
          The Shame of Contra Aid
          By Finlator, W.W.W.W. Finlator
          Vol. 8, No. 3, 1986, pp. 18-19
          
          The Old Testament prophet called down woe upon those who said that
darkness was light and light was darkness. We today fall within the
shadow of that prophetic judgment since, led by our super-patriotic
President, we have come to call what is truly American, un-American,
and what is truly un-American, American. Consider the contras and
Nicaragua, for there, our President would have us believe, the former
Somoza death squads can be likened to George Washington's freedom
fighters at Valley Forge.
          To achieve such self-deception requires a leadership skilled in the
art of misconstruing the American dream. From the Monroe Doctrine, to
the Good Neighbor policy of Franklin Roosevelt, to the present crisis,
we have been assured that our relationship with Central and South
American nations has been one of justice, freedom, and
democracy. Actually, we have treated these countries as US
colonies. We have set up and maintained repressive, despotic,
governments. We have frustrated and defeated movements by the people
of these countries to achieve justice and freedom for
themselves. Nowhere has America, while believing its motives pure and
unmixed, been so cynically and systematically un-American than in its
dealings with these nations. Nicaragua is now exposing the sham and
shame to the world.
          Millions of Americans are waking up to these dark chapters to our
history and we are angry at what our militaristic President is doing
to the people of Nicaragua, angry that a spineless Congress supports
him and, in the South, particularly angry that our timid
representatives fall such easy prey to his jingoistic rhetoric. It is
for us to hold these Southern politicians to strictest account, as one
day all of us surely will be held in account for what we are doing to
that suffering nation.
          But, it is what we are doing to ourselves in the name of
Americanism that concerns me for the moment. In supporting the contras
and keeping alive the war and destruction in Nicaragua we are
violating the heart and soul of our nation, in several ways.
          First, we are in violation of the spirit and letter of our
Declaration of Independence when we try to crush the yearning and
striving of Nicaraguans for justice and 

freedom. It is as though the
loyalists, following the American Revolution, and after leaving or
being driven out of colonies, had regrouped on the Canadian border and
with reenforcements from a hostile European nation, resumed the
conflict as "freedom fighters."
          Secondly, we are in violation of the spirit and letter of our
Constitution and its Bill of Rights. Rather than attempt to understand
and support the strivings of Nicaraguans who wish to "establish
justice, insure domestic tranquility, provide for the common defence,
promote the general welfare, and secure the blessings of liberty" to
themselves and their families," we support a war of terrorism while
hypocritically decrying a communist take-over and international
terrorism. When you think of the kidnappings, tortures, burnings,
maimings, pillage and murder, you have to spell it terrorism, pure and
simple, underwritten by the US Government. This is not only deceitful
and hypocritical, it is also plain un-American.
          Thirdly, we are in violation of the spirit and letter of the
Charter of the United Nations. The World Court, which we helped to set
up and have appealed to in the past, has found our involvement in
Nicaragua in violation to the UN Charter. We have become, as it were,
an international outlaw to our own structure for justice and
peace. The Oval Office seems to exult in this outlaw posture.
          The final violation is theological. Millions of our citizens insist
that America is a "Christian" nation. That such a designation
contravenes the state-church separation principle is an argument I
should like to push on another occasion. But, assuming, for the
moment, that we are a "Christian nation" we have to define what is
"Christian" and then we must decide who does the defining. This could
lead to endless mischief and controversy. Perhaps most Christians
would agree on the centrality of John 3:16 where we are told that God
so loved the world that he sent his Son into the world to save
it. From this we deduce that Jesus in His incarnation identified
himself with all people, and apparently with a special option for the
poor and lowly. The classic passage for this is the one in which Jesus
tells us that he was hungry and we fed him, he was thirsty and we gave
him drink, naked and we clothed him, sick and we visited him,
imprisoned and we came to him, and then he added that inasmuch as we
did these things for others, even the least, we did them also to
him.
          It takes no effort of imagination to see that these are literally
the same basic needs of the vast majority of the people of Nicaragua,
and indeed of all nations south of our border and the third world. But
they are needs that neither their government, nor their church has
met. When at long last the people have undertaken for themselves to
achieve a just and peaeful and compassionate society, "Christian"
America is prepared to use every means to prevent them. We are, I say,
in violation of our religious faith!
          For these reasons a moral outrage in America is in order. And this
is why we cry shame, shame upon so many of our Southern members of
Congress and why we must hold them to strict account.
          
            Rev. W. W. Finlator is the retired pastor of Pullen
Memorial Baptist Church in Raleigh, N. C.
          
        