Archive | December, 2015

The Time Has Come for a Department of Peace

14 Dec

Over at 3 Quarks Daily I’ve posted The United States Needs a Department of Peace. The idea was first proposed in 1793 by Dr. Benjamin Rush, one of the signers of the Declaration of Independence, and has been frequently proposed over the last century (Wikipedia). Starting in 1935 a number of bills have been introduced introduced into Congress, most recently by Dennis Kucinich as H.R. 808. It was re-introduced in the 114th Congress on February 26, 2015 by Barbara Lee as H.R. 1111.

I devote most of my 3QD post to the text Rush’s proposal, but introduce it with some commentary on the allegorical paintings he proposes for the room that would house his proposed Peace Office. He also proposed that the following assertions be posted on a sign above the door to the War Office:

1. An office for butchering the human species.
2. A Widow and Orphan making office.
3. A broken bone making office.
4. A Wooden leg making office.
5. An office for creating public and private vices.
6. An office for creating public debt.
7. An office for creating speculators, stock Jobbers, and Bankrupts.
8. An office for creating famine.
9. An office for creating pestilential diseases.
10. An office for creating poverty, and the destruction of liberty, and national happiness.

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Pope Calls for ‘God’s Mercy’ at Start of Yearlong Jubilee – The New York Times

8 Dec

Since 1300, Jubilee years have been celebrated at 25- or 50-year intervals, with the occasional extraordinary Jubilee, like this one. Francis called for this Jubilee to highlight the world’s need for mercy, “the revolution of tenderness,” the pope said in an interview this month with the Italian magazine Credere.

“It is the year of forgiveness, the year of reconciliation,” he said.

For the first time, too, the Jubilee is focused not only on Rome but also on local places of worship, in keeping with the pope’s instruction that bishops open Holy Doors in cathedrals around the world so that the faithful can participate in the celebrations without traveling to Vatican City.

The ceremony on Tuesday formally opened celebrations of the Jubilee, which ends on Nov. 20, 2016, but the pope had already opened another Holy Door during his trip to Africa last month, proclaiming Bangui, the capital of the Central African Republic, “the spiritual capital of the world.”

Source: Pope Calls for ‘God’s Mercy’ at Start of Yearlong Jubilee – The New York Times