| Peace and Justice - Your Contributions Contributions to the conversation "from here, there and everywhere" Yours? (These quotes are exactly as received from others. Notification of errors, more complete source information...and other quotes on either Peace or Justice page, are solicited. Please refer to # if correcting.) 1. The fruit of violence: 108,000,000 human beings, most of these non-combatants, died as a result of War in the 20th century. Of these victims, over 50,000,000 died in World War II alone. The century just past was by far the most destructive and violent century in all of human history. Various sources. 2. "War is not healthy to children and other living things." Medallion found with dog tags of a 1971-73 U.S. Army veteran, in the coat pocket of his Dress Green uniform, April 21, 2002. 3. http://www.home.earthlink.net/~lkennen Photo memories of a spring, 2000, visit to places of horror, as Auschwitz and Terezin death camps. 4. "Five simple rules to be happy: A. Free your heart from hatred Specific source unknown Printed in P&J#9 October 7, 2001 5. "...in the midst of putative peace, you could, like me, be unfortunate enough to stumble on a silent war. The trouble is that once you see it, you can't unsee it. And once you've seen it, keeping quiet, saying nothing, becomes as political an act as speaking out. There is no innocence. Either way, you're accountable." (p. 7) Arundhati Roy in Power Politics, 2nd edition, 2001, South End Press, Cambridge MA 6. "what globalization really is: Life is Profit." (p.31) Rohington Mistry in A Fine Balance Vintage International, 1997 7. "To laugh is to risk appearing the fool. To weep is to risk appearing sentimental. To reach out for another is to risk involvement. To expose feelings is to risk exposing your true self. To place your ideas, your dreams before a crowd is to risk their loss. To love is to risk not being loved in return. To live is to risk dying. To hope is to risk despair. To try is to risk failure. To serve God is to risk danger and martyrdom. But risks must be taken, because the greatest hazard in life is to risk nothing. The person who risks nothing, does nothing, has nothing and is nothing. They may avoid suffering and sorrow, but they cannot learn, feel, change, grow, love, live. Chained by their certitudes they are a slave, they have forfeited their freedom. Only a person who risks is free." Reprinted from the Methodist Church bulletin Park Rapids MN October 17,1982 8. "Poverty is the worst form of violence...The Arms race is an act of aggression against the poor, causing them to starve." Roman Catholic Bishop Thomas Gumbleton at Minneapolis, February 6, 2002 9. "Life is what happens when you're busy making other plans" John Lennon, in Beautiful Boy 10. "When will we ever learn? When will we ever learn." From the song "Where have all the flowers gone?" 11. "Then came the "long" prayer. None could remember the like of it for passionate pleading and moving and beautiful language. The burden of its supplication was, that the ever merciful Father of us all would watch over our noble young soldiers, and aid, comfort, and encourage them in their patriotic work; bless them, shield them in the day of battle and the hour of peril, bear them in His mighty hand, make them strong and confident, invincible in the bloody onset, help them to crush the foe, grant to them and to their flag and country imperishable honor and glory." Quote from Mark Twain's "The War Prayer", written at the Time of the Spanish-American war 1898-1901, but not published for many years after. (Still in print). Quoted in "Jesus Against Christianity: Reclaiming the Missing Jesus" by Jack Nelson-Pallmeyer, Trinity Press International, 2001. 12. "Every act of love is a work of peace, no matter how small." Mother Teresa, quoted in P&J#60 13. "I know not with what weapons WWIII will be fought, but WWIV will be fought with sticks and stones." Albert Einstein, quoted in P&J#60 14. "Do all the good you can, by all the means you can, in all the ways you can, in all the places you can, at all the times you can, to all the people you can, as long as ever you can." John Wesley, quoted in P&J#57 15. "Life is short And we do not have much time to gladden the hearts, for those who would travel the way with us. So be swift to be kind And make haste to love." Reverend Bob H., a physically handicapped minister Quoted in P&J#59 16. "We must be the change we wish to see in the world." "An eye for an eye makes the whole world blind." Gandhi, quoted in P&J#57 17. "at the end of the talk someone from the audience asked the Dalai Lama, "Why didn't you fight back against