[Vision2020] Christians Gather in D.C. to Protest War

[Tom Hansen]

>From the Huffington Post at:

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/huff-wires/20070317/war-protest-christians

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Christians Gather in D.C. to Protest War

Sarah Karush, Associated Press
March 17, 2007 09:53 AM EST

WASHINGTON - Thousands of Christians prayed for peace at an anti-war service
Friday night at the Washington National Cathedral, kicking off a weekend of
protests around the country to mark the fourth anniversary of the war in
Iraq.

Afterward, participants marched with battery-operated faux candles through
snow and wind toward the White House, where police began arresting
protesters shortly before midnight. Protest guidelines require demonstrators
to continue moving while on the White House sidewalk.

"We gave them three warnings, and they broke the guidelines," said Lt. Scott
Fear. "There's an area on the White House sidewalk where you have to keep
moving."

About 100 people crossed the street from Lafayette Park _ where thousands of
protesters were gathered _ to demonstrate on the White House sidewalk late
Friday. Police began cuffing them and putting them on buses to be taken for
processing.

Fear said 222 people had been arrested by Saturday morning. The first 100
were charged with disobeying a lawful order, and the others with crossing a
police line. All of them were fined $100.

The windows of the executive mansion were dark, as the president was away
for the weekend at Camp David in Maryland.

John Pattison, 29, said he and his wife flew in from Portland, Ore., to
attend his first anti-war rally. He said his opposition to the war had
developed over time.

"Quite literally on the night that shock and awe commenced, my friend and I
toasted the military might of the United States," Pattison said. "We were
quite proud and thought we were doing the right thing."

He said the way the war had progressed and U.S. foreign policy since then
had forced him to question his beliefs.

"A lot of the rhetoric that we hear coming from Christians has been
dominated by the religious right and has been strong advocacy for the war,"
Pattison said. "That's just not the way I read my Gospel."

The ecumenical coalition that organized the event, Christian Peace Witness
for Iraq, distributed 3,200 tickets for the service in the cathedral, with
two smaller churches hosting overflow crowds. The cathedral appeared to be
packed, although sleet and snow prevented some from attending.

"This war, from a Christian point of view, is morally wrong _ and was from
the beginning," the Rev. Jim Wallis, founder of Sojourners/Call to Renewal,
one of the event's sponsors, said toward the end of the service to cheers
and applause. "This war is ... an offense against God."

In his speech, the Rev. Raphael G. Warnock, senior pastor at Atlanta's
Ebenezer Baptist Church, lashed out at Congress for being "too morally inept
to intervene" to stop the war, but even more harshly against President Bush.

"Mr. Bush, my Christian brother, we do need a surge in troops. We need a
surge in the nonviolent army of the Lord," he said. "We need a surge in
conscience and a surge in activism and a surge in truth-telling."

Celeste Zappala of Philadelphia recounted how she learned of the death of
her son, Sgt. Sherwood Baker, who served in the National Guard. When a
uniformed man came to her door asking if she was Baker's mother, she said
yes.

"'Yes,' and then I fell to the ground and somewhere outside of myself I
heard someone screaming and screaming," she said.

The Friday night events mark the beginning of what is planned as a weekend
of protests ahead of Tuesday's anniversary of the U.S.-led invasion, which
began on March 20, 2003.

On Saturday morning, a coalition of protest groups has a permit for up to
30,000 people to march from the Vietnam Veterans Memorial across the Potomac
River to the Pentagon. Smaller demonstrations are planned in cities across
the country.

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Seeya round town, Moscow.

Tom Hansen
Moscow, Idaho

"As more and more heathens 'choose' to not have children the number of Godly
souls will increase. If the number of Christian births out number the number
of Islamic births the battle will be over in 3 or 4 generations."

- Doug "No-Clue" Farris (March 10, 2007)