LTE – Buzz Marzolf – 9-11-2013

Monday, September 9, 2014

War vs. Peace

As I write this letter, our nation and the world await President Obama’s address Tuesday evening regarding the humanitarian crisis in Syria, and then Congress’s decision on Wednesday whether or not to make a strike.

On Sunday, September 1st, Pope Francis delivered his weekly Angelus address in which he stated:  “… my heart is deeply wounded in particular by what is happening in Syria and anguished by the dramatic developments which are looming.

With all my strength, I ask each party in this conflict to listen to the voice of their own conscience, [and not] solely to their own interests, but rather to look at each other as brothers and decisively and courageously follow the path of encounter and negotiation, and thus overcome blind conflict.  I exhort the international community to make every effort to promote clear proposals for peace in that country without further delay, a peace based on dialogue and negotiation, for the good of the entire Syrian people, … especially among civilians and the unarmed!

Never has the use of violence brought peace in its wake.  War begets war, violence begets violence.

I repeat forcefully:  it is neither a culture of confrontation nor a culture of conflict which builds harmony within and between peoples; rather, it is a culture of encounter and a culture of dialogue; this is the only way to peace.”

During the 4th century B.C., while chronicling the Greco-Persian wars, Herodotus wrote:  “In times of peace, children bury their parents; war [so] violates the order found in nature that it causes parents to bury their children.”

We must become students of history, lest–as warned by George Santayana, in his essay titled Common Sense–by failing to do so we condemn ourselves to repeating its mistakes.

Respectfully,
Buzz Marzolf
Town of Troy