30 Nov 2002
Shocked with the brutal murder of Mrs. Bonnie Weatherall, a number of groups and Lebanese young men and women signed a letter, this letter announcing Bonnie a martyr of Lebanon. The letter was delivered to the American Embassy, the British Embassy and the Evangelical Church. the groups that signed the letter:
Solide: NGO
working for the Lebanese in Detention and Exile -
'Servitors of the Cedars of the Martyr': this group plans to plant a cedar in her
commemoration
The Student Committee of the Mont La Salle school.
‘Alas for you, scribes and Phareesis, you hypocrites! You who are like whitewashed tombs that look handsome on the outside, but inside are full of dead men’s bones and every kind of corruption.’ Matthew 23:27
We the undersigned express our deepest condolences and sympathies to the family of the late Bonnie Weatherall may God rest her soul in peace.
We also condemn in the strongest terms possible the heinous act of murder that took her life while doing community services as a nurse assistant at an evangelical clinic in Sidon. This act of barbarism is a crime against humanity and must be condemned as such but what was distinctively appalling to us where the statements given by two prominent religious leaders in which they deliberately and shamelessly justified and legitimized the murder by describing it in political terms and we mean here Sheikh Maher Hammoud and the Roman Catholic Bishop George Kuweiter.
Sheikh Hammoud said: ‘… We do not condemn, … we want our society to become a resistance and work against the Great Satan; the oppressive and criminal America...Actions of killing and bombings that target Americans in any place...are an expression of Muslim condemnation of U.S. policy.
Bishop Kuweiter said that Mrs. Weatherall defied all threats against her life and continued her humanitarian and religious work. He added that she had no right to preach because there are only four major and legal Christian communities in Lebanon. Anyone outside these groups has no right to preach the word of God. This kind of excuse to the murder on behalf of a Christian clergy makes us wonder where are the basic human rights? Where is the right to be different and where is the right of expression? What is the peace of Christ in Bishop Kuweiter’s mind? Is it only an empty word: ‘peace be with you’?
Peace of Christ is more than that, it is the meticulous work of tending the sick and those who are in need; it is teaching the children and taking care of them and more. This is exactly what Bonnie Weatherall was willingly doing, and willingly accepted her fate in spite of all the threats.
Based on what Bishop George Kuweiter said, we pronounce Bonnie Weatherall a Martyr of Lebanon.