Art Laffin: Closing Statement at Sept. 28 Trial

Following is the statement made by Art Laffin at the September 28, 2011, trial for those arrested last May for resisting the building of a new nuclear weapons plant in Kansas City.

Art Laffin's Closing Statement

We come before you, Judge Brand, as Catholic Workers who serve the    poor and work for peace. Our May 2 action at the site of the new Bomb  complex is rooted in a long tradition of nonviolent dissent and resistance, dating back to biblical times and up through our own American history, including the abolitionist movement, the suffragist movement, the union movement, the civil rights movements, anti-Vietnam war movement, and multiple other social justice movements. We act in the nonviolent tradition of people like Jesus, Gandhi, Martin Luther King, Jr., Caesar Chavez and Dorothy Day, the co-founder of the Catholic Worker of which I and many of us on trial today are members.

The evidence you have heard in our case is compelling. The city prosecutor has failed to prove its case beyond a reasonable doubt.

 --No city witness testified that they told us we were on private property.

 --We did not trespass but rather went on the road near the locked gate of the construction site to pray and sing. None of the three city witnesses ordered us to leave the property.

 --There were no signs where we were saying "No Trespassing", or whose property we are supposedly trespassed on. There were only signs on the fence which we did not enter.

Judge Brand, you have heard evidence that we acted to stop the construction of the new Kansas City Plant. We acted on May 2 because we believe that there is a causal connection between the action we took and and the immediate effect it would have on creating political change, namely that the US government stop making weapons of mass destruction.

We live with the daily constant threat that nuclear weapons could be used. The stated Pentagon policy is that we must be prepared to use whatever military means is necessary, including the use of nuclear weapons, to protect our national security interests and to make sure another rival superpower does not emerge to challenge US interests.

The Obama Administration's new Nuclear Posture Review, released last April, asserts that the U.S. defense system requires nuclear weapons as a deterrent to a nuclear attack on the United States or its allies.

The Kansas City is a key part of the US nuclear weapons complex which also includes new facilities at Los Alamos Nuclear Labs, and the Y-12 nuclear weapons facility in Oak Ridge, Tennessee. The Kansas City will continue making 85 percent of the non-nuclear components for the bomb: plant produces such as high-energy laser ignition systems, microwave hybrid microcircuit production, and miniature electromechanical devices.

 We acted on May 2 to also address am imminent harm posed by the Kansas City Plant. You heard testimony from Josh regarding the 150 people who died at the old plant from toxic chemicals and how the site has been contaminated. Health concerns at the current complex were highlighted this past April when the administrator of the General Services Administration confirmed that detectable levels of an unidentified carcinogen were found at that site. We are deeply concerned that more workers will be exposed to health hazards at the new plant.

How is it possible that in this time of massive national deficits and debt, when so many cities, including my city of Washington, D.C., and Kansas City, are experiencing a major economic crisis, when the Census Bureau reports that one out of six Americans live below the poverty line, that nearly 40 % of African American children live in poverty, that a new weapons facility, which is being built on 180 acres that used to grow soybeans, is being built for over $600 million and which will cost $1.2 billion over the next two decades? We believe the new KC Plant should be converted to make products that serve life. We call for transformation not annihilation.

Our action on May 2 was in accordance with our God's law and International  law.

With respect to God's law, we sought to uphold God's commands: Thou Shalt not kill, renounce all idolatry and do worship gods of metal, beat swords into plowshares, love your enemies.

We also call your attention to the words of Archbishop Francis Chullikatt, Apostolic Nuncio to the United Nations who came to Kansas City on July 1st and declared the following statement: "Viewed from a legal, political, security and most of all - moral - perspective, there is no justification today for the continued maintenance of nuclear weapons."

The Nuncio went on to condemn the current efforts to modernize the nuclear weapons infrastructures here in the U.S. as well as the other nuclear weapons states saying that, "With development needs across the globe far outpacing the resources being devoted to address them, the thought of pouring hundreds of billions of additional dollars into the world's nuclear arsenals is nothing short of sinful. It is the grossest misplacement of priorities and truly constitutes the very 'theft from the poor' which the Second Vatican Council condemned so long ago."

