BUT YOU, PASTOR ABE,  YOU ARE NOT AMONG THOSE CALLING FOR PEACE, SO WE WILL HOLD A VIGIL FOR LIFE AND PEACE IN FRONT OF YOUR CHURCH ON SEPTEMBER 29, AND WE INVITE OTHERS TO JOIN US.

Abe Daniel, Senior Pastor,
Trinity Life Center
5225 Hillsdale Blvd
. Sacramento, CA
Dear Pastor Daniel
And Many Other Pastors;
(PLEASE FEEL FREE TO SHARE)

Many church leaders were among the overwhelming public resistance to President Obama’s campaign to bomb Syria. Their long awaited call for peace is a most encouraging sign of a Great Turning.*(2) America’s grass roots war resistance has been slow in coming, long after many European politicians, goaded by their own constituencies, refused to play the U.S. Administration’s war-game in Syria.   Pastor Abe, it is indeed sad that your name was not among them!

We ask you to cancel your Night To Honor Israel on September 29th.  It is a matter of record that Israel’s lobby in American (AIPAC) is openly blitzing our congress with demands that we attack (the people) of Syria, and your Night to Honor Israel guests are anything but peacemakers!  

Project Strait Gate will be there on September 29, 2013, during the hours that you host John Hagee’s, “Night to Honor Israel.” In accordance with the instruction of Jesus’ words and your obligation to shepherd your congregation, we pray you, Pastor Abe, will be able to join us, without CUFI at your back.

We ask you to tell those who listen to you that you have seen the truth and changed your position — that “Night To Honor Israel” is a racist, anti-life program that will only foster more death and agony of spirit for many, including Jesus Christ himself!  He is for peace, not war, which can never be said of Christians United For Israel.(1)

Israel is a state that borrowed its name from the Bible in order to sway your sympathy;  your name, Pastor Abe, was borrowed from the same book; does that make you holy?  John Hagee has called for war against Muslims in Iraq, Iran, Lebanon, and Syria. What would Jesus say? In “What We Believe,” Trinity Life Center claims the Bible is the “inspired, infallible and the authoritative words of God.” Do you really believe that?  Jesus said “Blessed are the Peacemakers,” “For as much as you have done it (both kindness and evil) to the least of my brothers, you have done it unto me,” and “Love your brother as you love yourself… love even your enemy.”

Christians United For Israel was spawned by the State of Israel in July 1991, right after Operation Desert Storm, to gain Christian support for its occupation of Palestine. One of Israel’s political propaganda front organizations, Unity Coalition for Israel, spun off the activist organization Christians United For Israel, to be run by San Antonio Pastor John Hagee.  It is a political group, not a Christian one; it serves Israel, not Christ.

Art Preisinger, a Lutheran minister associated with the Institute for the Study of Christian Zionism, attended  a “Night To Honor Israel” at Hagee’s Cornerstone Church in San Antonio and had this to say: “From dramatic processions to keynote addresses; from offerings taken and offerings given — there was not a shred, a trace, a scintilla of Christianity in the proceedings. It could well have been sponsored by the PTA or the Rotary Club.”

Our 32-minute video entitled Christian Zionism, The Tragedy and the Turning, Part 1.(2) is free on Vimeo to anyone who will watch it.  It contains a visual witness of Israel’s bombing raids on the Palestinians photographed from a rooftop in downtown Gaza City by this writer.  You will hear my agonized narration as bombs fell and ambulance sirens screamed.  They carried four dead and 39 wounded civilian Philistines out from their historic Gaza City in front of my eyes.

Tragedy and Turning also explains how the meanings of Bible text were manufactured and distorted in the footnotes of the Scofield Reference Bible and bibles that have followed it. These distortions have been used to support the preposterous claim that today’s political “Israel” owns the land where Abraham is believed to have lived 3000 years ago. “The Turning” is the growing movement against Zionism in churches world wide. We are asking your church to be part of “The Turning” instead of “The Tragedy” of supporting Israel’s occupation and wars against their neighbors.

Pastor Daniel, you know about people of Gaza from the Bible, do you not?  Some may have blood in their veins from ancient Philistines who settled Gaza. Remember David’s conquest of Goliath, the Philistine, and Delilah’s seductions of of the Israelite superman, Samson, who died in Gaza trying to kill Philistines?  Why do you claim the Israelis are the heirs to David, but deny that the Philistines have a right to life regardless who their ancestors were?  Do you deny that German and Japanese children have a right to live today no matter who their ancestors were? Do you really believe the present State of Israel is entitled to force the Philistines out of their historic land because the book of Genesis says God gave some undefined piece of land to a man named Abraham three thousand years ago?  With this logic you too could claim a piece in Bethlehem because your parents named you “Abraham!”

