"Our lives begin to end the day we become silent about things that matter." - Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.
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Page index:
Why this site exists
Free Yourself - Albert Einstein
The Price of Indifference
The Country is in Deep Trouble - Cornel West
Compassion - Susan Sontag
Let's Get Political - Nathan Karrel
How to Contact Media, Elected Officials
What motivates U2's Bono to activism?
Fair Trade Resources and Consumer Activism
Altar Call to Social Action
Donate to make a difference in the world
PEACETAX - don't want your taxes to support military killing? You will probably go to prison.
reinform action points: Click here for current petitions, emails to elected officials, etc.
The Price of Indifference
What guaranteed the success of the Holocaust was the indifference of the onlookers. Today we have as many indifferent onlookers as Europe had in the 1930’s and 40’s.
We have had mass murderers doing their thing in Kosovo, mass murdering in Rwanda in which approximately 1,000,000 people were slaughtered in 100 days. That’s about 10,000 murders a day. In the Sudan today we have a situation that the U.N. has labeled genocide, but to no avail. In Rwanda, even with 10,000 people being slaughtered every day, it was not considered genocide. It was labeled “acts of genocide” but not “genocide.”
One reporter asked a State Department representative how many acts of genocide it took to become genocide. But the U.S. State Department, in an extraordinary display of doubletalk, wouldn’t say.
Martin Buber, a Jewish Rabbi, described conditions in Germany with the observation that in Nazi Germany there were five different groups:
• A very few who did not know what was going on;
• Those who knew what was going on and approved it;
• Those who knew what was going on and left because they couldn’t handle it;
• Those who knew what was going on and put themselves at risk to stop it;
• Those who weren’t quite sure what was going on and made quite sure they did not find out.
Down here in the inner-city of San Antonio we have some of the worst conditions for our children living here. They are surrounded by drug dealers, drug users, violence - especially gang violence. Single mothers, and at times single grandmothers, try to cope. The fathers are missing, which is unfortunate. But the church is also missing, which is just as unfortunate.
What is taking place is not a holocaust but a disaster supported by the indifference of the onlookers.
I once heard of an analysis by a Boston drug dealer on why the church was losing to the gangs in the inner city. Selvin Brown, the drug dealer, explained to Rev. Eugene Rivers, a Pentecostal minister, that the main difference was that he was there.
When Johnny goes to school in the morning, I’m there, you’re not.
When Johnny comes home in the afternoon, I’m there, you’re not.
And when Johnny goes out for a loaf of bread at the grocery store, I’m there, you’re not.
I win, you lose.
Robert J. Guinee is the founder and pastoral presence at Potter’s Home Ministries, 2138 S. Calaveras, in San Antonio, Texas.
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First, Free Yourself
A human being is a part of the whole that we call the universe, a part limited in time and space. He experiences himself, his thoughts and feelings, as something separated from the rest--a kind of optical illusion of his consciousness. This illusion is a prison for us, restricting us to our personal desires and to affection for only the few people nearest us. Our task must be to free ourselves from this prison by widening our circle of compassion to embrace all living beings and all of nature. - Albert Einstein
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The country is in deep trouble. We've forgotten that a rich life consists fundamentally of serving others, trying to leave the world a little better than you found it. We need the courage to question the powers that be, the courage to be impatient with evil and patient with people, the courage to fight for social justice. In many instances we will be stepping out on nothing, and just hoping to land on something. But that's the struggle. To live is to wrestle with despair, yet never to allow despair to have the last word. - Cornel West
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Compassion is an unstable emotion. It needs to be translated into action, or it withers. The question is what to do with the feelings that have been aroused, the knowledge that has been communicated. People don't become inured to what they are shown...because of the quantity of images dumped on them. It is passivity that dulls feeling. - Susan Sontag
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Let's get political
by Nathan Karrel
I have encountered many who say they are not interested in politics. Yet that statement in and of itself is a political statement. When one analyzes the term "politics" one observes that its roots are in the Greek word polis, which translates roughly to "community." As citizens of the world and ambassadors of Christ, we are called to enter this global community and to speak for those who have no voice, creating ways for the least of those among us to enter the community as well: the 300 children lost in a Russian school due to the brutal acts of Chechen rebels, those trapped in conflict and HIV/AIDS in Africa, the 35 million people in America in poverty, and the millions of other injustices that pierce our lives daily.
