@stevecanuck
They are considered as extreme because they are fighting for Freedom of Religion within the Empire.
Fighting the Lamb's War: Skirmishes with the American Empire.
The Autobiography of Phillip Berrigan, with Fred A. Wilcox
(page 193 in the 1996 edition.)
We had a fine time between Christmas and the trial in May. Liz is home again, and though we know she will be leaving us soon, each day is a celebration. Not with streamers and baloons, but through reflection and preparation for the trial. Liz will undoubtedly be sentenced to prison. She acted out of love for her children, and for the children of the world. The National Security State considers her a dangerous person.
The Griffiths Plowshares defendants appeared before Judge Howard Munson, federal court judge, Northern District of New York. On bahalf of the seven defendants, Liz presented an arguement,
"On Freedom of Religion and Contempory Idolatry." She argued that nuclear weapons constitute a religion, and that this violates certain freedoms guarenteed by the US Constitution. This, in part, is what she said to Judge Munson and the jury:
We are dealing with serious constitutional issues—namely, the issue of a national religion having been established in our country in violation of the First Amendment. The religion of national sovereignty or nuclearism is alive and flourishing, and its existence, its pre-eminence, its rituals, gods, priests, and high priests make serious encroachments on all of us. In fact—and this is the second part of our argument—violating our freedom of religion. This state religion not only compels acts that are prohibited by the laws of God but the state religion itself prohibits the free exercise of religion. The state religion compels a quality of loyalty focused on our acceptance of the existence of nuclear weapons as a necessity. Weapons we are expected to pay for, adulate, thank God for, become sacred objects of worship. And such worship is prohibited by the laws of God.
Nuclearism is the ultimate fundamentalism of our time. Above all, this is the idolatry against which we stand and because of which we stand in this court. And the modern state is the child of the nuclearist religion. In the years since 1945, the modern state has moved steadily in more and more authoritarian directions. The process was subtle. Leaders who insisted that the major stake in international conflict was the fate of democracy were the very ones who steadily eroded democratic content in the name of ‘National Security.’ Legally, we have witnessed a constitutional antipathy to standing armies give way to an expanding, permanent military establishment with the Pentagon as the cathedral of the nuclearist religion. We have seen the Executive Branch claim privileges to keep national security information secret without any correction from the judiciary. Judge Munson, this nuclear, national-security state is a new, as yet largely unanalyzed phenomenon in the long history of political forms and of civil religions.
Being constantly ready to commit the nation and the planet to a war of annihilation in a matter of minutes created a variety of structural necessities that contradict the spirit and substance of democratic government: secrecy, lack of accountability, permanent emergency, concentration of authority, peacetime militarism, plus an extensive apparatus of state intelligence and police.
Quoting Richard Falk and Robert Lifton,
"Indefensible Weapons: The Political and Psychological Case Against Nuclearism", Liz informed the court that:
No king ever concentrated in his being such absolute authority over human destiny. ‘The claim by fallible human beings to inflict total devastation for the sake of the national interests of any particular state is an acute variety of idolatry.
snip---------------
“And, Judge Munson,” Liz continued, “this has all been done ‘legally,’ and it amounts to a congressionally established religion. ‘Congress will make no law with respect to the establishment of religion. . . .‘ Yet Congress has passed laws approving and funding the Manhattan Project, the continued arms race including the first strike arsenal of cruise, MX, Trident; the new scenario for winning a nuclear war. It requires that our taxes fmance these projects. The bomb and nuclearism have been protected too by laws concerning national security, restrictions on free speech by government employees, loyalty and secrecy oaths required for security clearances. And now the laws of sabotage, laws that protect government property from destruction, and the conspiracy laws are used to punish and prosecute those who, from a perspective of conscience and Christian witness, would speak the truth, would resist the evil of nuclearism and the idolatry of nuclear violence. To so use these laws is to prohibit the free exercise of religion and violates the constitutional guarantee of this freedom.”
