When does civil disobedience become a sin?

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Sean_Boyle

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My local catholic newspaper ran a front page article about a local women (a grandmother) who as part of a larger peace protest in Georgia climbed thru a fence to trespass on federal property. This group that she was a part of was protesting the use of US facilities to train soliders from latin american countries. Her purpose for trespassing was to highlight the injustice in the practice of training latin american soliders to kill by our military.

In this article she and her family talks about how this was an act of civil disobedience, nothing more. She justified her actions by saying that no one way harmed by her actions.

This all got me to started wondering. Where is the line between sin and civil disobedience? If I were to do the same thing at an abortion clinc, I wouldn’t expect an article in the local Catholic newspaper glorifing my efforts.

Does her “justification” take into account that a group of young soldiers, some the same age as her grandchildren, had to draw there weapons to repel an invasion onto military property and arrest these “peace protesters” regardless of the intention for this trespassing of federal property/invasion.

It sure seems like some harm was done. And I’m struggling with why my local Catholic newspaper would gloify this action and not label it a sin. Wrong is wrong, right. When is wrong, right?
 
The Church teaches:
  1. Evil can never be the means to good
  2. We are to obey our government laws except if they go against the teachings of the Church as God.
I don’t believe that breaking the law to protest a wrong satisfies either of these two teachings. Breaking the law to avoid commiting an act that is morally wrong would.
 
I agree with the list of criteria. No gray area.

Is there something wrong with my Archidiocese for allowing this women’s civil disobedience to be gloified as front page news as it was?
 
“Let he who has not sinned cast the first stone”. We are sinners, why do we expect perfection out of others? If you know what is right, pray for them.

I have gotten a new appreciation for the human condition by reading a lot about the lives of the saints, thereby learning a lot about the state of the Church at different times in history. Abuses, scandals, bad teaching, and more have been prevalent since day one. The good news is, Christ will not let His Church fail! Pray for all of us.
 
For what ever it is worth I agree with you, I do not believe her action qualifies as civil disobedience because it is report she climbed the fence and entered their property. If climbing the fence or crossing the property is normal behavior then it could be civil disobedience. Had she protested on the street by picketing or laid down in front of the gate to prevent the dangerous interaction of these soldiers and other soldiers that would be civil disobedience. My guess to your question is when you become offensive as opposed to defensive, or when injury whether mental, or physical (this includes baiting) then you are being vindictive and thus committing a sin. As for the reporting that is a tricky issue because the reports may like an issue however they have an obligation to report all reasonable news or stop calling themselves reporters. A person who only reports conservative issues is a conservative commentator not a reporter.
 
Father Benedict Groeschel reported live on his television program (EWTN, Sunday night, 7pm) that he got arrested for protesting at an abortion mill.

Got the orange suit and spent a week or so in jail.

Said he spent the time reading his New Testament from cover to cover.

So, I guess if someone can tolerate getting arrested and jailed for picketing on a sidewalk (which is not technically trespassing since it is outside the property lines), then I guess folks who actually trespass can tolerate doing jail time for actually crossing the property lines.

You know what they say: “If you can’t do the time, then don’t do the crime.”

Don’t expect special treatment … exemption from punishment … just because you “feel” like you and your mission are holy and special.

Expect martyrdom. Embrace it.

Like Fr. Groeschel.
 
Here is a link to the story the thread speaks of. Just posting it so you can see for yourself.

http:/www.archindy.org/criterion/local/2007/01-19/protext.html

I don’t think that I’ve distorted the intent of the article.
 
