One of my best friends told me today he preferred to read about the three eared rabbit and less about Iraq. I haven’t seen my dear three eared friend in a couple of months which makes me wonder if he’s been eaten by one of the darned cats in our neighborhood. I’m not into hurting any creatures even cats, but they’re murderin’ ways irritate me. We had a lovely cardinal nest right under our window we were enjoying the mother feeding her young until one of the cats ate the birds. Another form of terrorism I suppose.
I was at a conference yesterday and one of my colleagues introduced me to someone he was speaking with. He felt it necessary to describe me as a pacifist. I am a pacifist but not a passive-ist.
I cannot not speak out about issues that I think about and pray about. I believe very strongly that we are a warlike nation, although most Americans don’t see themselves that way. We are surrounded with all sorts of violence. We have violence on television and it doesn’t all come from Hollywood. A lot of it is in our newscasts. The Moveon.org and Rush Limbaugh insults are another form of hitting back. We have loads of structural violence wherein we wantonly hit and hurt the poor. In fact our system of healthcare or the lack of public health care is yet another form of violence and those most affected are the poor.
One of my favorite Gandhi quotes is, “I am prepared to die but there is no cause for which I am prepared to kill.”
This morning, my husband and I were talking about how many people are one illness away from bankruptcy. And about how there is no safety net. If you are lucky, there’s extended family, but if you aren’t… “Are there no prisons?”