As we approach the upcoming election, a common theme is that an opportunity for pivotal change lies in the hands of either George W. Bush or John Kerry. Yet this is a problem itself, that Americans rest their hopes for transformation on two figures who in many respects represent the status quo: white, Anglo-Saxon, affluent men. While the upcoming election is being called critically important - which in many ways it is - in other ways it is inconsequential. Iconsequential because, in riding hopes for critical change on two candidates, Americans have shirked their duty as individuals and communities to transform the world. Yet now is the time to challenge the common assumptions that frame the world around us. So let your voice be heard, not only by voting, but through actively and responsibly engaging the world. Get political!
Nathan Karrel is a senior political studies major attending Gordon College in Wenham, Massachusetts.
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Contact the Media and your Elected Officials
These are wonderfully convenient tools for getting active and trying to make a difference in this messed up world.
To reach the media
(up to five at a time) via TheNation.com web site: click here
via Show George the Door (TrueMajority ACTION PAC): click here
To write to your senators and congress:
http://capwiz.com/thenation/dbq/officials/
The Nation's issues and education page:
http://capwiz.com/thenation/issues/
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What Motivates Bono to Activism
Well, you know, I am not a very good advertisement for God. So, I generally don't wear that badge on my lapel. But it is certainly written on the inside. I am a believer. There are 2,103 verses of Scripture pertaining to the poor. Jesus Christ only speaks of judgement once. It is not all about the things that the church bangs on about. It is not about sexual immorality, and it is not about megalomania, or vanity. It is about the poor. 'I was naked you clothed me. I was a stranger and you let me in.' This is at the heart of the gospel. Why is it that we have seemed to have forgotten this? Why isn't the church leading this movement? I am here tonight because the church ought to be ready to do that.
- Bono in response to a question about how faith motivates his activism, asked during a press conference at Northeast Christian church, Louisville, KY
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This is why this site exists:
The real damage is done by those millions who want to "survive." The honest men who just want to be left in peace. Those who don’t want their little lives disturbed by anything bigger than themselves. Those with no sides and no causes. Those who won’t take measure of their own strength, for fear of antagonizing their own weakness. Those who don’t like to make waves-or enemies. Those for whom freedom, honor, truth, and principles are only literature. Those who live small, mate small, die small. It’s the reductionist approach to life: if you keep it small, you’ll keep it under control. If you don’t make any noise, the bogeyman won’t find you. But it’s all an illusion, because they die too, those people who roll up their spirits into tiny little balls so as to be safe. Safe?! From what? Life is always on the edge of death; narrow streets lead to the same place as wide avenues, and a little candle burns itself out just like a flaming torch does. I choose my own way to burn. - Sophie Scholl - read more about Sophie (who was beheaded for her beliefs)
"To fail to speak to the utter moral corruption of the mass destruction of civilians was to fail as a Christian and as a priest. Hiroshima and Nagasaki happened in and to a world and a Christian church that had asked for it - that had prepared the moral consciousness of humanity to do and to justify the unthinkable."
- Father George Zabelka, Catholic chaplain for the 509th Composite Group, the atomic bomb crew.
Who will speak for me?
First, they came for the terrorists,
and I didn’t speak up because I wasn’t a terrorist.
Then they came for the foreigners,
and I didn’t speak up because I wasn’t a foreigner.
Then they came for the Arab-Americans,
and I didn’t speak up because I wasn’t Arab-American.
Then they came for the radical dissenters,
and I didn’t speak up because I was just an ordinary citizen.
Then they came for me, by which time
there was no one left to speak up for me.
