Thank you for your response to my e-mail. Although it is often difficult to talk across divides, I continue to believe it is important, crucial, that we do so, not so much for conversion from one side to another, but because in our encounter, we will each be changed. God's Holy Spirit is at work in each of us; thus I owe you the honor and duty to listen.

On the issue of gratitude, I must confess that I remain a bit mystified by the degree of anger CPT's release generated in many people, particularly Christians. CPT did say thank you. Norman Kember, Jim Loney, Harmeet Sooden and their families said thank you. That we did not do it promptly enough, often enough, quickly enough or freely enough (without any caveats) seems to really reflect an underlying issue: that CPT does not agree with the mission is really what has sparked the furor, it seems to me; else, there would have been a bit of grace extended to three men who were just released from almost four months of captivity and to the people who were also working tirelessly for their release within CPT. You also castigate CPT for using the word 'release' to refer to the freedom of Jim, Norman and Harmeet; but in its own press releases, that is what the British forces said, that the men had been 'released'. I suspect the original point sticks: there is anger at CPT for opposing the presence of United States and other forces in Iraq. That is a fair disagreement. And if the way we speak leaves you believing that it is our agenda to denigrate our troops rather than to recall us to our highest best selves, then we have not spoken well.

I have always understood that in challenging my country, I am challenging myself. For you and I agree on one thing: 'I' (and all other citizens of the United States) sent our troops to Iraq. There is no 'us' and 'them' in what we do, what I do, in Iraq. As a citizen of the United States, I am every soldier. And we agree that the stakes are high in Iraq. I submit that the battle is not for territory or ideology, but for our souls. To paraphrase Jesus, the test of character is not how we treat the people we love and who love us, but how we treat our enemies. And based upon what I have seen, I fear it is a test we are failing before God.

You may well be right that many detainees in Iraq 'deserve detention'. CPT does not address itself to the merits of the holding of anyone in Iraq; rather, it addresses itself to conditions of confinement and due process: to the belief that no one should be subjected to torture or abuse while detained or held incommunicado for months or years without any resort to even minimal due process, for due process is the means we have to assure that those holding prisoners do not abuse them and that people are not detained for improper purposes.

The International Red Cross, the recognized international agency for assuring humane conditions of confinement, has been denied access to certain detention facilities run by the United States in Iraq (see recent New York Times article on the subject). Abuse of detainees is a real phenomenon and it is not acceptable, no matter the crime. Jesus said when asked, when did we visit you? "When I was in prison."

How do we separate the obligation to hold people accountable for their misconduct from the temptation to mistreat them because of their own mistreatment of others? How do we hold ourselves accountable to refrain from the abuse of power? I hold no perfect answer to these questions, but I do believe that bringing what happens behind closed doors out into the light of day is a good first step. Perhaps a second one is to not assume that everyone who is detained deserves to be. And perhaps the third (maybe it should be the first) is to recall the Golden Rule; for I know for a certainty that no matter what I do in my life, I always hope for mercy. And I believe that mercy enacted is one of the most transformative powers on earth, as well as being that which God requires of me (Micah 6.8).

Every Sunday we are told in one form or another that if we got what we deserve from God, we would be in big trouble indeed, but are then reminded of the Gospel promise: Christ died for us that we might live. Which brings us full circle around to the subject of gratitude: my gratitude about my own salvation is so great that I must share it, albeit imperfectly, with others. That I did not deserve this gracious gift moves me to share it with others, regardless of their merit, for like Paul, I know the state of my own heart and I am the greatest of sinners. Perhaps there are detainees who 'deserve' all the abuse we can heap upon them. But how can I, who was so graciously rescued from divine retribution, not withhold my own retribution? Even more importantly, how can I abuse a monster without becoming a monster myself?

About whether Iraq is or is not on the brink of civil war, what I said in my reflection was that no one at that moment was in a position to know which way things would go, least of all me. I did also point to signs of hope,

But there are also signs of peace and reconciliation and hope: Shi'a and Sunni marched together in numerous locations, demonstrating solidarity. Leaders of various factions on both sides have issued solidarity statements. Ayatollah Sistani, the leading Shi'a cleric in Iraq, has called for peace and non-violence. Various groups within Iraq, as well as surrounding nations, have pledged assistance to rebuild the shrine. Sunni in Baghdad play the words of a Shi'a leader. Shi'a and Sunni worship together.

