CrossCurrents A Catholic Reflects on Faith in Our Times
# 162 Bernard
F. Swain, Ph.D. www.CrossCurrents.us
AinÕt Gonna Study War No
More
Last Monday we observed Martin Luther
KingÕs 78th birthday. He died at 39—39 years ago this April. And we have
now mourned him for precisely as long as we had him. From now on, our memory of him will be longer than our time
with him.
He is widely remembered as a champion of
social justice and civil rights, as the preeminent black leader of his
time. He was not a President, a
Supreme Court Justice, a Congressman, a general—in fact, he held no
public office at all. He was an
ordained minister, pastor of a local church, and leader of the relatively
obscure Southern Christian Leadership Conference. Yet he now stands as our
national saint—the only individual American with his own national
holiday.
But even now, I wonder if we have fully
appreciated his place in American life and history. As one observer remarked:
Although King's name and achievements
are known to many people, the deeper implications of his life, as the lives of
many peacemakers, are often trivialized or forgotten. This is particularly true
of his deep, persistent commitment to nonviolence.
King was not the first great civil rights
leader, nor the last. Yet he
changed American life forever. For
me, KingÕs life-work means more than civil rights. Indeed, I see him as the
great human hinge on which American history has finally swung away from its
past and opened toward its future—if only we have the wisdom to grasp
that future.
Just think of our history. The slave trade, which preceded the US
by a century, was not a ÒtradeÓ at all, but a kind of war, marked by overseas raids,
kidnapping, rape, the destruction of whole tribes and the deliberate escalation
of war between tribes.
The slave system was also rooted in
violence and blood—the rape, torture, and murder of slaves, the
destruction of families, the brutal suppression of rebellions, the hunting down
of escapees as if they were wild game.
When America became the United States, its
birth also came as bloody war—and the ÒFather of Our CountryÓ was its
greatest warrior. But then the bloody violence of slavery continued for nearly
a century, until the UnionÕs true identity was challenged by southern
secession.
I recall my confusion when, in Mr. PerryÕs
8th grade US history class, I asked how we knew that secession was
forbidden, since the US Constitution is silent on that issue.
ÒWe know secession is forbiddenÓ Mr. Perry
replied, ÒBecause the North won the Civil War.Ó
He was, of course, absolutely right. Our
national identity as an irrevocable, indissoluble Union of states was
established, not by Constitutional Convention or Supreme Court or Congress, but
by the Union Army on the field of battle in the bloodiest war of our entire
history.
Even the heroic Civil War service of the 54th
Regiment of Massachusetts Volunteer Infantry (the black regiment honored in the
film ÒGloryÓ) was the heroism of combat. And the abolitionist Christian
churches we honor as prophets of slaveryÕs evil and end preached the civil war
as a crusade—as a holy war.
Sadly, the majority of our history since
the Civil War has continued the violence. Reconstruction was often a brutal,
bloody aftermath to civil war, and long after LincolnÕs emancipation American Blacks
still suffered not only segregation, discrimination and disenfranchisement, but
also the terror of widespread lynchings (not just by hanging, but also by mutilation,
blowtorching, electrocution, and worse) and the more public terror of the KU
Klux Klan. Meanwhile the US entered military combat repeatedly, with barely a
war-free generation between 1865 and World War II.
The next decades brought full-scale war in
Korea, Vietnam, The Persian Gulf, and Iraq—with several smaller invasions
in between. And at home, even into the 1960s, police-state tactics, bombings, lynchings,
and assassinations stalked every effort to extend the rights of Afro-Americans.
Born into this history, Martin Luther King
broke radically from the past and chose a path he knew to be ancient for
Christians but unprecedented for Americans: the path of nonviolence.
During his early theological studies at
Crozier Theological Seminary, King first reacted skeptically to the pacifism of
A.J. Muste, but he was the impressed by the life and teachings of Mohandas K.
Gandhi, who offered a sound method for applying KingÕs biblical values:
My study of Gandhi convinced me that
true pacifism is not non-resistance to evil, but nonviolent resistance to evil.
Between the two positions, there is a world of difference. Gandhi resisted evil
with as much vigor and power as the violent resister, but he resisted with love
instead of hate. True pacifism is not unrealistic submission to evil powerÉIt
is rather a courageous confrontation of evil by the power of love.
He met with GandhiÕs followers during a 1959
trip to India, and there his discussion of ÒsatyagrahaÓ (Òdevotion to truthÓ)
convinced him that Ònonviolent resistance was the most potent weapon available
to oppressed people in their struggle for freedom.Ó
King persisted in this conviction despite
all setbacks, despite dissension within the ranks of the civil rights movement,
and despite violent rivals. He expounded on his non-violent philosophy from jail,
and later delivered the controversial Riverside Church speech, in which he opposed
US involvement in Vietnam.
His critics and many co-workers alike were
shocked and chagrined by his stance, and even today many choose to overlook it,
or mark is as a tangent to KingÕs career.
But the truth cannot be found in what one
social critic has called Òa sugar-coated, superficial view of the life and
legacy of arguably the greatest American apostle of non-violence.Ó
For the truth is that King saw his Vietnam
stance as a consistent, even inevitable, outcome of his whole approach to
social justice—an approach that transcended civil rights and racism and
embraced the unity, peace and harmony of the entire human family. In this light,
all violence is an affront to true freedom. In KingÕs own words:
"I am convinced that if we succumb
to the temptation to use violence in our struggle for freedom, unborn
generations will be the recipients of a long and desolate night of bitterness,
and our chief legacy to them will be a never-ending reign of chaos."
Dr. Martin Luther Kling Jr. was a champion
of traditional American values of freedom and justice—but he also
championed a Ònew wayÓ for achieving those things, and in doing so he gave
America a new, very non-traditional value—Peace. To put it bluntly:
before King, our history was rooted in blood and war. Since King, our true destiny lies in peace and love. We must grasp that destiny, lest we
squander this great manÕs legacy.
© Bernard F. Swain PhD 2006
Send Your Comments and Questions to bfswain@juno.com
Dr. SwainÕs
opinions do not represent the views of this parish or any other official body.
Bernie Swain has
devoted more than 30 years to adult spiritual formation in dioceses in the US,
Canada, and France. Since 1991 he has maintained a private practice as trainer,
teacher, and consultant to leaders in parishes and other religious
organizations. He holds degrees in theology and political science from Holy
Cross, Harvard, The University of Paris, and The University of Chicago.
His writings include Liberating
Leadership (Harper & Row,
1986) and more than 200 articles in periodicals such as The National Catholic
Reporter, Commonweal, The Miami Herald, The Catholic Free Press, The Pilot,
Harvard Theological Review, and
Liturgy.
A lifelong layperson,
he lives in Boston with his wife and three children. Visit his website at:
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