Global Candle Chain - 3/11 Third Anniversary Remembrance by Beautiful Energy @The World

(Photo by Teppei Sato (c))

Via our friends at Beautiful Energy:

Global Candle Chain - 3/11 Third Anniversary Remembrance by Beautiful Energy

When: Tuesday, March 11, 2014,  2:45pm in UTC+11

Where: The World

日本語は英語に続きます。

Light a candle this coming March 11 and join the Beautiful Energy - Global Candles Chain in memory of the triple disaster of March 11, 2011 and in solidarity with the global stand for a nuclear-free world.

March 11 it will be 3 years since the Northeastern Earthquake and Tsunami hit Japan, killing over 15,000 people, destroying numerous villages along the Tohoku coast and disrupting the lives of millions.

On that same day the Fukushima Nuclear Plant disaster also put an end to the peaceful lives of many people living in the vicinity of the plant.

Helps us create a global chain of light to honor those who lost their lives or loved ones.

Last year over 900 people in 47 countries joined our global candle chain. See here for many beautiful photos https://www.facebook.com/events/420275958062841/

You can join from anywhere in the world. Anytime on March 11 between 2.46pm Japan time (the time the earthquake first struck ) and midnight in your country light a candle and stand one minute (or more) in silence.

Send us a photo of your candle, if you will. Upload to this page or send by email to globalcandlechain@gmail.com.
Or post on twitter or instagram with hashtag #candlesforpeace

And spread the word! Share this event page with your friends. The more people and countries join, the more powerful our chain will be!

Here are the global starting times of the chain:

イベント開始時刻 / Start time
グローバル・キャンドルチェーンの開始は、3月11日、東北地方太平洋沖地震発生時刻の14:46から同日深夜まで行う予定です。

各国の現地時間は下記リストからご確認ください。

6.46pm New Zealand (Auckland)
4.46pm Australia (Sydney)
2.46pm Japan, South Korea
1.46pm China & Hong Kong, Mongolia, Singapore, Malaysia, Philippines
12.46pm Thailand, Indonesia, Vietnam
11.16am India, Sri Lanka
9.16am Iran
9.46am Russia (Moscow)
7.46am Finland, Estonia, Israel, Greece, Rwanda, South-Africa
6.46am Europe: Netherlands, France, Germany, Sweden, Italy, Spain, Austria, Switzerland
5.46am Europe (UK & Scotland)
2.46am Brazil, Argentina, Trinidad, Chile
1.46am USA (Washington, New York, EST)
1.46am Canada (Toronto)
00.46am Peru
10.46pm Canada (Vancouver) (March 10)
> 10.46pm USA: (Los Angeles) (March 10)
> 7.46pm Hawaii (March 10)

来る3.11に、東日本大震災により、地震・津波・原発事故と、三重の被害を受けた方々への追悼と核のない世界を願い、世界中でキャンドルを灯すことで私たちのBeautiful Energyに参加しませんか？

Global Candle Chainは、世界中どこからでも、キャンドルに火を灯すことで参加できるワールドワイドなイベントです。
キャンドルであかりを灯す様子を写真に取って、イベントページへシェアして下さい！

15000人以上もの人々が犠牲となり、広大な地域を破壊した東日本大震災。現在もなお、多くの人々が避難生活を強いられています。
また3月11日に発生した大地震が誘発した福島第一原子力発電所の事故により、日本、そして世界中が原発の恐ろしさに気づかされました。

震災発生から3年目を迎える3月11日、震災犠牲者への追悼、
そして被災者のみなさまが一刻も早く穏やかな生活を取り戻せることへの祈り、また、核のない世界への願いを込めて、世界中をキャンドルの光で繋ぐグローバルな"Chain"を作ることに是非協力してください！

去年の3.11には、900人以上、47カ国の世界中の人々がこのGlobal Candle Chainへ参加されました。

前回のたくさんの美しい写真を見るにはこちら：https://www.facebook.com/events/420275958062841/

3月11日当日は震災の起きた14：46（日本時間）～0：00（あなたの住んでいる国）の間、いつでも、どこででも参加することができます。
キャンドルを灯し、心の光と共に黙祷を捧げましょう。

＜参加方法＞
あなたのキャンドルナイトの様子を、写真で撮って私たちに送ってください。
1.Instagram、Twitterを利用する（ #candlesforpeace のタグを使ってください）
2.Emailに添付（アドレス：globalcandlechain@gmail.com）する
3.このFBイベントページにアップロードする
※世界中からの参加者数をカウントしますので、ご事情でキャンセルしなければいけない場合は必ず「参加」を取り消してください。

311 Global Candles for Peaceは、オープンなイベントです。日本はもちろん、各国にお住まいの友人・家族にぜひこの活動を共有してくださいね。

B.E.メンバー一同より

About us:

https://www.facebook.com/BeautifulEnergyTokyo
https://www.facebook.com/groups/BeautifulEnergy/

May 2014 be filled with light, healing, and peace...

