Michael's Blog

Dear friends,      I alternate between violent rage, a welling up of unwept tears, frustration, utter speechlessness, and rage again. I don’t have words, but sometimes all we have is words, and if we don’t speak up, if we don’t act, then who will.  We, people of privilege, we in the US and in the West, with blood on our hands.      Some thoughts:      ONE.  Yesterday, Saturday, July 26, Israeli forces intercepted the Gaza Humanitarian Aid flotilla ship,

     Indiana Center for Middle East Peace (ICMEP) condemns in the strongest terms the unprovoked bombing by the United States of Iranian nuclear facilities.      On Saturday evening, the President of the United States declared:      “Tonight, I can report to the world that the strikes were a spectacular military success. Iran’s key nuclear enrichment facilities have been completely and totally obliterated.”      Code-named “Operation Midnight Hammer,” it involved seven B-2 Spirit bombers dropping a dozen 30,000-pound bunker-busting Massive

     I just returned from Palestine and Israel, leading my 18th “solidarity tour” in 23 years, 18 of us in all – mostly Christian, a few clergy, a few secular folks, and a Jewish member of Jewish Voice for Peace (the 40th time I’ve traveled to Palestine and Israel since 1998).  We meet with Jewish, Christian, and Muslim religious, political, and NGO leaders committed to justice, human rights, non-violence, and the liberation of Palestine.       We met with Fadwa

First Reading:  Isaiah 50.4-9a     The Lord GOD has given me a trained tongue, that I may know how to sustain the weary with a word. Morning by morning he  wakens, wakens my ear to listen as those who are taught.  The Lord GOD has opened my ear, and I was not rebellious; I did not turn backward.  I gave my back to those who struck me and my cheeks to those who pulled out the beard; I did not hide

     I’m shocked.      But the biggest reason I’m shocked is that people are shocked at President Trump’s plan to “own Gaza,” to ethnically cleanse Gaza, and turn Gaza into the “Riviera of the Middle East.”      I’m shocked not at its brazenness, but that we’re shocked he has said out loud what Zionists – Jewish, Christian, and others – have been saying for 76 years, and shouting out loud in the last 15 months.      I’m shocked that

Dear friends, This past week, ICMEP commemorated Martin Luther King, Jr. by hosting Baptist pastor and retired Appeals Court Judge, Wendell Griffen. Wendell is one of the co-chairs of the Samuel DeWitt Proctor Conference, the pre-eminent African-American organization of Black clergy and church leaders committed to social justice. He is also a long-time friend with South African anti-apartheid activist, Allan Boesak. As I mentioned, Wendell is the pastor of New Millennium Church, Little Rock, Arkansas – “Inclusive, Progressive, Welcoming.”