Democratic US Congressman Dennis Kucinich has been overwhelmed by
support following a major speech questioning the war on terrorism. He has
already gained the support of forty-three fellow Congressmen for his bill
proposing the creation of a US Department of Peace. He also wants a ban
on weapons in space.

This article is extracted from his recent call to action made in the House of Representatives.

"WE HAVE REACHED a moment in history where it is urgent that people
everywhere speak out, each as president of his or her own life, to protect
the peace of their nation and the world. We should speak out and caution
leaders who generate fear through talk of endless war or the final
conflict. We should appeal to our leaders to consider that their own
bellicose thoughts, words and deeds are reshaping consciousness and can
have an adverse effect. Because when one person thinks: fight! he or she
finds a fight. When one faction thinks: war! he or she may start a war.

When one nation thinks: nuclear! he or she approaches the abyss. What
then, of one nation which thinks peace, and seeks peace?

Neither individuals nor nations exist in a vacuum, which is why we have
a serious responsibility for each other in this world. Each of us is a
citizen of a common planet, bound to a common destiny. So connected are
we, that each of us has the power to be the eyes of the world, the voice
of the world, the conscience of the world, or the end of the world. And as
each one of us chooses, so becomes the world.

THE SPLITTING OF the atom for destructive purposes admits a split
consciousness, the compartmentalized thinking of us versus them , the
dichotomized thinking which spawns polarity and leads to war. The proposed
use of nuclear weapons pollutes the psyche with the arrogance of infinite
power. It creates delusions of domination of matter and space. It is
de-humanizing through its calculations of mass casualties. We must overcome
doom thinkers and sayers who invite a world descending and disintegrating
into a nuclear disaster. With a world at risk, we must find the bombs in
our own lives and disarm them. We must listen to that quiet inner voice
which counsels that the survival of all is achieved through the unity of
all.

We must overcome our fear of each other, by seeking out the humanity
within each of us. The human heart contains every possibility of
race, creed, language, religion and politics. We are one in our
commonalities. Must we always fear our differences? We can overcome our
fears by not
feeding them with more war and nuclear confrontations. We must ask our
leaders to unify us in courage.

We need to create a new, clear vision of a world as one, of people
working out their differences peacefully, a new, clear vision with the
teaching of non-violence, non-violent intervention and mediation, where
people can live in harmony within their families, within their communities, and
within themselves, a new clear vision of peaceful coexistence in a world
of tolerance.

At this moment of peril we must move away from fear s paralysis. This
is a call to action: to replace expanded war with expanded peace. This is
a call for action to place the very survival of this planet on the agenda
of all people, everywhere. As citizens of a common planet, we have an
obligation to ourselves, and our posterity. We must demand that all nations
put down the nuclear sword.

When peace is not on the agenda of our political parties or our
governments then it must be the work and the duty of each citizen of the
world. This is the time to organize for peace. This is the time for new
thinking. This is the time to conceive of peace as being not simply the
absence of violence, but the active presence of the capacity for a higher
evolution of human awareness. This is the time to conceive of peace as
respect, trust and integrity. This is the time to take the infinite
capabilities of humanity to transform consciousness, which compels violence
at a personal, group, national or international level. This is a time to
develop new compassion for others and our selves.

IT IS PRACTICAL to work for peace as a means of achieving permanent
security. It is similarly practical to work for total nuclear disarmament,
particularly when nuclear arms do not even come close to addressing the
real security problems which confront our nations: witness the events of
September 11, 2001.

The purpose of the new Bill HR2459 is to create a Department of Peace
in the US. It envisions new structures to help create peace in our homes,
in our families, in our schools, in our neighborhoods, in our cities, and
in our nation. It aspires to create conditions for peace within and to
create conditions for peace worldwide. It considers the conditions, which
cause people to become the terrorists of the future: issues of poverty,
scarcity and exploitation. It is practical to make outer space safe from
weapons so that humanity can continue to pursue a destiny among the stars.

We can achieve this practical vision of peace, if we are ready to work
for it. People worldwide need to meet with like-minded people, about peace
and nuclear disarmament, now. People worldwide need to gather in peace,
now. People worldwide need to march and to pray for peace, now. People
worldwide need to connect with each other on the Web, for peace, now.

Where war making is profoundly uncreative in its destruction,
peacemaking can be deeply creative. We need to communicate with each other
the ways in which we work in our communities to make this a more peaceful
world. Now is the time to think, speak, write, organize, march and take action to
create peace as a social imperative, as an economic imperative, and as a
political imperative. As the hymn says, "Let there be peace on Earth and
let it begin with me."

This is the work of the human family, of people all over the world
demanding that governments and non-governmental actors alike put down
their weapons. This is the work of the human family, responding in this
moment of crisis to protect the planet and all life within it. As we
understand that all people of the world are interconnected, we can achieve
both nuclear disarmament and peace. We can accomplish this through
upholding a holistic vision where the claims of all living beings to the right of
survival are recognized.

Nuclear disarmament and peace are the signposts toward the up-lit path
of an even brighter human condition wherein we can through our conscious
efforts evolve and re-establish the context of our existence from peril to
peace, from revolution to evolution. Think peace. Speak peace. Act peace.

Peace.

 

 

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