This luminous photo is from  Beautiful Energy's last Candles for Peace gathering of 2013.  Their first Candles for Peace gathering in 2014 will be Friday, January 10, as always, at the Kokkai-gijidomae Station, adjacent to the Japanese National Diet Building.

IMAGINE PEACE

Via Yoko Ono:

New York Times - 1 Jan 2013

IMAGINE PEACE

love, yoko

An Ancient Jewish Prayer for Peace...

My Yiddish-speaking grandmother handed this picture down to me several years ago. Regardless of religious and cultural beliefs, all peoples hope for the same thing—Peace.

A Prayer for Peace

Let peace reign over all,
Let none, in fear or hate
evermore shed blood in Our presence.
Grant us peace, the blessing above
all blessings we owe Ourselves.
Grant us peace that we may all
live in grace.

I know we will find peace one day.

—Jen Teeter

Obon, Kyoto: "The Rafts of Spirits"

Beautiful video short from Studio Red Dot...

Nippon Myohoji: "Walk of Life" (命の行進 2012)

(空から一条の光が玄題旗に降り注ぎ、雲に、紫の帯になって、映っているようです！At the Kagoshima Prefecture Sendai nuclear power plant, before fasting, the priests engage in a prayer walk for purification from the sea. A streak of light from the sky fell on the flag from the sky, the clouds turned purple. Photo: Walk of Life on Facebook)

In early February, Nippon Myohoji Buddhist priests began a "Walk Of Life" across Japan, stopping at all the country's nuclear plants to offer prayers to the sacred grounds of each of these locations. Their final stop will be the Hiroshima Peace Memorial Park on August 6.

This photo was taken in Kagoshima, at the southern tip of Kyushu.

Constellation Earth - Nagasaki

Velcrow Ripper: "Lanterns of Memory"

Via fillmaker Velcrow Ripper:

"Each of us faces circumstances in life which compel us to carry heavy burdens of sorrow...Adversity assails us with hurricane force...Glowing sunrises are transformed into darkest nights...Our highest hopes are blasted...Our noblest dreams are shattered...

August 6, 2000. A Hiroshima atomic bombing survivor describes what she saw ("There was no place to hide...") and expresses her wish that this never happen again.

Woven throughout, the words of Martin Luther King Jr. ask us: why should we love our enemies?

Children's Peace Monument - Hiroshima

Share Your Christmas with Tohoku, Japan

Via Kim Hughes on FB, Shareyourchristmas.org:

Share Your Christmas this Christmas with a child in Tohoku, Japan

The idea of Share Your Christmas is simple. Children (and adults) choose a present from the many received on Christmas Day and send it, wrapped or re-wrapped to Tohoku, where it will be passed on to a child (or adult) in need.

The powerful earthquake and tsunami of nine months ago on left many thousands of children (and adults) without families and friends and their homes. Children of all ages lost all their toys, their most beloved possessions.

Over 360,000 children in Fukushima Prefecture, where three nuclear reactors melted down after the tsunami, are living in especially stressful conditions. They are not allowed to play outside, where the earth and air is poisoned with radiation; they have to wear geiger counters to keep a constant check on radiation levels.

But Fukushima is not the only area where children are suffering. Up and down the northeastern coast are hundreds of small communities where people lost just about everything.

To unconditionally share or pass on a gift is a small thing in many ways, but for the children of Tohoku, abandoned by their government and much of mainstream Japan also, it will mean so much. Connection. Comfort. Love. Someone somewhere cares, is thinking about them, if offering a small piece of their heart from somewhere far away.

How Share your Christmas began

A resident of Tokyo received a request from his niece in Baltimore, asking for a computer for Christmas. After long and all-due consideration he agreed, but on the promise she donated one of her gifts from under her family tree to a child in Tohoku.