But when you say that there has not been violence in the aftermath of the shrine bombing, this is mistaken. It is difficult to know whether the ensuing violence is simply a continuation of what has already been happening or whether it is an escalation. But the fact is that a small minority of largely unknown perpetrators are continuing to engage in the slaughter of innocent people, Shi'a and Sunni. I view the question of whether Iraq is or is not in civil war to be largely irrelevant. In the summer of 2005, the Christian Science Monitor reported that Iraq at that time was already in civil war (August 22, 2005). Regardless of what we call it, Iraq is a place of great instability and violence.

I must confess that I was most surprised at your assertion that crime is not necessarily a corollary to war. I take it as such a given that when I read what you wrote, I spent some time in on-line research, asking myself, am I just wrong about this? The reason that I take it as a given is colored by my own view of violence: it seems impossible to me that we who train our children that it is wrong to hit or to kill, when asking them to set aside those ingrained beliefs to participate in a war, should expect that the lifting of the restraint against violence would not bleed into the lifting of restraint in other areas of life. By this, I do not mean to say that everyone who is a soldier is a criminal. Rather I am trying to say that when restraints are lifted against violence in a society, that violence will play itself out in a myriad of predictable, if criminal ways. But back to the question of whether my own presuppositions are right. The World Bank introduces its study of violence in war and in crime this way:

But the World Bank is addressing itself to the long view. I am speaking about the criminal activity in the context of war as it is happening. You point out that crime did not explode in the United States during Viet Nam or other wars. With the exception of the Civil War, none of these wars were fought on our soil (the attack on Pearl Harbor being the exception). I am speaking to a country that is the locus for war, to the place and time where the violence is actually happening.

In Congo and surrounding countries, which have been embroiled in violence for years, rape is such a common phenomenon that it has become an enormous social problem: women who have been raped are expelled from their families and have no other resources for their support.

In fact, rape during war, particularly of detained women, has become such a common phenomenon that it is being treated as an international war crime in violation of the Geneva Conventions.

Colombia has been embroiled in a form of civil war for four decades; kidnapping and drug trafficking are boom industries there.

In Afghanistan, the opium trade has been resurrected by its war lords.

But in my research, what I was surprised to find is a paper documenting that civilian violent crime rates increased in the United States during the Viet Nam years and at other times we were involved in violent conflicts around the world. It would appear that the thought that our wars have no impact on the crime rates even at home is ill-founded:

If I "pierced your heart with anger, sadness and fear" I apologize. That certainly was not my intent.

I also want to acknowledge that each of the three men who were rescued did, upon returning home, express their gratitude to the British and American soldiers who secured their release. Furthermore, I also acknowledge that in an addendum the Christian Peacemakers Team also expressed a rather muted form of appreciation while also expressing their concern for detainees (many of whom totally deserve detention) in the custody of US, Coalition and Iraqi authorities. Believe it or not, the US, Coalition and Iraqi authorities are also concerned about the health and well-being of their detainees.

Before I address your correctives, let me state again my disdain for the original press release made by CPT. It called the recovery of your three colleagues a "release" and then, without either acknowledging the role played by the British and American armed force or thanking them for their efforts, nonetheless used the announcement of the rescue of these men to restate their contentions that Operation Iraqi Freedom constitutes in illegal and immoral war and to express their concern for the treatment being given to detainees. It was, by the way, a detainee who revealed the information that led to the recovery of your colleagues. He was rewarded with his freedom and the criminals who kidnapped your friends and murdered Tom Fox were warned to vacate their location.

The Iraqi people are a testament to this. They have voted in extraordinary numbers. They continue to sign up for military service even though recruitment centers are targets for attack. The men and women who serve in administrative positions with the new government are marked for death, yet they serve anyway. They are a people who deserve our support and they are going to continue to get that support.

I have no quarrel with CPT's policy on not negotiating with kidnappers or hostage takers. I am angry that CPT is in Iraq to denigrate the efforts of this nation and its military and that in doing so some of its people get into trouble. Whether you want them to make an effort to ensure your safety or not, the beauty of the US military is that they will do so anyway. No one asked Christ to die for their salvation either.

War ultimately is a test of wills, not just fire on targets. Wars are won when the enemy knows it has been defeated. This war is going to go on for a very, very long time. Iraq is simply a theater in this war. It may be that the war soon will extend into Iran and Syria. I certainly do not expect people who are traditionally opposed to all wars to be very happy with that reality, but it is a reality. If we lose this war, it will not be Iraq that is the loser. If al Qaeda has its way, your great grandchildren and mine will be part of a world-wide Islamic Caliphate. That may seem preposterous to you, but it made enough sense to nineteen Muslims so that they murdered over 3,000 innocent people in New York, Washington and Pennsylvania on September 11, 2001. I would submit that the CPT is doing a disservice in that regard.

