Torture Not the Way of Jesus or Us
May 1, 2009
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April 30, 2009
Torture is morally reprehensible. Christians, who serve a Christ who was tortured and murdered by a brutal Empire should know this to be true. Torture is not just an affront to the human dignity of the person being tortured but also on the one's who are dong the torturing. Any society that sanctions torture has lost its moral compass and threatens the ethical integrity of all its people.
Both Senator McCain and President Obama have clearly said that torture is not consistent with what the values of U.S. society ought to be. For when we torture we sink into the milieu of nations, empires, and civilizations throughout history that forgot that human dignity is not a value we wish to compromise.
I have heard the arguments concerning torture as a means to gather information to save lives. Nevertheless, many studies have shown that information gathered under torture is unreliable and unusable. I do not know if this is reliable or not. Nevertheless, this should not be the criteria for deciding whether or not we use torture techniques. I was struck by President Obama's quoting of Winston Churchill when London was under a ferocious bombing by German forces. Even though there were several German soldiers in captivity, Churchill remained firm in his commitment not to torture. For in the long run, the price of torture remains incalculable.
Morality and ethics require hard decisions. Often in a world filled with terrorism, suicide bombers, rampant war and violence we are tempted to respond in kind. Some argue that it is pure naïvete to think we can overcome evil with a higher moral standard. Opponents say that people who oppose torture do not understand the nature of the world we are living in. I disagree, we understand all too well the nature of a world who finds the way of violence acceptable. It is because we have understood that this is the way things "are" that we choose to model a different way. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr never used violence although violence was constantly used against him, his home, and the many people in the Civil Rights movement. Did the millions of people who partook in the non-violent marches not understand terror? Nonsense. They chose a different way. Did the thousands of blacks who chose non-violence in the face of lynching, church-bombings, and racially-motivated beatings not understand terrorism? Nonsense. They chose a different way. Did Jesus not understand the way of terror when he was being crucified on an imperial cross? Nonsense. He chose a different way.
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