At dinner that evening, her agreement became the basis of an urgent campaign. Since Japan is not a Christian country as such, it will not matter that gifts only arrive after Christmas Day itself. We then anticipate several weeks of intense activity, making sure gifts reach boys and girls - and adults too - of the correct age.

We invite those sharing their gifts to write messages, and will encourage recipients to reply. In this way we hope Share your Christmas will translate into Share your Lives, with many friendships being forged for the future.

Find out where to send at the above link...

Interfaith Pilgrimage for Peace for Jeju island & the Korean Peninsula earlier this year

Interfaith Pilgrimage for Peace for Jeju island and the Korean Peninsula earlier this year:

 

March 1, 2011 - Benediction for the Life, Peace, and Community in Korea Interfaith 100-day Pilgrimage from Jeju Island to the DMZ—for Life, Peace, & Community in the Korean Peninsula. The benediction was made in Gangjeong.

Dobub, a Buddhist monk who was born on Jeju Island, led the pilgrimage benediction on March 1. He engaged in dialogue with Fr. Kang Woo-Il, Chairman of the Catholic Bishops’ Conference of Korea, & the bishop of the Catholic Jeju district, during the designation of Jeju as a "Peace Island" in 2007.

After the ceremony, the Life and Peace Fellowship visited Gangjeong village, to meet with the villagers and to spend the first night of the pilgrimage in the Gangjeong village.

Reverend Jeon of the Life and Peace Fellowship said, “Our organization opposes those things related to war. We oppose the naval base plan with the thought that the peace in the Korean peninsula and North East Asia will be threatened if it is built on Jeju Island." He added: “We are walking with our praying hearts.”

Urakami, Nagasaki: August 9, 1945 & Today (renewed community at Ground Zero)

The city of Nagasaki came into being when Portuguese adventurers came to Japan in 1542 and asked Lord Sumitada, who ruled the area, for the use of the beautiful harbor. Japan's most southern island, Kyushu, had long been the archipelago's principal crossroads for Silk Road traders, and, before that, prehistoric travelers, but their route took them through Hakata, an ancient port city, slightly to the north.

After a squabble with Ming China interrupted old commercial routes, the newly arrived traders became the Japanese elite's only source of Chinese silk, Indian and Persian luxury goods, and European guns. Military unifier Oda Nobunaga welcomed the European merchants and accompanying missionaries, aligning with them to create leverage against rival daimyos backed by powerful Buddhist temples in Kyoto. Franscisco de Xavier arrived with other Spanish Jesuits in 1549, and after two years, left behind behind 1,000 converts.

In 1582, after Nobunaga's suicide during a battle in Kyoto, power transferred to Toyotomi Hideyoshi, who, inspired by European imperialism, launched an invasion of the Korean peninsula ten years later. Within six months, superior Korean strategists routed his troops (but not before they forcibly brought back tens of thousands of Korean master potters who created renowned Imari and Arita ceramics). Confounded by his loss and threatened by the power of Kyushu's daimyo traders and their European allies, Hideyoshi responded by issuing orders to execute Christians and instituting a draconian policy that came to define Japan: he began closing its borders to foreigners. By this time, hundreds of thousand Japanese in Kyushu had become Christian. Many of the conversions were nominal, ordered by daimyos; yet others would prove enduring.

After Hideyoshi died in 1597, his successor Ieyasu Tokugawa, restored trade with Korea, China, and European-controlled outposts throughout Asia. However the shadow cast by European imperial military power and Japan's growing community of native Christians proved too daunting for following shoguns who partially closed the archipelago's borders (allowing Chinese, Korean, Ryukuan, and Dutch exchanges at some ports).

Japanese Christians were forced to go underground, not to resurface until 1865 when several thousand Catholics from the fishing village of Urakami confessed themselves to a French priest in Nagasaki. In 1895, these descendents of Christians worshipping secretly for two centuries built the first cathedral in Asia in Urakami, a site of repeated earlier persecutions.


(Urakami Cathedral before August 9, 1945)
On August 9, 1945, clouds prevented an American B-29 from dropping a plutonium bomb on its original target, the weapons manufacturing center at Kokura. So the pilot aimed the bomb "Fat Man" towards their alternate target, the spires of Urakami Cathedral, the center point between his secondary targets, Mitsubishi's torpedo factory and steel and arms factory.


