This is a picture of me handing out flyers in front of the White House during Unite to Ban the Bomb. Rehumanize International organized the Unite to Ban the Bomb event that took place on June 17. This was the first anti-war/anti-nuclear weapons event I had ever been to, so I was excited for the experience and to publicly show my beliefs. Friday night – the day before the event – the Rehumanize International team worked together to make signs for the march. One side of all the

I remember the day Obama was elected quite clearly in my mind. I had decided Monday evening to set up a “Cemetery of the Innocents” on my college campus exposing the truth of the children lost to abortion in the United States. There were about eight students who worked together the night prior to the 2008 election to create 3,000 tiny crosses with popsicle sticks and hot-glue, and then we stuck them in the cold, hard, frozen ground. We were up all night. We lost sleep. We mad

[The following is part of a series on bringing the Consistent Life Ethic to various political conventions. Click to see Day 1 & Day 2] Wednesday was by far the longest day for us, but arguably also our most productive. Not only did we have many wonderful conversations with the guests of the RNC, but we received quite a lot of media attention as well. The attention we received, I believe, was in large part to our non-traditional message: we were not there to criticize solely t

The United States imposed an oil embargo in mid-1941 on Japan, then engaged in the military conquest of China and parts of Southeast Asia. As the United States was Japan’s leading oil supplier, this embargo threatened the future of Japan’s expansion, and the Japanese ultimately compensated for the loss by embarking on a comprehensive invasion of Southeast Asia and the Dutch East Indies (present-day Indonesia) in order to seize the region’s oil and other resources. To protect

Many beliefs and practices of early Mormonism such as polygamy, theo-democracy, the Order of Enoch, and the hope for Zion were profoundly counter-cultural and critical of aspects of the American order. However, the painful reconciliation with monogamy and mammon that followed on the heels of Utah statehood and the Second Manifesto dramatically transformed the Mormon ethos. From former Church President Ezra Taft Benson’s vociferous denunciations of socialism, to the Church’s o

The myriad atrocities committed by the organization known variously as the Islamic State, the Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant, or the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria (ISIS) have filled the news for over a year now. ISIS’ activities have prompted a military response by the United States, which has bombed ISIS forces in Iraq and Syria and sent troops back into Iraq in support of the Iraqi military. Earlier this year, the Obama administration sent a request to Congress for

Dirty Wars, the documentary film counterpart to the book of the same name, begins its investigation of the secretive world of U.S. counterterrorism operations with a disturbing episode set in Afghanistan. The book’s author, Jeremy Scahill, was working as a war correspondent in Afghanistan when he looked beyond the limited flow of information provided by the American and allied military authorities to report on the killing of Mohammed Daoud, an Afghan police officer, and other

The pope’s weekly Angelus message, named for the prayer it accompanies, is generally a routine occurrence akin to a Sunday homily. On September 1st, however, Pope Francis chose this venue to make an important announcement: the proclamation of Saturday, September 7th, 2013 as “a day of fasting and prayer for peace in Syria, the Middle East, and throughout the world.” Not only Catholics but people around the world of all faiths were encouraged to participate “in whatever way th

Mark Hare is not the kind of person who strikes you as being aware that he played more than a minor role in changing the world. When I interviewed him for this article, he downplayed his role in the Women’s Peace Encampment, which was established in the summer of 1983. The encampment was in remote Seneca County, NY, a 55-minute drive from Rochester where I live. It was 51 acres of farmland that abutted the Seneca Army Depot, which Hare’s research revealed, was the eastern sea

The worsening violence and repression in Syria has left many analysts and policymakers in the United States and other western countries scrambling to think of ways our governments could help end the bloodshed and support those seeking to dislodge the Assad regime. The desperate desire to "do something" has led a growing number of people to advocate for increased military aid to armed insurgents or even direct military intervention, as the French government has said it will co

There has been an increase in suicides of military personnel in recent years. It has become quite a major issue. In fact, more veterans die from suicide than combat. Some statistics say that it is at least 22 per day who have taken their own lives and the number could in fact be even higher than that. [1]The big question is, why is this happening? The most frequently attributed explanation to the problem is posttraumatic stress disorder, or PTSD for short.[2] [3] The conditio

BY JULIA SMUCKER This weekend, the consistent life publication Life Matters Journal is hosting a "blogfest" in response to the Feminist Majority Foundation's "AbortionMatters blog carnival." While clearly responding to a polemical position, this is not about perpetuating divides but attempting to bridge them: demonstrating that it is not only possible but indeed more consistent to be both pro-woman and pro-life, that concerns for universal human dignity and protection of th

Like many believers in peace, I opposed the draft in principle, but I don't think I grasped the human face of it until recently. My brother had just turned 18, and I realized that he would have to sign up for the selective service. I had to sit down and tell him he was required by law to give his information to the state, in order to make it easier for them to take him by force to kill other human beings far away. I myself had to sign up for the selective service years ago an

The following is a transcript of a speech given at an anti-war rally by Nicholas Neal, a student at SIU Carbondale and a leader in the Students Against Unjust War student organization on campus. Greetings fellow activists! My name Is Nicholas R. Neal. I am the president of Students Against Unjust War. I’m here at this great gathering because the drone issue is very critical for the cause of peace. I happen to be twenty-two, and were I to unfortunately be killed by a drone in

“The Scourged Back,” so dubbed by Kathleen Collins, is an image that pops up in the mind of most people when thinking of American slavery. A nineteenth century photo of a man sitting in a chair with his whiplashed back turned towards the camera was the horrific image of America’s historic injustice used by abolitionists to prick the consciences of their contemporaries and lay forth a visual case against slavery.[1] The same could be said of the Associated Press’ iconic photo

BY NICHOLAS R. NEAL The Obama administration has once again shown its shockingly obvious use of wordplay. The New York Times reports that the White House will not determine whether the military overthrow of a democratically elected government in Egypt is a coup or not. "We will not say it was a coup, we will not say it was not a coup, we will just not say," a White House official said. The White House doesn't need to use the word "coup" in order to clarify the issue to the A

BY NICHOLAS NEAL The cause for peace between Israelis and Palestinians might have more financial backing than we think. William Booth of the Washington Post reports that at the World Economic Forum, 200 of the top business leaders from Israel and the West Bank converged to argue for their government supporting U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry's plan for peace talks. According to Booth: The group calls itself "Breaking the Impasse" and includes corporate heavyweights from

Two documents have been made public this year that provide more information about the Obama administration’s targeted killing policy. The first is a Justice Department paper that describes the administration’s justification for killing American citizens who are living overseas and are thought to be terrorist leaders. The second is a letter from Attorney General Eric Holder on whether the government could kill an American citizen living within the United States. Both documents

What do we mean when we say anti-war Republicans? Is the Republican party becoming more anti-war? If we look at history we will see that historically the Republican Party has been much less hawkish than it is now. Republicans in the early part of the 20th century were by and large non-interventionist. They opposed Woodrow Wilson’s efforts to get the United States involved in World War I. Robert Taft, son of former president and chief justice William Howard Taft, was a leading

Upon watching Senator Rand Paul’s March filibuster opposing the confirmation of CIA director John Brennan, the first thing that becomes apparent is his resemblance to his father, former Congressman Ron Paul. Rand may have not yet inherited his father’s grey hair or gaunt physique, but his eyes give off the same worried expression, his voice the same concerned quiver. Minutes into Rand’s now famous 13-hour monologue, which ignited a national conversation about the Obama admini