The Apostle's Creed as a Focus for Thinking About Drones

This content has been moved to: "Do You Know What You Believe? (The Apostle's Creed as a Focus for Thinking About Drones)" at Scarry Thoughts.

Call to Confession

by Susan Soric

The following Call to Confession comes from a service that  Rev. Loren McGrail and I did  at our home church of Wellington Avenue United Church of Christ.  This Confession became the inspiration for the name of our blog Awake to Drones.  I invite you to be in touch with how the use of  robotic warfare is affecting you. Trust your gut instincts.

Hear My Cry

A few months back, when our daughter was a little over a year old, we were watching an extremely innocuous, usually very comforting and quaint little British children’s show called Postman Pat. It was about an ordinary and uncomplicated man named Pat who loved his job in the village, loved his wife and son, and was truly very happy. But one episode contained an unusual character. Postman Pat was overwhelmed with all the packages he was delivering and wanted to find a way to get some help, so he created a robot, which he was demonstrating for Mrs. Goggins in the post office one day. When our little girl saw the boxy, bug-eyed, gangly can of metal lurching and flailing, smashing windows and knocking things over; she started to panic. Aaaah aaah! AAAAH! She cried, and of course I stopped the show very quickly.

I have pondered that moment, taking to heart the terror in her voice, her innocence, her lack of understanding of the world and of human creations; and
yet for all that innocence there was something primal, maybe even instinctual, something real and deeply human in the fear she expressed at that lifeless, yet moving, machine. My theological mind turned immediately to the lack of humanity in the robot: the absence of something familiar, reassuring, comforting. Inhumanity, non-humanity. Disembodiment. Perhaps she was expressing the lack of connection one feels to something that is not of you.....not your kin.....But why did I not feel 
that way about the robot? Yes, I’m old and jaded, but maybe I also wasn’t tuning
in to a place within myself that our daughter could touch immediately. What was happening in that place deep in side me that numbed me to the horror of a lifeless imitation of humanity?

And that brings me to our focus for today. Robots of death. Death by
 drone. Killing by remote control. Since taking office, President Obama has been undertaking a personally-directed, CIA-administered, high-tech assassination campaign in Western Asia (particularly in Yemen and Pakistan), using drone technology to target what he describes as terrorists. Some reports estimate that Obama has personally ordered hundreds of assassinations by drone since he took office, striking out at supposed Al Qaida targets while also killing innocent children and adults. Technology is not always bad. It can be life-saving, but in the hands of the powerful, it can also be an abomination.

Ohio Representative Dennis Kucinich warns us that the executive power
of the presidency is now unleashed, and our system of justice is being radically altered. “I feel that we have had a kind of psychic dismemberment from our foundational causes of nation,” says Kucinich. “How did the nation, that was founded under such egalitarian principles, find itself running a killing bureaucracy? How did that happen? How did we make that journey? This is clearly a story of a nation that is losing its way in the world to a mixture of fear and hubris,” Kucinich said.

I believe that fear is a natural instinct, and sometimes we do need to protect ourselves from trauma. But our faith also reminds us that we also must do the opposite. We must sensitize ourselves to the fear and trauma and suffering around us so that we can be of help; so that we can promote an end to violence and the establishment of peace.

Some of our United Churches of Christ once used the crucifix in worship. This is one such crucifix that a suburban UCC church was giving away at a recent wider church meeting. Gone are the wretched bodies of Jesus once mounted on
 our crosses, and for good reason: Jesus is no longer dead, but alive. Resurrected.
 But our faith also calls us to remind ourselves that death is real; murder is real. Assassination is real. Real flesh-and-blood bodies die. People made in the image of God die every day at the hands of other human beings. This crucifix reminds us to be fully human. It reminds us that when we kill others just because they are vigilantes, because they are different, because they are a threat, that we are destroying a part of the very God we profess to love and part of ourselves as well.

“I think,” says Kucinich, “the people of the United States would be horrified if they actually understood how many innocent people are being swept up in the maw of these wars. So people are just permitted to sleep. And it’s going to be 
very disturbing for the American people when they awake from the slumber to look out upon a world where there’s carnage everywhere that’s created by our nation without any legal process, without any constitutional basis and without any articulated justification.”

I have been asleep. Where have you been? Is there any justification for this kind of killing: either killing by cross or by drone? When will we awaken and cry out about the horror of it all? And once we reach that place of gut-felt anguish, what will we do about it?

Susan Soric

image from Patrician Sotarello and AFSC

Joe Scarry: Confessions of Faith

Joe Scarry has written:

I will be thinking about how a confession of faith -- such as the Apostles' Creed, used in the Christian Church -- helps us think through our response to a problem like that of drone killing and drone surveillance. Since I was brought up in the Lutheran tradition, I am especially attentive to Luther's gloss on the Creed: "my Lord ... has redeemed me, a lost and condemned creature, purchased and won [delivered] me from all sins, from death, and from the power of the devil, not with gold or silver, but with His holy, precious blood and with His innocent suffering and death ....". Can one rely on one's confession of faith to make sense of, and respond to, a situation such as the drones problem? In the light of a problem such as that of drones, is one's confession of faith further illuminated and strengthened? (Read my further thoughts about the Apostles' Creed as a focus for thinking about drones.)