Ultimately it is war that offends you. It should. War is a very offensive and horrible thing. Statements like "Look out Warmongers, here we come" (See the CPT website) certainly miss the point.

Nevertheless, I do commend you for your courage. I apologize if my words and my expressions of "utmost disdain" aimed at the people who neglected to thank the American and British armed forces for rescuing three CPT members but also did not refrain from attacking the motives and conduct of those forces in announcing the "release" of those men offended you. They remain ungracious in their idiocy, with "idiocy" being defined as the remark attributed to Lenin about the usefulness of kindhearted but also easily manipulated people: folks like Paul Robeson in the 1930s and William Sloan Coffin during the Vietnam War and a certain Presbyterian leader who claims there is religious freedom in Cuba. Nevertheless, you are a stand up woman with a great deal of courage, both physical and moral, and for that I commend you and offer my apology.

Dear Professor Tilford,

I just read your letter to Christian Peacemaker Teams (CPT) on the Witherspoon Society's web page this morning. I confess to you that your words have pierced my heart with anger, sadness and fear. The anger and fear, I release to God's Holy Spirit as best I am able. The sadness lingers, for I find it heartbreaking that the body of Christ should be so divided.

That you have only the 'utmost disdain' for me and my colleagues is wounding; you are my brother. That the pejorative 'useful idiots' you find to be 'too kind a descriptive' for us is breathtaking in the rage these words express. I beg you to reconsider if not your anger, at least your way of expressing it.

But I must say that your assertion of facts begs for a few correctives.

You state that the time spent 'searching for and then rescuing' Harmeet, Jim and Norman 'could have been spent stopping the terror attacks . . . thousands of Iraqis may be dead because of the Christian Peacemaker Teams!'

My four colleagues, of course, are not the only ones to be kidnapped in Iraq. Estimates are that two to ten Iraqis are kidnapped every day somewhere in Iraq. Western targets receive the most press, but the fact is that kidnapping is a boom 'industry' in Iraq now, emerging in the chaos that is war. This is a new post-invasion phenomena in Iraq. To what do we attribute this, if not to the context of the lawlessness that routinely emerges in a nation at war? Surely context is relevant to any discussion of events? I posit this in response to your dismissal of CPT's remark that the context of the United States' occupation of Iraq must be considered in determining why things are happening as they are. US military experts within the Pentagon have been saying almost from the outset that the 'victory' in Iraq, if victory is to be had, must be a political rather than military solution.

Secondly, I would ask why you do not indict the many contractors and journalists who travel to Iraq and are kidnapped for distracting the soldiers from their work of 'stopping terror attacks'? For that matter, why do we not attack the troops themselves for being there? Even when they are benign, they themselves are targets for so much violence that mostly kills innocent civilians. By what yardstick do we measure to determine that one person's presence is legitimate, worth the risk of life and liberty, yet another's is not?

CPT has a policy remarkably similar to that of President Bush when it comes to hostage situations: do not negotiate for us; do not rescue us; expend no resources on us; endanger no lives for us. That position was communicated clearly to those in authority in the Green Zone in the immediate aftermath of the kidnapping. You are angry with the diversion of resources and the risks imposed, but do not ask at whose behest the resources were diverted or the risks imposed. Perhaps you will say I am naive; perhaps I am. I can only cite to you a recent interview with a British military expert (the operation that freed my colleagues was a British-led one) who, vehemently disagreeing with CPT, nevertheless said that CPT most emphatically did not endanger the lives of military personnel and that CPT had every right to be in Iraq doing its work.

I confess I was most surprised by your statement, "Have your team members look around Iraq. Unless they are so blinded by ideology they will see a country struggling – and succeeding – against forces determined to return that nation to the slavery of totalitarian rule and the darkness of religious oppression."

"Have your team members look around Iraq."  Professor Tilford, in my four short months in Iraq, I have lived in Baghdad, traveled to Nejef and Karbala, to the Syrian border and the Jordanian border with busloads of fleeing Palestinians, to Baquba, and to Balad to spend three days at Anaconda Air Force Base in an unsuccessful attempt to accompany Tom Fox's remains home. My team mates have traveled to Fallujah, to Basra, to Talafur, to Babylon. In our work we visit electric power plants, water treatment facilities, the Ministry of Interior (Iraq's national police force), the Ministry of Defense, prisons run by multi-national forces and by Iraqi army and police. We visit people in their homes. We work with Iraqi non-governmental organizations. By default we have become the eyes and ears for the International Red Cross and Amnesty International, because they have withdrawn from Iraq due to the level of violence there. We meet with religious leaders, Christian, Sunni and Shi'a.