(11:02 a.m. atomic bomb "Fat Man" explodes above Nagasaki)

(People walking down a street in Nagasaki, unaware of the plutonium bomb explosion about to hit them.)


(Urakami Cathedral after August 9, 1945)

The plutonium bomb exploded over Japan's (and East Asia's) largest church at 11:02 a.m.—while a priest was beginning midday Mass. More Japanese Christians (8,000 among 70,000 mostly civilian victims) were killed in that moment than in all the previous shogunate persecutions of Christians combined.


(Ground Zero Memorial, a few minutes walk from Urakami Cathedral
In 1959, parishioners rebuilt the cathedral on the exact spot where it was destroyed, on Angelus Street. They decorated the new cathedral with charred angel faces from the bombed building, and left blackened and broken statues of saints (now covered with chains of colorful origami cranes) standing in the front, as a memorial.


(Urakami Cathedral today)
After spending the night traveling on the Akatsuki ("Red Moon"), a slow night train that left Kyoto in the early evening and arrived in Nagasaki early morning, I hopped on a streetcar and found myself in Urakami just as Sunday morning mass at St. Mary's had started. All the seats in the church were filled, so I joined people standing in the entrance way. The women all wore white veils and nuns wore old-fashioned blue habits. In this quiet place, I experienced awe, witnessing a renewed faith community that had experienced archetypal devastation.

After the service, I asked a tall, young, bushy-haired, smiling priest where I could find the ruins of the old cathedral. He asked an older, also smiling parishioner, to show me the broken and charred statues of saints, all covered with chains of colorful origami cranes. Looking into the eyes of the parishioner, a peaceful, even joyful survivor of the atomic bombing, I thought of Dr. Martin Luther King's view that the universe is held together by an invisible force of unsentimental, unshakeable love.


(Broken and burned statue of a saint at Urakami Cathedral)
The recreated community seems to prove that this love that binds people together—is alive in the people of Nagasaki—and more enduring than man's greatest weapon of mass destruction.


(Stained glass street art in the Urakami District)

(More street art depicting the music of peace)


(Children's art in the Urakami District )
— Jean Miyake Downey (text & contemporary photos)

Multiple traumatic effects of the atomic bombings of Hiroshima, Nagasaki, and the thousands of nuclear test explosions worldwide; other uranium weapons; and nuclear plant meltdowns have not healed, even if survivors and their descendants have been able to renew their communities. Please support nuclear abolition.

Thich Nhat Hanh's and Joanna Macy's thoughts for Japan, humanity, & all beings

Via Jizo Chronicles, Thich Nhat Hanh's and Joanna Macy's thoughts for Japan after the great earthquake and tsunami:

Dear Friends in Japan,

As we contemplate the great number of people who have died in this tragedy, we may feel very strongly that we ourselves, in some part or manner, also have died.

The pain of one part of humankind is the pain of the whole of humankind. And the human species and the planet Earth are one body. What happens to one part of the body happens to the whole body.

An event such as this reminds us of the impermanent nature of our lives. It helps us remember that what’s most important is to love each other, to be there for each other, and to treasure each moment we have that we are alive. This is the best that we can do for those who have died: we can live in such a way that they continue, beautifully, in us.

Here in France and at our practice centers all over the world, our bothers and sisters will continue to chant for you, sending you the energy of peace, healing and protection. Our prayers are with you.

Thich Nhat Hanh

Nuclear-free activist Joanna Macy who spent time with the people  of Novozybkyov, a village about 100 miles from Chernobyl, in 1992, addresses the nuclear disaster in Fukushima:

Dear Ones,

In this hour of anguish we reach out to our Japanese colleagues and all beings of that noble and stricken land.  As our hearts unite in prayer for them, we experience our own non-separation from the immeasurable suffering inflicted by the successive earthquakes and tsunamis, and by the nuclear catastrophe these have triggered.

Having just begun the last week of my three-month retreat, I break silence to give voice to my solidarity with you all.  By speaking to you, I remind myself of what we can remember in this time of grief and fear.

It helps me to remember what I learned in Novozybkov with survivors of Chernobyl: that is that there are two basic responses to massive collective trauma.  One response is to let it destroy our trust in life and in each other, plummeting us into division, blame and despair.  The other is to let the shared cataclysm strengthen us into greater solidarity, and deepen our knowledge of our mutual belonging in the web of life. Your communications are evidence already of that second response.  Indeed the Work That Reconnects has been preparing us for it.

