From: jsax@igc.apc.org (Joel Sax)
Newsgroups: soc.religion.quaker
Subject: Friendly Thoughts No. 5
Date: 18 Dec 92 20:16:00 GMT
Nf-ID: #N:cdp:1744600053:000:3240
Nf-From: cdp.UUCP!jsax    Dec 18 12:16:00 1992


From: Joel Sax <jsax>
Subject: Friendly Thoughts No. 5

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FRIENDLY THOUGHTS No. 5                             Joel GAzis-SAx 
18 December 1992                                    Copyright 1992 
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A Friend rose in Meeting the other day to respond to concerns 
about the war that is now and the war that is to come.  He told 
the story of his great great grandparents who gave up all that 
they had to send his great grandfather and great grandmother out 
of Russia at the time of the pogroms.  The Friend reflected on all 
the descendants of this pair and concluded that perhaps something 
good could come out of a Bosnian war. 

I have met others recently who think we should send arms or 
intervene in Bosnia.  Many of these are peace activists.  
Those among us who think that military intervention can bring 
peace have, I think, been co-opted by the dominant ideology in our 
society.  Many point to "the good that came out of" World War II:  
a peaceful Europe, Germany and Japan redefined and resurrected, 
etc.  I have heard it said, by some, "We have all these arms that 
we shouldn't have anyway.  Why not use them for a good cause?" 

To all these, I commend the words of Maria Chapman, who wrote:  
"We may draw good out of evil; we must not do evil, that good may 
come."  I believe that the Second World War (with its destructions 
of cities and whole peoples) had little to do with the good that 
followed.  Are there not some who still count the effects that 
that war, fifty years in our past, wreaked on their lives?  I was 
born 13 years after this war ended, but I grew up knowing it as a 
contemporary event.  The war did not make the peace for us:  it is 
what men and women of good will did during and after the war to 
heal nations and renew the love between peoples that made the 
peace. 

We cannot depend on war to secure peace.  How often do we hear 
that a war will solve our problems and how seldom do we see the 
problems go away?  We are never called, I think, to be indifferent 
to the sufferings of the victims of war.  Neither are we called to 
make more victims and more sufferings.  Many of us say that "We 
can do nothing to stop the war".  I feel that we cannot stop war 
if we do nothing.  Chapman's words call for an active peace 
witness.  Let us not just hope that good will come of the Bosnian 
and Somalian tragedies:  let us make them happen.

Pray for the peacemakers for they are God's true intimates.  Pray 
that you may know and love God by your thoughts, by your words, 
and by your actions.

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Copyright 1992 by Joel GAzis-SAx.  This article is distributed for 
use of Friends through the Alliance for Progressive 
Communications.  Permission to download for personal or Meeting 
use granted.  If you use this in your Meeting or Church 
newsletter, please send a copy to me.  Financial support for this 
work is appreciated.  Send checks or money order to Joel GAzis-
SAx, 2727 Midtown Court #37, Palo Alto, CA    94303. 
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