In his article in Anabaptist Witness volume 11, no. 1, “Mission and Peace in Ethiopia” (April 2024), Yimenu Adimas Belay states, “Peacebuilding in Ethiopia needs to be considered a crucial element of every Christian community in order to transform the situation of our beloved historical country” (p. 23). I really love this expression. It not only links peacebuilding to Christian community, it also looks toward the goal of national transformation. Along with other interactions I’ve had lately with African and African American Christians, I’m looking at nationhood in a new light. What would it mean if I called America “my beloved historical country?” Could I do this without getting strange looks from my progressive Mennonite brothers and sisters? Could I do this without legitimizing the awful realities that have been connected with my country throughout its story?

 

To me, America is indeed beloved: these are the people and spaces I love, people and spaces that have nurtured me and continue to sustain me. It is also historical in the sense of rich and complicated history. Nationhood in our discourse often refers to the geopolitical realities of nation-states: borders, defense, claims of one against the other. Yet I am drawn more to an original sense of the word “nation” that connects communities of people to their place. We can also refer to it as “country,” which is perhaps even more indicative of that sense of place.

 

Before going further, I need to acknowledge that as a white, educated male, I occupy a position of distinct privilege in America. The way I experience my country is not usually the way others experience it from a position of marginality. I hear the cry of Black poet Langston Hughes, who wrote “Let America be America again…(America never was America to me.)” I rail against the “Make America Great Again” slogan that refuses to acknowledge the “not great” of our past. And yet, voices like that of Hughes are often crying out for a fuller, broader definition of nationhood, not an erasure of it.

 

So I ask myself: Could I love America in the same way Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. loved it, as he expressed so poignantly in his famous “I Have a Dream” speech?

So even though we face the difficulties of today and tomorrow, I still have a dream. It is a dream deeply rooted in the American dream. I have a dream that one day this nation will rise up and live out the true meaning of its creed: We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal. … I have a dream that one day every valley shall be exalted, every hill and mountain shall be made low, the rough places will be made plain, and the crooked places will be made straight, and the glory of the Lord shall be revealed, and all flesh shall see it together.

King wove together the Biblical tradition of Isaiah with the American creed; King called his own beloved historical country to the very best version of itself as represented in ideals that are rooted in the Judeo-Christian tradition of shalom justice. King boldly proclaimed a dream of justice for America without shrinking back from the very real injustice he experienced. In fact, King’s vision of a beloved country was the foundation for his incisive critique.

 

I also ask myself: Can I put my hand over my heart and pledge allegiance to the red, white, and blue flag, alongside fellow Christians and persons of other faiths whose political colors are both red and blue, confessing a shared secular creed of “liberty and justice for all”? Twenty years ago, my Mennonite heroes J. Nelson Kraybill and June Alliman Yoder created an alternative pledge of allegiance, which says, “I pledge allegiance to the cross…” I liked that a lot as a young person, as it differentiated me from the pack of Americans waving flags while bombing Iraq to smithereens after the attacks of September 11, 2001. I would repeat my Christian pledge to myself as others said their American pledge. But did my conscious differentiation from America truly bring peace between myself and my neighbors near and far? I’m not sure. I still believe, of course, that my primary allegiance is to the cross, but I also have a secondary allegiance to my neighborhood and nation. Can I now hold these in creative tension?

 

My wife, who is from Canada, observed upon her arrival in America that it was much more difficult being Mennonite in America than Canada. We Americans have to struggle with the fact that our country is a highly militaristic and colonial global superpower. This sometimes leads to a bias among progressive Mennonites that borders on anti-American when we are offering otherwise valuable critiques of our militarism, our Christian nationalism, our colonialism, and our other forms of idolatry. We need a prophetic imagination that calls out our confusion of state power with divine power for the idolatry that it is, that calls in for questioning our economic systems that advantage some over others, that calls sin, sin. We also need a prophetic imagination rooted in more love, joy, and hope for our nation and our fellow citizens. To use a favorite text that most in America would recognize, “For God so loved the world that he gave his only-begotten son” (John 3:16). God’s saving act in Jesus Christ was predicated on God’s love for this world (America included).

 

This takes me back to the phrasing that inspired this reflection, which I’ll restate as follows: “Peacebuilding in America needs to be considered a crucial element of every Christian community in order to transform the situation of our beloved historical country.” I think that rooting our hope in Christian communities building peace through love for our neighbors is the exact right place to begin. My impulse as a Mennonite has been to consciously differentiate myself from my neighbors when I see them doing wrong. Instead, I need to claim community with them as a fellow sinner and invite them to a vision of discipleship, to worship in spirit and in truth. It isn’t our efforts that will transform America, it is Christ’s work, work that was already accomplished on the cross.

 

If we as American Christians have any hope at all of joining in Christ’s work of building peace here and beyond, we need to first love our country and its story. The way God already loves it. America, my beloved historical country. Ethiopia, also a beloved historical country. God bless America. God bless Ethiopia. God bless all the nations of the world.