Thursday, April 7, 2005
This is a press release that was just forwarded to me. Dexter Van Zile has been at the forefront of the internal Christian dialogue opposing the divestment activities of the PC(USA), and he has the knowledge and ability to approach the issue using Church philosophy that many of us on the "outside" are only dimly aware of. The internet is gone haywire for me at the moment, so I can't get into the site to read the report, but I look forward to doing so. It's also good to see the David Project (the tenacious David Project) keeping on this issue.
New report says PC(USA) is megaphone for PLO
The Judeo-Christian Alliance, an initiative of the Boston-based David Project, today released its in-depth critique of the Presbyterian Church(USA)'s decision to divest from Israel. The report, Blind Prophecy, documents the process that led to church to offer a one-sided anti-Israel narrative to Presbyterians in the U.S.
Citing the Barmen Declaration, written by German theologians fighting the Nazi takeover of Christian churches in the 1930's, Dexter Van Zile, the author of the report, says proponents of divestment should have subjected the Palestinian Christian narrative to more scrutiny.
"By broadcasting this narrative, the PC(USA) did not speak in a prophetic voice, but allowed itself to be used as a megaphone for the Palestinian nationalist cause," says Van Zile. "We've seen Christian churches used this way before and the results were catastrophic."
"The Barmen Declaration is included in the PC(USA)'s Book of Confessions," he says. "The warnings are there in black and white, but for some reason, they were ignored by people who knew better."
The report also documents efforts by some of the denomination's leaders to misrepresent the meaning of the resolution after it was passed, says Van Zile.
"After the resolution was passed, the denomination's leaders tried to portray the policy as if it punished both Israelis and Palestinians for acts of violence. The resolution did no such thing," Van Zile says.
The 37-page document is available at the Judeo-Christian Alliance web site: (www.judeo-christianalliance.org). Van Zile hopes the document will alert other denominations in the U.S. to the problems with the Palestinian Christian narrative.
"If churches are going to speak prophetically about the Arab/Israeli conflict, they need to listen to more than a narrative produced by Christians living under the threat of Arab terrorism," Van Zile says.
The Judeo-Christian Alliance is an initiative of the David Project, a group that promotes a fair and honest understanding of conflict in the Middle East. The JCA was founded to give Christians in the U.S. the information they need to act with an informed conscience about the Arab/Israeli conflict.