We remember to breathe.  As we have practiced, we breathe through the reports as we hear and the images of disaster. This helps us simply take in what is happening, and not be blocked by horror or the desire to fix or flee.

We also breathe with those who are caught up in this tragedy, in the intensity of panic, shock, and loss. Feel how this breathing-with helps your heart-mind fearlessly and tenderly embrace them.

You see, if we understand and accept the Great Unraveling, we can let it break us open to greater realizations of our innate solidarity.  That this realization in itself is a kind of “enlightenment” has been brought home to me in my retreat by two great teachers of Japan.

One is the 13th century Zen master Dogen.  He illumines our connections with the ancestors and the future ones, so that we can experience these connections in the immediate present moment.  So does the other figure, the archetypal bodhisattva Ksitigarbha, who is beloved in Japan, where he/she is known as Bodhisattva Jizo, with images everywhere.  Both of them help us realize that we are not alone in this moment of time, but surrounded by past and future generations ready to help.  We who inhabit the present can do what they cannot: that is to make choices and take action/  But the past and future ones are right at our side with support and guidance.

Also, to hold steady and open in this anguished time, try the Spiral of the Work That Reconnects. As I take in the catastrophe in Japan, the Spiral serves to ground my heart-mind, and widen its dimensions.  It brings gratitude for all those at work to bring support and clear reporting.  It helps me honor the heartbreak, to simply open to it and let it reveals our true nature and mutual belonging. It shows me how solidarity can move us forward, and offer us practical, immediate steps to alleviate suffering and enact safe, sustainable, and sane energy policies. An obvious urgency is to stop US government subsidies and loan guarantees to nuclear industries, including bills that are before Congress now.

As radiation from Fukushima spreads, I know that protection of self and family is on our minds.  I’m asking Anne to append here two kinds of information: about health measures, and some links to breaking news from Japan. See our page dedicated to this issue: http://joannamacy.net/nuclearguardianship/fukushima-dai-ichi-2011.html

Love,

Joanna

Drepung Loseling monks in Atlanta leading chants & prayers for Japan

The Mystical Arts of Tibet:

Tonight through Friday March 25 from 6 PM - 7 PM , the Drepung Loseling resident and touring Mystical Arts of Tibet monks will lead chants and prayers at Drepung Loseling Monastery in Atlanta, GA for the victims and families of the Japan Earthquake and Tsunami.

New York Cares for Japan - Event Listings, Relief Resources; Prayer Service Tonight

3.
New York Cares for Japan - Event Listings and Resources for Support Relief

Ongoing community relief support events of all kinds, from arts to running to praying.

March 18 - Prayer Service and Candlelight Vigil for Japan

Who: coordinated by Rev. T.K. Nakagaki
Place: The Church Center for United Nations, 777 First Ave. at 44St
Time: 5:30PM

Candlelight Vigil

Place: Dag Hammarskjold Plaza, 47th St. between 1st and 2nd Ave.
Time: 7:30PM

Info: New Yorkers gather for prayer and hope in the aftermath of Japan’s earthquake and tsunami. On Friday, March 18th, marking one week since Japan was devastated by the massive earthquake and tsunami, New Yorkers will come together to pay respect to the victims of this tragedy and send solidarity to all those affected.

Biodiversity and COP10: Spotlight on Brazil's Amazon Rainforest and the Council of Thirteen Indigenous Grandmothers

6th Festival Cinema Brasil official logo

With all eyes presently on the issue of biodiversity as the COP10 conference unfolds in Nagoya, one interesting and yet widely unknown angle to this issue is the connection between the endangered brazilwood tree in Brazil’s rainforest—and the future of classical music as we know it.

This critical problem is explored in depth in the beautifully made documentary film A Arvore da Musica (The Music Tree), which is currently screening in Japan at the 6th Festival Cinema Brasil. From the festival website:

Found only in the remnants of Brazil's devastated Atlantic Rainforest, Brazilwood (known abroad as “Pernambuco’s wood”) is vital in the manufacture of fine violin, cello and viola bows. Ever since the time Mozart was composing his masterpieces, 250 years ago, when it was first introduced, luthiers and musicians from all around the world haven’t discovered a wood of comparable quality that could replace the Brazilian one. From the search for the wood in the forests of Brazil, to their use by the world’s greatest symphony orchestras, the film explores a path to saving the trees and the music that depends on it.