We submit it's a sin to build a nuclear weapon!

You also heard testimony from Dan and Jerica about International law. We sought to call attention to the fact that the new KC plant is in direct violation of the treaties and UN resolutions binding on the US. We submit that treaties which the U.S. has signed, have been, and continue to be blatantly violated. The Nuremberg Principles, which the United States helped write, state that individuals have a duty to prevent crimes against humanity from occurring and that if people don't act to prevent such crimes; they are actually complicit in them. We, who are on trial today, along with many friends, refuse to be complicit in these crimes, namely the possession and intention to use nuclear weapons.

Specifically we want call your attention to the fact that the U.S. is in violation of the UN Resolution 1653. It reads in part:

"Recalling that the use of weapons of mass destruction, causing unnecessary human suffering, was in the past prohibited, as being contrary to the laws of humanity and to the principles of international law, by international declarations and binding agreements, such as the Declaration of St. Petersburg of 1868, the Declaration of Brussels Conference of 1874, the Conventions of the Hague Peace Conferences of 1888 and 1907, and the Geneva Protocol of 1925, to which the majority of nations are still parties.

Considering that the use of nuclear and thermonuclear weapons would bring about indiscriminate suffering and destruction to humankind and civilization to an even greater extent than the use of those weapons declared by the aforementioned international declarations and agreements to be contrary to the laws of humanity and a crime under international law.

 Believing that the use of weapons of mass destruction, such as nuclear and weapons, is a direct negation of the high ideals and objectives which the United Nations has been established to achieve through the protection of succeeding generations from the scourge of war and through the preservation and promotion of their cultures,

I. Declares that:

a. The use of nuclear and thermonuclear weapons is contrary to the spirit, letter, and aims of the United Nations and, as such, a direct violation of the Charter of the United Nations."

 Therefore, if it's illegal to use nuclear weapons it's also illegal to make them!

We acted lawfully, in accordance with International law's and treaties that are binding on the US government and every U.S. court, including this one. International law is an integral part of U.S. constitutional & domestic law. Treaties and international executive agreements that the U.S. is party to, such as the UN Charter & Nuremberg Charter, are “the supreme law of the land” under Article VI of the U.S. Constitution. When the U.S. government clearly violates U.S. Constitution, when it develop and built the bomb in secrecy, when it used the Bomb twice in secrecy, when, now, a new weapons plant is being built without the consent of its citizens, we, as citizens, have no choice but to engage in nonviolent acts of resistance, such as we have.

We emphasize that our intent was not to commit a crime but to prevent a crime, to keep the law not break the law. Our action was in fact, an act of crime prevention.

The ultimate violence in our time is the existence and intent to use nuclear weapons which can destroy all life on earth. And Dr. King said that in a nuclear age the choice before us is not between violence and nonviolence, but nonviolence and nonexistence. We ask: Where is the judicial system when it comes to confronting the criminal acts of our government? We urge all judges and those involved in the legal profession to follow the example of Judge Ulf Panzer and 21other German Judges who were arrested in 1987 for doing a nonviolence blockade at the US military base in Mutlangen to stop the deployment of Pershing nuclear missiles.

This is an historic moment. If real disarmament is to occur, it will happen because judges like you spoke out, and people from across the political spectrum took nonviolent action to petition our government to make this a reality.

William Penn stated: "Always put justice above the law." And St. Paul writes: "Love is the fulfillment of the law." As you determine the outcome of this case, we appeal to your conscience to act in a spirit of justice that is rooted in love and find us innocent.

Judge Brand, you have legal ground to stand on in finding us not guilty. We appeal to you to exercise your moral and legal responsibility and to uphold international law and work together with other judges to issue an injunction barring further construction of the new Kansas City plant. Please join us!

