Sin, guilt, and Baghdad

So I was browsing YouTube tonight and I came across an amazing web documentary: http://www.hometownbaghdad.com/. It's a series about the lives of a group of middle class 20-somethings in Baghdad, filmed by an Iraqi crew. It's the most honest, unbiased stuff I've seen on Iraq... Ever.

In turn, Hometown Baghdad led me to it's sponsoring site, http://www.chattheplanet.com/, a group dedicated to a global dialogue between young people. It's exactly the kind of thing I've thought the clash of Christian (like it or not, America is viewed by the world at large as a Christian society) and Islamic societies have needed, and it is incredibly refreshing to see someone actually doing something to promote understanding.

And it was troubling.

During one of the discussions, an American student talks about how she feels helpless to help those in Iraq. She wants to do something, but doesn't know what to do, and doesn't think she could do it even if she did know. In another discussion, an American student asked if the students in Iraq felt like the young people of America were responsible for the state of Iraq today. The Iraqis said no.

What was so troubling is that it was very evident in these convesations that the American students' concern was not really for Iraqis; it was for their own consciences.

Sure, it's great for people to feel guilty for starting a war and to have that guilt spur them on to action. But it also can be a very dangerous platform for restoration and healing, because as soon as the guilt more or less disappears, the restoration and healing will disappear too.

Jacques Ellul writes that in the modern age of nation-states, sin becomes less and less an individual matter and more and more a corporate, societal matter. The magnitude of the wrongdoings of the individual may decrease with the increased prosperity, enforcement of justice, etc. that comes with the modern nation, but the magnitude of the wrongdoings of the people as a whole increases exponentionally. Most in America, at least to some degree, feel the guilt associated with Iraq. Whether we consider Iraq a good cause handled poorly or a purely evil grab for oil, there is some hint of guilt -- Collective, corporate guilt.

Of course, we don't assume responsibility for this guilt. It is transferred, in a horrible step of illogic, to our leaders. Just as if we and our society had nothing to do with the mess. At all. Bush bears the weight of our guilt -- and so we despise him. This is a very dangerous line of thought. When Bush (and the other neo-conservatives) becomes the sole source of all of the problems and troubles which America has brought to Iraq, the solution seems simple enough.

Elections are coming.

Remove the leaders; remove the guilt.

I am terribly afraid that Americans will kick out the neocons, and throw our guilt out with them. And since our efforts to rebuild Iraq are based on our guilt, all progress towards healing and restoration will stop.

And Iraq will suffer even more.

Our aim cannot be to make amends between nation-states. That kind of guilt is far too easy to erase. Our repentance must be personal; we must aid in the healing ourselves. We cannot allow ourselves to get tricked into thinking that because we don't feel resposible for the situation in Iraq, we have no reason to help rebuild.

Because after all... If not us, then who?