Of course, the Apostles' Creed is but a single example of a confession of faith. I'm grateful to Newland Smith for reminding us that we should be thinking about the entire rich heritage of credal statements/confessions (see, for instance, the Baptismal Covenant of the Episcopal Church's Book of Common Prayer), as well as the way they find expression in covenants on justice issues (including examples such as "Covenanting for Justice in the economy and the earth," and Kairos Palestine 2009).

And, as Rev. Loren McGrail points out, beyond formal confessional statements and covenants, it is desirable to consider scripture more broadly.

For me, some of the key questions are:

* How does a confession of faith help clarify the issues surrounding the exercise of authority to order killings by drone?

* How does a confession of faith help clarify the issues surrounding the injury to innocent parties ("collateral damage") in drone attacks?

* How does a confession of faith help clarify the issues surrounding the way drones place people under increased surveillance?

* How does a confession of faith help clarify the issues surrounding the way people engaged in warfare are distanced from those they injure?

* How does a confession of faith help clarify the issues surrounding the responsibility of the citizens of a nation for drone attacks carried out in their name?

* How does a confession of faith help clarify the issues surrounding the proposition that violence can be pre-empted by acts of "defensive" violence?

* How does a confession of faith help clarify the posture we should take to drones in their roles as new and "advanced" technology?


MORE ON THESE QUESTIONS

* How does a confession of faith help clarify the issues surrounding the exercise of authority to order killings by drone?
There is a great deal about our modern life that supports the myth of legitimately-conferred authority. The carrying out of killings with drones provokes us to put the question under a microscope: does the authority really exist for those actions? Is it something that I can support, in light of my confession of faith?

* How does a confession of faith help clarify the issues surrounding the injury to innocent parties ("collateral damage") in drone attacks?
We are inevitably asked to accept injury to innocents as an unavoidable consequence of a goal that is considered very important. Assuming for the moment that we accept the "very important goal" ... what does a confession of faith clarify about collateral damage? (See Ending Drone Killing: The Spirit Is Moving.)

* How does a confession of faith help clarify the issues surrounding the way drones place people under increased surveillance?
There is a tremendous range of opinion about the desirability and permissibility of the surveillance under which, more and more, we all live. Is surveillance -- or opposition thereto -- a matter of faith?

* How does a confession of faith help clarify the issues surrounding the way people engaged in warfare are distanced from those they injure?
Obtaining "distance" from where war and injury is happening seems like a desirable objective, and drones have been championed precisely because they put members of the U.S. military (and, all the more so, the rest of us) at the greatest possible distance from where the actually injury is taking place. What does a confession of faith suggest about this view? (See Drones vs. Up-Close-and-Personal Reality.)

* How does a confession of faith help clarify the issues surrounding the responsibility of the citizens of a nation for drone attacks carried out in their name?
It is a condition of modern life that there are a few very narrow slices that any one of us is able to experience directly; most of human experience is "out there" somewhere, and we only have a very tenuous relationship to it. When drone killings are being done in our name, can we look the other way? Or do we bear responsibility? Does a confession of faith help answer these questions? (See Drones: Am I Responsible?.)

* How does a confession of faith help clarify the issues surrounding the proposition that violence can be pre-empted by acts of "defensive" violence?
Does a confession of faith help clarify whether we can espouse absolute, unequivocal non-violence? (See: Is God Urging Us to "Risk It"?)

* How does a confession of faith help clarify the posture we should take to drones in their roles as new and "advanced" technology?
What do we need, other than an open mind, when we consider whether we approve of technology? Does our faith really have anything to say about it?


Image source: Barewalls.com

Susan Soric: Humanity and Technology

Susan Soric has written:

Technology is a gift from God that can be used in service of humanity. Not all technology is bad. Drone technology can be used for good (surveying the aftermath of natural disasters, putting out fires, etc.) I will explore briefly the good and humane uses of drone technology, weaving into this statement the theological understanding that nothing created or made is bad: it is the spirit in which it is used that is the problem. I may talk about the theological implications of misusing the common good: technology that was developed by the people for the people (implying the intent to use it for good) and is, instead, used to murder and to spy (violate airspace, privacy, psychic space).
View my Call to Confession.