________

Art Laffin <artlaffin@hotmail.com>

Dorothy Day CW House

503 Rock Creek Church Road, NW

Washington, D.C. 20010

Phone: 202.882.9649 or 202.829.7625

http://dccatholicworker.wordpress.com/

Carol Gilbert: Sentencing Statement for Y-12 Action

Judge Guyton, before I begin my prepared statement I want to apologize for how I look and hope my mind is operating because the last 31 hours have been hectic.  We were awakened at 2 am and left Ocilla at 4:30 am with the officer driving 80 -90 miles an hour plus about half of the trip texting.  I don’t know what the law is in TN or GA but in MD and in MI that is illegal. You might not think I am a very law and order person but my friends would tell you I am. We arrived about 11:30 am and were given a very nice lunch by the marshals. We then sat in the holding cell for most of the afternoon and then taken for processing.  We arrived in our cells at 10:30 pm and were taken out again at 5 am for court.  The jail also ran out of combs to give us. So, I apologize to you.

One of the charisms of my Dominican religious order is “to give to others the fruits of your contemplation.”

These past 131 days I have contemplated what if anything I would say to this court.

Four clarifications need to be made:

We do not choose jail. Anyone who has ever been in jail, prison, or even a lock-up would never choose it.  We do choose non-violent direct action. We do choose civil resistance enough to risk arrest and incarceration.  We do choose to try and uphold Article 6 of the United States Constitution (the supremacy clause) which was not allowed in this courtroom. We do choose life over death.  But, we do not choose jail.

I chose not to testify at trial because of your order which would silence my truth.  Your order spoke of lack of “imminence”. I believe that every human being and all species are my brothers and sisters.  These last 131 days have only strengthened for me how imminent our action was.

The United States cannot at one, refurbish and upgrade nuclear warheads at Y-12 Oak Ridge for deployment, threat or use and abide in good-faith by promises to adhere to humanitarian law, the laws of war limiting the use of force and our obligation in accordance with the U.S. Constitution, the U.S. Criminal Code and I understand the U.S. Military Code.

We met women both in Blount County Detention Center, Maryville, TN and Irwin County Detention Center, Ocilla, GA who had friends, relatives, spouses or themselves that worked or lived near Y-12.  We heard stories of cancers, deaths, class action suits, loss of jobs due to contamination, money awards, environmental contamination and radiated deer.  We heard from peacemakers where on 279 out of 365 days last year, the water leaving the Y-12 facility was contaminated beyond safe drinking water levels.  This speaks to me of imminence!

This court has no understanding of the difference between civil disobedience and civil resistance.  Civil disobedience means breaking a specific law.  One example from our history is the African-American population who broke the racist Jim Crow municipal ordinances by sitting at lunch counters legally prohibited from serving them.  Civil resistance is upholding the laws.  The necessity defense and Nuremburg principals say that citizens have a responsibility and a duty to resist illegal government crimes.

In many countries around the world and sometimes in this country people are acquitted for these non-violent actions.  Our Y-12 action on July 5, 2010 was an act of civil resistance.

I want to explain why Sister Ardeth Platte and I chose not to comply with supervised release after trial.  We had been on ten months of strict supervised release which we followed to the letter of the law.

When we appeared here in July of 2010 you gave us permission to go to our motherhouse in MI for meetings.  Usually, we have been on unsupervised release where we just signed a paper promising to return to court and not break any laws. So, when we got to Baltimore the papers did not read we could travel outside of MD.  We did finally get approval after many phone calls. Then in October we had a college student group and we wanted to take them to a trial in VA for a Pentagon peace action. When I called the probation department the officer said he would need to call TN.  He called back a few hours later and said if it was up to him he would give permission but after talking to TN he could not say yes. We could not participate in any demonstrations, vigils, rallies, prayer services, even our local death penalty vigil all of which were legal and First Amendment rights. Another hardship was parking when we had to visit the probation office as the costs were at least $8 and sometimes as high as $18 which were prohibitive for us. We could not work with the Dorothy Day Catholic Worker Community on Faith and Resistance Retreats held three times a year in D.C. We also knew that after the guilty verdict we would need to return to TN for PSI reports and sentencing and it seemed better to begin serving the time.