the Chinese?" The Dalai Lama looked down, swung his feet just a bit, then looked back up at us and said with a gentle smile, "Well, war is obsolete, you know." Then, after a few moments, his face grave, he said, "Of course the mind can rationalize fighting back but the heart, the heart would never understand. Then you would be divided in yourself, the heart and the mind, and the war would be inside you." From someone in the world, Quoted in P&J#65 18. "Evil is any abstraction that enables you to look at someone and not see the person." Lee Thorn, from "Reconciliation", Turning Wheel magazine, Fall 2000 19. "Do you have the patience to wait till your mind settles and the water is clear? Can you remain unmoving till the right action arises by itself?" Lao-Tzu 20. "When I despair, I remember that all through history the way of truth and love has always won. There have been murderers and tyrants, and for a time they can seem invincible. But in the end they always fail. Think of this always." Mahatma Gandhi 21. "Stopping" is the basic practice of meditation. To keep our flowerness fresh, we have to learn how to stop our worries, anxieties, agitation and sadness so that we can find peace and happiness and smile again. When things are not going well, it is good to stop in order to prevent the unpleasant, destructive energies from continuing. Stopping does not mean repressing; it means, first of all, calming. If we want the ocean to be calm, we don't throw away the water. Without the water, nothing is left. When we notice the presence of anger, fear and agitation in us, we don't need to throw them away. We only have to breathe in and out consciously, and that alone is enough to calm the storm. We do not need to wait for a storm to begin to practice. When we are not suffering, conscious breathing will make us feel wonderful, and it is the best way to prepare ourselves to deal with troubles when they come." Thich Nhat Hanh from p. 13 in "Touching Peace: Practicing the Art of Mindful Living" Parallax Press 1992 22. "Men never do evil so completely and cheerfully as when they do it from religious conviction." Pascal 23. "Although the world is full of suffering, it is also full of the overcoming of it." Helen Keller 24. "You want to know how to overcome despair? I will tell you. By helping others overcome despair." Elie Wiesel Quotations 18-24 included in P&J#66 25. "We women of one country will be too tender of those of another country to allow our children to be trained to injure theirs. From the bosom of the devastated earth a voice goes up with our own. It says, "Disarm! Disarm!" Julia Ward Howe 26. "[War] - whether nuclear or not makes it totally unacceptable as a means of settling differences between nations. War should belong to the tragic past, to history; it should find no place on humanity's agenda for the future." Pope John Paul II 27. "In the terrible midnight of war, men have knocked on the door of the church to ask for bread of peace, but the church has often disappointed them. What more pathetically reveals the irrelevancy of the church in present-day world affairs than its witness regarding war? In a world gone mad with arms buildup, chauvinistic passions and imperialistic exploitation, the church has either endorsed these activities or remained appallingly silent A weary world, pleading desperately for peace, has often found the church morally sanctioning war." Dr. Martin Luther King, during a sermon on the church and war 28. "Isn't it time to begin flying a world flag as well as a national flag? We are long past the time when any nation can exist without the rest of the world. A world flag would remind us that we are a very fragile part of the entire human race, beholden to all the others, responsible for all the others as well as our selves." Sister Joan Chittister, OSB 29. "Just war thinking has become in our time the great myth that we kill by." Eileen Egan 30. "The just war theory should be filed in the same drawer that contains the flat earth theory." Bishop Carroll Dozier 31. "Take that "just war" theology. Put it in a drawer. Lock it. Never open it again." Bishop Thomas Gumbleton, at the U.S. Bishops Conference, November, 2001 32. "Clearly this is a critical turning point in human history. How we as a nation respond to this attack may determine the fate of humanity. We can choose as we have in the past, to answer violence with violence, or we can chart a new and life-affirming course." Bishop Thomas Gumbleton, from a statement Regarding September 11, 2001 Quotes 25-32 from P&J#84 33. "Prayer is not an old woman's idle amusement. Properly understood and applied