Country’s conscience being deadened by war
I am not surprised, but very disappointed that our City Council majority approved the display of banners with pictures and names of local military personnel, including the children and other loved ones of the Chico promoters and supporters.
My thoughts on this banal ode to the military are best expressed by Thomas Merton who over 50 years ago wrote, “One of our great problems is to see clearly what we have to resist. I would say at the moment we have to understand better than we do the war mentality. If we do not understand it, we will run the risk of contributing to its confusions and thereby helping the enemies of man and of peace. The great danger is that under the pressures of anxiety and fear, the alternation of crisis and relaxation and new crisis, the people of the world will come to accept gradually the idea of war, the idea of submission to total power, and the abdication of reason, spirit and individual conscience. The great peril is the deadening of conscience.”
Conscience distinguishes humans from other beings. The conscience of humans has been deadened over and over throughout history. Dare we to hope that in this era, we humans will resist, and creatively regain peace.
— Cathy Webster, Chico
