12, I asked him if he could tell me anything heroic he had done. He proudly described his role as “helping to heal the wounds of war.” Before I sent my letter to the draft board, I talked it over with my father. Though he did not consider himself a pacifist, he affirmed and supported my decision to express my Christian discipleship in this way.

The Baptist General Conference (once known as the Swedish Baptist Conference) in which I grew up was not an historic peace church. However, at the beginning of the 20^th century, many young men from “non-conformist” (meaning non-Lutheran) backgrounds in Sweden came to the United States to avoid being drafted, contributing to the growth of that denomination. My father’s father was among them.

Though my adult church life and ministry career led me out of the Baptist General Conference, I did not worship with or serve as pastor in historic peace churches. In those years I hope I learned to have healthy dialog with those who do not embrace my pacifist convictions. I respect and do not judge those who sincerely live out their Christian discipleship in military service. I hope that they have been able to respect without judgment my conscientious objection to war and military service as my expression of sincerely following Jesus.

I must confess that this has been more challenging in my family than in the congregations I have served. My brother-in-law Max still suffers with PTSD from his time in Vietnam. My nephew Tom is a career Navy officer and in my estimation is an admirable example of living as a disciple of Jesus in his marriage, family, church, and yes his Navy career. Some of these issues are so sensitive, we all cautiously put priority on loving relationships in the family.

You all know David and his commitment to peace and justice. Our oldest son Jon does not consider himself a pacifist. However, after his sophomore year as a mechanical engineering major at Grove City College, he was offered a Navy nuclear scholarship – a high academic honor and financially substantial. Before making his decision he spent an evening with a retired career Navy officer in our church. Much to the surprise of the engineering faculty and fellow students, Jon turned down the scholarship saying that he could not relinquish making his moral decisions to the Navy or the US government. I don’t know that our youngest son Erik has had occasion to consider this the way his brothers have, and his personal spiritual journey is still very much in formation. Nevertheless, he does have an acute sensitivity to issues of peace and justice.

While I have necessarily focused on my conscientious objector journey, I hope you can see how this is inseparable from my intent to live in such continuous awareness of the presence of God that my heart and character are in increasingly congruent harmony with Jesus Christ. I resonate with the prayer of Richard of Chichester (1197-1253) which some of you may know from the musical Godspell.

Thanks be to thee, my Lord Jesus Christ,
for all the benefits thou hast given me,
for all the pains and insults thou hast borne for me.
O most merciful redeemer, friend and brother,
may I know thee more clearly,
love thee more dearly,
and follow thee more nearly, day by day.
Amen.

Ray Responds to Norm

I am grateful to be able to stand in the 500 year teaching of my Mennonite discipleship that requires non-participation in war. That position as a subset of allegiance to Jesus rather than the state has been a minority position—a small minority—among Christians since 1525. And, I stand in awe of those early Anabaptists who were drowned and burned for their discipleship. Being labeled a draft dodger pales in comparison to our ancestors’ persecution.

But, in the present era, when the laws of our country’s religious freedom allows for our minority stance without persecution, my admiration for people like Norm exceeds that of people like me. As to Christians participating in war, Norm comes from a tradition much older than my own, which dates back to Constantine early 4th century. Shortly after marching his armies into rivers for baptism, Augustine of Hippo led the church’s heretofore teaching against participation in war to a new doctrine of sanctioning participation in “just war.”  I went with the flow—with my teaching from childhood at very low cost to me. Norm went against his tradition, his church’s teaching, his parents’ teaching and followed his own conscience. Norm, I admire you for your bravery and for your witness.

Norm Responds to Ray

I was intrigued that Ray used the term “draft dodger” from the way he was greeted on arrival for his alternative service assignment at Mt. Sinai Hospital. From my perspective, as one who performed alternative service facing both its ridicule and opportunities, I hardy consider the term appropriate for him. I suppose it might better fit me as one who was not drafted because of student deferments and a high lottery number. Of course, we both know the term “draft dodger” was applied more to those who illegitimately manipulated the system with minor medical or other excuses rather than deal with issues of conscience.

I was also intrigued that Goshen College students debated pacifism. I would have assumed a uniform pacifist consensus. At community college in 1964-67, it was much discussed but without reference to Christian convictions. Many of us Bethel College students wrestled together about how to follow Jesus in the pursuit of both peace and civil rights. I naively imagined that if I had been in an historic peace church setting, this would not have been such a struggle. I am encouraged to know that those in pacifist traditions were also wrestling and not just accepting inherited presuppositions.  Thanks, Ray, for sharing your story.