Everywhere we go, we "look around Iraq". We live there. Every day we get a phone call from a Team friend who reads Iraqi newspapers and translates the news into English for us. And the news is not good.

How I pray that you are right and I am wrong; that Iraq is succeeding in remaking itself into a place of safety, security and freedom, a place of love. But I must tell what I see, what I hear. And it is a very different story. We all know, because we hear the stories every day, of the violence of car and suicide bombs, of insurgents and IED's. These are all too real. But what is also real that we do not hear about is the violence that rests squarely on our shoulders, we citizens of the United States:

Infrastructure is worse now than at the time of the invasion in all but one category. There is less electricity. Potable water in Baghdad is virtually non-existent. (Source: NYT, Feb. '06)

Estimates are that from 40-70% of the people of Baghdad have hepatitis from the drinking water

Unemployment is sky-high (as a side note, Kellog, Brown and Root pays its contract employees $3,000 -$10,000 per month plus benefits to do the same work as soldiers who are paid much less. Iraqi laborers working for the MNF are paid $1 per hour)

You may indict me for being an idiot or a fool, but please do not indict me for not looking.

The real question of violence and harm being occasioned by CPT's presence in Iraq, a question we revisit every day, is whether someone will be harmed simply for associating with us: will they be killed? Taken into detention? Kidnapped with us? These are real concerns that focus on the civilians of Iraq who truly have no choice about the violence which embroils their country. In striving to answer this question, we routinely consult with those Iraqis we know. It is their voice we seek, as it is their country, their future.

In response to the question of whether our continued presence is a positive or negative force, an Iraqi, a Christian priest friend has said, "I would feel bad if something happened to you, but I would be angry if you disappear. If you care for us just in the good times, I will forget you. If you take care of us in the bad times, I will remember you. You die when you do nothing, but live when you do something. Everyone dies, but not everyone lives." Referring to Tom Fox, he added, "When we lost our friend, the suffering is hard, but it gives us courage. When they bombed my church, it didn't weaken us; it made us strong. Iraq's recovery may take ten years or more. But we can't wait until the tragedy is over to work, laugh, and hope."

Professor Tilford, this is what we in CPT do in Iraq: we work, we laugh, (and we cry) and we hope. And as best we are able, we try to enact God's kingdom. In this we fail more often than we succeed. In the words of a Christian pop song, we fall down, we get up; we fall down, we get up.

If I have failed in my duties as a citizen of the kingdom of God, please show me how. Repentance is my privilege as well as my duty and humility is my perpetual struggle. I do not have all the answers; indeed, all I seem to have are questions.

Struggling to be faithful,

Your sister in Christ,

Beth Pyles

Lenin spoke of "Useful Idiots"…those well-meaning and good-hearted people in the West who, believing mankind is essentially good, will readily support the Bolshevik's declared goals of creating a secular utopia while ignoring the reality of the terror Lenin believed essential to the revolutionary process. The Christian Peacemaker Team shows us how prescient Lenin really was concerning the nature of useful idiots. Just as Lenin and his successor Josef Stalin cleverly exploited useful idiots in the West while an estimated twenty million Russians were slaughtered or worked to death during collectivization and industrialization, today's terrorists and their supporters throughout the radical Islamic world are exploiting you and your cohorts in Iraq and elsewhere.

I am appalled that in the wake of heroic efforts of men of the US Special Forces and British Special Air Services--men who truly understand that the essence of love is the willingness to risk one's life for the innocent--your team expressed only the tired old cant of "illegal occupation". Your ungraciousness is beyond all comprehension. It is beyond decency.

The efforts of the US and Coalition forces to save the lives of men who themselves demean this nation's objectives in Iraq, our struggle to bring freedom, peace and stability to that country, is truly amazing. The time our forces spent searching for and then rescuing these men could have been spent stopping the terror attacks that claim hundreds of innocent Iraqi lives every week. It is not unreasonable to assert that over the past four months thousands of Iraqis may be dead because of the Christian Peacemakers Team! And many more Americans will die because terrorists will take heart at your continued carping about "illegal occupation". Furthermore, had it not been for information obtained from a detainee, those men quite possibly would have shared Tom Fox's fate. Have your team members look around Iraq. Unless they are so blinded by ideology they will see a country struggling--and succeeding--against forces determined to return that nation to the slavery of totalitarian rule and the darkness of religious oppression.