These 131 days most of which were spent in a “for profit, private jail” (and that is a whole other story) taught me again how we treat the poorest in this country-the throw aways:  pain clinics, addictions, trauma, conspiracy laws, no trials, plea bargains, mandatory minimums, over-crowded federal and state  prisons and lack of medical care – you know what happened to our Sister Jackie, may she rest in peace, and hers is one of many stories I could share.

I want to close with a story about our Sister Jackie Hudson.  When Jackie was giving a presentation she always ended by asking people “to take one step outside of their comfort zone.

 Each of the warheads prepared or refurbished at Y-12 is known and intended to threaten or inflict vast, indiscriminate and uncontrollable heat, blast and radiation.   Life as we know it would cease.

After ten months of strict supervised release and 131 days in jails we come before this court as drops of water...drops of water that over time can wear away the stone.

And so Judge Guyton, prosecutors, U.S. Marshalls, court workers and friends, I stand before you today, in the memory of our Sister Jackie, who was to be sentenced in this courtroom on Monday, September 19th and say, “Let’s all take one step outside of our comfort zone.” 

Jackie Hudson, Order of Preachers, PRESENTE!

Sentencing Statement

September 16, 2011 –Knoxville TN

Carol Gilbert, OP

(Y-12 Action July 5, 2010)

For information about sending letters to Y-12 protesters still imprisoned, click here:

http://orepa.org/supporting-jailed-y12-resisters/

Steve Baggarly: Sentencing Statement, September 19, 2011

The Y-12 plant in Oak Ridge enriched the uranium that is contained in every nuclear warhead in the United States’ arsenal. It first produced weapons-grade uranium for the atomic bomb dropped on Hiroshima, Japan on August 6, 1945. Kozo Itagaki was one mile from ground zero on that day:

Victims of the blast seemed like ghosts, without a vestige of clothing on their sore and burned bodies and it was hard to distinguish their sex if you didn’t take a close look. They were tottering toward the park, avoiding people who had sunk to the ground. They were asking for help and water in a faint voice, with their arms held out, with their skin peeled and hung down like potato skins. Supposedly they thought there must be some remedy if they could reach the top of the hill. But the next morning those who finally reached the top were dead, falling one upon another without being able to get medical treatment.

Together with some relatively healthy soldiers I spent days relieving injured people in the city, collecting corpses, burying and incinerating them, putting ashes in order, and so on. At around noon four days after the incident, when we were at rest, a boy (he looked like a third grader) came up with tottering steps and said, “Soldier, please give me water.” I looked at him and saw that the boy had a sign of jaundice. He also showed signs of dehydration. His hair had partly fallen out. Everyone there agreed that if he drank water he would die. I said I would bring him some a little later, and told him to lie down under the tree for a while. And we proceeded with our conversation. Suddenly I noticed the boy drinking sewage with his head down deep in the gutter nearby. He soon died.

Now I am a parent of a child and whenever I recall the happenings I imagine how hard the boy was crying for Father and Mother in his heart, or if the parents had been on the spot how much they would have felt frantic; and I regret that I didn’t let him drink water there and then.

In Hiroshima, 100,000 people were killed instantly and another 100,000 died painful deaths within the next few months. Just the US nuclear weapons ready for launching right now have over 55,000 times the explosive power of that first bomb, and there are more in reserve. As it is, the government is building three new nuclear bomb plants, including one at Oak Ridge, and is in the process of rehabbing and upgrading every weapon in its stockpile to make them even more powerful and to ensure they last into the next century. Through Y-12 nuclear weapons complex the Department of Energy, the US military, Congress, the Federal Courts, the White House and the American people conspire daily in preparation and rehearsal for the end of the world.

If the nation doesn’t repent of its nuclear idolatry, we won’t even have the luxury of feeling regret should anything like the following words of Jimmy Carter come to be:

In an all-out nuclear war, more destructive power than all of World War II would be unleashed every second during the long afternoon it would take for the missiles and bombs to fall. A World War II every second—more people killed in the first hours than all the wars in history put together. The survivors, if any, would live in despair amid the ruins of a civilization that had committed suicide.

