The Fierce Urgency of Prophetic Hope

  BREAKING SILENCE ABOUT THE HATEFUL FAITH OF U.S.-ISRAELI ZIONISM, SETTLER COLONIALISM, APARTHEID, WHITE SUPREMACY, XENOPHOBIA,  AND VIOLENCE AGAINST PALESTINIANS IN THE “HOLY LAND” In the U.S.-funded and sponsored project to dispossess the indigenous Palestinians, we are witnessing an overt and bald expression of white supremacy, racism, Anglo-European imperialism, settler colonialism, apartheid, genocide, and xenophobia. Zionism has historically played and continues to play a key role in the crimes committed against the Palestinian people by Israel and its supporters in the West. Expressing itself potently in Christianity from the time of the Reformation to the present day, and more recently in Judaism, Zionism has propelled and served to legitimate the actions of our government and other Western powers to support Israel’s project of colonialism and ethnic cleansing.   Both forms of Zionism betray the values of love, compassion and equality that are fundamental to thei...

  ©Wendell Griffen, 2024 I am a public theologian, pastor in the religion of Jesus, retired jurist, legal scholar, activist for peace and justice, and cultural competency and inclusion consultant who has written and spoken publicly about the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. [1] I now offer my latest and most extensive judgment about the impact of the hateful faith of U.S./Jewish Zionism, white supremacy, racism, Anglo-European imperialism, settler colonialism, apartheid, genocide, and xenophobia on Palestinians, other people of African descent in Palestine and Israel, and on the Muslims, Christians, and persons of other faiths in the region of Africa between the Jordan River and the Mediterranean Sea that is called “the Holy Land.” The United States government has invested over $150 billion in foreign aid to Israel since 1948. Israel has used that money to arm its military and depopulate indigenous Palestinians from Palestine, Zionist Christian and Jewish settler colonies in Pa...

  ©Wendell Griffen, 2024 Early voting for the Arkansas primary elections begins February 20 across Arkansas, and March 5 is Election Day.   So, candidates are working hard to attract attention and influence voting decisions by voters. This essay is my effort to inform voters in Arkansas about election contests involving candidates for positions on the Arkansas Supreme Court, Arkansas Court of Appeals, circuit courts, and district judges. Because judicial candidates are the least well known of all political office contenders those of us who understand what judges do must help voters decide whether to support certain candidates over others. I have been a licensed attorney in Arkansas since 1979. I am also a retired state court judge who served on the Arkansas Court of Appeals (from 1996 through 2008) and as a Circuit Judge (from 2011 through 2022). I taught law   at the University of Arkansas at Little Rock Bowen School of Law from 2009 through 2011. I share this info...

  ©Wendell Griffen, 2024 Section 3 of the Fourteenth Amendment to the Constitution of the United States reads: No person shall be a Senator or Representative in Congress, or elector of President and Vice President,  or hold any office, civil or military, under the United States, or under any State , who, having previously taken an oath, as a member of Congress, or as an officer of the United States, or as a member of any State legislature, or as an executive or judicial officer of any State, to support the Constitution of the United States, shall have engaged in insurrection or rebellion against the same, or given aid or comfort to the enemies thereof. But Congress may by a vote of two-thirds of each House, remove such disability. (Italics added). Insurrection means an act or instance of revolting against a civil authority. On January 20, 2017, Donald John Trump (Trump) took the oath of office as President of the United States (POTUS), having been duly electe...

  ©Wendell Griffen, 2024 January 3, 2024 Little Rock, Arkansas   Since October 7, 2023, Israeli Defense Forces (IDF) have killed close to 22,000 people in Gaza. Most of them were women and children. The death toll includes teachers, health workers, humanitarian aid workers, artists, and more than 90 journalists. Since October 7, 2023, the IDF have wounded more than 50,000 people in Gaza. Most of them are women and children. Since October 7, 2023, the IDF have dropped more bombs on Gaza, an area about the size of Washington, DC, than the United States dropped in a year during its war in Afghanistan. Houses of worship, schools, universities, hospitals, and United Nations refugee camps have been bombed. The United States supplied the bombs, artillery shells, and other materiel used by the IDF in Gaza. The United States vetoed resolutions introduced in the United Nations Security Council that called for a bilateral ceasefire to allow humanitarian aid to Gaza. Pro-Z...

  ©Wendell Griffen, 2023   To the One who gives all life, God of Creation, Love, Justice, Hope, Peace, Truth, and Vindication, hear this prayer for your children in Gaza, the Occupied West Bank, and East Jerusalem. Hear our prayers for the infants of Palestine. Hear our prayers for their parents. Hear our prayer for the playmates children in Gaza will never know. Hear our prayers on their behalf for justice. See the silent and sobbing tears we weep for the futures they will never experience.  Smiles. Laughter. Giggles. All lost. Bombed. Incinerated. Targeted. Massacred. The slaughtered children, parents, and elders cannot plead for help. The nations of the world will not protect them. Religious leaders across the world do not cry out for them. Politicians in Israel, the United States, and their allies calculate how to take advantage of them, discount them, and subsidize, arm, and cover for Israel. Israeli Defense Forces collectively punish th...