10/18/2024

Oct. 18, 2024

My dear Friend & POTUS, JRB,

            I am here to remind you of George Fox’s admonishment that you can’t kill the devil with a gun or a sword. You just gotta keep walking in the Light.

            I feel led to share that bit from a Quaker song about our leader with his “shaggy, shaggy locks,” because everyone seems so gleeful that Yahya Sinwar (YS) is dead. The response to his killing evokes another lyric, “Ding Dong the witch is dead.”

            I am troubled by the celebration of anyone’s death, even if they planned the massacre of 1200 innocent people on Oct 7, 2023. Moreover, I think the festivities reveal arrogant ignorance of the true effect of YS’s death. He will become another icon that young Palestinians will want to emulate. The WP quoted an 84-year-old as saying, “He was not assassinated by Israel; it was America who assassinated him…If Sinwar was killed, his successor will be 20 times better than him — more courageous.”

            While I hope you & others can persuade Bibi to end his assault on the Palestinian people, I doubt he will. If you really want that to happen you should stop supplying him with weapons, but I doubt that will happen either. At least you could refrain from smiling when you talk about YS’s death.

            So how is Berlin? Isn’t that a cool city? They’ve got a Bauhaus Music Festival going on that look’s intriguing. I hope you get a chance to do something fun while you’re there.

            Final question, what is a synod? I ask because Yangon Cardinal Charles Bo is having a Synod on Synodality. It has something to do with getting feedback & seeking harmony & unity. Sounds good. Burma could certainly use that. Do you think WSWC should have a synod?

            BYBS,