Dr. Strangelove: How I Learned To Stop Worrying and Start Praying

Reacting in part to recent missile tests by Iran and North Korea, President Obama and a unanimous UN Security Council last week endorsed a sweeping strategy to halt the spread of nuclear weapons and ultimately eliminate them. Is nuclear disarmament a religious issue? Is it a pro-life issue? Is support for nuclear disarmament a moral imperative? Should we pray for nuclear disarmament?

I watched last week, for the umpteenth time, Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb, a movie made nearly 50 years ago. In the movie, a paranoid U.S. general diverts his B-52 bombers from airborne alert to an attack on the Soviet Union, using nuclear weapons. But the Soviets have—and plan to use if attacked—a secret doomsday weapon designed to destroy all life on the planet. After the attack by the U.S., instead of responding in kind, the Soviets decide to use the doomsday machine. Their rationale is that it makes no sense to save the lives of only a few—especially when they are part of a species capable of annihilating the world. If a few survived, wouldn’t they inevitably recreate the same mistrust and struggle for domination that caused the devastation?

Today, between the U.S. and Russia, there exists a “mutual deterrence” strategy—the idea that each will refrain from attacking the other because to do so would surely cause complete destruction of the planet. In theory, total and mutual nuclear armament is a kind of safeguard against annihilation; in reality, however, each nation has developed its own doomsday weapon.

Is nuclear disarmament a religious issue, a moral imperative, or a pro-life issue? The question touches on all three. Religion may tell us what our lives mean, and whether there is something greater than us in the universe. Moral imperatives and ethics guide us in deciding what is fair, just, and right. But both religion and ethics are just the tip of the iceberg, hinting at a much greater and deeper issue—the sanctity and preservation of human life.

In fact, three of the world’s major faith traditions—Judaism, Christianity, and Islam—embrace a belief in the sanctity of human life. In the Qur’an, each individual human life is equivalent to that of the entire community—and should be treated with care and reverence. Judaism details this belief most clearly: one human is worth an entire world. If you kill just one person, you are destroying all of his or her potential offspring and descendants. But, by the same token, saving one person saves an entire world. For Christians, when Jesus heals one blind man, one leper, one lame person—he heals all of humankind in that act.

Yes, we should pray for nuclear disarmament. We should pray that people of all faiths, people of no faith, people who care about morality and ethics and people who embrace anarchy. We should pray that each and every one of us recognize and remember the sanctity of human life, that by saving one life, we save an entire world.

Faith on the Hill

Dozens of major religious groups and denominations are urging Atty. Gen. Eric H. Holder Jr. to renounce a Bush-era memo that allows faith-based charities that receive federal funding to discriminate in hiring. Should religious charities that receive federal grant money be allowed to discriminate in hiring?

If history has taught us anything, it’s that blurring the lines between church and state always limits freedom. In the Middle Ages, every individual was expected to be part of the Christian community; the party line was that this body was especially ordained and sanctioned by God. Mission movements to lands all over the world were financed by their sponsoring states, and the real benefit was not in converting believers, but in colonizing new lands and getting valuable resources from these lands. Even in the early years of this country’s founding, there was a nationally-supported state religion in which all were expected to participate. Fortunately, by the time the 13 colonies appeared, volunteerism became the accepted practice, and freedom of religion became one of the pillars on which this country was founded.

If the U.S. government is allowed to dictate the hiring practices of faith-based organizations—as the Bush-era memo suggests—the direct and immediate harm is apparent. When job opportunities are restricted to those of a particular faith, equal opportunity is no longer equal. Civil rights become conditional. Religious freedom is limited. If this is allowed to happen, faith-based organizations could become de facto agencies of the government.

But the real danger, we all know, is that this kind of intervention with faith-based groups allows for government sanctioning of a particular religion, and in this case, that religion is Christianity. This practice is contrary to the very tenets this country was founded on. It’s allowing the government to promote a specific religious agenda in this country—the equivalent of what my younger colleagues call “sneaky Jesus.”

A few years ago, I attended a Shabbat dinner, and the conversation turned to the question of church and state. One comment by the rabbi summed up this issue: “Whenever I hear the president say this is a Christian country, I wonder—if I’d been living in Germany in 1938, how long I would have waited to leave?” I have never forgotten the quiet fear in his voice.