From the editor's desk

Well, we put a new bumper sticker on our old car yesterday; it says "No More Victims--Anywhere." Over and over we hear the chant: This changes everything. Not really, not in Durban where the US government walked out on a chance to face up to racism, not in Afghanistan where there have been drought and famine and terror for years, not for Palestinians living under occupation, to name a few.

Sept. 23, Boston © Ellen Shub

This is a moment that brings out some of the worst, of course--cowardice, bigotry, ethnic venom, false patriotism, lust for vengeance, abject fear. But it's a time that also presents a rare opportunity--the Kairos, the teachable moment. Already the mainstream press has rolled over, laid aside its responsibility and its wits. But already thoughtful people are moving into the streets; they are writing letters, holding teach-ins, hotly debating the right words for the banners, thinking deeply about the meaning of flags; they're vigiling and marching. You see pictures in these pages from one such gathering, here in Boston last Sunday, taken by our friend Ellen Shub.

In this office we have received--been deluged with, would describe it better--a tide of remarkable words--angry, thoughtful, anguished, compassionate, vindictive, despairing, visionary. Their volume and power are overwhelming. Painfully, we've chosen a few from the many voices, saving others for later, hoping to make this hastily assembled October issue of Peacework of some use to people setting about the work ahead.

The material which emerged as most crucial for this moment arranged itself in three piles:

First, analysis and commentary, a sorting out of what happened and answers to the ubiquitous "Why do they hate us?" We put an account of the World Conference against Racism in this group. You figure. As we worked on this section we couldn't help remembering the message from an Iraqi teacher which we printed last month, before September 11: "Your children will have to live with ours."

Next comes nuts and bolts: some of what's going on in the movement, resources that we know about, an instructive fact sheet on the US in the Middle East, a primer on the draft, guidelines for helping children, notices for "Columbus Day" and for Oct. 13 protests of the militarization of space. Both carrying special urgency now.

Finally, a few examples from the astonishingly beautiful and powerful work that has been pouring out from many communities of faith, written in anguish, from spiritual depths, but holding out whatever hope there may be.

We couldn't help thinking about a poem we've quoted here before, W.H. Auden's "September 1, 1939 "--you know, the one with the indelible jingle: "I and the public know/ What all schoolchildren learn, / Those to whom evil is done / Do evil in return." The Boston Globe thought of it, too, and printed it last week. It contains another stanza that works in fact even better for our age than for the eve of World War II when Auden wrote it:

Into this neutral air
Where blind skyscrapers use
Their full height to proclaim
The strength of Collective Man,
Each language pours its vain
Competitive excuse:
But who can live for long
In an euphoric dream;
Out of the mirror they stare,
Imperialism's face
And the international wrong.

This is also the poem that says, "We must love one another or die." The Globe tells us that Auden later disowned "September 1, 1939" because he no longer found that line to be true. A question to ponder today.

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