PETITE RIVIÈRE DE L’ARTIBONITE, HAITI -- It is no wonder that after the attendant terrors of January, the fertile valleys of Haiti’s north beckoned those who survived the earthquake that had laid waste Port-au-Prince and other Haitian cities.
This is green, lithe, quiet country, and if for no other reason, its seeming peace can be a balm for those seeking relief from the Haitian capital’s congestion and chaos.
KANSAS CITY, Mo. — Holding large signs and chanting refrains of "Build for peace, not for war," eight peace activists were arrested here Sept. 8 for blocking access to the official groundbreaking ceremony for a major new nuclear weapons production facility.
The acts of civil disobedience came six days after Bishop Robert W. Finn of the Kansas City-Saint Joseph diocese released a statement asking officials to reconsider the construction of the new plant and three weeks after 14 activists were arrested at the same site for a separate nonviolent peace action.
The new plant, which will make nonnuclear parts for nuclear weapons, is set to be the nation’s first new major nuclear weapons production facility in 32 years.
Stepping in front of buses carrying local, state and federal officials, activists halted the flow of people into the official ceremony for a few minutes as police gathered to arrest those who would not get out of the way and let the buses continue to move.
Earth and Spirit
Not long ago, as I recalled bygone Labor Days, I dreamed this nightmare. Due to an acute shortage of folks to do service jobs because of rising anti-immigrant fervor, a new technology was sweeping the country. If the recently deceased were hooked up to car battery jumper cables, you could get another few weeks out of them; you just had to jolt them every eight hours.
WASHINGTON -- Jewish, evangelical and Catholic speakers, some with backgrounds in national security and interfaith relations, called the controversy over plans to build an Islamic community center and mosque a few blocks from ground zero in New York "contrived" and likely to help those who would recruit potential terrorists.
"The individuals and organizations who are contriving this controversy seem to will that [a war with Islam] will come into existence," said Andrew Bacevich, a retired Army officer and professor of international relations at Boston University, in a Sept. 1 teleconference organized by the group Faith in Public Life. "It is absolutely imperative that we act together to deny them this."
Meanwhile, in an interview with the Wall Street Journal the same day, New York Archbishop Timothy M. Dolan said he was working with Jewish and Muslim religious leaders to identify clerics and laypeople to invite to interreligious discussions to work out conflicts as they occur.
America’s boardrooms, hives of capitalism where money is the honey, are the last places you’d think an idea by Ralph Nader, the arch-skeptic of corporate power, would be embraced. Alas, it has come to pass. The unlikely idea? Share your wealth, Big Guys.
A federal judge has given the go-ahead for the continued distribution of a documentary that portrays working conditions for immigrant Haitians at sugar plantations in the Dominican Republic as akin to modern-day slavery.
SAN DIEGO -- A lineup of high-profile presenters, including former House Speaker Newt Gingrich, headlined the first Mother of Life Conference.
About 1,800 people attended the conference held Aug. 14 at San Diego State University's Viejas Arena and sponsored by the San Diego chapter of the Knights of Columbus.
The outcry over the proposed Islamic community center near Ground Zero should not be lumped together with protests against planned mosques in other parts of the country, a new poll suggests.
Nearly 60 percent of Americans oppose building an Islamic center or mosque two blocks from the site of the 9/11 terror attacks, but 76 percent would support one in their own communities, according to a PRRI/RNS Religion News Poll released Aug. 26.
The strongest opposition to the New York project, called Park51, came from Republicans (85 percent) and white evangelicals (75 percent opposed the New York project, and 24 percent don't support mosques in their own communities), according to the poll conducted by Public Religion Research Institute and Religion News Service.
The numbers suggest that the negative reaction to what's been dubbed the "Ground Zero mosque" stems more from its proximity a site that's considered "sacred ground" by a majority of Americans rather than the general Islamophobia exhibited in the nationwide protests, researchers said.
WASHINGTON -- Cardinal Daniel N. DiNardo praised a federal judge's recent ruling that temporarily stopped federal funding for embryonic stem-cell research, but the U.S. Department of Justice said it would appeal the decision.
The cardinal, who heads the Archdiocese of Galveston-Houston and chairs the U.S. bishops' Committee on Pro-Life Activities, called the Aug. 23 decision by Chief Judge Royce C. Lamberth of U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia "a victory for common sense and sound medical ethics."
"It also vindicates the bishops' reading" of the Dickey-Wicker amendment, approved by Congress since 1996, which prevents federal funding of research in which human embryos are harmed or destroyed, Cardinal DiNardo said in an Aug. 25 statement.
I have never seen the movie “Animal House.” I blame the Catholic church for this cultural deficiency.
You see, while all my high school friends were enjoying John Belushi’s antics in National Lampoon’s classic tale of fraternity hijinks, I had to stay home. In our house, before my sister and I were allowed to see any movie, my parents consulted the U.S. Catholic Conference list of movie ratings dutifully clipped from our diocesan newspaper and posted on the refrigerator.
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