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Video: Watch the Trailer for ‘Hit & Stay’ – The Catonsville 9 and Beyond
Hit & Stay explores a little known group of nonviolent activists. They broke into draft boards, exposed corporate ties to the war in Vietnam, and went to prison in an attempt to stop the killing on both sides. The Catonsville Nine and the actions that followed turned priests, nuns, and college students into fugitives and targets of the FBI.
Staring: Daniel & Phil Berrigan, Elizabeth McAlister, Noam Chomsky, Ramsey Clark, Amy Goodman, Laura Whitehorn, Howard Zinn, and many of the men and women who participated in draft board raids between 1968-1974. They prevented thousands of young men from being sent to the wars in Southeast Asia.
The film will premier at the Chicago Underground Film Festival on March 9, 2013.
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First Friday of Lent: Is Alligator a Fish?
As a Catholic with a Louisiana-Catholic grandmother, I could not resist posting this letter from the Archbishop of New Orleans from a few Lents back. If you want to read the hilarious comments from when it was first posted (and you aren’t afraid of The American Conservative), then check them out.My favorites?
For the Monty Python fan:“Now given that witches are made of wood and thus float, does that mean that alligators, being a species of fish and thus also float are witches? Or does it mean that alligators are made of wood?”
For the Byzantine:
“I’ve heard that both Catholic and Orthodox Lenten Fast laws classify beaver meat as a kind of fish, not that I’d every take advantage of that loophole.”
For the Bible geek:
“While I’m in total agreement with you concerning Abp Aymond’s apostolic authority, please remember that ancient Hebrew had no word for reptile. Ergo, just as the Hebrew words “brother” and “sister” actually mean cousin, auntie, BFF, and old lady from down the street when referring to the family of the Lord; in the same way “fish” in Hebrew actually refers not only to alligator, nutria, and capybara, but to crocodile, cayman, eel, and platypus as well.
As an alternative exegesis of John 21, it is entirely possible that the apostles were grilling alligator with a bit of platypus by the shore of Genesseret, but our Lord thought it was icky and changed it into tilapia when they weren’t looking.”
Seriously, this is one of the best comment threads I’ve come across in a long time. There’s even a Lenten recipe for bayou delicacy nutria. (Don’t even ask ….)
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Valentine’s Day Poem: “Positioning” by Rose Marie Berger
Artist Kypros Kypros Positioning
I didn’t count the rings
on the oak we took down—crane and all—but think
there must have been a hundredor more. I’d rather,
I’m sure, count the hairson your head
or finger the spanof your spine, my hand
on your smooth skin,until we are old enough
to have limbsthat can no longer bear
the weight of a high windor surprise snow.
Rose Marie Berger is a Catholic peace activist and poet. This poem is part of an unpublished collection.
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The Unsettled Ashes of Lent
In an act of Ash Wednesday repentance, nearly 50 of our friends were arrested in front of the White House to keep pressure on the Obama administration and new Secretary of State John Kerry to “repent and turn away” from the Keystone XL and lead America into a low-carbon, non-fossil fuel future.
Earlier Wednesday morning, I joined about a dozen others at an Ash Wednesday service outside the U.S. Capitol with undocumented DREAMers and allies who were preparing to testify at the Senate hearings on immigration reform. With fasting and prayer, we asked God to drive out the demons of dehumanization that thrive under our current broken legal structure.
May the ashes never settle. Stir us up, O Lord, with the fire of your Holy Spirit.
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Lent: Ashes, Ashes
"The tide comes in; the tide goes out again washing the beach clear of what the storm dumped. Where there were rocks, today there is sand; where sand yesterday, now uncovered rocks."
Paula Meehan ("Ashes") -
Video: Ash Wednesday & Lent in 2 Minutes
Our friends over at Busted Halo, present Lent for the newbie, the unchurched, the low Protestant, the spiritual seeker, the inter-curious, and all of us who need a brush up.
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No To Keystone XL: Playing Chicken With Climate Change, We All Lose
Michael Klare’s written another good summary of where we are with the Keystone XL pipeline and why it’s so important to stop it.If you can’t join the thousands for Forward on Climate on the National Mall on Sunday, 17 February, please pray that President Obama, new Secretary of State John Kerry, Canadian foreign minister John Baird, and TransCanada CEO Russ Girling will find a way out of this predicament. It’s gone way past access to oil or American jobs.