The film festival finished in Tokyo on October 15th, and is presently screening in Osaka until October 22nd. It will run in Hamamatsu from October 23rd - 29th, and Kyoto from November 13th – 19th.

The festival also includes many other interesting films in its lineup, such as an excellent documentary on the history of music and the spoken word in Brazil, and another on the cultural relevance of the national passion for football. For full festival details, visit the trilingual official website. A 2009 interview with festival director Edison Mineki regarding cinematic history in Brazil in the context of the country’s turbulent political trends of recent decades may also be read at a previous blog post here.

For more on the Brazilian Amazon rainforest and all of its living brilliance, the collection of online articles from the Kyoto Journal Biodiversity issue includes this gorgeous piece written by shaman (and Amazon resident) Clara Shinobu Iura, a Nikkei Brazilian who is a member of the International Council of Thirten Indigenous Grandmothers. A synopsis of a talk that she gave earlier this year regarding the grandmother's project and their film, For the Next Seven Generations, during a peace and music event at Yoyogi Park may be read at this previous blog post.


The grandmothers are presently in Nagoya, where they are vocalizing their moving appeal for protecting the world’s biodiversity from their unique perspective as the stewards of indigenous wisdom and traditions. The grandmothers will then travel onward to Amami Oshima from October 22-25 for a weekend of prayer and creating bonds of solidarity with the indigenous peoples of the island, which will be followed by a journey to the atomic grounds of Nagasaki to conduct ceremonies of prayer and healing. Details about the grandmothers’ Japan tour are available here.

--Kimberly Hughes

Urakami, Nagasaki: August 9, 1945 & Today (rebuilt cathedral & renewed community at Ground Zero)

The city of Nagasaki came into being when Portuguese adventurers came to Japan in 1542 and asked Lord Sumitada, who ruled the area, for the use of the beautiful harbor. Japan's most southern island, Kyushu, had long been the archipelago's principal crossroads for Silk Road traders, and, before that, prehistoric travelers, but their route took them through Hakata, an ancient port city, slightly to the north.

After a squabble with Ming China interrupted old commercial routes, the newly arrived traders became the Japanese elite's only source of Chinese silk, Indian and Persian luxury goods, and European guns. Military unifier Oda Nobunaga welcomed the European merchants and accompanying missionaries, aligning with them to create leverage against rival daimyos backed by powerful Buddhist temples in Kyoto. Franscisco de Xavier arrived with other Spanish Jesuits in 1549, and after two years, left behind behind 1,000 converts.

In 1582, after Nobunaga's suicide during a battle in Kyoto, power transferred to Toyotomi Hideyoshi, who, inspired by European imperialism, launched an invasion of the Korean peninsula ten years later. Within six months, superior Korean strategists routed his troops (but not before they forcibly brought back tens of thousands of Korean master potters who created renowned Imari and Arita ceramics). Confounded by his loss and threatened by the power of Kyushu's daimyo traders and their European allies, Hideyoshi responded by issuing orders to execute Christians and instituting a draconian policy that came to define Japan: he began closing its borders to foreigners. By this time, hundreds of thousand Japanese in Kyushu had become Christian. Many of the conversions were nominal, ordered by daimyos; yet others would prove enduring.

After Hideyoshi died in 1597, his successor Ieyasu Tokugawa, restored trade with Korea, China, and European-controlled outposts throughout Asia. However the shadow cast by European imperial military power and Japan's growing community of native Christians proved too daunting for following shoguns who partially closed the archipelago's borders (allowing Chinese, Korean, Ryukuan, and Dutch exchanges at some ports).

Japanese Christians were forced to go underground, not to resurface until 1865 when several thousand Catholics from the fishing village of Urakami confessed themselves to a French priest in Nagasaki. In 1895, these descendents of Christians worshipping secretly for two centuries built the first cathedral in Asia in Urakami, a site of repeated earlier persecutions.


(Urakami Cathedral before August 9, 1945)
On August 9, 1945, clouds prevented an American B-29 from dropping a plutonium bomb on its original target, the weapons manufacturing center at Kokura. So the pilot aimed the bomb "Fat Man" towards their alternate target, the spires of Urakami Cathedral, the center point between his secondary targets, Mitsubishi's torpedo factory and steel and arms factory.