Source: Bernard Weiner, 2001, paraphrasing Martin Niemoeller
A New Altar Call for Social Action
A common experience among many Christians in modern culture is a lack of defined purpose having responded to an altar call. Many of us have begun the journey of faith without much assurance of exactly what we have been “called” to do. However, it seems there is an intuitive sense to work for the common good of society including overcoming poverty, preventing war, protesting for equal rights and caring for creation. Sadly, becoming involved with any of these causes often brands one a progressive, which to many in the Christian community is the dirty unspoken “p” word. It seems to some in this community that social action and progressive advocacy is merely the vocation of young, hopeful dreamers even though such hope is written about throughout the pages of scripture.
Perhaps to address the concerns of those who consider social action and progressive policy liberal code words for unrestrained humanism we need a new altar call manifested from a holistic vision of the message of gospel found in the incarnate Christ. Conceivably, it is no longer wise to end the standard altar call with a simple invitation to follow Jesus. In order to invoke the full meaning of scripture it appears time to encourage more than just a plea to our Father in Heaven to forgive us our sins. Instead we ought to demonstrate our passion of Christ in our commitment to love one another including those who we politically oppose.
“Just as I have loved you, you also should love one another” – John 13:34 (NRSV)
A new altar call would not suggest that we are no longer sinners but would confess that we no longer wish to sin by ignoring the daily plight of millions of people who suffer needlessly. We have seen millions suffer poverty, war, homelessness and hunger as we rested comfortably in our homes without the least of bit interest in them or their suffering. In turn our rhetoric of speaking against injustice only makes our commitment to love one another as hollow as the words of most political speeches and speechmakers. Perhaps, it’s because many of us have not heard that loving one another involves action on behalf of those who experience injustice. This includes the mom who works 40hrs a week and can’t afford to pay the rent but makes too much to qualify for assistance, the child in Iraq who no longer has a home or even the family to fill one, or the father who through no choice of his own never sees the face of his unborn daughter.
In this new altar call loving one another would be expanded to include those we do not know but whom we know suffer to exist. Social Action on behalf of the poor, war ravaged or diseased would no longer be termed progressive policy or represent a secular or naïve utopian enterprise, but would be transformed into an answer to Christ’s call to love as he has so capably loved us. Then we can truly ask God to “forgive us our sins” because we would now know truly what they were and are, both individually and as a Christian community. Still the question remains - are we bold enough to speak of a new altar call or will this remain hidden in our thinking for another time when such things cause less controversy or embarrassment. Nevertheless if Jesus had not willingly been a cause of controversy and bore the shame of the cross where would we be, could our journey of faith have even begun?
"If any man would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow me… and he who does not take his cross and follow me is not worthy of me.” – Matthew 16:24 and 10:38 (NRSV)
- Clayton W. Smith, Technology Coordinator
Call to Renewal
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Peace Tax
Would you like your taxes to support killing, or would you like to go to prison?
On July 1, 2005, three conscientious objectors from New Jersey were sentenced to prison terms of 6, 24 and 27 months for refusing to pay taxes for military purposes. Please join us in asking Congress to respond to these harsh sentences by supporting the Religious Freedom Peace Tax Fund bill. This bill would allow conscientious objectors to pay their Federal taxes into a fund for non-military purposes only.
reinform action point: Take action now at http://www.democracyinaction.org/ncptf/campaign.jsp?campaign_KEY=1003
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reinform action points:
Fire Karl Rove: http://www.democraticaction.org/firerove/
Stop Extremism and Abuse of Power in the House: http://www.dccc.org/petitions/stopextremism.htm
Stop the Genocide in Darfur: http://ga3.org/campaign/DarfurPetition/w3uxwg62l55i357
Support the Peace Tax Fund bill: http://www.democracyinaction.org/ncptf/campaign.jsp?campaign_KEY=1003
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Donate to Make a Difference in the World
Lutheran World Relief
Catholic Relief Service
International Red Cross
Bread for the World
Healing Waters International
World Vision
Jesuit Refugee Service
Oxfam
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