Lullabies
May 16, 2004 Our preacher gave a sermon this morning that began with what has been in the news as of late. He did not want to go into politics or finger-pointing, but made a point that has really triggered a lot of feelings I have had for a while. He commented that many Americans are justifying the torture of Iraqi prisoners by saying that the American soldiers weren't doing anything compared to what the terrorists have already done to "us". He pointed out the Americans that have been executed over in the Middle East and the many thousands that we lost here on 9-11. We have people in our congregation that were at the Pentagon that horrible day.A member of our congregation and a friend of mine was the first to die over in Afghanistan. I have cried many times over his loss, tried to comfort his wife and children and sung sad lullabies to his baby. And, yet, I do not hate "those people". As our preacher pointed out, we are not to compare ourselves with other people, but to God. It doesn't matter what other people have done throughout history or even that they may have actually done these things directly to us. God is our standard, not other people. How many times have I had to tell my own children this? You don't set your standards by what others do.
Let me be clear. I support our troops and our President. While my friend was over in Afghanistan, he wrote to his father that we needed to support our troops even when the bodies started coming home. Especially when the bodies started coming home. Little did we know that his would be the first.
I ordered a CD a couple of months ago and, while I don't necessarily agree with the politics of the man who put this CD together, I fell in love with the music on it. It is a CD of lullabies from Iran, Palestine and Iraq sung by native singers.
I take some small comfort listening to the lullabies that are actually being sung to the babies in the heart of such sadness. It makes me remember that we are all human. We need to treat each other humanely even in the midst of war, as much as that is possible. I walked and sang sad lullabies to the baby of my friend who died. A little boy who will grow up not ever having had the chance to know his father. I feel a connection when I listen to the soft, often sorrowful lullabies sung to the babies of Iranian, Palestinian and Iraqi mothers. Unfortunately, war is sometimes necessary and in war there is almost inevitably death. I think that we will ultimately be measured by how we treated the life left over.
TrackBack URL for this entry:
http://www.fireflyplace.net/cgi-bin/mt/mt-tb.cgi/44
Comments:
Beautifully written. ;-)
Posted by: sherle at May 20, 2004 1:50 AM
Post a comment
(If you haven't used TypeKey identification, you may need to be approved by the site owner before your comment will appear. Until then, it won't appear on the entry. Thanks for waiting.)
