Dear President Bush:

I write to you as a follower of Jesus, our Lord, to let you know that my
wife and I are going to Iraq to be with the people there. Scripture tells us
that when one part of the body suffers, we all suffer. 720,000 Christians
have suffered from an evil Iraqi regime and unjust UN sanctions. Both sides
are guilty. We go with the Christian Peacemaker Teams to proclaim God’s good
news to Iraqis and to Americans: “Repent, for the kingdom of God is at
hand.”

Saddam Hussein must repent of his wicked acts, or he will never make it into
the kingdom of heaven. Angry Iraqis must repent of their enmity toward the
Western world, or they will never know God’s peace. We in the United States
must repent of our dependence on an over-consumptive way of life that
increases resource scarcity and necessitates the violence of security, or we
will never know the protection of God’s tabernacle. I must repent of my
hesitancy to follow the call of Jesus, or I will never know the joy of life
in him. And you, President Bush, must repent of the rhetoric that has led
American citizens to believe that it is our responsibility to “rid the world
of evil,” or you will never know the freedom of faith in Jesus Christ.

When those who followed Jesus were tempted to think that they could rid the
world of evil, he told them this story:

The kingdom of heaven is like a man who sowed good seed in his field. But
while everyone was sleeping, his enemies came and sowed weeds among the
wheat, and went away. When the wheat sprouted and formed heads, then the
weeds also appeared. The owners servants came to him and said, “Sir, didn’t
you sow good seed in your field? Where did the weeds come from?” “An enemy
did this,” he replied. Then the servants asked him, “Do you want us to go
and pull them up?” “No,” he answered, “because while you are pulling the
weeds, you may root up wheat with them. Let both grow together until the
harvest. At that time I will tell the harvesters: First collect the weeds
and tie them in bundles to be burned; then gather the wheat and bring it
into my barn.

It is true that weeds are everywhere and that they are evil. But we cannot
root them out. “Vengeance is mine,” says the Lord. The Christian knows no
violence other than the violence of love--the violence that nailed Jesus to
a cross. We believe in the violence that we do to ourselves so that we might
learn to resist the temptation to follow the gods of security, freedom and
prosperity. We believe in the way of Jesus that leads us to suffer and die
with the victims before we would tear out the weeds and “rid the world of
evil” by our own means.

This is the heart of the Christian just war tradition. Just war theory was
not developed to justify the wars of the nation state, but, instead, to
articulate when and where war is unjust. (In the Middle Ages, even just
warriors had to do penance after battle in order to receive Holy Communion.)
A war to “rid the world of evil” could never be a just war precisely because
it is necessarily a war without limits. To say a war is “just” is to say
that there is some point at which we would rather surrender and die than
fight immorally for the sake of our “cause.” If, however, our goal is to
root out evil at any cost, there can be no justice in war. What we have is
not just war. This is holy war. And the god for whom we fight is not the God
we know in Jesus Christ.

President Bush, the god whom you’ve invoked in the name of freedom and
democracy is not the “light that shines in the darkness.” The “wonder
working power” that you spoke of in your State of the Union address is not
in the “precious blood of the Lamb.” For the war of the Lamb is a war in
which the victor rides into battle with his robe already dipped in blood
because it is his own. And he has already shed it for the sake of the whole
world. His name is “King of kings and Lord of lords,” because he has won the
victory over sin, death and hell by following the road to the cross. “This
is my Son, in whom I am well pleased,” God says of Jesus. The maker of
heaven and earth is pleased by the One who leaves the weeds to be bundled up
and burnt at the harvest.

If we will repent, there is another way. It is not a way that we can see so
long as we are advancing toward the false gods who tempt us. But if we turn,
we can see Jesus. We may not see an end to evil. But we can see Jesus. We
may not see security against those who plot against us. But we can see
Jesus. We may not see our economy recover as fast as we might like. But we
can see Jesus. And when we see him, we will be like him; for we will see him
as he truly is.

My wife and I are going to Iraq, Mr. President, because we want to see
Jesus. He is there, we believe, in and among the people who are suffering.
We go for the love of Jesus. But we also go for the love of our country. We
do not want to see America fall to the greed and violence that has brought
down so many empires. We go for the love of Iraq, praying that Saddam will
repent of the evil he has committed against so many people. We go and we
write because we love you, George, as a brother. We long to see you turn and
commit to study war no more--to seek peace and pursue it. We invite you to
celebrate with us the Lamb who died to rid the world of evil and who is
coming again to judge the living and the dead. May God be gracious to us all
on that day.

Peace to you,

Jonathan Wilson-Hartgrove
West Philadelphia Mennonite Fellowship