From Pope Leo XIII’s encyclical, (On the Origin of Civil Power)*Diuturnum * (my emphasis):
  1. This doctrine the Apostle Paul particularly inculcated on the Romans; to whom he wrote with so great authority and weight on the reverence to be entertained toward the higher powers, that it seems nothing could be prescribed more weightily: “Let every soul be subject to higher powers, for there is no power but from God, and those that are, are ordained of God. Therefore** he that resisteth the power resisteth the ordinance of God, and they that resist purchase to themselves damnation** . . . wherefore be subject of necessity, not only for wrath, but also for conscience’ sake.”[16] And in agreement with this is the celebrated declaration of Peter, the Prince of the Apostles, on the same subject: “Be ye subject, therefore, to every human creature for God’s sake; whether it be to the king as excelling, or to governors, as sent by him for the punishment of evildoers, and for the praise of the good, for so is the will of God.”[17]
  2. The one only reason which men have for not obeying is when anything is demanded of them which is openly repugnant to the natural or the divine law, for it is equally unlawful to command to do anything in which the law of nature or the will of God is violated. If, therefore, it should happen to any one to be compelled to prefer one or the other, viz., to disregard either the commands of God or those of rulers, he must obey Jesus Christ, who commands us to “give to Caesar the things that are Caesar’s, and to God the things that are God’s,”[18] and must reply courageously after the example of the Apostles: “We ought to obey God rather than men.”[19] And yet there is no reason why those who so behave themselves should be accused of refusing obedience; for, if the will of rulers is opposed to the will and the laws of God, they themselves exceed the bounds of their own power and pervert justice; nor can their authority then be valid, which, when there is no justice, is null.
 
The US Role

Commission chairman Christian Tomuschat, a respected German lawyer and human rights expert, stated that the US was responsible for much of the bloodshed. “The United States government and US private companies exercised pressure to maintain the country’s archaic and unjust socioeconomic structure.” He noted that the CIA and other US agencies “lent direct and indirect support to some illegal state operations.” The support consisted of advising, training, arming and financing the overall operation.

The commission listed the American training of the Guatemalan officer corps in counter-insurgency techniques, including torture, as a key factor “which had a significant bearing on human rights violations during the armed confrontation.” The US Army School of the Americas (SOA) in Fort Benning, Georgia, was singled out for its role.

Specifically named was Guatemalan Military Intelligence (Ml) as the primary organizer of illegal detentions, torture, forced disappearances and executions. The report noted that most Ml officers were graduates of the SOA and maintained close and frequent contact with their US counterparts. Attempting to absolve himself, Mario Merida, former chief of Ml and one-time Minister of Interior, said “It was a war between the United States and the USSR. We should never have gotten involved.” Guatemalan President Arzu and others argue that Guatemalans were merely victims of a civil war and that the country was used by the US as a surrogate Cold War battleground.

United Fruit and Coca Cola In 1954, the United Fruit Company (now known as Chiquita Banana) pressured the US government to stage a ClA-directed coup that overthrew President Jacobo Arbenz. This action put an end to the first democratically elected president in Guatemalan history and set in motion the civil war that followed.
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http://www.thirdworldtraveler.com/Human_Rights/USGenocideGuatemala.html
 
Sean_Boyle said:
Protesting a US Army installation because you feel that they may have trained soliders from another country that used some of that training to do evil…
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Because they have and continue to train soldiers from other countries who act evilly.
Isn’t that like suing McDonald’s for serving coffee the burned you when it spilled all over your lap in a traffic accident???
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More like protesting McD’s for shipping rotten meat to foreign countries for the profit of the home office.
 
I don’t know if it was a “sin” to climb the fence, but I would say the woman crossed the line from peaceful civil disobedience into dangerous criminal activity when she went over the fence. Rather than making a point even by laying peacefully across the entrance they chose to do something that required an intervention by armed personnel who cannot be certain what someone who is breaching base security is really going to do.

I lived on bases as a child and we saw our share of screaming hippies and what not during the late '60’s and early '70’s. A sniper kept us pinned down in my elementary (and the surrounding homes) for a while one day in Ohio. A lot of people are so focused on their own agenda that they forget the fact that our military personnel are real people who also have families on most of our bases.

I was standing outside at lunch during jr. high when our officer’s club blew sky high at a base in Germany around '77 or '78. We didn’t know if WWIII was starting (Russians had short range nukes pointed right at our base) or if it was just “regular” terrorists. The following year armed terrorists came “over the fence” right across the street from my apartment firing automatic weapons while my little sisters were trapped at the movie theater on the other corner across the street in a children’s movie. Thank God no innocent people were hurt and the terrorists were chased right off the base during the fire fight.