That such a possibility exists in a world filled with children is unspeakable evil. The United States, as inventor of nuclear weapons, the only nation ever to use them on human beings, and as perpetual leader in the nuclear arms race, bears the greatest responsibility to ensure such mass suicide never happens. At this critical time in history, if there is to be any hope for stopping the proliferation of nuclear weapons and moving toward a nuclear weapons-free world, the United States must make good on international commitments to disarm. It must act in spite of fear. With Manhattan Project-like relentlessness, we must lead the world in a nuclear DIS-armament race.

If we as a people stop putting our faith in gods of metal, our trust in superior firepower, seeking salvation in the DEATH OF EVERYTHING… If we depart from evil and do good, seek peace and pursue it, I believe we will see the goodness of the Lord in the land of the living.

For information about sending letters to Y-12 protesters still imprisoned, click here:

http://orepa.org/supporting-jailed-y12-resisters/

Patrick O'Neill: Y-12 protestors' sentences too harsh for the charges

Photo by John P. Kernodle

by Patrick O'Neill

There's a saying among lawbreakers: "If you can't do the time, don't do the crime." There's also another saying for law-keepers: "Make the punishment fit the crime."

The latter was not the case recently in Knoxville as U.S. Magistrate Judge Bruce Guyton handed down several severely punitive sentences of up to eight months in federal prison with no chance of parole for defendants found guilty in U.S. District Court of misdemeanor trespass at the Oak Ridge Y-12 nuclear weapons facility on July 5, 2010.

On that sweltering summer day more than 14 months ago, I watched 13 people, among them four Catholic nuns and a Catholic priest, step onto a patch of grass — moving from state to federal property — in broad daylight and in full view of more than 100 uniformed police officers from several Tennessee and federal jurisdictions.

Acting in the nonviolent tradition of Indian pacifist leader Mohandas Gandhi, the group, which stood opposed to the production, testing and possible use of nuclear weapons, engaged in open resistance to Y-12's nuclear weapons program. After a few minutes the friendly group (several police officers kindly gave water to some of the elderly folks who were wilting in the heat) was rounded up by police in what was a gentle, largely symbolic and moving act of civil disobedience. Those of us on the other side of the fence cheered our friends as they were handcuffed and taken to jail.

The folks arrested at Y-12 that day were among a cadre of some of the nation's best-known anti-war and anti-nuclear activists who had come together at nearby Maryville College for "Resistance for a Nuclear-Free Future," a weekend conference about ways our nation and the world can move out from under the ominous cloud of nuclearism. Locally, the conference was sponsored by the Oak Ridge Environmental Peace Alliance.

The 13 defendants (now 12 after the untimely death of Sister Jackie Hudson) followed a noble U.S. abolitionist tradition in which people of conscience take a stand, risk personal freedom and subject themselves to arrest in order to challenge unjust government policies.  In past eras, civil disobedience has been successfully employed to oppose British tyranny (the Boston Tea Party); to stop slavery and segregation, to gain suffrage for women and in opposition to the Vietnam War.

Those of us who are nuclear abolitionists believe nuclear weapons represent the preeminent threat to human survival. Preventing nuclear war requires abolishing those weapons of mass destruction. There has never been a weapon developed that was not eventually used in war. Any use of nuclear weapons would be horrific beyond imagination. Untold millions could die. Preventing nuclear war is the life's work of many of those arrested at Y-12. These are good people who devote their lives to warning the rest of us about the moral imperative of nuclear disarmament.

While most readers likely believe some form of punishment was in order for the 12, it is also critical that said punishment be reasonable in light of the offense. The response of the federal government in Knoxville was unreasonable. Guyton imposed overly punitive sentences on most of these activists for what was a minor transgression of the law. Three of my friends — Bonnie Urfer, Michael Walli and Steve Baggarly — will miss Christmas with their families this year because of their harsh sentences.

