January 15, 2005

Back in November of 2004 the United States government and military decided to empty out Fallujah a city of 300,000 souls in the dead of winter in order to liberate the citizens there. This undertaking was timed to occur just after the Presidential election just in case there were one or two citizens left in the United States to scream out with some degree of moral outrage. The timing proved to be inconsequential because there was not even a whimper from a Priest, or a Rabbi, or a Minister, or a Bishop, or any man or woman of the cloth to speak out about the injustice brought upon the citizens of Fallujah. It would appear that somehow Christians have forgotten Christ’s second commandment. From the Gospel of Matthew, through the Words of Jesus the Two Commandments are. Matthew 12:30 "(T)AND YOU SHALL LOVE THE LORD YOUR GOD WITH ALL YOUR HEART, AND WITH ALL YOUR SOUL, AND WITH ALL YOUR MIND, AND WITH ALL YOUR STRENGTH.'

"The second is this, '(U)YOU SHALL LOVE YOUR NEIGHBOR AS YOURSELF.' There is no other commandment greater than these."
In would appear that Jesus recognized the dummying down of the faithful which started two thousand years ago and instead of Ten Commandments He shortened these down to just Two. Today we find ourselves with Shepard’s who would rather have earthly treasures than God’s own Love and have absolutely no idea of what constitutes a neighbor and it is some distant memory of how to love your neighbor as yourself. How this occurred would fill volumes and this writing is supposed to be an "Idiots Guide to Falluja."

Maybe what’s happened is the citizens of the United States no longer have a concept of just what 300,000 souls represent. I’m told that the math scores of my fellow citizens here in the U.S. are going down so maybe we need some examples of just what 300,000 souls equates to. Population numbers from 1990 show these cities in the United States to have a population close to 300, 0000. Miami, FL 358,548 Fresno, CA 354,202; Toledo, OH 332,943; Buffalo, NY 328,123; Wichita, KS 304,011; Santa Ana, CA 293,742; Mesa, AZ 288,091; Colorado Springs, CO; 281,140; Tampa, FL 280,015; Newark, NJ 275,221; St. Paul, MN 272,235; Louisville, KY 269,063; Anaheim, CA 266,406; Birmingham, AL 265,968; Arlington, TX 261,721; Norfolk, VA 261,229; Las Vegas, NV 258,295.

Now let’s take every person living in anyone of these cities and have them evacuate their homes in the dead of winter to go live with friends or relatives someplace else or live in tents just outside the city line. Do you and your family happen to live in one of these cities? Does your mother or father live in any of these cities? A brother or a sister perhaps? An Aunt or an Uncle? Maybe one or your cousins finds themselves having to flee their home in one of these cities. Could be just a childhood friend, you know an old neighbor who mistakenly has found themselves through no fault of their own living in a city that needs to be evacuated. If not you what do you think the chances are of your neighbor next door or the one across the street having family or friends living in one of these cities?

This Idiots Guide to Fallujah gets even better. Now imagine that every other home and all the contents there in of one of these cities are destroyed. If you know someone in one of these cities now that person has a 50% chance of having everything they own destroyed and only having what they were able to carry with them. This story of Fallujah just keeps getting better, keep in mind if you know someone living in one of the above cities chances are after three months they still can’t return to their home if it’s still there, they have no job, no income and have been either imposing on a friend or relative for the last three months or better still find themselves living in a tent with no heat in the dead of winter. It seems having some degree of empathy for the people of Fallujah is a trait people living in the United States have long ago forgotten. We seem to have found a way of trading in the words of compassion and caring for a self centered life of gluttony.

Now if we were to look at these 300,000 souls from a proportional stand point in comparison to the United States the story gets more remarkable. For the sake of argument let’s say Iraq has a population of 25 million. These 300,000 human beings make up 1.2% of the total population of Iraq. If we were to compare what this 1.2% of the population represents to the United States that number is about 3,480,000 people. If we turn to a 1990 census of population centers in the United States we find that Los Angeles has a population of 3,485,000. What the United States government and its military have in fact done was remove the entire population of Los Angeles from their homes and destroyed every other house there. Almost every Church, or Temple, or Mosque or any other House of worship has been destroyed there.

The real remarkable thing about imagining the destruction of Los Angeles is realizing that a good portion of my brothers and sisters living here in the United States would think this is a good thing. Perhaps in the near future we’ll all get to truly find out if this is a good thing or not. Maybe we could all stand to read from the words of Martin Niemoeller, German Lutheran Pastor regarding the rise of the Nazi’s in Germany prior to World War II.

"In Germany they came first for the Communists, and I didn't speak up because I wasn't a Communist. Then they came for the Jews, and I didn't speak up because I wasn't a Jew. Then they came for the trade unionists, and I didn't speak up because I wasn't a trade unionist. Then they came for the Catholics, and I didn't speak up because I was a Protestant. Then they came for me, and by that time no one was left to speak up."

Peace