(11:02 a.m. atomic bomb "Fat Man" explodes above Nagasaki)

(People walking down a street in Nagasaki, unaware of the plutonium bomb explosion about to hit them.)

Urakami Cathedral after August 9, 1945

The plutonium bomb exploded over Japan's (and East Asia's) largest church at 11:02 a.m.—while a priest was beginning midday Mass. More Japanese Christians (8,000 among 70,000 mostly civilian victims) were killed in that moment than in all the previous shogunate persecutions of Christians combined.


(Ground Zero Memorial, a few minutes walk from Urakami Cathedral
In 1959, parishioners rebuilt the cathedral on the exact spot where it was destroyed, on Angelus Street. They decorated the new cathedral with charred angel faces from the bombed building, and left blackened and broken statues of saints (now covered with chains of colorful origami cranes) standing in the front, as a memorial.


(Urakami Cathedral today)
After spending the night traveling on the Akatsuki ("Red Moon"), a slow night train that left Kyoto in the early evening and arrived in Nagasaki early morning, I hopped on a streetcar and found myself in Urakami just as Sunday morning mass at St. Mary's had started. All the seats in the church were filled, so I joined people standing in the entrance way. The women all wore white veils and nuns wore old-fashioned blue habits. In this quiet place, I experienced awe, witnessing a renewed faith community that had experienced archetypal devastation.

After the service, I asked a tall, young, bushy-haired, smiling priest where I could find the ruins of the old cathedral. He asked an older, also smiling parishioner, to show me the broken and charred statues of saints, all covered with chains of colorful origami cranes. Looking into the eyes of the parishioner, a peaceful, even joyful survivor of the atomic bombing, I thought of Dr. Martin Luther King's view that the universe is held together by an invisible force of unsentimental, unshakeable love.


(Broken and burned statue of a saint at Urakami Cathedral)
The recreated community seems to prove that this love that binds people together—is alive in the people of Nagasaki—and more enduring than man's greatest weapon of mass destruction.


(Stained glass street art in the Urakami District)

(More street art depicting the music of peace)

Children's art in the Urakami District

— Jean Miyake Downey (text; contemporary photos)

Multiple traumatic effects of the atomic bombings of Hiroshima, Nagasaki, and the thousands of nuclear test explosions worldwide; other uranium weapons; nuclear plant meltdowns, & uranium mining have not healed, even if survivors and their descendants have been able to renew their communities. Please support nuclear abolition.

An ancient Jewish peace prayer for modern times

My Yiddish-speaking grandmother handed this picture down to me several years ago. Regardless of religious and cultural beliefs, all peoples hope for the same thing—Peace.

A Prayer for Peace

Let peace reign over all,
Let none, in fear or hate
evermore shed blood in Our presence.
Grant us peace, the blessing above
all blessings we owe Ourselves.
Grant us peace that we may all
live in grace.

I know we will find peace one day.

—Jen Teeter

Fierce Light: When Spirit Meets Action—Transforming Crisis into Compassionate Activism

"Fierce Light" is filmmaker Velcrow Ripper's term for what Martin Luther King called "Love in Action" and Gandhi called "Soul Force." These concepts reflect nonviolent social change philosophy and action rooted in compassion, faith, and what Gandhi called "satyagraha," the power of truth.

Ripper's 2008 documentary Fierce Light: Where Spirit Meets Action tells several stories that show the victories of grassroots activists relying on nonviolent methods against seemingly overwhelming forces of hate, oppression, greed, and violence.

The Canadian director begins his film by sharing his personal reactions to the assassination of his friend, journalist Brad Will, killed by government paramilitary gunmen in Oaxaca, Mexico, while filming a teacher's strike. He then asks himself this question:

Why do I keep working to change the world when we're up against impossible odds and how can I even think about spirituality when they're killing my friends?

The film follows how Ripper and others respond to this question by affirmative attitude and action—regardless of specific outcome. And many of the multi-leveled outcomes are not what they initially appear to be.

Compassionate activists featured include civil rights activist John Lewis, Buddhist monk Thich Nhat Hanh, Archibishop Desmond Tutu, Daryl Hannah, eco-activist Julia Butterfly Hill, Ralph Nader, eco-organizer Van Jones, eco-activist John Quigley, actor Danny Glover, and Engaged Buddhist Joanna Macy.

