Lent and Lockheed Martin

Each Friday during Lent, the SF Bay Area's Pacific Life Community is sponsoring a silent prayer vigil outside the gates of Lockheed Martin, the country's leading weapons manufacturer and the world's most prolific arms exporter. The intent is to bring the community's attention to the activities of a firm that hasn't produced a civilian aircraft since the early 1980's.

This seems to be a beautiful act of solidarity against an American WMD manufacturer. Why isn't there more of this type of social action from among the Church? Why are these types of nonviolent activism only seen as acts for the fringe (of society and of the Church)?

How are communities of faith formed in a way where there are large and genuine acts of nonviolence action against instruments of war? I think there are numerous reasons. But central to all of the reasons I believe is that the Church is the State's prostitute. The State provides the Church national security, freedom of speech and assembly, and tax-exemption. What more could a religious movement ask for? All the state requires are taxes and an unspoken promise not to question its war machine.

Unfortunately, we are not just talking about the institutional Church organizations. We are also talking about the members of those churches. How can you boycott the war businesses when you work there? For many years I lived in San Diego, and on any freeway you drove on during rush hour, 1 out of every 3 cars had military parking stickers in their windshields. These are the people that sit besides us on Sunday mornings. How can we expect these Christians to join us at candlelight vigils outside the offices where they just spent the day working on a tracking microchip for a new missile system?

A beautiful act of solidarity against the military industrial complex. I guess its too complicated for the Church to get involved in. We might hurt the feelings of so many in the pews. And that might cause our offering plates to get a little lighter. We wouldn't want that. Let's just leave these kind of act of social activism to those people on the fringe.