Throughout their sentencing, Assistant U.S. Attorney Melissa Kirby stressed to Guyton the importance of imposing stiff sentences as a deterrent. Rather than concern themselves with deterrence, Guyton and Kirby would have better served society if they had recognized the important role those defendants play in keeping a check on the U.S. military-industrial complex. Our democracy needs people like those 13 brave folks, who stood on principle and took a risk for peace. Why deter them? Their punishment surely did not fit the crime, but those good people of conscience are doing the time for the rest of us.

For information about sending letters to Y-12 protesters still imprisoned, click here:

http://orepa.org/supporting-jailed-y12-resisters/

Patrick O'Neill pmtoneill@aol.com 

is cofounder of the Fr. Charlie Mulholland Catholic Worker House in Garner, N.C.

Story Source:

http://www.knoxnews.com/news/2011/sep/24/y-12-protestors-sentences-too-harsh-for-the/

Tom Cornell: Valuing Labor

by Tom Cornell

It’s been a year since I’ve been able to speak to you from this spot.  It was shingles, a severe case of shingles.  And after the shingles cleared up, neuralgia set in, nerve pain where the shingles had been. The pain is enough to leave anyone limp.  It’s still there, but not as bad.  There’s a vaccine now to prevent shingles.  It costs a couple of hundred dollars.  Medicare will pick up much of the cost.  You don’t want to go through this.  I shouldn’t complain, really.  I was young for a long time, 76 years.  Now, all of a sudden, I’m old.  At 77 I suppose it’s time.  Get that shot!  Now let’s take a look at today’s readings.

Today’s Gospel reading is not a recommendation for the reform of labor law.  (By the way, have you noticed that politicians use the word “reform” when they actually mean “weaken” or “destroy” in talking about Social Security or Medicare?  But that’s another matter.)  Here in today’s Gospel we have a parable of Jesus about the kingdom of heaven. 

The owner of the vineyard stands for God.  The laborers are all of us.  God keeps looking for more laborers all through the day.  Some of us came to the vineyard early.  Or rather, we were brought to baptism as infants and grew up and were confirmed in the Faith and never abandoned it.  Others, though baptized, never really appropriated the Faith until later in life.  They were baptized but not evangelized.  Still others sought baptism as adults or even as old folks at the verge of death, coming to belief literally only at the last.  I think of an old uncle of mine, long gone, Uncle Lawrence, Zio Laurienz’.  He went to church three times in his life, and twice they had to carry him in, for his baptism and his funeral.  He made it on his own for his wedding, at age 14!  He was a skeptic and a cynic; he mocked the Church and the priests and all of us faithful who supported them.  But at the last I pray that he held his hand out to Jesus, as Peter did when he was sinking, and asked for mercy.  Did he get it?  Let us hope so.

“Seek the Lord while he may be found,” Isaiah warns.   While he may be found!  We must not presume.

“He is near to all who call upon him,” sings our Psalm.  “He is kind and merciful… compassionate to all his works… near to all who call upon him.”

Paul was touched by God mightily on the Road to Damascus, thrown from his horse.  Then he was so filled with energy and enthusiasm for the Faith that he, more than any of the other Apostles, spread the Faith throughout the Mediterranean world.  And yet he so yearned for the kingdom that he could write, “I long to be freed from this life and to be with Christ… . Yet it is more important that I live for your sakes.  Conduct yourselves, then, in a manner worthy of the gospel of Christ.” 

In today’s parable all the workers get the same wage no matter how long they worked.  This is a metaphor for entrance into God’s kingdom.  Is that fair?  In God’s economy it is!  Where would any of us be if God treated us as we deserve?  Would any of us be jealous or complain if we, who have born the heat of the day, faithful all our lives, were to find Uncle Lawrence at the Lord’s banquet table in heaven?  I’d be overjoyed to see the old rascal!  So we pray for our dead, that at the last they held out their hand to the Lord.  We can pray now for them then because with God there is no time. 

There is one startling sentence in this reading that deserves a closer look.  “I am free to do as I please with my money, am I not?” says the master of the vineyard.  No, my friends, he is not.  Remember this is a parable, a metaphorical teaching device.  Jesus was not giving a lesson in social justice in this story but a lesson in the infinite mercy of God.  But it poses an important question.  I have heard it said many times, “It’s my money.   I earned it by my own hard work.  I can do with it what I please!  Can’t I?”