Congressman Lewis described how spirituality formed the heart of the American Civil Rights Movement. His strategic advice:

Get in the way.

Fierce Light followed the movement to save South Central Farms, an urban cooperative farm and garden project in Los Angeles, in real time. Daryl Hannah, Julia Butterfly Hill and John Quigley joined a mass sit-in of urban farmers who attempted to prevent the eviction and closure of the farm.

Van Jones observed during this struggle:

Our whole species is on trial.

In the episode on war and the wounds of war, Thich Nhat Hahn talks about actions that come from the heart. He emphasizes that war, as with all violence, starts at the level of thought and emotion.

If we want to end the war in the world, we need to end the war in our own hearts.

Two million Vietnamese people and 60,000 Americans died during the Vietnam War. Fierce Light shows Hahn returning to Vietnam in 2007 after 40 years of exile, leading a ceremony to help heal the wounds of war. At dusk, with candles floating on lotus flowers illuminating the sacred space those who have gathered have created, the Buddhist monk invites all the souls of deceased people to gather with them for release.

In the segment on the Civil Rights Movement John Lewis relates how social change for human rights merged with the movement to end the war in Vietnam. During this period, Thich Hahn and Martin Luther King became colleagues in their struggle to show the connections between racism, neo-colonialism, militarism, and war.

How do we stay strong, clear, and focused in our grassroots work to support the shift from a primitive and unsustainable civilization based on structural exploitation and state violence to an affirmative and sustainable civilization based on cooperation?

Congressman Lewis guides us:

We've been in the storm so long, I don't know of any other way—but the way of Love...

The Fierce Love on YouTube offers many inspiring "video diaries" spotlighting Aung San Suu Kyi & Alan Clements (the first American ordained Buddhist priest in Burma) and the movement for democracy in Burma; the creation of Bat Nha monastery and its persecution by the Vietnamese government; Congressman John Lewis; the World Social Forum; and Gandhi's Phoenix Ashram and Robben Island in South Africa; and more.

My Lai Peace Park where U.S. Veterans, My Lai survivors, & Hibakusha gathered to pray for the end of war and for world peace

Children in My Lai, (Photo: My Lai Peace Park website)

The My Lai Peace Park was initiated by Quakers of Madison, Wisconsin and Vietnam war veteran Mike Boehm to help heal ongoing trauma from the Vietnam War experienced by Vietnamese civilians, veterans and American veterans.

Beginning with the My Lai Loan Fund, established January 10, 1994, the Madison Quakers have funded a series of projects in My Lai. They include the My Lai Primary Schools, My Lai Peace Park, medical supplies, and the Art Penpals project. Other projects funded by the Madison Quakers are loan funds in seventeen other villages (as of 2007), the construction of 'compassion houses', aid for ethnic minorities, the Sisters Meeting Sisters project and more.

The objectives of these projects go beyond economic aid. For almost 40 years My Lai has been evoked only in the context of grief, anger and recrimination. Before beginning our first project in My Lai the Madison Quakers were resolved to break that chain of hatred and to find ways to re-humanize people who had been de-humanized; the Vietnamese people certainly, but also American veterans, anti-Vietnam war protestors and others. By breaking the chains of hatred which have kept us apart we begin to understand that we are more alike than we are different.

We have shown over the years that if we can sit down with humility and respect and a willingness to listen and learn from each other then anything is possible. If hope can rise from the ashes of My Lai it can arise anywhere.

In 2008, Nanzan University historian Hiroshi Fujimoto, together with Mike Boehm, accompanied a group of Hibakusha to My Lai Peace Park for the 40th anniversary of My Lai where they gathered with the survivors of the My Lai massacre on March 16 in a plea for the end of weapons of mass destruction and peace in the world.

The Madison Quakers have worked with the people of My Lai to build primary schools; to fund hundreds of My Lai women in small businesses, and to build simple "Compassion Houses" for families Agent Orange victims.

Mike Boehm's moving "Hope Rises from the Ashes of My Lai," the story of his journey from war in Vietnam to "homelessness," (a healing time of retreat), to working to heal trauma from the Vietnam War in himself, other veterans, and survivors in Vietnam and their descendants--shows how positive transformation in one human being has ripple effects to others and the larger world. In Boehm's life, this led to the flowering of healing and hope at My Lai Peace Park.