November 23, 2005

I am writing this as we’re all preparing for Thanksgiving--.a time when we all reflect and give thanks for family, friends and community. As pies are being baked and my son Isaac plays computer games in the next room, I’m mindful of the hundreds of prisoners wrenched from their family, friends and community. I know they have been whisked off to far away Guantanamo in secrecy with no charges, no counsel, no due process and no release date. Their normal lives were totally disrupted.

In response, I am compelled to disrupt my own “normal” life to expose this outrage, to shine light on this darkness. In one sense, it is an extreme move to travel so far away to confront this terrible injustice. In another sense, it’s a simple gesture to acknowledge and vale the humanity of these prisoners, who are treated inhumanly and tortured to break their human and religious spirit. By going to Guantanamo, I regain some of my own humanity by breaking the silence and complicity. In addition, I got to Guantanamo as a Christian amidst a crushing violent Christianity which betrays Christ all over again. In the midst of Bush’s Crusade against Islam (despite all his rhetoric to the contrary), I travel with a faith community on pilgrimage—which in the Judeo-Christian tradition means a return to the sources. We return to the source of our faith; the central and yet so foten dismissed command of Jesus to “Love your enemies.”

Our pilgrimage does not count the prisoners as our enemies. But as American citizens, we got to Gitmo to reach out to our so-called enemies with compassion. We know we are not alone in our sentiments, but voice the position of many U.S. citizens who believe in Justice and Truth and Honesty.

So, we hope and trust that God will take this action, this pilgrimage and increase it as Dorothy Day said, as loaves and fishes. Our task is to sow the seed. Hands greater than ours will bring forth an abundant harvest.