You can, brother, yes you certainly can, but you may not!  Not if you wish to conduct yourself in a manner worthy of the gospel of Christ.  Catholic Social Teaching for over one hundred and ten years has been strong and clear on this.  On the one hand, all God’s creation is meant for the benefit of all God’s children.  On the other hand, the Church defends the right to private property.  That seems like a contradiction.  How are these principles to be harmonized?  By the principle of the common good.  We have a right to own property, not just our toothbrushes but productive property as well, our farms and factories and shops, most definitely, and we have a right to the fruits of our labor.  “Property is proper to man” (Peter Maurin).  But that right is not absolute.  It is limited by the requirements of the common good (cf. Rerum Novarum, Pope Leo XIII, 1891).  As individuals we deal with balancing our rights and our needs with the rights and needs of others in the privacy of our own consciences.  As a community we determine tax law and regulations democratically, whether to have them and how much. 

One of the functions of government is the redistribution of wealth (cf. Mater et Magistra, Pope Paul John XXIII, 1961).  We’ve all played the board game Monopoly.  How many winners are there at the end?  One!  Unregulated capitalism results in money and power funneling up into fewer and fewer hands.  The game Monopoly was invented by a pious Quaker lady to teach that very lesson.  The problem with unregulated capitalism is that “ it doesn’t get enough capital to enough people” (G.K. Chesterton).  

A just, not to say a Christian society will not allow the defenseless to fend for themselves.  Twenty-five years ago, our bishops declared that all economic and social policy initiatives should take into account first their effect upon the most vulnerable among us, the poor, the young, the sick, the elderly and the unborn.  Not as an after-thought, but first and above all (cf. Economic Justice for All, USCC, 1986). 

God will not be outdone in generosity, and man will not be outdone in greed and selfishness, or so it would seem.  But then we see acts of self-sacrificing generosity as at the Twin Towers ten years ago and our hope is renewed in the Spirit, for still “the Holy Ghost over the bent world broods, with warm breast and with ah, bright wings.” (God’s Grandeur, Gerard Manley Hopkins).  He is near to all who call upon him.

It’s so good to be back.  Twenty-three years ago, when I was ordained a deacon, I didn’t realize how much it would mean to me to proclaim the Gospel and to break open the word of God with you.  It is a great privilege, one I don’t deserve.  But neither does anyone else.  There are others in this congregation who might hear the call to diaconate or to priesthood, or to the religious life as a sister or brother.  Pray for them.  None of us is worthy.  But God’s grace and mercy are infinite.  We don’t get what we deserve.  Thanks be to God! 

Deacon Tom Cornell is a veteran of the Catholic Worker Movement, former national secretary of the Catholic Peace Fellowship, and a founder of Pax Christi, U.S.A. This sermon was originally given at St. Mary’s Church, Marlboro, N.Y., on September 18, 2011.

25 Sunday A  #133

Is 55, 6-9

Ps 145

Phil 1, 20c-24. 27a

Mt 20, 1-16

Art Laffin on Upcoming Trial for Kansas City Witness, May 2011

by Art Laffin

I'm writing to let you know that I, along with other Catholic Workers, will go on trial in Kansas City on Wednesday, September 28th for the May 2nd nonviolent peace witness at the new nuclear weapons facility that is being constructed in Kansas City. Below is a link to an article by NCR reporter Joshua McElwee about the witness and the new Bomb plant.

