pacifist
Glen H. Stassen. Photo courtesy Danske Kirkedage via Flickr
Editor's Note: This piece originally appeared at ABPNews/Herald HERE.
My friend Glen Stassen died today (Saturday, April 26) in Pasadena. He was 78. But because he was born on Leap Day — February 29, 1936 — Glen liked to joke that he was only 19. Until an aggressive cancer took his vitality over the last year, and finally his life, Glen as 78-going-on-19 was totally believable. It is impossible to believe that he has gone to be with Jesus.
There are only a small number of people beyond family who deeply affect the course of one’s life. Glen Stassen was one such person for me, perhaps the primary person outside my family who shaped who I am and what I have become. Having him gone makes me feel like an orphan.
Christians are called to be peacemakers and healers. Disagreement on policy does not excuse us from a responsibility to help those who come home broken and in need of help.
You might call yourself a pacifist, a just-war theorist, a pragmatist, a dove or a hawk but today (and every day), you should be a good neighbor to a veteran.
Last March I testified at the Truth Commission on Conscience in War (TCCW) at the Riverside Church in New York City.
Before I went to Iraq with my friend and fellow God's Politics contributor Shane Claiborne, I was trying to figure out how to take the lessons I would learn there back home. I felt certain (and now know) that the experience could be a small but powerful step toward improving our understanding of how to prevent any future indiscriminate uses of force similar to the invasion and occupation of Iraq.
There are good men (and certainly at least a few women) who have been slipping through the cracks within our military. Too often service members are not made fully aware of their rights under the Uniform Code of Military Justice. Sgt. Travis Bishop, out of Ft.