ABSTRACT
This chapter examines the symbols being used by the protagonists in the war in Iraq relative to traditional Christian theology. That reality, mediated through our bodies and psyches, is always within the context of the community, both local and global, symbols expressing deeply held cultural values reflecting the desires of the community and its understanding of humanity's relationship with the divine. Language is perhaps the most potent bearer of symbolic meaning, political correctness in the use of inclusive language going far beyond the use of the correct pronouns. Symbols come naturally from human experience: communal universal and enduring symbols have through history reflected and made real different realities in differing contexts. All today lives under one global god: the God of War, who is continuously empowered and enlarged by the religion of money. War enacted in the centres of civilian populations, where many of the victims are women and children trapped in their homes.
