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Schindler said that by the very act of keeping Afghani prisoners at Guantanamo Bay, the US is in violation of the Geneva Convention. "In the war between Afghanistan and America, the Geneva Convention accords allowed the US to hold as prisoners, without charges, members of the Taliban government's armed forces," noted Schindler, "but the war ended in June 2002."

According to the Bush administration, torture and imprisonment restrictions no longer apply to what occurs in these US detention facilities. The New York Times reported that "Mr. Bush was not bound by either the International Convention Against Torture or a federal anti-torture statute because he had the authority to protect the nation from terrorism." This view was supported by a legal team working in conjunction with the Justice Department. Thus, according to the administration, the United States government is legally empowered with the ability to imprison and torture in the name of Homeland Security.

Rev. Steve Shoemaker of Myers Park Baptist is appalled by the forms of religious abuse being used at the Guantanamo facilities, as was reported by the New York Times. "The forms of torture that involve the use of the Koran and Muslim moral principles to humiliate prisoners seem especially abhorrent, and especially dangerous in a time when we want to play down any hint that what we are about is a Holy War against Islam," Shoemaker commented, noting that the hazardous practices employed by Guantanamo interrogators can be taken as a form of religious persecution. Religious persecution by the United States Government.This brings up an interesting question: with the recent elections highlighting the concern of many Americans about our society's moral values of our society, why is there not more public uproar about our own government carrying out torture, specifically the religious torture, of another human being — maybe not with our graces or consent, but at least our lack of intervention?

"In the post-9/11 era, we've barricaded ourselves into some notion that America is right, no matter what, no matter what it takes, all bets are off, we will win, we will never forget," comments Reverend Howell. "I'm not sure people pay attention to the war itself, much less what happens with prisoners."

Pastor Chadwick, remembering the civil rights and anti-Vietnam War movements of the 1960s, said that change is possible through civil protest. The problem is the people are lacking one thing: "The right pictures were seen," said Chadwick, referring to images of police dogs attacking praying civil rights marchers. He says we're lacking the images needed for outrage. "Like Abu Ghraib, that really didn't affect anyone until the pictures were shown."

Rabbi Schindler responded to the moral values issue by saying that the government is "using their moral meter as a political tool. The government plays the morality card when it is politically advantageous for them to do so."

Howell stated, "You squander your moral capital, if in the name of defending moral values, you stoop to the level of those you are fighting. Too often, when Americans talk about moral values, they mean something about how we live here among ourselves — but do not think much about how we relate to other nations and people in moral ways."

Baxter sees this as a very grave problem: "People have made a split between public life, which includes things such as politics, economics and government, and their private life, which includes religion and morality. Religion is kept separate from public life." This split creates the possibility for people to continue through their lives seeing themselves as generally good, without having to speak out against political and governmental abuses. Baxter feels this attitude is shared by both conservative and liberal Christians. It's also something he sees as especially dangerous. When living this way, he says, "You lose the ability to talk about moral decisions from a collective standpoint. Going to war is a moral decision, but it can't be discussed that way." This split is hard to remedy, and religious leaders constantly battle the attitude that by attending a service, a worshipper has redeemed himself or herself for the week.

So far, despite their feelings about the issue of torture by Americans, the clergy members we spoke to have not done much to broach the subject with their followers.