|
Letter to the Cardinal Justin
Cardinal Rigali Your Eminence: I am writing to you as a parishioner of St. Vincent dePaul Church, Germantown, and as a member of Catholic Peace Fellowship. My concern is the war in Iraq and what can be done to end it. As a father of eleven children, and having one of my four sons serve in the U.S. Navy for six years, I am aware of the sacrifice of families with sons and daughters serving in the military. I myself was in the military during World War II. Our country recently celebrated “Memorial Day,” an occasion for honoring those men and women of our military who died in our country’s wars. Some say that deaths in war are a necessary and worthwhile price to pay for an advantage gained. We at Catholic Peace Fellowship disagree. The cost of war, especially this Iraq War, is too high a cost for the so-called gain. As a Catholic organization dedicated to working for peace and justice, we believe that the Iraq War should not have happened; Pope John Paul II advised: “Don’t do it!” The U.S. Catholic Bishops said: “War is not justified,” and millions of people around the world demonstrated against its possibility. So, how did war occur despite all this resistance? What now can be done to end the Iraq war? And most importantly, what should U.S. Catholics do, both the hierarchy and the laity in the pews, to avoid such unnecessary wars in the future? How can we make the advice of the Pope and the Bishops more effective? How can the expression of the people in the pews to “avoid war, act for peace” be heeded in the future by those who would wage war? These are questions that need to be explored in depth by every parish in the diocese. Hopefully, in concert with the recommendation of Bishop Thomas Wenski, U.S.C.C.B., “Toward a Responsible Transition in Iraq,” you will lead our archdiocese to a “serious and civil national discourse”... on how to end it and how to avoid war in the future. We at Catholic Peace Fellowship have suggestions as to how a program of dialogue throughout the parishes of the archdiocese can be implemented. May we meet with you in the near future to share our ideas with you? Respectfully, Charles Bauerlein |