Opinion | The Power of Community, Religious and Secular
To the Editor:
“As a Rabbi, I’ve Had a Privileged View of the Human Condition,” by David Wolpe (Opinion guest essay, nytimes.com, July 2), is spot on.
As a recently retired Lutheran pastor, I can affirm Rabbi Wolpe’s portrait of congregational life as a community of humble, imperfect people who share their joys and sorrows, their questions and their faith.
A pastor has privileged access to the spiritual and emotional dimensions of the lives of parishioners. The comfort and support that members offer to one another, the courage to forgive and to accept forgiveness, and the perseverance in times of stress or grief are inspiring.
No congregation is perfect, which is why worship begins with the confession of sins. We learn to believe in goodness even though we are not always good. The hard work of trying to love our neighbors as ourselves is a shared responsibility. Life together as a community of believers is challenging, mysterious and richly rewarding.
Richard Holmer
Lake Forest, Ill.
To the Editor:
Rabbi David Wolpe’s essay strikes a number of chords, one of which is to affirm the value of affiliating with a house of worship. Sadly, just 16 percent of Americans feel that religion is the most important thing in their lives, down from 20 percent a decade ago, according to a recent survey conducted by the Public Religion Research Institute.
With the stark divide in our country, it would behoove members of the clergy to stay out of politics, and to be a beacon of light for their congregants to promote what Rabbi Wolpe has tried to do in his career, listening to each other with respect, even though we may disagree, and being kinder to one another.
As a rabbi who served my congregation for 25 years before retiring three years ago, I do believe that Rabbi Wolpe is correct that houses of worship like synagogues, churches and mosques must serve as more than just a venue for religious services.
Faith institutions offer individuals and families the opportunity to be an integral part of a community, sharing times of joy and sadness. That human connection with one another is so important. It is a remedy for loneliness and enables the nurturing of meaningful relationships, which are so essential in our turbulent society.
Reuven H. Taff
Sacramento
To the Editor:
Rabbi David Wolpe writes with his usual grace, eloquence and wisdom.
Yet religion is not the only force that promotes community. Idealistic people who join together in furtherance of social goals often create supportive and nurturing associations. A union can create a sense of community, as can a group like the Masons or a sports club. Or even a neighborhood.
Anyone who has worked in a hospital when an injured policeman is brought in, followed by a sea of officers in blue uniforms volunteering blood, knows that the cops have a strong and supportive ethos that bypasses religious beliefs.
It is undeniable that Americans are lonely and disconnected from each other. But connections can start without the strictures of religion. Perhaps we should start by recognizing the power and potential of secular organizations.
Tamar Singer
New York
The Immorality of Using Cluster Munitions
To the Editor:
Re “U.S. to Send Cluster Munitions to Ukraine” (nytimes.com, July 7):
Russia’s invasion of Ukraine is regarded as unjust because it was an act of aggression against a neighboring nation. It is also unjust in the way Russia’s military has conducted the war. The indiscriminate targeting of civilians and their homes, churches, medical centers and schools by Russian forces violates the laws of war.
Russia’s use of cluster munitions, with a 40 percent “dud rate” (unexploded munitions that can explode later when handled), kills and injures many Ukrainian noncombatants. These cluster munitions, which have also been used by Ukraine, were banned by the United Nations Convention on Cluster Munitions in 2008.
Although the dud rate of 2 percent for U.S. cluster munitions, if accurate, would be a vast improvement, this is not the only problem. The footprint of cluster munitions can be as large as two football fields.
During the decades since they were used in the Vietnam War, 98 percent of the casualties have been civilian noncombatants. Thus far Ukraine has held the moral high ground, but maintaining this position requires that its forces, unlike the Russians, fight justly.
Tobias Winright
Maynooth, Ireland
The writer, a professor of moral theology at St. Patrick’s Pontifical University, specializes in the ethics of war and peace.
To the Editor:
I spent my college years protesting the Vietnam War. One of my many concerns was the American use of cluster bombs that tore into the flesh of Vietnamese children and other civilians. That the United States is providing these bombs for use in yet another war is simply unconscionable.
Steven E. Barkan
Holden, Maine
Telling Our Abortion Stories
To the Editor:
Re “Abortion Stories Matter,” by Christine Henneberg (Opinion guest essay, July 5), on the importance of physicians telling those stories:
Ten years ago, despite my agent initially saying, “Oh, nobody’s interested in that anymore,” I published a book of abortion stories. We survivors of pre-Roe abortions were fast dying out and worried that our stories would never be heard, or believed, so we had begun telling those stories after decades of silence.
We spoke for the countless women of our generation who did not survive those dark days, but died of sepsis or bleeding or suicide in their despair.
My book starts with stories in biblical times and ends with the 20th century. That in the 21st century we should return to the barbarism of prehistoric days is utterly obscene.
Unless women are given control of their own bodies and their own health care, needless deaths and senseless tragedies will proliferate again. It breaks my heart to see this happening.
Fran Moreland Johns
San Francisco
The writer is the author of “Perilous Times: An Inside Look at Abortion Before — and After — Roe v. Wade.”
How Canada Surpasses the U.S.
To the Editor:
Re “It’s Not the Nation’s Unhappiest Birthday,” by Gail Collins and Bret Stephens (The Conversation, July 4):
Mr. Stephens says he’d rather live in America than in Canada.
When Canadian parents send their children off to school, none of them worry that they might be murdered there. Same thing when they go to the cinema, the park, church, a concert, a sporting event, or all the other myriad places where Americans are gunned down in droves. In Canada, the leading cause of death among children is not guns.
When a Canadian woman becomes pregnant, she doesn’t need to worry that she doesn’t live in a “blue province.” She can secure an abortion no matter where she resides. Every woman has full autonomy over her body.
In Canada, no child dies because their parents can’t afford health care. Nobody loses their house because they get sick. In Canada, as in every other developed country except the United States, every citizen has universal health care as a birthright.
In Canada, as in America, we also have ignorant, arrogant, racist, loudmouth, conspiracy theory grifters, but we try to ignore them. We don’t elect one of them leader of the country.
Edward McManus
Toronto
