A nation which can prefer disgrace to danger is prepared for a master, and deserves one! - Alexander Hamilton
The issue today is the same as it has been throughout all history, whether man shall be allowed to govern himself or be ruled by a small elite. - Thomas Jefferson
The greatest tyrannies are always perpetrated in the name of the noblest causes. - Thomas Paine
The doorstep to the temple of wisdom is a knowledge of our own ignorance - Benjamin Franklin
Categories: Quotes
Zwei Dinge bedinke, woher, wohin
Dan hat dein Leben den rechten Sinn.
Consider two things: from where, to where
Then your life will have its true meaning. – FRANZ JÄGERSTÄTTER
“From the very beginning of the war, he contended that it was being waged by “bad men”, playing a “crooked game”. Quite simply, he concluded, “I cannot play the game. The game is a lie.”
On June 1, Pope Benedict XVI approved a series of decrees, issued by the Congregation for the Causes of Saints, that attributed martyrdom to Jagerstatter, a husband and father of three who was beheaded on August 9, 1943, for refusing any collaboration with the Nazis.
Jagerstatter is an example of a Catholic whose conscience forbade him to participate in war (see “In Light of Eternity: Franz Jagerstatter, Martyr,” published by the Catholic Peace Fellowship n 2003).
This young man, despite a wild and rebellious youth, in his adulthood became a devout Catholic, a third-order Franciscan, and a church sexton for his local parish.
Jagerstatter read and prayed over the Scripture and the lives of the Saints, and his conscience was shaped and formed by his active participation in the sacramental life of the Church. He understood that he was a part of the Kingdom of God and that, as a Catholic, his allegiance was to his “Eternal Homeland” – not to “the Fatherland.”
Although advised by his parish priest and local bishop that his duty was to serve his country and preserve his own life for the sake of his family, Jagerstatter held firm to his belief that to cooperate with the Nazis was to cooperate with evil, and so refused to join the military. Franz Jagerstatter was a conscientious objector, one to whom we look to, and now can pray to, for guidance.
Categories: news
[The following are some notes from the talk last Saturday by Dale and Susan Recinella about the Death Penalty.]
Last Saturday, at St. Joan of Arc parish church in Boca Raton, Dale and Susan Recinella gave a 3+ hour presentation on their ministry to death row inmates, the families of these inmates, and the families of the victims of murder. The bishops of Florida promoted the presentation and our own bishop, Bishop Barbarito, was there to introduce the Recinellas and recite an opening prayer.
Though there was a good representation from our Pax Christi group, I wish the overall crowd had been larger. We are the choir, after all.
I found the presentation very powerful and emotional, and was riveted to my chair the entire time.
The Recinellas are both very grounded in traditional Catholicism. The presentation began with a video from the American Catholic bishops, condemning the death penalty. There is no debate going on in the Catholic Church about capital punishment – the bishops have spoken. A statement was issued first in the 1980’s and reaffirmed in more recent years.
Through their stories, the Recinellas took us through a personal experience of what the death penalty is.
Dale, a former business attorney, is a lay minister to the almost 400 death row inmates who are housed at the state Prison in Raiford Florida. In order to minister to these men, the state requires that he not practice law. This is perhaps a blessing, Dale says, because every prisoner would want his legal help. Even though he does not practice, he keeps his license current.
Dale is also a serious Catholic. He knows and practices his faith. His legal and spiritual background gives a lot of credence to his understanding and explanation of what the death penalty is all about.
When a death warrant is signed, the inmate can then choose a spiritual advisor. If they choose Dale, he is then responsible for preparing the prisoner for death. This is very, very different from preparing a person who is suffering from disease for death, he says. He is preparing a healthy person who wants to live, to be killed by other human beings. Dale spends the last 5 hours with the inmate, accompanies to him to the gurney, and then witnesses the execution.
Susan Recinella is a professional psychologist who works with severely mentally ill women at the state hospital.
Many times, when a man is executed, the family comes to the prison a week ahead of time. There are no services provided for these families. On the day of the execution they are allowed, after a thorough body search, to have a contact visit with the inmate to be executed. Then 5 hours before the execution they are required to leave the premises. Susan provides a quiet place for these people to be during the actual execution, many times a Catholic Church. She asks: “what do they need?” – which is mostly to be together. Susan is able to provide that presence and support.
After the execution, Dale returns to where Susan and the family are gathered, and tells them about the death. They are anxious for details. And then they talk about their memories.
It is clear that the ministry to death row inmates and their families – that of Susan and Dale – is one ministry.
There were many aspects to the presentation that Dale and Susan gave, one of which was the spiritual burden of those who minister to prisoners. How do you keep from falling into the abyss of darkness? There is a deeper abyss, Dale says, the abyss of God’s love for all of us. You have to discover that abyss.
Prayer will sustain you, Susan says. You continually open yourself to what is being asked of you, moment to moment. “I see that God is asking us to come closer in this ministry, to show us who God is.”
