THE SEASON - Child in Swaddling Clothes, Child as Collateral Damage, Herod Bush Ahern Midwives Magi

international | anti-war / imperialism | opinion/analysis Saturday December 23, 2006 22:55 by Ciaron - Dublin Catholic Worker

For the Christian exploring radical salvation history and seeking to be faithful in a time of escalating and expanding imperial war on the Middle East, the co-option of the Christmas season by the state is always a problem. How do we remain faithful in a context where our radical traditions and stories are being co-opted to feed rampant consumerism that drives the ever expanding market and diminishes finite ecology?

How do we claim our identity as radical disciples in this season where our traditions are box, diced, decontextualised, packaged and co-opted to service empire and death?

The co-option of the season is carried out by the decapitation of the story. The joy and hope of the Advent season cannot be seperated from the cost of discipleship and the collateral damage created by clients in service to the imperial state - expressed with Herods "Slaughter of the Innocents".

In the early '80's in Australia, our Catholic Worker community would vigil amongst the shoppers with appeals to boycot the sale of war toys. In '87 we were arrested en masse as a nativity scene blocakding U.S. sailors disembarking from a nuclear warship deploying to the Persian Gulf. The U.S. navy is still in the Persian Gulf (presently escalating its firepower presence) and we are still on the streets! The holding cell at the Brisbane watchhouse made quite a manger scene as we were dressed as angels, shepherds and magi. A Christmas drunk would only enter the cell when the cops had afixed an inflated latex glove to his head so he could pretend to be a chook in our manger!

Of the four Christmas seasons I spent in the United States, U.S. troops were deployed (Panama, Iraq, Somalia) for three of them. To watch the White House co-opt Christmas, depoliticise it and downsize it to sentimentality in support its latest war effort is truly sickening. How do we avoid getting sick? The only anti venom we have is to gather in community, share soldarity and continue the nonviolent resistance to the high crimes of empire. "The Feast of the Holy Innocents" (Dec 28th.) has become a significant time for our movement to gather, to celebrate, to reflect, to act. We reflect on the scriptual stories of salvation history and the latest seismic shifts in empire and we act nonviolently, directly and prophetically.

There is much to be gleaned from the Herod's slaughter of the innocents in terms of understanding Bush/Blair/Ahern/Howard's ongoing slaughter in Iraq and elsewhere.

The Matthew's (Ch 2) gospel story has its echo in the Book of Exodus (Ch. 1). Pharoah attempts to launch a preemptive strike on any scent of liberation and stirrings of solidarity. The story tells of the slaughter of children continued in the latest imperial adventure in Iraq, Lebanon, Afghanistan etc. The story also tells of solidarity expressed by the marginalised and nonviolent resistance to power by midwives and magi.

The Exodus and Gospel narratives tell us what we already know,

1) ...that the powerful only know power. Whether they claim to be american neocon, british new labour or old irish nationalist everyone is expendable for their maintenance of power. Ahern provides the refueling at Shannon, Blair the fig leaf of the "special relationship" and Bush the military firepower to slay 600,000 Iraqis (mostly women and children) to impose the imperial order on a part of the world rich in resources.

2) Pharoah and Herod, Bush and Ahern, seek out accomplices to get the job done on the sly, on the quiet, covertly. The midwives are instructed "kill the kids" (Ex 1.16), the magi are ordered by Herod to do the search, he will do the destroy (Matt 2:8)

Herod disguises his murderous intent stating he "wishes to pay homage". Bush wished to rid Iraq of WMD, replace (a former accomplice) Saddam, bring all things good to the Iraqi people, to pay homage. In '03 Bush failed to recruit the U.N. as an accomplice as his Daddy had done in '91, he recruited Blair who was proud to embrace the mission and Ahern among others who denied he was part of it - while providing Shannon Airport as the most significant stopover for the invading military. Bush, Blair and Ahern tried to recruit us to maintain a housebroken silence as these high crimes are commited, as the innocent are slaughtered. Once again this Christmas season, Bush and Blair will repackage the slaughter in diplomatic pieties. Ahern will claim he knows nothing, a cultivated ignorance he hopes we will all embrace.

In both Exodus and Gospel narratives, God's messenger enters the drama at the time of the highest risk. In a reed basket on the Nile, in a feed trough in a Bethlehem stable, as threatening as the truth to those in power. Disarmed and dangerous as the overwhelming presence of power faces off with the providential power of presence. The imperial state only knows the dominance of escalated violence. The war spreads to Lebanon, it threatens to embrace Iran.

As it is our time now, the then accomplices take centre stage. They perceive the royal mandates to kill as tests of allegiance. To follow God or Ceaser, to go along to get along in the context of imperial normalcy or to nonvilolently resist claiming some other reality where children are not reduced to collateral damage.

The "midwives feared God and did not do as the King of Egypt ordered them and let the boys live" (Exodus 1:17). The "magi from the east understood God's word, they disobeyed Herod by secretly fleeing the country" (Matt 2:12)

What are we now being injuncted or ordered to do by Bush/Blair/ Ahern/ Howard so the killing of children in Iraq can proceed without disruption, so empire can be maintained and expanded?

How do we shake off the slumber and sedation of consumerism to gather and to resist - to fulfil the prophecy of one threatened by the imperial sword....

"His mercy is from age to age
to those who fear him.
He has shown might with his arm,
dispersedthe arrogant of mind and heart.
He has thrown down the rulers from their thrones
but lifted up the lowly.
The hungry he has filled with good things;
the rich he has sent away empty..." (Luke Ch1)

In the days following Christmas, various Catholic Worker communities and friends will gather near various military hell holes in North America and Europe. We will pray, reflect, rejoice in community and nonviolently resist at sites on the assembly line of death. An assembly line that has produced 600,000 Iraqi and 3,000 American corpses untold maimed and traumatised in this latest venture. In the paradigm of the power of the weakness of God in a manger we will expose the weakness of power on the throne.
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