Newland Smith: Drone Surveillance, Civil Liberties, and the Church Resolution

Newland Smith has written:

I will write about church resolutions, including the Episcopal Church's General Convention resolution (A017) "Monitor the Use and Ethics of Drone Warfare", the Resolution that just passed the 77th General Convention bearing witness to the increased use of remotely piloted aircraft, or "drones," by the United States military and intelligence agencies for surveillance and weaponized attacks; and be it further ...Resolved, That the General Convention urges the Standing Commission on Anglican and International Peace with Justice Concerns, in collaboration with the Bishop Suffragan for Armed Services and Federal Ministries and the Committee on Science, Technology, and Faith of Executive Council, to monitor the continued use of remotely piloted aircraft, evaluate their ethical implications, and prepare a report for the 78th General Convention with recommendations for governmental leaders and military commanders concerning their use.

Continued in: Drone Surveillance: "Tracing Our Journeys"?

I will also write about the UK Methodist Resolution and report about the ethical issues related to the use of drones as weapons.

Rev. Loren McGrail: Human Rights and the Breaking of International Law

Loren McGrail has written:

I am interested in exploring Obama’s use of both target assassinations and “signature strikes” and how these break moral, constitutional and international laws. I will also write about the variety of actions that people of conscience are involved in from Letters from Faith Leaders to protests, to education, to advocacy. As part of my exploration of actions, I will also highlight what is happening around the country at the air force bases and at the air and water shows. Finally, as a worship leader myself, I will help collect or write resources for faith communities to use in worship.

Read more:

Drones of War or Doves of Peace?
The Hour Has Come

Jack Lawlor: the Buddhist Approach to Understanding Conflict and the Concept of Misperception.

Jack Lawlor has written:

By way of some initial exposure to Buddhist thought, I'm attaching the Buddha's "Discourse on Love", as fresh today as it was when memorized by the monastic community 2,500 years ago.

The following lines from the Collected Sayings of the Buddha, known as the Dhammapada, are also illustrative of the Buddhist approach to identifying and remedying the roots of conflict:

We are what we think.
All that we are arises with our thoughts.
With our thoughts we make the world.
Speak or act with an impure mind
And trouble will follow you
As the wheel follows the ox that draws the cart.

We are what we think
All that we are arises with our thoughts.
With our thoughts we make the world.
Speak or act with a pure mind
And happiness will follow you
As your shadow, unshakable....

"Look how he abused me and beat me,
How he threw me down and robbed me."
Live with such thoughts and you live in hate.

"Look how he abused me and beat me,
How he threw me down and robbed me."
Abandon such thoughts, and live in love.

In this world
Hate never yet dispelled hate.
Only love dispels hate.
This is the law,
ancient and inexhaustible.

Ven. Thich Nhat Hanh urges us to cultivate the following qualities through an engaged, consistent practice of meditation based on mindful breathing in order to live in love in the manner suggested by the Buddha:

1.) The cultivation of stopping, or "Shamatha" in Pali: to recognize and let go of compulsions and prejudices which cause misperception. At a recent retreat with over 1,000 people in Mississippi, Thich Nhat Hanh begged Americans not to enter any more wars based on misperception;

2.) The cultivation of concentration, or "Samadhi". Everything in our culture encourages distraction and reduces our ability to concentrate, thwarting our ability to understand what is actually going on.

3.) Dwelling in "Appammada", the absence of madness. Once we cultivate stopping and concentration, we dwell in awareness, free of misperception that causes us to say and do things we do not understand.

4.) The cultivation of insight, or Vipassana. Once we dwell in concentration, our preception clears, and we can see and understand underlying causes and conditions not only effecting us, but also others. We are capable of seeing and understanding things from the vantage point of other beings.

5.) The cultivation of compassion, or Karuna. Once free of our own obsessions and misperceptions, we better see and otherstand what is going on, how we have an impact on others, and how they influence us, opening the way to compassion.

6.) The cultivation of understanding, or Prajna. The practice of compassion deepens our understanding of the radical impermanence and interdependence of all beings, resulting in wisdom.

Drone warfare is the apex of misperception. Rather than practicing stopping, we begin with a prejudice that certain "types" do not deserve to live. Rather than take the time to look deeply and really understand who we are targeting, or even provide the basics of due process, growing numbers of people are targeted for destruction. Rather than question the saneness of this approach, and whether it is consistent with human morality, the rules of engagement in warfare, or morality, we are led by technology to rely more and more on the use of robots. Rather than learn from the protestations of countries who protest the sudden death of so many innocent people within their territory in our pursuit of untried terrorist suspects, we purchase and accelerate the use of more and more drones, never pausing to contemplate the world we will have created once other nations obtain this technology within a few years. Our hearts are hardened to the possibility of compassion, even when our Hellfire missles strike weddings and family gatherings. In reliance on technology, we understand less and less, rather than more.

Continued in:
"The Buddha Meets the Drone"
"The Buddha and a Culture of Violence"
"The Buddha On Love"
"The Suffering Caused By Misperception"
"Modern Applications of the Buddha's Teachings on Love and on the Suffering Attributable to Misperception"
"The Nearsighted Drone"