I guess my point is that people may have a “peaceful” agenda, but there is no way to know that for certain when mounting a response. I believe the people who breach a building or otherwise secured area would have some culpability if things went badly since they started the chain of events.
 
Sean_Boyle said:
Protesting a US Army installation because you feel that they may have trained soliders from another country that used some of that training to do evil…

Isn’t that like suing McDonald’s for serving coffee the burned you when it spilled all over your lap in a traffic accident???

Is it a 60’s thing… I don’t get it.
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She believed that torture is wrong and that the killing of innocent people is wrong. If that were the sort of thing that she was protesting, how could trespassing be deemed “morally” wrong from her perspective? She followed her conscience, broke the law in a peaceful manner knowing that there would be a price to pay. Seems to me that she did a brave thing.
 
Ituyu said:
She believed that torture is wrong and that the killing of innocent people is wrong. If that were the sort of thing that she was protesting, how could trespassing be deemed “morally” wrong from her perspective? She followed her conscience, broke the law in a peaceful manner knowing that there would be a price to pay. Seems to me that she did a brave thing.
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She was protesting at a US Military facility, not against the commander incharge of these men that may have done an evil act. She isn’t protesting against the individuals that did the alleged evil act. She is protesting against an entity the is the least responsible for the actions of these soldiers.

She is protesting the fact that our military trained these soldiers to be soldiers at the request of their government in an effort to save lives in their country.

Peaceful manner.???

Forcing eighteen year old american soliders to repel an invasion into a miltiary base is by no means peaceful. Guns were drawn and someone could have been hurt. If the protesters were willing to accept responsiblity that one of their own could be hurt. Maybe that is okay. But the possiblity of an american soldier being hurt in this action where just as great.

Would this “peaceful demonstration” claim responsiblity for putting american soldier at risk? I don’t think so.

peaceful indeed!
 
Sean_Boyle said:
She is protesting against an entity the is the least responsible for the actions of these soldiers.

She’s protesting against a policy that is ours, to teach governments that have turned its military against civilians, to torture and exterminate.
She is protesting the fact that our military trained these soldiers to be soldiers at the request of their government in an effort to save lives in their country.
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Ituyu said:
She’s protesting against a policy that is ours, to teach governments that have turned its military against civilians, to torture and exterminate.

It was American tax dollars, expertise and equipment that were used against civilians. That is certainly something that she had every right to protest.

Fifteen people walking through a “hole in a fence” is hardly an invasion. And, nowhere in what has been made available was there mention that arms were drawn or that the protesting civilians were armed in any way.

Threatened by an unarmed grandma?
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Sean_Boyle said:
Ituyu;1917553:
It can’t be justifed as a faithful christian, or human being. The risk was to great, and the reward ,if any was possible, to small.
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I think she quite aptly justified her action and from her perspective it was quite the Christian thing to do. She didn’t threaten or harm any person or property. She broke the law and went in through a hole in a fence. I don’t believe that our military would leave holes in a fence if it created a risk. So it must not have been that important to ward off trespassers. She was fully aware that the risk was to herself and that her actions would cause her to be punished. She was also willing to accept her punishment. She didn’t run or otherwise try to evade her punishment and submitted herself to the law. Where is the sin in that?
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Ituyu said:
Sean Boyle;1917738:
Where is the sin in that?
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The actions of the protesters forced a reaction by the military that included the possibility that someone could be seriously hurt. The military didn’t know the extent of the threat until the protesters were confronted arrested and questioned by military police. The military officials couldn’t have known the intend of this invasion. That word “invasion” seems like a strong word to use, but there is no better word to describe it if you were one of the soldier that witnessed it.

Breaching the security fence is number one. The fact that there was trepassing can’t be miminized by the idea that they climbed through a hole in the fence.

Planning the invasion for more than a year was another.

Putting members of our soldiers at a higher risk of injury is another.

These people didn’t just climb through the fence and kneel down with there hands behind there heads ready for arrest. They continued their incursion futher onto military property.
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Over the weekend, I read somewhere that we had to obey the major laws of our civil governments (I’m paraphrasing). Otherwise, we’d all be committing sin if we went over the speed limit by 1 mph, or crossed outside of a crosswalk by an inch.

I will try to determine where I read that.
 
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