As I/we go to trial I am mindful of the following realities:

• The ultimate violence in our time is the existence and intent to use nuclear weapons which can destroy our sacred earth.
• The stated Pentagon policy is that the U.S. must be prepared to use whatever military means are necessary, including the use of nuclear weapons, to protect its national security interests and to make sure another rival superpower does not emerge to challenge U.S. interests.
• U.S. and Russian nuclear weapons are still on high alert and are on "launch on warning" status.
• Even though the U.S. and Russia plan on reducing the # of nuclear warheads from roughly 10,000 apiece to 1,555 over the next seven years, the U.S. plans to spend $65 billion over the next ten years to upgrade the existing nuclear arsenal.
• The Kansas City Nuclear Weapons plant is expected to cost over $670 million to construct and some $1.2 billion over the next two decades. This plant will make 85 percent of all non-nuclear components for the U.S. nuclear arsenal.
• The new Census Bureau reports that one out of six Americans is living below the poverty line, including nearly 40 percent of African American children. Also nearly 50 million Americans are without health insurance.

Other friends arrested for this action who pleaded guilty back in July were given fines and community service.  It is my sincere hope that in our trial, I/we will be able to continue the court witness conveying that nuclear weapons are immoral and illegal, and that the primary intent of our action was to uphold God's law and International law and not to commit a crime. We will again assert that nuclear weapons endangers God's holy creation, that they constitute a direct theft from the poor, and that these weapons must be abolished now! And that we were, in fact, engaging in an act of "crime prevention."

In the face of all the efforts by the local political and economic powers, in conjunction with the D.O.E. and Honeywell, to do whatever it takes to build this new Bomb plant, I am so deeply grateful to the Cherith Brook and Holy Family Catholic Worker communities and Peace Planters group for continuing their nonviolent campaign to close this new Bomb plant. They are a great light in the darkness!!!

Please pray for us, the judge and the prosecutor as we seek to bear witness to the truth. And please pray for friends imprisoned for the Disarm Now Plowshares action and the nonviolent resistance action last year at the Y-12 nuclear weapons facility at Oak Ridge, TN.

We keep our eyes on the prize and hold on!!!

With gratitude, Art

Art Laffin

artlaffin@hotmail.com

Dorothy Day Catholic Worker

503 Rock Creek Church Road, NW

Washington, D.C. 20010

Phone: 202.882.9649 or 202.829.7625

http://dccatholicworker.wordpress.com/

FIFTY ARRESTED PROTEST NUCLEAR WEAPONS PLANT

http://ncronline.org/news/peace/over-50-arrested-protesting-nuclear-weapons-plant

Sue Frankel-Streit: Rain of Justice

by Sue Frankel-Streit

Steady rain all day today—the earth mourns Troy Davis, a symbol of so many people, creatures, plants and streams killed by oppressive institutions. Seems many in my circle of women took this one pretty hard; perhaps because it was so premeditated, so contested, and could have so easily been prevented.  Even my 13 year-old daughter was up last night reading Democracy Now’s reports on the case.

Troy Davis

And while part of me was proud of her for caring, another part was even sadder that despite so much work by so many, her young heart must also hold the pain of our failure to save the innocent.

What do you do when righteous anger just doesn’t touch the grief? Rain, I suppose.

Last week our community hosted some North Carolina activist elders who were presenting at the “Military Industrial Complex at 50” conference in Charlottesville. One night as we sat talking about the state of the world one of them stopped mid-sentence and turned to a young woman in the room. “I’m so sorry,” she said with tears in her eyes. ”I want you to know we really tried.”

I’ve been thinking a lot about that apology lately. And about how, when I told another sister that our friend Steve had gotten 8 months for trespassing at the nuclear weapons production plant in Tennessee, her eyes filled up, and she just looked at me through that mist of anger and grief, the same apology in her eyes.

We have tried; we are trying. And it is not enough. So we feel guilty, paralyzed, exhausted, depressed, anxious…and most of all, sad. Some days, like this rainy day-after another unjust state-sponsored execution, it all seems too much.

But the one thing I know won’t help is giving up. So I helped the kids put their boots on and we went outside to jump in puddles and look for a rainbow. No rainbow today, but by the time our boots were soaked through, the sun was out. Wherever Troy Davis is now, I hope it feels like that moment when the world suddenly brightens after a long rain, and everything is washed clean and shining in the sun and everything feels possible again for a moment.

Sue Frankel-Streit littleflowercw@cvalink.com

is a member of the Little Flower Catholic Worker Farm in Louisa, VA