it is the most potent instrument of action." Gandhi as quoted in P&J#130 34. "The ultimate measure of people is not where they stand in the moments of comfort and convenience, but where they stand in times of challenge and controversy." Dr. Martin Luther King, P&J #111 Quoted in Henry Oertelt's "An Unbroken Chain" Lerner Publications, 2000 35. "Each time a person stands up for an ideal, or acts to improve the lots of others...they send forth a ripple of hope, and crossing each other from a million different centers of energy and daring, those ripples build a current that can sweep down the mightiest walls of oppression and resistance." Robert F. Kennedy 36. "It seems that we are living in a time of prophesies, a time of definitions and decisions. We are the generation with the responsibility and option to choose the path of life with a future for our children or the life and the path that defies the laws of regeneration. Even tho' you and I are in different boats, we share the same river of life. What befalls me, befalls you. And downstream in this river of life our children will pay for our selfishness, for our greed and for our lack of vision." Oren Lyons 37. "Fight intolerance with tolerance, hatred with compassion, and bigotry with knowledge." Rebecca Kanner 38. "The time has come for man's intellect to win over the brutality and insanity of war." Linus Pauling 39. "There is going to be a social and political and economic revolution that will explode with such suddenness as to have the character of revolution. The Revolutionary forces are already at work today, and they have humanity's dream on their side." Walter Cronkite Quotes #35-39 with thanks to Anne D. 40. "The choice is no longer violence or non-violence. It is non-violence or non-existence." Father John Dear quoting Martin Luther King statement made the night before MLK died. Speech at national Call to Action conference. 41. "The arch of evolution ultimately curves towards justice." Martin Luther King 42. "If you are neutral in situations of injustice, you have chosen the side of the oppressor. If an elephant has his foot on the tail of a mouse and you say that you are neutral, the mouse will not appreciate it." Archbishop Desmond Tutu 43. "This is what we are about. We plant the seeds that one day will grow. We water seeds already planted, knowing that they hold future promise. We lay foundations that will need further development. We provide yeast that produces effects far beyond our capabilities. We cannot do everything, and there is a sense of liberation in realizing that. This enables us to do something, and to do it very well." Reflection of Archbishop Oscar Romero 44. "War is Peace. Freedom is Slavery. Ignorance is Strength." The slogans of the regime in George Orwell's "1984", written in 1949. 45. "The ultimate weakness of violence is that it is a descending spiral, begetting the very thing it seeks to destroy. Instead of diminishing evil, it multiplies it. Through violence you may murder the liar, but you cannot murder the lie, nor establish the truth. Through violence, you may murder the hater, but you do not murder hate. In fact, violence merely increases hate. So it goes. Returning violence for violence multiplies violence, adding deeper darkness to a night already devoid of stars. Darkness cannot drive out darkness; only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate; only love can do that." Martin Luther King 46. Anyway "People are often unreasonable, illogical and self-centered. Forgive them anyway. If you are kind, people may accuse you of selfish, ulterior motives. Be kind anyway. If you are successful, you will win some false friends and some true enemies. Succeed anyway. If you are honest and frank, people may cheat you. Be honest and frank anyway. What you spend years building, someone can destroy overnight. Build anyway. If you find serenity and happiness, they may be jealous. Be happy anyway. Give the world the best you have, and it may never be enough Give the world the best you've got anyway. You see, in the final analysis, it is between you and God. It was never between you and them anyway." Uncertain, but said to have been found inscribed on the wall of Mother Teresa's orphanage in Calcutta. Another source says that this poem was found by Mother Teresa's bedside when she died, written in her own handwriting. It remains a mystery (from Bob Feldman of Red House Records, St. Paul MN). 47. "None of us alone can save the nation or world, but each of us can make a positive difference if we commit ourselves to do so." Cornell West | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