Pastor Daniel, do you know about the growing movement within mainline churches against the use of Jesus’ name to promote cruel acts of occupation? You will not learn the truth from Hagee’s imported Zionist “witnesses.”  Mainline churches have too long ignored Christian Zionism as a fad offshoot of the Evangelical movement, but now many are awakening. Among the first to speak out was The National Council of Churches, in a bulletin entitled “Why We Should Be Concerned About Christian Zionism.”(3)

In November 2012, fifteen mainline church denominations joined in the call to stop military aid to Israel, because the aid led to the deaths of Palestinian children.  The list included leaders from Evangelical Lutherans (ELCA), United Methodists, Presbyterians (PCUSA), The United Church of Christ, and others.(4)  They wrote to Congress of the abuses of Palestinians by Israel and the sorry role played by Christian Zionists. The signatories asked politicians to investigate why US taxpayer dollars are being given to Israel, knowing they are used for occupation and war.

Pastor, are you aware that in May 2013, The Church of Scotland joined those in protest of Israel’s occupation of the Palestinian’s land and Christian Zionist influence, stating that “the Bible gives no country the right to any piece of land”.(5)  Israel is the only country to make the outrageous claim that God gave them land owned and occupied by someone else. When will you join this mainline minority in calling for peace and justice?

Christian churches in your community should make reclaiming “Christian Zionist” neighbors a mission priority. Yours is the largest apostate group in America.  Your church and hundreds more who have hosted Christians United For Israel, have not only ignored evil in government, you have joined it.  In your rush to show love for political Israel, you have failed to show any love for Arab LIFE, Muslim CHILDREN, or Bedouin NEIGHBORS.  You even fail to love the CHRISTIAN Philistines inside the Israeli gulag.

This author is a former baptist Deacon who saw war for what it is during operation Desert Storm.  I am praying for you to show your respect for Jesus’ words by canceling this NIGHT TO HONOR ISRAEL.If not, we will see you outside Trinity Life Center on Sunday, September 29, 2013. We will be located on public right-of-ways near your church, ready to answer questions from all who wonder. We will be respectful of your rights and the local laws, but not in respect of your abuse of Jesus’ words.

Toward the Strait Gate,

Charles E. Carlson
charlesecarlson.com
Project Strait Gate
PO Box 35
Wheat Ridge, CO, 80034
Contact phone on site: 602 741 4650
Copies to staff, 
CA Press, 
Other national churches
(1) “John 
Hagee With Benny Hinn:  Praying For War In The Name of Jesus,” The clip of Hagee’s prayer for war was made on the “This Is Your Day” program hosted by Benny Hinn prior to the Gulf War against Iraq that was started in 2003.   WHTT, 2012:  https://vimeo.com/59933668.
(2) Christian Zionism, The Tragedy And The Turning, Part 1, Carlson, 2010 (c):  http://vimeo.com/34409225
(3) “Why We Should Be Concerned About Christian Zionism,” National Council of the Churches of Christ in the USA, 2007:  http://www.ncccusa.org/pdfs/christianzionismbrochure.pdf  Also, see News from the National Council of Churches:  “Most Christians support Israel AND Palestine, and oppose a war with Iran, say NCC leaders,”  Jan. 16, 2007:  http://www.ncccusa.org/news/070716israelpalestine.html

(4) Mainline church leaders ask members of Congress to “make U.S. military aid to Israel contingent upon its government’s “compliance with applicable US laws and policies.” , Oct. 5, 2012:  http://blogs.elca.org/peacenotwalls/files/2012/10/12oct5letteraboutaid.pdf  Also, see:  “JVP Rabbinical Council stands with churches challenging US aid to Israel,”  Mondoweiss, Oct. 15, 2012:  http://mondoweiss.net/2012/10/jvp-rabbinical-council-stands-with-churches-challenging-us-aid-to-israel.html
(5) “The inheritance of Abraham? A report on the ‘promised land’,” Church of Scotland, May, 2013:  http://www.churchofscotland.org.uk/__data/assets/pdf_file/0010/14050/The_Inheritance_of_Abraham.pdf