Terrorism is cancer.
A little over six years ago, my best friend's baby son died from brain
cancer. His mother died of lung cancer a month ago. Three years ago, I
worked from home for a year so that I could take care of my father-in-law as
he fought lung cancer; he died two years ago. My friend and I now manage
one of the Internet's oldest cancer support groups. I know much, much more
about cancer than I would ever want to. And when I look at terrorism, I see
the same horrors and frustrations on a global scale.
We, the people of the world, are one body. And like those rotten cancer
cells, some of the people of the world are rebelling against their own body,
destroying neighbors whom they are called to love. It's not as if any of us
are particularly good at loving our neighbors; in our ignorance, we all fall
short. But few of us, thank God, intentionally kill our neighbors and
destroy their homes.
Here in our nation, we did not believe that the cancer of terrorism could
spread so far and cause such profound damage. We thought it was contained,
far away, and so we didn't take it quite as seriously as we now wish we had.
We forgot that we are, indeed, one body. Cancer "over there" is now clearly
our cancer, too. The horror arrived in a spot where many of us have walked
many times. So is the frustration.
For the most part, we don't have good tools to fight cancer. Most cancers
are so stubborn that we cannot do better than poisoning and burning. We
poison with chemotherapy and burn with radiation, which have awful side
effects and don't work very well at all. They are crude and primitive. For
babies with brain tumors and adults with lung cancer, they hardly extend
life at all -- and the quality of that life during treatment is pretty
miserable.
My father-in-law said he would never have radiation, never have
chemotherapy. But when surgery failed, because the cancer was wrapped
around his heart, he changed his mind. What else am I going to do, he
asked. Burning and poisoning are primitive, horrible, expensive,
depressing, frustrating. We know they don't have much chance of success,
but what else is there to do? Give up?
The tools we have for fighting terrorism aren't much better than the tools
doctors offer to treat cancer. We speak of surgical attacks, but we know
they may go about as well as it did for my father-in-law. More widespread
attacks, like chemo and radiation, cause great collateral damage. And even
though the collateral damage would probably be a place far, far from where I
write these words, it is still damage to humanity's one body.
I would rather not think of terrorists as cancer cells -- unconscious living
bags of chemicals that don't know what they are doing. I know they are
human beings. I don't want to turn to surgery, poisoning and burning
because I know they probably won't work. Like my father-in-law and everyone
else who has had cancer surgery, I'll pray hard that the doctors "get it
all." I know that it probably won't be so. But what else are we going to
do?
We don't understand what causes cancer; we remain far from a cure. We don't
understand why we seem to rebel against ourselves, in cells of cancer or
terror. And we are tempted, like Job, to negotiate with God, to explain
that we don't deserve this, to get God to see our point of view. God's
answer to Job was a thundering reminder that Job didn't create this world.
God didn't even tell Job that he deserved what he got. God didn't say one
way or the other; what Job received was a humility-inspiring reminder of who
God is, creator of the universe.
Like Job, I want to say that if *I* designed the universe, babies wouldn't
get brain tumors. If *I* designed the universe, terrorist plots would fail.
But the greatest moment of healing in my life came not when I demanded an
explanation or change, but when I told God how angry I was that my friend's
son died... and realized that it was because I do not understand.
Terrorism is a cancer and we have no reliable weapons against it. We know
that some of the weapons could make our illness worse instead of better.
But what else can we do? We can and must start living in ways that will
prevent further cancer, but that doesn't change the reality that we have it
now.
It is important, I am certain, to examine our global lifestyle, so to speak,
with the goal of preventing terrorism in the future, as cancer patients
change their lifestyles to prevent further tumors and slow or reverse the
ones they already have. I wish we knew exactly how to behave, as
individuals and nations, to accomplish that with regard to terrorism. We
don't.
If someday I am diagnosed with cancer, could I say no to the controlled
violence of surgery, chemo and radiation, and all the harm they would do to
my body? Today, as I recognize the extent of the cancer of terrorism in our
world, can I say no to violence? Shall I negotiate with God, demanding a
better answer, since the choices at hand are so miserable? Or shall I
become ever more convicted of my utter dependence on God?
I want us to be convicted of the inadequacy of our response to terrorism.
That doesn't me we don't use the best tools we have invented; it means not
forgetting for a moment that they are not the best we can be. My prayer is
that the Son of God holds us in his arms, not only to comfort us, but to
restrain us from misusing our primitive tools.
Nick Arnett
Direct phone: 408-733-7613 Fax: 408-904-7198