Dale recounted times when the innocence of a condemned man was indisputable, and there was proof of that innocence, and yet the laws surrounding the death penalty are such that this evidence is not allowed to stop an execution. He asked us, again and again, “who is the killing for?”
We say that it is for the victim’s family, but even when the family of the victim insists that they do not want the murderer to be killed, the law does not allow them to interfere.
Dale named the darkness of the death penalty: the system of attorneys, judges, and politicians who profit monetarily from the business of Capital Punishment.
- by beth cioffoletti
Categories: Death penalty · local events
I thank God that at this hour I am dangerous to the war profiteers of this country who rob the people on the one hand, and rob and debase the government on the other; and then with their pockets and wallets stuffed with the filthy, bloodstained profits of war, wrap the sacred folds of the Stars and Stripes about them and [about] their blatant hypocrisy to the world.
Kate Richards O’Hare’s Address To the Court Proceedings on the Sentencing of Mrs. Kate Richards O’Hare by Hon Martin J. Wade, 1 P. M., Friday, Dec 14, 1917.
http://rs6.net/tn.jsp?t=gdmp8acab.0.u7np8acab.iqnuv6bab.19271&ts=S0254&p=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.binghamton.edu%2Fwomhist%2Fkro%2Fdoc006b.htm
When people who are honestly mistaken learn the truth, they will either cease being mistaken, or cease being honest! – Anonymous
I would rather have free a press and no government, than a government and no free press. – Thomas Jefferson
The most consistent and ultimately damaging failure of political journalism in America (is that it) has its roots in the clubby/cocktail personal relationships that inevitably develop between politicians and journalists. - From “Fear and Loathing On the Campaign Trail ‘72″ by Hunter S. Thompson
As nightfall does not come at once, neither does oppression. In both instances, there’s a twilight where everything remains seemingly unchanged, and it is in such twilight that we all must be aware of change in the air, however slight, lest we become victims of the darkness. - Justice William O. Douglas
Categories: Quotes
Civil disobedience is not our problem. Our problem is civil obedience. Our problem is that numbers of people all over the world have obeyed the dictates of the leaders of their government and have gone to war, and millions have been killed because of this obedience. Our problem is that people are obedient all over the world in the face of poverty and starvation and stupidity, and war, and cruelty. Our problem is that people are obedient while the jails are full of petty thieves, and all the while the grand thieves are running and robbing the country. That’s our problem. - Howard Zinn, from ‘Failure to Quit’
For those who stubbornly seek freedom, there can be no more urgent task than to come to understand the mechanisms and practices of indoctrination. These are easy to perceive in the totalitarian societies, much less so in the system of ‘brainwashing under freedom’ to which we are subjected and in which all too often we serve as unwilling instruments. - Noam Chomsky
With numbing regularity good people were seen to knuckle under the demands of authority and perform actions that were callous and severe. Men who are in everyday life responsible and decent were seduced by the trappings of authority, by the control of their perceptions, and by the uncritical acceptance of the experimenter’s definition of the situation, into performing harsh acts. A substantial proportion of people do what they are told to do, irrespective of the content of the act and without limitations of conscience, so long as they perceive that the command comes from a legitimate authority. - Stanley Milgram, 1965
Stanley Milgram was a psychologist who performed a series of experiments that proved conclusively that obedience to authority was so ingrained in the average US citizen they were prepared to cause lethal harm to others when instructed by authority figures to do so. All those who took part were first asked if they would be capable of killing or inflicting severe pain on their fellow human beings. 100% replied categorically ‘no’. http://tinyurl.com/cm6xq
Categories: Quotes
Here is the latest letter from Greg, dated 5/28/07
Greetings to you today. I hope that life is treating you well. You and the family have been in my thoughts and prayers. I want you to know I am very upset. I had gotten to where I wanted to give up and take my life. I was crying. I had somebody in here to tell me it’s not over, they want you to give up. He told me to keep on fighting. He told me God brought me this far, keep my head up. The thing that is getting to me, these people know I did not do this crime and they are scared if they let me go I will sue them and plus they hate to say thay are wrong. Beth I tell you it seems like this Judge slapped me so hard in the face now I have to hope and pray my appeal will be answered real soon. To be sitting in this place for a year of more. I tell you the truth I am really scared that I will lose you and the family. I can not understand how this justice system works. All the evidence says I did not do this but they want to keep saying I did this. I really need you all out there for me to get my freedom back. I hope and pray you will find me a lawyer. But in the meantime I need for you all to get hold of some news peopla and get them to come see me so that I can get my story out, for they can help me get my freedom. I need to reach out to other people out there to help me get my freedom back, ok? Beth I hope you had a wonderful mother’s day and Memorial Day with the family. I love you take care please give Eleanor and everybody my love. Thanks for everything. God bless you, Greg
Please know I sent everything to John Dwyer. I hope he will share the paperwork where they denied me, ok?
Categories: Greg Capehart
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