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| 167 6 Peacemaking In the aftermath of the attacks on September 11, 2001, a resurgent Christian triumphalism successfully reframed the U.S.’ policy options in the context of a civilizational battle between good and evil. In its most polemical form, the situation was portrayed as a battle between morality and immorality ; between the light of freedom and the darkness of dictatorship. President George W. Bush’s speeches were sprinkled with biblical images depicting his perception of this cosmic struggle. These references served as coded messages to Bush’s solid base of supporters among Christian conservatives who had come to embrace the Republican Party as though it were the party chosen by God. At its most extreme, triumphalist Christian rhetoric projected an image of the United States as a nation uniquely ordained by God to assume the mantle of the world’s hegemonic superpower. It was simply the latest manifestation of what the theologian Walter Wink has termed “the myth of redemptive violence,” which establishes a patriotic religion at the heart of the state while repeatedly giving divine sanction to the nation’s imperialism. “The myth of redemptive violence thus serves as the spirituality of militarism.”1 The Bush administration’s initial decision following 9/11 to retaliate against al Qaeda by invading Afghanistan aroused little opposition. In sharp contrast, a little more than a year later, despite the administration’s full-scale propaganda campaign, the looming invasion of Iraq triggered the “most intensive mobilization of antiwar sentiment in history. On February 15, 2003, in hundreds of cities across the globe an estimated 10 million people demonstrated against the war.”2 In the course of just a few months, the peace movement in the United States had reached levels of mobilization that had taken years to develop during the Vietnam War. Even more significantly, the antiIraq -war movement had a much more global character than any previous antiwar movements, as protests were coordinated throughout the world, and activists understood themselves to be part of a global opposition. The political scientists Michael Hardt and Antonio Negri interpret this massive global 168 | Peacemaking turnout in opposition to the U.S. invasion as the pinnacle of a longer cycle of antiglobalization struggles that began in Seattle in 1999. “The war represented the ultimate instance of the global power against which the cycle of struggles had formed; the organizational structures and communication that the struggles had established made possible a massive, coordinated mobilization of common expression against the war.”3 The massive opposition to the invasion also manifested a growing consensus in opposition to war among many of the world’s religious leaders. The decision to invade Iraq was condemned by religious leaders throughout the world. National conferences of Catholic bishops in Europe, Asia, and Africa joined the Vatican in issuing statements against the war. In the United States, nearly every mainline Christian denominational body opposed the war.4 Religious opposition to the Iraq war was broader than any previous conflict in modern history, with religious activists serving as major players in the principal U.S. coalitions against the war. Traditional religious peace groups, including the Catholic pacifist organization Pax Christi and grassroots groups within the Quaker, Mennonite, and Brethren communities, played leadership roles in raising awareness and organizing opposition. While this opposition did not stop the Iraq war, it did limit international support for it; including among countries such as Germany and France, otherwise considered to be among the U.S.’ closest allies. The UN Security Council decisively rebuffed the U.S.’ attempt to secure its authorization for war in February 2003. Not only did France, Germany, and Russia vote against the war, but six other nonpermanent member states did as well. The Security Council’s rejection of the U.S. and Great Britain’s attempt to gain its support for an invasion marked the first time since the UN’s founding that the United States, on an issue that mattered to it, could not get a majority on the Security Council.5 The important role of religious activists in building opposition to the war in Iraq is emblematic of a widespread commitment to the practice of peacemaking among an increasingly broad spectrum of American religious believers. Religious and secular peacemakers are components of a broad peace movement in the United States. The huge religious coalition that was active at the beginning of the Iraq war has not been sustained, but that has also been equally true of secular antiwar activists.6 At its...

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