Is hatred ever the answer?

Nonviolent resistance is model Jesus set

The Rev. Peter Luckey, senior pastor, Plymouth Congregational Church, 619 Vt.:

From Jesus (“love your enemies”) to Martin Luther King Jr. (“Hatred cannot drive out hate, only love can do that”), the voices of saints have resounded in unison: No, hatred is never the answer.

And yet, we ask ourselves, “Had a loved one been killed on 9-11, or if one of our children had been taken hostage in this latest and equally unthinkable terrorist attack in Beslan, Russia, how could we not reach for this most poisonous of all human emotions?”

How does a person of faith reconcile the greatest commandment (Love God, love one another) when facing the powers and principalities that seek to harm? Is there any way love is able to translate into a power in the struggle for good over evil?

The message of Jesus to “turn the other cheek” and “Do not resist an evildoer” (Matthew 5:39) have been hugely misunderstood. People have erroneously thought that Jesus taught submission to evil. But biblical scholar Walter Wink claims the intent of Jesus in these passages has nothing to do with being passive or giving in to oppressors.

In his life, Jesus modeled a way to combat the powers and principalities of the world: neither fighting evil on evil’s terms (fighting hate with hate), nor capitulating in weakness. Jesus offers a third way — the way of nonviolent resistance.

An example: When Jackie Robinson became the first black player in baseball’s major leagues, Branch Rickey of the Brooklyn Dodgers pressed his intensely competitive athlete to agree that for three years he would take whatever abuse was heaped on him without a word.

Robinson finally said, “Mr. Rickey, are you looking for a Negro who is afraid to fight back?” Rickey replied, “I’m looking for a ballplayer with guts enough not to fight back.”

In these fearful times, the rhetoric of our politicians panders to our human instinct to fight back. The principles I have discussed are deprecated, labeled as being “soft” and “weak.”

The call of the Gospel is not to fight back. Rather, the call is to resist. But ground the resistance in love, lest we become a mirror of our enemies.

Send e-mail to the Rev. Peter Luckey at peterluckey@sunflower.com.

Life should reflect peace, love for all

The Rev. Darrel Proffitt, lead pastor, St. Margaret’s Episcopal Church, 5700 W. Sixth St.:

When asked this question, I am tempted to answer it with one word: No.

But can I answer that without hesitation? The experience of many people causes me to wonder. Hate seems to be both the answer and the question. How should we live? To love, we are told, is to be naive. To love is to find ourselves unprotected and vulnerable. When we are vulnerable, others will hurt us. If they do, then we must hurt them. Such a life is a vicious cycle of hurts and wounds, lashing out and hating.

It is too easy to sit in the comfort of my office in Lawrence and say people should never hate. Unless I stand in the shoes of those who lose their loved ones through the violent actions of others, I hesitate to stand in judgment. I can only imagine the gut-wrenching feeling of losing a child through the random violence of a terrorist, strapping bombs to his body and entering a school building. Yet it is an experience that too many people understand. Senseless acts of hate fill our newspapers daily. The natural response, the human response, is to lash out in the same way. I understand that, because I feel it in myself. Yet there is a better way. There is a more excellent way.

Many people throughout history have stood in the midst of violence and said that hate is not the answer. The most significant of these people was an itinerant preacher, Jesus of Nazareth, who is the Messiah, the Christ. He came into our world to show us how to live and how to love. Hate tried to silence him. It could not. The truth of his life, the truth of God’s love, would not be silenced. On the third day, he rose again.

His promise is that one day, all the hate that threatens us will be destroyed. He has called forth his followers to live a life that reflects the peace and love freely given to all humankind. It is the hope of the world that love will win in the end, and show that it is the answer.

Send e-mail to the Rev. Darrel Proffit at stmargaret@sbc.global.net.