REFLECTION

Remembering Martin Luther King on the national holiday that remembers his life, Paul Kendrick of VOTF Maine shared the following:

Excerpt - "You may well ask: 'Why direct action? Why sit-ins, marches and so forth? Isn't negotiation a better path?' You are quite right in calling for negotiation. Indeed, this is the very purpose of direct action. Nonviolent direct action seeks to create such a crisis and foster such a tension that a community, which has constantly refused to negotiate, is forced to confront the issue. It seeks so to dramatize the issue that it can no longer be ignored. My citing the creation of tension as part of the work of the nonviolent-resister may sound rather shocking. But I must confess that I am not afraid of the word 'tension.'

I have earnestly opposed violent tension, but there is a type of constructive, nonviolent tension, which is necessary for growth. Just as Socrates felt that it was necessary to create a tension in the mind so that individuals could rise from the bondage of myths and half-truths to the unfettered realm of creative analysis and objective appraisal, we must see the need for nonviolent gadflies to create the kind of tension in society that will help men rise from the dark depths of prejudice and racism to the majestic heights of understanding and brotherhood." Martin Luther King, Jr., Letter from a Birmingham Jail, April 16, 1963

Maintaining A Watch On Episcopal Accountability in the Catholic Church

"The panel warned last March that 'there must be consequences' for bishops who led the years of cover-up." New York Times Editorial, December 16, 2004

"Until the cover up, too, is explored and acted upon, the bishops - in every effort to right past wrongs, including the way they track their corrective procedures - will be working under a cloud." Arizona Daily Star Editorial, December 15, 2004

"The church leadership has demonstrated by its behavior over several decades that it cannot be trusted to put the interests of parishioners ahead of pedophile priests, which is why the state has been placed in this custodial relationship to begin with. The church's current attempt to neutralize the state's authority by rendering the audit useless is consistent with the arrogance displayed throughout the years of abuse and deceit." Nashua Telegraph, January 15, 2005

"...no bishop or other hierarch who, knowing of the sexual abuse of minors by any priest, has failed to remove the priest from any exposure to minors or to take any other effective step to protect the people of God, or who has concealed the risk of abuse presented by such priests from the people to whom such priest was assigned to minister, should be permitted to hold any position of ecclesiastical leadership in the Church." VOTF Episcopal Accountability Resolution, September 18, 2004

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