Is Abortion Different from Other Violence?
by Julia Smucker Four Ways of Isolating One Issue Any advocate of the consistent life ethic (CLE) can expect to encounter people who share their pro-nonviolence position on certain issues but depart from it on others. And among those working on various peace and life issues, including those of us who adhere to the CLE,…
Ireland’s Votes for Violence: Sinn Féin and Abortion
by Maria Horan Not Surprising It may surprise those outside the Republic of Ireland that Sinn Féin (SF) came in second in the recent Irish elections. However, people voting for a political party with a strong connection to the IRA and many of the murders in the North during the Troubles and which still refuses…
“Remember Pearl Harbor—Keep ‘Em Dying”: War and Racism in the Pacific
by John Whitehead American planes dropped firebombs on Tokyo 75 years ago, on the night of March 9-10, 1945, killing an estimated 80,000-100,000 people. The firebombing began a six-month-long American bombing campaign against 66 Japanese cities that culminated in the two atomic bombings and killed roughly 400,000 people in total. This killing campaign was the…
A Consistent Day in the Neighborhood
by Andrew Hocking While Tom Hanks plays Mister Rogers in the 2019 movie A Beautiful Day in the Neighborhood, the plot centers on a journalist named Lloyd Vogel. When assigned to write a short piece depicting Fred Rogers as a hero, he would much rather uncover moral failure and write an exposé. His cynical approach…
Racism and the Death Penalty
by David Cruz-Uribe, OFS The death penalty, the state-sanctioned killing of criminals, continues to be a part of the American justice system. While 140 countries have abolished the death penalty in law or in practice, including every other industrialized democracy (except Japan and Taiwan), executions are still regularly carried out in the United States. Its…
In Defense of “Yes, But” Rhetoric: The Case of the Suleimani Assassination
by John Whitehead The U.S. government’s assassination of Iranian General Qasem Suleimani began the year 2020 with violence, and the possibility of more violence. The assassination, in retaliation for Suleimani’s alleged involvement in attacks on U.S. personnel in Iraq (and supposedly to prevent further attacks), threatened to escalate into open war between the United States…
Fifty Years of Protesting for Peace
by Lisa Stiller Fifty years ago I was running from tear gas on the university campus in Madison, Wisconsin. Massive protests had erupted opposing the Vietnam War. Classes were often canceled as students clashed with police and the National Guard during the two years I attended school there. I was right out front, making protest…
Purple Sash Revolution
by C.J. Williams Past and present converged at Nancy Pelosi’s office in Washington D.C., January 22nd, 2020. It was the anniversary of Roe v. Wade. Women across the nation were celebrating the centennial of women’s suffrage. And a large crew of women — myself included — were tying it all together with a purple…
March for Life 2020
Comment: The Fundamental Reason Roe Must be Overturned by Richard Stith Roe v. Wade has done much more than legalize abortion up to birth. By making abortion a constitutional right, our Supreme Court has validated and legitimated abortion. In a presumptively just society, like ours, an individual citizen has a right to rely on the…
“An Inferno That Even the Mind of Dante Could Not Envision”: Martin Luther King on Nuclear Weapons
Compiled by John Whitehead We remember this time of year the life and public ministry of Martin Luther King. Although famous for championing racial and economic justice and nonviolence, an aspect of King’s thought that has received relatively less attention is his opposition to the ultimate tools of violence, nuclear weapons. Historian Vincent Intondi, in…