The Fierce Urgency of Prophetic Hope

Like each of you, I am hearing from many people who ask my opinion about what is going on in Gaza, Israel, and Palestine. Here are my thoughts. I am concerned about the current war in Gaza, Israel, and Palestine because I care about life, justice, truth, and peace as a follower, ordained minister, and pastor of a congregation of people whose faith and living are inspired by the teachings of an itinerant Palestinian Jewish rabbi named Jesus, who lived, suffered, and died under Roman military occupation.   (1) I have deep anger and sorrow for the victims of the Hamas attack on last Saturday, the Israeli counterattack, and for the men, women, and children who are being killed, injured, traumatized, and otherwise scarred every day by the horrendous violence associated with this war.  (2) I lament the casualties and destruction from the Hamas attack, the Israeli counterattack, the Israeli blockade, siege, and impending invasion of Gaza, and Israel's threat to depopulate and slaughter Ga

  ©Wendell Griffen, 2023   Mark Wingfield of Baptist News Global has written an analysis of the current war between Israel and Hamas. I am quoted in it along with others who hold shared and different perspectives.  https://baptistnews.com/article/in-this-war-there-are-no-good-guys/ The analogy Ashlee Wiest-Laird shared in Wingfield’s piece is appropriate. Nobody should expect people whose land has been stolen, who've been locked in a room of their house, denied basic protections and civil rights, attacked at will by a stronger, US financed, stocked, and cheered military that is the fourth largest in the world, and whose 75-year plea for justice has been belittled, to decide that fighting their way out of the hellish place they have been forced into is unreasonable.  I wrote a long piece for Baptist News Global in May of this year to mark the 75th anniversary of the Palestinian Nakba (meaning "catastrophe") that provides the historical context for the war now bei

  ©Wendell Griffen, 2023   A Little Rock, Arkansas police officer shot Brendon Johnson a few days ago ( https://www.arkansasonline.com/news/2023/oct/05/lr-officer-facing-shooting-charge/ ). That Little Rock police officer shot Brendon Johnson in the back of his head as Brendon was fleeing – moving away from him – in a vehicle. The Little Rock police officer shot a fleeing person who was not threatening physical harm to anybody. That police officer was recruited, hired, trained, and deployed by the same police agency that hired, trained, and deployed a former Little Rock officer who shot 15 times and killed Bradley Blackshire on February 22, 2019, less than five years ago. The police officer who shot Brendon Johnson in the back of the head was recruited, hired, trained, and deployed by the same police agency that recruited, hired, trained, and deployed another former Little Rock officer who shot and killed unarmed Bobby Moore III on August 12, 2012, eleven years ago. The pol