Beating the war drums at Christmas
Monday Ministerial Musings
By Rev. Mark William Ennis
2025 Blog #48
December 29, 2025
Beating the war drums at Christmas
We just celebrated Christmas, a time of celebrating peace, love and light and I am hearing our nation beating war drums again, starting a military conflict and looking to expand it. I wonder if our nation is simply addicted to going to war or if there are people who profit from war who instigate such events. I can barely remember a time in my life when our nation was not at war.
I grew up during the war in Vietnam. Each night our family watched the news with Walter Cronkite as he announced the daily casualty counts from the war. My family seemed grieved over American deaths but still supported the effort to contain communism. This war did not end until Saigon fell during my junior year in high school. There were many who applauded the end of the war but others worried that the United States had suffered its first loss against the communists.
We enjoyed eight years of peace until the war drums began to beat again. This time, our military invaded the Island of Grenada in 1983. I had not even heard of that island until it was the headline news. Our government was concerned about the influence of Cuba on that Island and went in to rescue America citizens who were living there or were students there. We did rescue hundreds of citizens, mostly students, but like any war, we suffered military casualties in the process.
We enjoyed six years of peace until we invaded Panama to arrest the national leader, Manuel Noriega. Prior to the bad relations with the United States, he was actually an ally who received CIA money when future president George Bush was head of the CIA. Relations soured and we invaded.
Only a year after the Panama invasion, we constructed a coalition of military forces in the first Gulf War. After months of troop buildup, I was shocked to see how quickly and effectively we pushed Sadam Hussain out of Kuwait and back into Iraq. The conflict lasted only about a month, and our casualties were much lower that we feared they would be.
Our nation was at peace for the next ten years. This was the longest stretch of peace that our country enjoyed in my lifetime before it was interrupted by our invasion of Afghanistan following the September 11 attacks on our nation. This war in Afghanistan lasted twenty years and did not end until we left in 2021.
Of course, during this time we also invaded Iraq in 2003 and toppled Sadam Hussain. Our occupation lasted nine years, but with the rise of ISIS, our military was there for another three years. I have seen mixed reports in news outlets as to whether or not Iraqi citizens are better or worse off because of our military interventions.
Now we are enjoying four years of peace since we left Afghanistan. It appears that we are once more ready to go to war. This time, our military is striking boats that are allegedly boats smuggling illegal drugs. Most recently, an oil tanker from Venezuela has been seized. Our news media is speculating that our national intention is to topple Nicolas Maduro, who most of the world considers to be an illegitimate president because of a stolen election.
Of course, we also conducted an air strike against Nigeria. During the holy seasons of Christmas and Hanukkah, we are again at war. Our seasons of light were celebrated against the background of military conflict and the resulting deaths of both military participants and civilians.
I’m certainly not saying that every military conflict is wrong, although with our technology, civilians are too often casualties of war. I could never be called a “peacenik” or a pacifist. Yet, I wonder if our nation has become too quick to turn to war and has become reluctant to try more diplomatic approaches. I wonder if war has become too easy and too acceptable for our country. Is this really where we want to be as a nation? Just because we have a powerful military, does this mean that we must constantly use it?
I pray that these holy seasons of light and peace will cause us to evaluate our nation’s quickness to go to war, wars that hurt many civilians. I believe that war, which I consider a last resort, is becoming a first choice of our government leaders. I hope that all people of faith will contemplate this and encourage our government to handle things peacefully whenever possible. I hope that war will become a last resort, not the first. May this be so during our new year.
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