Raising Questions Is Our Responsibility
An interview with UUA President William G. Sinkford
Dharma World, May/June
2003 - Volume 30
Dharma World is the English-language publication of the Rissho Kosei-kai.
Last March 8, as a preemptive strike against Iraq by U.S. and U.K. forces
was looming, many citizens and religionists in the United States and all
across the world were apprehensive about the Bush administration’s determined
choice of war and were calling for a peaceful resolution of the crisis. Against
such a backdrop, Dharma World asked Rev. Sinkford, president of the
Unitarian Universalist Association in North America, about how his organization
was involved in efforts to prevent war.
We understand that hundreds and thousands of people in America have demonstrated
strong opposition to the Bush administration’s determination for military
action against Iraq, while there is still a high approval rating for its
policy. How do you evaluate the overall reaction of the American people to
the Iraqi crisis?
It is true that more than a million American citizens have demonstrated against
unilateral war with Iraq. There will be, as you know, demonstrations taking
place today as well. It’s my belief that support for the administration is
actually quite mixed and has been dropping. So that now about half of the
American people are in support of President Bush and about half are against
unilateral war with Iraq. So it’s a very divided United States.
Unfortunately, the conversation about war has been framed
by the administration, and I believe it has confused the issues of the war
against terror with a war against Iraq. And so it’s my belief that the support
for the war is actually very shallow in the American public, and when the
realities of war come, and sadly I believe that they will, I believe that
that support will rapidly evaporate. I don’t think the American people want
war, and I think it is a sad fact that we are going to be forced into one.
Soon after September 11, 2001, a tremendous number of American flags were
displayed across the country. What did you think about this phenomenon?
I think the attacks of September 11 galvanized the United States public in
a way that we have not been galvanized for a generation. And having the American
flag displayed was a way of showing our solidarity with one another. And
I understand that perfectly. I have to tell you that what I did at the Unitarian
Universalist Association—rather than having the American flag flying—was
to have the world flag flying, the picture of the world taken from space,
which shows one blue planet on which we all must learn to live together.
That was my primary response.
Could you elaborate your ideas on the meaning of patriotism?
I think that the American people want to be patriotic. I want to be patriotic,
and I want to be happy with what my government is doing. I want to be able
to support it fully. I think that’s true for all of the peoples of the world.
But I think it’s a real mistake to confuse nationalism with patriotism. Nationalism
says, “My country, right or wrong, I will stay behind it, regardless of what
my country does.” Patriotism, especially for the American people, means that
we have not only the right but the responsibility to question what our government
does. In a democratic society, like the United States or Japan, we have a
right to be in conversation and to have our opinions heard. And that is certainly
happening. The groundswell of opinion against the war has been substantial,
and so most of us are not confusing nationalism with patriotism.
I should tell you that my son serves in the U.S. Army,
with the 82d Airborne Division. He is just back from seven months in Afghanistan.
He and I have had some good but often hard conversations about what patriotism
means. The simple nationalistic approach, which members of the armed forces
are required to hear, because their job is to follow orders, needs to be
balanced with the more democratic, patriotic response, which says we all
need to be in conversation about this.
As we move into war, one of the things that is most on
my mind—perhaps it’s because my son is in the military— is that I hope that
the American people and the people of the world do not confuse the soldiers
(the young men and women who have to execute the war) with the government
that decides that war is necessary. During the war in Vietnam, too many Americans
became confused about that, and attacked the soldiers when in fact it was
the government that was making the decisions. So I am urging Americans not
to do that, and to be in full support of our young men and women, even if
we are in disagreement with our government.
What kinds of actions have the UUA and other religious communities in
America taken?
I was in Washington, D.C., on September 11, 2001, when the terrorist attacks
occurred. The first thing I did on September 12 was to go to the American
Muslim Council and offer to stand in solidarity with them, knowing that Arab
and Arab-looking people would be profiled and attacked, as indeed they were—there
were thousands of incidents. So Unitarian Universalists and other people
of faith stood with the Muslim community. We walked Muslim children to school,
so that they would not be harmed. And that was very much appreciated by the
Muslim community. Religious communities in the United States have come together
in extraordinary ways. The UUA has been working closely with the National
Council of Churches, which calls together most of the Christian denominations,
to raise our voice against the rush to war. And the religious community has
been working with others in coalitions that sprang up almost instantaneously.
The most important one is called “Keep America Safe: Win Without War,” which
calls together the National Council of Churches, the National Organization
for Women, the NAACP (National Association for the Advancement of Colored
People), business leaders, doctors; it is a broad coalition, including an
Internet group called “MoveOn,” which in one week registered something like
400,000 e-mails against war. So the coalitions are broad, and I know that
for relatively small religious movements like Unitarian Universalism, we
can be far more effective if we work in coalition with others, and we’ve
been working hard to do that.
Buddhism teaches us that there exist in each of us “three poisons”—greed,
hatred, and ignorance—including a hidden drive toward confrontation. Therefore,
the basis of our endeavors for world peace must be the building of peace
within each and every one of us. Could you expound your thoughts on this
for us?
I appreciate the question and I should say in advance that I’m no Buddhist
scholar nor am I a practicing Buddhist, so I approach the question as an
amateur. But I do think that the three poisons resonate with me.
