Every so often real world events remind me just how convoluted and morally ambiguous the living world really is.

For me, such events pose questions, and yield answers both tentative and unsatisfying.

Too bad I can't accept the moral pieties of politicians and pundits who praise the "war on terror" or explain that "Americans don't torture enemy combatants." Too bad that the death penalty leads me down tortuous paths, or that so many national holidays seem to my mind to be conflated with militarism.

Two recent events, one national, the other local, raise the old quandaries yet again.

In July two criminals, having been released from jail in Connecticut, commenced to brutally murder a loving mother and her two daughters, according to the police. Only the husband survived.

All four were members of the United Methodist Church of Cheshire, a politically active congregation where the prior three pastors as well as most of the congregants are against capital punishment. In years past the church sponsored classes on "restorative justice" promoting rehabilitation over punishment and congregants attended midnight vigils protesting capital punishment.

Now the congregation is stunned and anguished. The state seeks the death penalty against the alleged killers.

The victims were active and well-liked church members and the dead mother's own father, a retired former leader of Methodist church congregations, is against capital punishment. The surviving husband still attends church, grieves, and has been silent on the death penalty issue.

Other church members acknowledge "violent anger" when shown photographs of the suspected killers, but have been loathe to advocate either for or against the death penalty in this particular circumstance. The current pastor, also a death penalty opponent, has remained silent about the issue to date.

Against the death penalty in the abstract, some church members now find themselves forced to reconsider their views.

Tragedy can unhinge moral certainty, and certainly has at the Cheshire Methodist Church.

Closer to home, I found myself adrift last week during and after the first ever organizational meeting of the Incline Village Veteran's Group. While not a veteran, I was invited to attend the meeting.

Veterans who "served" together, particularly veterans of World War II, have a particular comradeship borne of their uniquely shared experience. As a group they are clearly a good deal older than the general population, more likely to support military efforts and to vote Republican.

It is not by chance that the "war president," George W. Bush, tends to deliver his speeches at military colleges, on military bases, and at military convocations to include various veteran's groups.

It's not as if there is a "veterans for peace" movement because all other veterans' organizations are "for war," but neither are other veterans' organizations exactly pacifist in their orientation.

Last week's Incline meeting commenced with a spirited presentation of the colors by our own Junior ROTC program at the Incline High School. Vets then introduced themselves and made brief statements about their "service." Aside from one fellow who blamed President Clinton for weakening the military, commentary was succinct and apolitical. The group then decided to provide assistance to local veterans in need.

I would have liked the group to discuss the inexcusably negligent care of the war wounded at Walter Reed Hospital, or why the families of active duty personnel receive such meager levels of support, or why the military has failed our soldiers so grievously in this war.

I would have liked to discuss the larger issue of how politicians and particularly Mr. Bush insist that we spend billions upon billions to "support the troops" yet allow so much of that money to be siphoned off into corrupt nonmilitary enterprises.

Somehow, asking such questions in that setting to those who served when I didn't seemed in bad taste, so I remained silent.

Then something happened which made me feel really uncomfortable. A very lovely person turned to me, told me her son was now serving in Iraq, and asked me where I had served. I told her that I had not served in my generation's war, the Vietnam War, and that in fact I was against that war.

She seemed incredulous and, as I recall, suggested that I must be kidding. Another lovely lady, knowing me, said that I wasn't kidding. End of discussion. End of communication.

In retrospect, I realize how difficult it was for me to empathize with the fear that nice lady must feel for her son's safety, how my anti-war posturing must have been received while she still has a son in harm's way.

Too late, I want this nice lady to know that I hope her son is safe, but that like Vietnam, I believe this war harms our nation's interests and the world's.



Andrew Whyman is a nearly-retired physician who lives in Incline Village. To contact Whyman, email adwhyman@aol.com.