Chaldean Catholic leaders appeal to prevent Iraq war

National Catholic Reporter, Jan 24, 2003

Chaldean Catholic church leaders in Iraq and the United States--the two countries that possess the largest Chaldean Catholic populations in the world--have appealed to world leaders to prevent war.

Speaking on Vatican Radio Jan. 9, Chaldean Auxiliary Bishop Shlemon Warduni of Baghdad said war would have a devastating effect on the country, especially because the population is already weakened by more than a decade of U.N. sanctions.

"We don't understand this war. It threatens our children, our elderly, our sick and our young, who for 12 years haven't known anything about their future," he said.

In December, a leaked U.N. planning report estimated that a war against Iraq could cause as many as 500,000 civilian casualties and nearly a million refugees.

Warduni questioned whether Iraq's vast crude oil reserves--the second largest in the world after Saudi Arabia--might not be the real reason behind the West's interest in the country.

"Why come to us? Because we have oil? Let them take the oil, but leave us in peace," he said. "Because we are rich? But this richness has come from God, not us. What is our guilt?"

Pressed by the Vatican Radio interviewer to acknowledge Iraq's international obligations, the bishop said: "Everyone has fault. Everyone has been a cause of past wars and of this one, if it happens."

Warduni said the number of Iraqi Christians had shrunk because of mass emigrations since the 1991 Gulf War.

"Unfortunately; many of our young people have a dark future before them," he said.

Vatican Radio said Christians in Iraq number about 670,000, or about 3 percent of the population, and a large majority of them are Catholic.

The Chaldean Catholic church is one of the seven non-Latin traditions in communion with Rome. While most of its members live in Iraq, approximately 160,000 now live in the United States. Of that number about 100,000 live in the Detroit area.

The biggest concern for Chaldean Catholics in the Detroit area is that their new country may soon be at war with their homeland. Most still have family there, said Chaldean Catholic Bishop Ibrahim N. Ibrahim, head of the Michigan-based Eparchy of St. Thomas the Apostle, which serves Chaldean Catholics in the eastern United States.

Ibrahim, 65, has been in the United States since 1978, when he was appointed associate pastor of a Chaldean Catholic parish in the San Diego area. "Do I agree that Iraq should have weapons of mass destruction?" he asked. "Neither Iraq nor [any] other country in the region should have weapons of mass destruction."

But whether Iraq even has such weapons is another question. He said America should let the U.N. inspection process take its course.

"The United States believes Iraq possessed in the past weapons of mass destruction. Iraq now is claiming that it has no weapons of mass destruction. The only way to verify this is the inspectors," he said in December to The Michigan Catholic, Detroit's archdiocesan newspaper.

"So, the inspectors are there; the report of the Iraqi administration is there. The United States should study the report, should say what they think about it, and if it is wrong, let them verify," Ibrahim said. "If the United States has a different view on that, they ought to have to prove it before going to war, which will be a disaster for the whole region, not only for the Iraqi people."

Something the bishop said he does not understand is why the U.S. administration seems to be so eager to pursue a war, when almost all other countries do not regard war as any way of solving the situation.

"Does the United States really want to see this kind of disaster in the world?" he asked.

The leadership position America holds in the world should actually make it less inclined to pursue war as an option, in the bishop's view. "You have always the opportunity to make war, but you do not always have the opportunity or the time to make peace when you want it," he said.

Although he appreciates the U.S. bishops making that point in the statement they adopted in November, he wants them to go further.

"I am asking the bishops of the United States to speak out strongly against a war--not only to issue a statement; a statement is not a big deal--but to speak out strongly from the pulpit, every bishop in his cathedral, to tell the people we should not go to war in Iraq at this time," he said.

With more Iraqis in the United States than in any other country except Iraq, the bishop said he wishes the U.S. government would show more concern for Iraqis who have chosen to build their families' future in this country by not being so quick to launch a war that could endanger their loved ones in the old country.

Ibrahim said it is not Chaldean-Americans' way to hold demonstrations or engage in other protest activity, choosing instead to lobby political leaders through the Chaldean Federation of America.

As for the Chaldean church, "We are praying in our churches every single Sunday for peace and we pray for our leaders--here and there--in order that God may grant them wisdom to do what is good for humanity and what is good for both countries, not only one side," he said.