From Harlem New York City, the wreckage and smell of dead bodies downtown is not visible. It is felt however, in the change in New York life, from the subway changes, to the constant police sirens, to the constant bombardment by the media, to the panic, fear and mourning of New Yorkers. There are missing persons pictures everywhere. Faces of the dead are posted on virtually every corner. It is a very sad thing. And makes one glad to be alive.

Immediately after the attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon, George Bush mad e a statement calling for retaliation. In the speech he claimed that there would be "no distinction between the terrorists who committed these acts and those who harbored them." Bush implied here that innocent civilians would most likely die as a result of US efforts to retaliate. The call is for Americans to have the nerve to die for and to kill for the nation-state. And if necessary, to kill even those who might not have any clue that the World Trade Center even existed let alone that it was destroyed.

Many American Christians are in agreement that vengeance is necessary and that God is on our side. I have heard many statements calling for revenge or in their words "justice." President Bush read Psalms 23 in his national address in which he invoked a spirit of revenge form this powerful nation. This usage of the Psalm, written by a man enduring severe persecution and who was completely powerless, applied to the most powerful nation in the world, which has killed more than they have been killed seems to me to be a terrible misuse of Christian Scripture by a man claiming Jesus Christ as his lord.

Bush has called this war a "Crusade" to "rid the world of evildoers" through "Operation Infinite Justice." I find such language to be grounds for the Methodist Church of which Mr. Bush is a member, to discipline him for blasphemy. No human institution is "infinite" let alone able to bring true justice and rid the world of evildoers. But I doubt the Methodist church has the moral resources for such an action. Like most of American Protestantism, they are bowing their knees to the god of war and wealth.

What I find most frightening in this time is not that America might go to war. Although that is a saddening and frightening thing in itself. No, what I find most disturbing is this newfound spirituality that America has suddenly found. The Sunday after the attacks churches were filled, prayer services were being attended; the rulers in the US government were using biblical images and even quoting the Bible.

My fear is not that America will go to war, but that it will go to war in God's name. That Christians will take communion, the sign of fellowship and embrace in the church, and then profane the Lord's Table by eating with bloody hands. That Christians will send soldiers to kill those they once sent missionaries to.

In Afghanistan there were several Christian groups helping to feed the starving population. Some of these Christians were arrested by the Taliban and are on trial for trying to convert Muslims to Christianity. Today these Christian organizations are no longer operating in Afghanistan. They have left. And in their place, the church is sending its children to kill those who dared to persecute the church.

Our "Christian" president is calling it a Crusade and demanding the release of those Christians who were arrested in Afghanistan. He has threatened to bomb them to hell if they do not meet every unconditional demand. Christians are fully supporting him. We seem to have forgotten that when the mob came to arrest Jesus and Peter tried to war against the mob, Jesus rebuked him and told him to put the sword away. And that earlier he had asked that all of those disciples die on crosses next to his.

Christians are supportive of violent action because they believe that God has ordained government (not the Afghanstan government however) as his instrument of wrath on earth. As such the human institution has a responsibility to attack and defend its people. Christians regularly call for an eye for an eye, and see that the government has no other recourse than to violence. And of course, being good citizens, that means Christians have to kill also.

All of this unmasks a Christian theology that is completely man centered. It reveals a theology that has forgotten that there are possibilities beyond the realm of the human. Democrats and Republicans may not be able to see beyond the human possibility of continuing the cycle of retribution and violence, but Christians know that there is a God who goes beyond politics. There is a God who demands that we follow him even when it is unpopular to do so, and even when it may mean risking persecution. There is a God who calls Christians to take the risk of reconciliation.

This theology centered in man also reveals itself by its exclusion of God from the scene and not God's inclusion as it may at first appear. Despite all the prayers and church going there is a fundamental disbelief, a basic non faith and trust in the God of the cross. Our faith is really put in our own righteousness. A hypocritical righteousness that sees the sinner Afghans as completely evil while the publican Americans are completely righteous. The government has not even once analyzed the reasons underlying the attacks. Instead they spit out rhetoric such as "they hate our freedom." Never do they confess that they to have committed heinous acts of terrorism against Muslim peoples, killing 500,000 women and children in their sanctions against Iraq, or that they actually trained this terrorist network to fight Russians from 1979 to the early 1990's.

American Christians in their patriotism have become self-righteous, refusing to look at their own nation and its terrorism. We have refused to look in ourselves individually to see the sin within ourselves as well. For the terrorism of the United States government is a manifestation of the sins of Christians who have supported these acts. They are manifestations of the American church's wealth. James 2 declares that the reason for such wars is that we desire what is not ours. I think if we Christians look deep into our souls we will find that our support of the United States government has sprung from such desires.

Now is not the time for "patriotism". Now is the time for Christians to love their enemies. The state has declared its enemy: the state cannot declare enemies for the church. For in the end, we will find that this dominating power called the United States of America is as much of an enemy of the church as any terrorists. For they have duped us into believing their lies, and captured our allegiance away from Jesus Christ, the crucified and risen Lord, to a human killing machine. The state is trying to replace the story of a Suffering Servant named Jesus, with stories of necessary evil and violence, with stories of war and killing. The state has its own theology, and its own gospels. They have their own gods, and these gods want us to bow to them, to be enslaved to them. But we arenot bound to necessary evil. We know the truth, and the truth has set us free.
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Andrew Baker currently works with the mentally disabled in New York City. He is a Mennonite and is active in his local congregation. He has a BA in theology from Wheaton College and is currently considering seminary studies.