The Christian Peacemakers Team has covered itself in shame. The term "useful idiots" is too kind a descriptive for CPT. Ungracious Idiots fits far better.

With Utmost Disdain,

23 March 2006   [posted here3-24-06]

Christian Peacemaker Team member Beth Pyles returned from Iraq a couple days before the three surviving hostages were released.

In December 2005 she began her assignment in Amman, Jordan doing the press work necessitated by the kidnappings. She moved to Baghdad mid-January 2006. She and other team members have documented human rights abuses of Iraqi detainees and continued building relationships with the Muslim Peacemaker Teams in Iraq. The team has also sought to provide an alternative, grassroots view of the current civil strife touched off by the bombing of the Shi’a Muslim shrine in Samarra.

This assignment was a second stint for Pyles, who also worked with CPT in Iraq September-October 2005. At that time she worked with Palestinians in Iraq who had been targeted for physical abuse and random detention. She also accompanied some of them as they sought to escape Iraq and cross into Syria.

Pyles practiced law for twenty-two years in Parkersburg, WV, before attending seminary in Princeton, NJ, from which she graduated in May, 2005. She is seeking a call with the Presbyterian Church (PCUSA); a prospective employer recently interviewed her over the phone in Baghdad.

Tom Fox was one of four Christian Peacemaker Team members kidnapped in Baghdad in November. The other three were recently shown alive on Al Jazeera TV. The Gospel reading for March 12, 2006 is Mark 8.31-38, Jesus’ prediction of his own death and his call to disciples to take up their cross and follow. Here is a genuine example of one who did just that.

Thanks to Witherspooner Arch Taylor

Saturday 11 March 2006

In grief we tremble before God who wraps us with compassion. The death of our beloved colleague and friend pierces us with pain. Tom Fox's body was found in Baghdad yesterday.

Christian Peacemaker Teams extends our deep and heartfelt condolences to the family and community of Tom Fox, with whom we have traveled so closely in these days of crisis.

We mourn the loss of Tom Fox who combined a lightness of spirit, a firm opposition to all oppression, and the recognition of God in everyone.

We renew our plea for the safe release of Harmeet Sooden, Jim Loney and Norman Kember. Each of our teammates has responded to Jesus' prophetic call to live out a nonviolent alternative to the cycle of violence and revenge.

In response to Tom's passing, we ask that everyone set aside inclinations to vilify or demonize others, no matter what they have done. In Tom's own words: "We reject violence to punish anyone. We ask that there be no retaliation on relatives or property. We forgive those who consider us their enemies. We hope that in loving both friends and enemies and by intervening nonviolently to aid those who are systematically oppressed, we can contribute in some small way to transforming this volatile situation."

Even as we grieve the loss of our beloved colleague, we stand in the light of his strong witness to the power of love and the courage of nonviolence. That light reveals the way out of fear and grief and war.

Through these days of crisis, Christian Peacemaker Teams has been surrounded and upheld by a great outpouring of compassion: messages of support, acts of mercy, prayers, and public actions offered by the most senior religious councils and by school children, by political leaders and by those organizing for justice and human rights, by friends in distant nations and by strangers near at hand. These words and actions sustain us. While one of our teammates is lost to us, the strength of this outpouring is not lost to God's movement for just peace among all peoples.

At the forefront of that support are strong and courageous actions from Muslim brothers and sisters throughout the world for which we are profoundly grateful. Their graciousness inspires us to continue working for the day when Christians speak up as boldly for the human rights of thousands Iraqis still detained illegally by the United States and United Kingdom.

Such an outpouring of action for justice and peace would be a fitting memorial for Tom. Let us all join our voices on behalf of those who continue to suffer under occupation, whose loved ones have been killed or are missing, and in so doing may we hasten the day when both those who are wrongly detained and those who bear arms will return safely to their homes. In such a peace we will find solace for our grief.

Despite the tragedy of this day, we remain committed to put into practice these words of Jim Loney: "With the waging of war, we will not comply. With the help of God's grace, we will struggle for justice. With God's abiding kindness, we will love even our enemies." We continue in hope for Jim, Harmeet and Norman's safe return home safe.

The rest of his essay >>

Thanks to Witherspooner Betty Hale