America Must Take Spiritual Path To Defeat Terrorism

By James Donahue

When former President George W. Bush responded to the 9-11 attacks by declaring what he called a “war against terrorism” he launched another one of those amorphous assaults, like the so-called “war on drugs,” that rages against an enemy that cannot be clearly defined and lacks political or physical boundaries.

In spite of this Bush treated his war on terrorism as a real war and launched military force against two Middle East nations defined as sources of people who commit acts of terrorism. In both cases he was in grave error, as were his military advisors. Neither governments of Afghanistan nor Iraq were behind the 9-11 attacks. There has been no evidence that either government was actively sponsoring terrorist organizations. Yet we invaded them anyway.

Through most of his term in office, Mr. Bush considered himself a “war-term president,” got involved with Vice-President Dick Cheney and the CIA in various clandestine and questionable operations only now coming to light, and took legal license on things like citizen rights and privacy that he never should have gotten away with.

Now that America is involved in wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, newly elected President Barack Obama is doing all that he can to bring them to a close, get our troops back home and explore ways to repair the damage caused by the Bush doctrines in the Muslim world.

Mr. Obama has begun a withdrawal of troops from Iraq and dispatched forces into Afghanistan where they are involved in intense fighting against Taliban fighters that hold ground spilling over the border into neighboring Pakistan. At the same time, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton is making peace offerings in an attempt to bring an end to hostilities in the region.

Now that we have rekindled the old “crusade” that pitched Christians against Islamic people, it may take more than a truce and an old-fashioned gathering of military leaders at a “peace” table to put an end to terrorism. The hatred among surviving family members of the hundreds of thousands of victims of the Bush bombing raids and military assaults against their homes will linger for a very long time.

As far as we know, no one in America has ever tried to find out what fueled the extreme anger that caused men to be willing to sacrifice their own lives during the 9-11 attacks. It caught most Americans by surprise, but we have a feeling that people in high places, perhaps within the CIA and the world banking system, understood perfectly well the mind of Osama bin Laden, and why he spurred his followers to do what they did.

Now that we are in this mess, how do we get back out and generate the world peace that everybody says they want?

We believe the best solution would be an agreement by everybody to abandon their religious system. Knowing this is highly improbable, we offer the next best solution . . . a willingness by people of all faiths to make a concerted effort to study one another’s faith, attempt to reach an understanding, and find common ground on which we can agree.

For example, we see a distinct flaw in Christianity that makes it almost impossible for Christians to get along with people of Islamic faith. Christian dogma forbids mediation. There is a purposeful refusal on the part of Christians to believe in or attempt to open what is known as the “third eye.” The Muslim believers, as do people of Hindu and Buddhist faiths, on the other hand, literally see the world through this part of their mind.

What is the third eye? In a simplistic description, it is a mystical and magical part of the human spirit that manifests right brain functioning and utilizes inner powers to gain knowledge and understanding of the universe in which we live.

The Christian belief system regards “magic” and necromancy, wizardry and consultation of “familiar spirits” as the practice of evil and thus to be avoided at all costs. Christians lean on Bible verses like Exodus 22:18, “suffer not a witch to live,” or Deuteronomy 18:10-11, “there shall not be found among you anyone who maketh his son or his daughter pass through the fire, or who useth divination, or an observer of times, or an enchanter, or a witch, or a charmer, or a counsulter of familiar spirits, or a wizard, or a necromancer” to make their case.

The evils listed by Paul in his New Testament letter to the Galatians (5:19-21) include adultery, fornication, uncleanness, lasciviousness, idolatry, witchcraft, hatred, variance, emulations, wrath, strife, seditions, heresies, envyings, murders, drunkenness, revelings and the like . . . The warning: "they who do such things shall not inherit the kingdom of God."

Many of these Bible verses appear purposefully designed to block the natural evolution of the human bicameral mind. In contrast, the Muslim believers are led on a different and more natural spiritual path from childhood. While extremist groups seem willing to blow themselves up and take innocent people with them for Mohammad, we are sure this religion is laced with impurities as well. Yet we also believe most practicing Muslim believers also have a different awareness of the world because that third eye is at least partly open.

The constant act by Islamic believers to turn toward Mecca, then fall to the floor and go through ritualistic prayer and worship several times each day, strangely has something to do with this spiritual ascension. It has been said that the repetitive vibrations of the spoken word, the symbolism, ritual and the resulting ideas that formulate within the mind of the worshiper, stimulates certain right brain functioning. Thus over time, there is a spiritual intelligence among these people that supersedes that of the Christian believer.

The Christian-based military in the United States will be engaged in an endless war against extremist Muslim terrorism until Americans learn to understand the Islamic world. Throwing away those Bibles and exploring the wonders of right-brain functioning would be a step in the right direction.

The bottom line to all of this is that America and its Christian faith-based Government is spiritually blind and cannot defeat terrorism until it opens its spiritual eye. Even worse, acts by many extremist Christian groups within the United States and many of our military actions abroad not only mimic, but exceed the Islamic terrorist acts committed against us.

Thus the Bush “war on terrorism” not only appears to be an unwinnable and perpetual war against an invisible enemy, it is stimulating even more acts of terrorism by humans against one another.