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The
Declaration
The Declaration below was completed on
April 2. It was read for the first time in Riverside Church, New York, on
April 4 by Kelley Ogden, of Houston, Texas, the final consensus leader of
the Peace Not Poverty Write-In.
Thirty-eight years ago today, Dr. King reminded us of
those moments in life where silence is betrayal. Our lives begin to end the
day we remain silent when our conscience tells us to speak. Today, we walk
in the footsteps of Dr. King, Fred Korematsu, Mahatma Gandhi, and countless
others who have walked this road before. Their examples guide us along the
path.
War poisons the moral fiber of every individual and
destroys the intricate fabric of life. As a nation, we value peace and have
prided ourselves in non-aggression towards other sovereign states. The war
in Iraq, however, violates this principle of non-aggression. The Iraq war is
a war of choice. We did not engage in diplomacy, but rather, bullying.
Saddam Hussein did not possess weapons of mass destruction. Iraq did not
invade our country or attack it. It is painful to admit that we invaded
another sovereign nation without cause and without provocation. Our
conscience tells us that we must end this war.
The war in Iraq violates law and perverts our sense of
justice. We are no longer viewed as an impartial arbitrator of disputes, but
as a biased proponent of our own self interest. We have lost the moral high
ground for condemning the aggression of others. Our compassion and care for
fellow man has been replaced by intolerance, hatred, and bigotry. The war in
Iraq has curtailed the freedoms and liberties that our founding fathers, and
those like Dr. King, worked so hard to secure. The war in Iraq promotes
fiscal insanity for us and future generations and it narrows and degrades
our soul. It is a cancer, that if left unchecked, will only spread.
Our conscience tells us that now is the time for action,
before the war destroys all that we hold dear. We must speak so that our
families, our children, our loved ones, and our nation, are not poisoned by
hate, bigotry, and intolerance. We must end this war.
We must cease all combat operations. Troops should be
withdrawn in an orderly fashion, with only a small portion remaining to
assist in the rebuilding efforts. To the extent that troops are necessary to
maintain order, peacekeeping activities should be turned over to the UN or
the Arab League.
We must dismantle our military bases, which only serve to
remind the Iraqi people of our presence. We have done enough damage and must
remove the vestiges of this transgression.
We must fund the rebuilding of Iraq's roads, buildings,
and infrastructure destroyed by this war, as this is our moral and legal
obligation. Iraqi engineers, labor, and business, not US corporations that
profit from war, should be employed to rebuild. Our actions must be pure in
deed and in heart. We must give international relief agencies full access to
help the people of Iraq and alleviate their suffering. We must help rebuild
the lives of the Iraqi people and restore the fabric of life.
We must accept the form of government freely chosen by the
Iraqi people, without US influence. Our insistence upon a particular form of
government only poisons the political process. Democracy cannot be imposed
upon others by the barrel of a gun.
We must take steps at home to change the mindset of the
American people. Describing the war in Iraq as a 'front' provides us with a
false sense of justification for our actions. We were wrong, and we need to
recognize that we were wrong.
Americans must be reminded that truth and honesty,
freedom, and liberty for all are our core values. The freedoms and liberties
that have been taken from us must be restored. We must also take steps to
safeguard our freedoms and liberties, to ensure that they are not taken from
us so easily again.
We must also address the root causes of this conflict, not
only in our hearts, but in our daily lives. We must reduce our dependence on
oil, which fuels our aggression.
As a result of this war, countless lives have been ruined,
and our integrity among nations has been compromised. We must repair our
relations among nations, and strengthen the ties that bind us all. We must
hold those responsible for this war accountable.
We must also demonstrate the power of forgiveness. We must
release those we have imprisoned, even those who may wish us harm. The men,
women, and children of Iraq should be free to begin rebuilding their lives,
regardless of their actions or our suspicions. We must remove the log in our
own eye before attempting to remove the splinter in another's.
We must right our wrongs. We must demonstrate our strength
at home and abroad by apologizing to the Iraqi people and to the world. By
redressing the wrongs that we have inflicted upon the Iraqi people, and the
damage that we have done to relations among nations, we demonstrate respect
for freedom and democracy. By redressing the wrongs, we strengthen the bonds
of humanity, we make peace possible, and we restore our soul.
Let us all lift our voices for as our conscience tells us,
now is the time to speak.
Now, what do you think of this Declaration?
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The
speeches were inspiring. Sister Joan [Chittister] always speaks with passion
and compassion, always raising up truth with power, always centering her
remarks in the Gospel that calls us to work on an agenda that we cannot
ignore: hunger, justice, peace. The two speeches that moved me the most,
however, were those of the two women who had lost their own in Iraq, and
were able to turn their grief and anger into action, speaking out to our
political leaders as well as to the public at large on the immorality of our
country's action in Iraq.