Many have responded to ReALMagazine.com's article "God, Please Don't Bless America" by Claire Mayo with less than enthusiasm. Below is a particularly poignant example. But before getting to the reaction, I'd like a chance to defend Claire's article (since she's in Australia and can't do so herself).

Many people are rushing to defend the dropping of the atomic bomb on Hiroshima, one of many brutal acts in a devastating war. Defending war is not an easy thing to do. World War II is especially complicated because, as Bart Simpson said, it's a good war. The Allied Forces were crushing an evil spirit, and perhaps that's a worthwhile justification. But let's not glamorize it. And let's not forget that people were dying.

A number of the responses liked to point out that the Hiroshima bombing saved lives, specifically the lives of their fathers and their grandfathers. And it's a true point. My grandfather was a Marine who had fought in Iwo Jima and was stationed in California when the atomic bomb was dropped. He was in California waiting for the order to invade Japan. But is my grandfather's life or your grandfather's life or my life or your life somehow worth more than the citizens of Hiroshima?

And while we're balancing lives, perhaps we should consider what else our grandfathers did. Your grandpa and my grandpa were killing people. People with families. Because of a bullet that struck and killed an enemy my grandpa lived and here I am today. Of course some poor sucker died and his grandson never was.

I don't mean to slam what our grandfathers did in World War II. They fought courageously against an evil and corrupt force. But there is no good guy in war. One side fire bombs cities and unleashes weapons of mass destruction that instantly kill thousands and kill many thousands more over time. Another side attacks completely unprovoked and slaughters millions in the Holocaust on the basis of prejudice. There is no easy answer.

Look at Iraq. For the past ten years we've been trying to avoid war. The result has been sanctions that kill people slowly and quietly. No, as long as we are a sinful, frail people there will be no easy answer.

It's certainly easy to sit here more than 50 years later and play Monday morning quarterback. But these are questions worth asking. Those who do not know the past are doomed to repeat it.

God Bless America
a letter to the editor
by Neal T. Redman

I read an article the other day that made me more angry than anything I have read for the last few months. Its title was "God, Please Don't Bless America."

It made me mad in both a good way and a bad way, so before the author gets riled up, this will not be a drawn out diatribe on the evils of her article.

After a long (and well-done) article on the Hiroshima bomb and the American/Christian confusion of peace and war, the author makes this comment, "And I don't Bless a country that bombs without blinking. Unbelievable."

Throughout the article, I had been getting more and more worked up, but this was the final straw. Something inside me exploded, so before I did some lethal harm to an innocent roommate, I went for a long walk.

My first reaction was to the fact the author thought America bombed without thinking. In July/August of 1945, President Truman was faced with two options: invade Japan or use a weapon unlike any the world had ever seen.
An invasion faced him with some fairly grim prospects.

One of the bloodiest battles of the Pacific theater was on Okinawa, where the Allies suffered 50,000 casualties, and the Japanese lost 110,000--including civilians, some of whom committed suicide rather than be conquered. The prospects for the Allies in a Japanese invasion foretold 1,000,000 casualties. Put at the same rate of the Okinawa invasion, there could be 3.5 million casualties total for both sides.

Both of my grandpas fought in the Pacific Theater, and I potentially would not be here if the bomb had not been used. There is also the potential that without our knowledge of what an atomic bomb can do, we might have used them again. The knowledge of what an atomic bomb can do has kept us from using them again. I say these things not to excuse Hiroshima and Nagasaki, but to say that our decisions in life are never that cut and dry.

As I walked, I realized that this is not what bothered me about the article. What bothered me is something I see infecting much of Christianity. What I see is guilt and judgment. We, as a country, and as Christians, have failed
and sinned. We feel this guilt strongly, and shame those who went before us and ourselves. This is wrong.

I said that last paragraph with a lot of trepidation. Because those announcing our failures are right. I want to weep every time I think of Hiroshima, of lovers melting in each other's arms, of pedestrians walking, skin stripping off their limbs. So do not mistake and accuse me of blindness to sin and guilt--because I feel it as much as anyone.

What I find wrong with this guilt is not that we should avoid looking at our wrongdoing, for that is never a bad thing. What I find wrong is us looking at where we have sinned--how we have overlooked poverty and the plank in our own eye--and condemned ourselves. In a statement like, "I don't Bless a country that bombs without blinking," I see no forgiveness. I see no love.

I learned what I know about love from my mother. My grandpa has Parkinson's disease and a gambling problem. The combination has caused him to say and do things to my relatives that make us want to hate him. I have seen my mother cry over him. For that I have despised him.

But my mother told me something--love is not tough; it is soft. It gets in your face when you're wrong, but also sets you on the right track.

So that is what I ask for Christians and America: announce our failures, be aware of them. But also love all who have done wrong. That is why I ask God to bless America and me.

That is why I say, "Oh God, my God, do not forsake me." Not because I deserve it, but because I need it.