Five go mad at Shannon!

by: Media Support

Ciaron O'Reilly being arrested outside PJHQ Northwood during a previous Catholic Worker antiwar action..
PHOTO: The d10 Group , d10northwood@gmx.net

Ireland: In the early hours of Monday 3 February, five members of the pacifist Catholic Worker movement cut their way into Shannon Airport (see http://www.refuelingpeace.org/). The peace activists poured human blood on the runway that has been servicing U.S. military flights, troop and munition deployments to US military bases in Kuwait and Qatar. They constructed a shrine on the runway to Iraqi children killed and threatened by US/British bombardment and sanctions. The shrine consisted of copies of the Bible and Quran, rosary and muslim prayer beads, flowers, photographs of Iraqi children and Brigid's crosses. They then began to take up the runway, working on its edge with a mallet.

The activists approached the hanger housing the US Navy plane under repair. They painted "Pit stop of death" on the hanger's roller door, and began the dismantling of the hanger. Others entered the hanger to disarm the repaired US warplane.

The five activists were arrested by Gardaí. They refuse to co-operate with bail conditions, have initiated a fast for peace and a call for mass nonviolent resistance to Irish complicity in the forthcoming war on Iraq. They are likely to be moved to Limerick Prison. The acts of witness will
continue in and out of prison. The Catholic Worker movement, founded by Dorothy Day in New York City in 1933, consists of small faith-based communities serving the homeless and
nonviolently resisting war preparations (see http://www.catholicworker.org/). Ploughshares acts of nonviolent disarmament were initiated by radical priests Fr. Philip and Daniel Berrigan in the U.S. in the 1980s. These nonviolent actions have addressed nuclear and conventional weapon systems by enfleshing the prophesy of Isaiah Ch. 2. Some activists have been acquitted of all charges, others have received prison sentences of up to 18 years. (See http://www.plowsharesactions.org/).

STATEMENT OF FAITH
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We come to Shannon Airport to carry out an act of life-affirming disarmament in a place of preparations for slaughter.

Like the railway tracks that ran to the town of Auschwitz, the runway at Shannon has been militarized for service on an assembly line of death. The train tracks at Auschwitz brought people to their deaths, the runway at Shannon brings death to the people. The Irish Government acts in contravention of the Irish Constitution, International Law and divine mandate to service U.S. military aircraft, troop and munition deployments.
The U.S./British war on the Iraqi people, and for Iraqi resources, has been long and varied.The U.S./U.K. military has claimed over 2 million Iraqi lives:
* in their financial and military support for the Saddam Hussein regime in the '70's and '80's
* in their hi tech bombing campaign of 1991
* in the 12 years of crippling sanctions imposed on the Iraqi people
* and now their plans to conquer and occupy Iraq

US/UK weapons manufacturers also continue to fuel the daily grind of death and destruction inflicted on the Palestinian people.

SWORDS INTO PLOUGHSHARES ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~
We come to Shannon Airport around the Feast of St. Brigid, to disarm and disable the war machine. We hope to begin to take up the runway and ground military aircraft. We hope to be joined in this act of disarmament by those who encounter us. Citizens, police and soldiers wielding hammers brought down the Berlin Wall; we hope all will pitch in to take up this runway and ground planes servicing the war machine. We find this easier to envision than the further slaughter of Iraqi children that U.S. British and Irish governments wish us to consider.
We act inspired by Brigid and Irish traditions of healing and peacemaking.
We carry out Christ's commandment to "love our enemies" by nonviolently resisting the slaughter of their children. We attempt to enflesh the prophesy of Isaiah Ch 2 and Micah Ch 4 "to beat swords into ploughshares".
We respond to the call of the prophets of Modern America. Catholic Worker founder Dorothy Day, who encourages us "to fill the jails with nonviolent resistance to war"; Martin Luther King, who warns us that we are confronted by "a choice between nonviolence and nonexistence". Fr. Daniel Berrigan, who observes: "We have assumed the name of peacemakers, but we have been, by and large, unwilling to pay any significant price. And because we want peace with half a heart and half a life and will, the war, of course continues, because the waging of war, by its nature is total - but the waging of peace, by our cowardice is partial."