Starting today, every decision we make has to move us toward a low-carbon future. Moving ahead with the Keystone XL takes us 180 degrees in the wrong direction. And pray for all those who are putting their bodies on the line to stop construction along the Keystone XL route–facing injury,jail, fines, and loss of homes and land–for our sake.
You can send a note to President Obama asking him not to approve the Keystone XL here.
Michael T. Klare writes:
Presidential decisions often turn out to be far less significant than imagined, but every now and then what a president decides actually determines how the world turns. Such is the case with the Keystone XL pipeline, which, if built, is slated to bring some of the “dirtiest,” carbon-rich oil on the planet from Alberta, Canada, to refineries on the U.S. Gulf Coast. In the near future, President Obama is expected to give its construction a definitive thumbs up or thumbs down, and the decision he makes could prove far more important than anyone imagines. It could determine the fate of the Canadian tar-sands industry and, with it, the future well-being of the planet. If that sounds overly dramatic, let me explain. …
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Can A Pope Resign? Well, It’s Been Awhile …
St. Peter's Square begins to fill as news of BXVI's resignation filters out. After nearly eight years since being named to the chair of Peter, Pope Benedict XVI announced this morning that he is resigning at the end of February.
If you live in the post-Modern, post-Christendom uber-hip world, you might not understand the full weight of this morning’s announcement.
A pope hasn’t “resigned” in 600 years.
“…in today’s world, subject to so many rapid changes and shaken by questions of deep relevance for the life of faith, in order to govern the bark of Saint Peter and proclaim the Gospel, both strength of mind and body are necessary, strength which in the last few months, has deteriorated in me to the extent that I have had to recognize my incapacity to adequately fulfill the ministry entrusted to me. For this reason, and well aware of the seriousness of this act, with full freedom I declare that I renounce the ministry of Bishop of Rome, Successor of Saint Peter, entrusted to me by the Cardinals on 19 April 2005, in such a way, that as from 28 February 2013, at 20:00 hours, the See of Rome, the See of Saint Peter, will be vacant and a Conclave to elect the new Supreme Pontiff will have to be convoked by those whose competence it is.”
As a cradle Catholic who loves the church enough to fight with her when she fails to live up to her gospel call, the words “the See of Saint Peter, will be vacant” are words that strike a dark loneliness in my stomach and soul.
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Video: Dorothy Day’s ‘Pacifist, Anarchist Movement’
Religion & Ethics Newsweekly ran an 8-minute segment on Dorothy Day and the Catholic Worker movement on Feb. 8.
If you’ve never heard Dorothy speak for herself, here’s your chance. Wonderful clips! As well as excellent interviews with heroes of the movement: Robert Ellsberg, Jane Sammon, Carmen Trotta, Joanne Kennedy, and Patrick Jordan.
http://dgjigvacl6ipj.cloudfront.net/media/swf/PBSPlayer.swf
Watch The Life of Dorothy Day on PBS. See more from Religion & Ethics NewsWeekly.
“The Catholic Worker is essentially a school, you might say. I mean, it’s a place where you…where you…a lot of young people come to us…It’s a pacifist, anarchist movement, and they come to us to learn more about this point of view of beginning a change from the bottom up, rather than from the top down—through unions and credit unions. You do away with banks by credit unions…you do away with interest, you do away with…by mutual aid. You do away with possession of goods by sharing.”–Dorothy Day, interview in 1974
Learn more here.
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Super Bowl Lights Out: Our Half-Lit Climate Future
“Last night’s power outage at the Super Bowl gave the world a glimpse of the daily challenges many New Orleans residents still face in the wake of rebuilding post-Katrina. Thanks to misplaced priorities that place war and partisan politics over our nation’s infrastructure needs, cities like New Orleans suffer. From New Jersey to New Orleans and beyond, we have watched recovery dollars spent in discriminatory ways. Suburban, more affluent areas and tourist zones get the lion’s share and communities — especially low resource communities and communities of color — wait for months and even years for relief. Studies published by the National Housing Institute and others have shown how these historic patterns of racism exacerbate present-day gaps but there has been no significant policy effort to address this inequity. The fact that New Orleans got the lights back on so quickly is a testament to its resilience and know-how. However, cities cannot put the lights back on or undertake the gargantuan task of rebuilding without their fair share of public dollars.”–Makani Themba, executive director of The Praxis Project
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Rose Marie Berger 