August 6, 2005
"Hiroshima Day Speech"
Los Alamos, NM
Dear Friends, today we remember that sixty years ago our country drop the atomic bomb on Hiroshima and vaporized 140,000 people in a flash,
reducing them to ashes. This morning, some of us in Pax Christi New
Mexico, a region of the international Catholic Peace Movement, took up
the book of Jonah, and like the people of Nineveh, put on sackcloth and
ashes to repent of the sin of war and nuclear weapons, and we will go on
repenting for the sin of war and nuclear weapons until all nuclear
weapons are dismantled. We repeat what Jesus said long ago: "Repent Los
Alamos, for the kingdom of God, a new world of nonviolence, is at hand."
Sixty years ago, after we dropped the bomb on Hiroshima
, Mahatma Gandhi
said: "Unless the world adopts nonviolence, this will spell certain
suicide for humanity. I hold that those who invented the atomic bomb
have committed the gravest sin." A few weeks later, Gandhi said, "The
atomic bomb brought an empty victory to the Allied arms, but it resulted
for the time being in destroying Japan. What has happened to the soul of
the destroying nation is yet too early to see." Today, sixty years
later, we see what has happened to our nation. We are losing our soul as
a people, as Gandhi predicted. The only way to reclaim our soul is to
stop making these nuclear weapons, stop maintaining these nuclear
weapons, stop spending billions of dollars for these nuclear weapons,
stop blessing these nuclear weapons, and stop threatening to vaporize
millions more people with these weapons.
Today, we denounce these weapons as immoral, illegal, evil, sinful,
demonic, unnecessary, unjust and impractical. We denounce them as
idolatrous, as blasphemous, as an affront to the Creator, the God of
peace. If Saddam could not have a part of one weapon of mass
destruction, we cannot have tens of thousands of them. If President Bush
was looking for weapons of mass destruction and couldn't find them in
Iraq, today we tell him, we found them; they're right here in our
backyard, but we say to President Bush, you don't have to bomb New
Mexico. Just dismantle these weapons of mass destruction and we'll live
in peace with everyone.
Today, in this post September 11th age, after the terrorists attacks on
London, we say: nuclear weapons are the ultimate form of terrorism. They
hold the whole world hostage. But we cannot fight terrorism by being the
ultimate terrorists and threatening to use our weapons of mass
destruction on others. If we seriously want to end terrorism, we have to
dismantle these terrorist weapons which do not protect us or make us
safe, and instead, use those billions and billions of dollars to feed
the world's hungry, fund jobs, healthcare and education for all, and
clean up the whole earth. If we do that, we will not only end terrorism,
we will win the whole world over through our loving action and
international service.
Yesterday, I received an email message from the mayor of Hiroshima which
I would like to read:
"I am grateful for the opportunity to send this message to the campaign
for peace and disarmament at Los Alamos, New Mexico. Since our
devastating experience sixty years ago, Hiroshima has continually
appealed for the abolition of nuclear weapons and the realization of
lasting world peace. Unfortunately, many areas around the world remain
trapped in cycles of hatred, violence, and retaliation. Our planet still
bristles with vast arsenals of nuclear weapons, and the danger that such
weapons will be used is actually increasing.
"I find it deeply significant that the campaign for peace and
disarmament will be conducted in Los Alamos, New Mexico. Let me commend
all the people involved in the undertaking. I hope that you will hold
the memory of Hiroshima in your heart and continue to do everything in
your power to sow the seeds of nuclear abolition. I close with my best
wishes for all those involved." --Tadatoshi Akiba, Mayor, the city of
Hiroshima.
And so, like Mahatma Gandhi, Martin Luther King, Jr., Dorothy Day, and
the people of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, we choose the wisdom of
nonviolence. We pledge to practice nonviolence in our personal lives, to
be nonviolent toward all those around us, and to engage in nonviolent
action for justice and peace for the rest of our lives, until a new
world is born, a world without war, poverty, or nuclear weapons. Thank
you and God bless you.
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