First, I think we are not having a good enough conversation
about the possibility of war. So on the issue of greed, there is very little
conversation, at least in the United States, about the role that oil plays
in the U.S. decision to attack Iraq. Very few people are talking about that.
But the reality is that Iraq sits on the second largest reserves of oil in
the world. The United States has done nothing to curtail its appetite for
oil. And I have to believe that there is a relationship here; there is a
reason that we are choosing to confront Iraq, and not confront North Korea,
for example, and I believe that oil plays a role there. So that is one response
to the poison of greed, something that the United States will do well to
pray on.
Hatred is a poison that I know well in my own life. I
am an African-American, and in the United States that places me in a position
where I have had to know hatred personally. The poison here for me is the
viewing of another human being as the “other,” as someone who doesn’t deserve
the same respect that “I” deserve, someone who can be viewed as less human
at least than “I” am. And it is very clear that many people in the United
States, I believe, encouraged by our government, are viewing people in the
Muslim world in that way, seeing them as dangerous terrorists, as amoral
people, as something less than we are. And the reality, of course, is that
they are just human beings like we are, with governments that they agree
with and don’t agree with, just as we do. And I think that that is a real
danger; it’s the kind of poison that allowed the internment of Japanese-Americans
in World War II in the United States. And it is a deadly poison.
Ignorance I understand as well to be a poison. As I said,
I think we are not having a good enough conversation about the reasons for
war. In the United States, at least, we are not talking about what the future
holds once we invade, we are not talking about how long we will have to stay,
we are not talking about how we can invade Iraq without creating the next
generation of terrorists that will threaten our safety and the safety of
the world. There are too many things we are not talking about. So the American
people actually are, I believe, ignorant of many of the dimensions of this
potential war. And I believe actually that is why so many, as many as half,
are willing to support the war.
I should say that the UUA and Rissho Kosei-kai have been
working with organizations that try to work against that ignorance. I am
thinking of the World Conference on Religion and Peace, and the recent trip
by two UUA representatives to Iraq—John Buehrens, the former president, and
Robin Hoecker, a young woman who wrote a journal that is available at the
UUA website; and I also know that you just had two young people from Rissho
Kosei-kai return from Iraq—so we are trying to do something to improve the
information that’s available, and I think that’s a very positive thing for
us to do.
In order for us to avoid a “clash of civilizations,” what do you believe
is necessary?
This is a big question. So let me say just a few things that are on my mind
and in my heart. What I know is that if we create an “other,” and call the
Muslim countries and Arabs and Muslim people “other,” we would set up an
expectation that we should clash. But the reality is that the Muslim faith
and the Christian faith and the Jewish faith all derive from the same foundational
story—we are all children of the same book. There is far more that unites
us than divides us. And we need to find ways to understand that, rather than
focusing on only those things that divide us. Now, the reality is that there
are many differences between Muslim culture and the culture of the West,
which is in part Christian, but certainly not only Christian at this point.
We live in a very pluralistic society in the West, as you do here. The test
for all of us—it’s not just the United States and the Muslim world—is to
find ways to live in which we can understand that our differences do not
need to divide us. Our differences can be blessings, and not curses, and
so there is a great deal of hope if you can move into that space, as I did
on this trip. I had wonderful opportunities to learn more about Japanese
culture and religious traditions, as well as time to sit with Japanese religious
leaders and converse with them and begin to learn a little bit. And they
could learn a little bit, I hope, from me. That is where we need to go. And
I just pray that we move there rapidly enough to save us.
Beginning with religious cooperation between organizations like the UUA
and Rissho Kosei-kai, what do you think the world’s religionists can or should
do to help bring about a better, more peaceful world?
I think that’s the real question. I also think that we need to be honest
with ourselves and admit that we have not yet found the way. Despite all
that we have done and the commitment of Rissho Kosei-kai and the UUA and
other people of faith, we have not yet found the way. And so being able to
move forward—and here we must go back to the three poisons—begins in a way
that tries to avoid ignorance of where we are and what we’ve been able to
do. So I don’t have a guaranteed program. I wish I did. I know, however,
that the religious community needs to continue to raise its voice. I know
that Rissho Kosei-kai young people have been praying in front of the American
Embassy, UUA young people and older people like me have been praying in the
United States; we’ve been speaking out. I know that that is necessary, so
that the voice for war is not the only voice in the public conversation.
I think that for the long term, building relationships
that cross the divides of religion and culture is probably the most effective
thing we can do. So I deeply value the relationship between the UUA and Rissho
Kosei-kai and want to further that and deepen it. I want to get our young
people together, to work together and to talk together, so that we do a better
job with the next generation than we have managed to do for ourselves. We
need also to develop some capacity for advocacy, and I know that this is
something to which Rissho Kosei-kai is committed, as is the Unitarian Universalist
Association. But always, there is a value in the separation of church and
state, and we need to find ways to respect that effectively, while at the
same time having a way for our voices to be influential in the shaping of
policies. My approach in my leadership has been more to ask questions than
to provide answers, because I don’t think it’s for the religious community
to write legislation; but we should be able to ask the questions that can
ground decision-making in religious depth. So that’s one more thing that
I believe we need to do—and I think we need to stay in the learning mode,
because as I said, we do not yet have this one figured out.
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