Vote for Joe

More summary updates from the last few days: In Winona, Minnesota I interviewed Paul and Sarah Freid who are live-in volunteers at a Catholic Worker house for the homeless there. Paul, who was a theology major in college, said the gospel message is pretty easy to figure out — “if you’re willing to suffer.” In Lake City, Minnesota (“birthplace of water skiing”), we passed out flyers in front of the Rythm & Brew Coffee Shop where the “hours of caffeination” are 8 to 4 p.m. Monday through Friday. After meeting with the editor of Lake City’s newspaper, I went inside the coffee shop. There is a reflection by Ghandi on the wall that includes things that lead to a: “Path of Destruction.” One is to have: “Pleasure without Conscience.” And it is “pleasure without conscience” which is becoming a problem along the Mississippi River Watershed Region, I told a reporter from the Red Wing (MN) Republican Eagle. I noted the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Division is recommending much less hunting and boats with electric motors only in the back waters of the Mississippi. I said to the reporter I would concur with the restrictions. “It’s time we started sacrificing some of our ‘fun,’ for the health of the environment,” I said. Note: On the lighter side, I told the reporter that I wanted the “good people of Minnesota” to know that one of the first things I’d do when I got to D.C. was to push to replace the Statue of Liberty with: a Viking. A couple stops later, in New Richmond, Wisconsin, a newspaper editor there asked if I sometimes have a hard time getting people to take me seriously. I said: “sometimes.”

The following is a summary of some of the other stops last week: During an interview with a reporter for The Monroe (WS) Times, I said our agricultural platform calls for much more organic farming because modern herbacides, pestacides and fertilizers are creating “chemical cocktails” in our systems, leading to things like cancer… I then interviewed Monroe’s George Schutte who has a quarter acre organic garden (he uses flour to dust his vegetables as a natural pesticide). Schutte’s license plate says: “17 kids.” Because, well, that’s how many he’s had… We then traveled west to Platteville, Wisconsin, where I interviewed Bob Metzger who is the president of this town’s Main Street Downtown Revitilization Program. He told me part of this rejuvination process is being driven by a group of shop owners who have moved in above their respective shops. (Metzger and his wife live above their “Badger Brothers Bagel & Coffee Shop” as an example.) He said for these store owners, the downtown becomes their “front yard” so they are very motivated to fix it up. In addition, Main Street Project coordinator Cheryl Smina told me the town has adopted a “4-Point Approach,” which includes putting on regular events downtown, recruiting businesses, publishing a newsletter, raising awareness about why it’s important to shop locally… Note: Outside Badger Brothers is a chalk board that displays different sayings. This week’s: “When the volume goes up; communication goes down.”

In Beloit, Wisconsin, at Our Lady of Assumption Church, I came across a pamphlet called: “Sing a Little Louder.” It was written by a Christian woman who lived in Germany during the Holocaust. She wrote her church was on a railroad track and on Sunday mornings, often, during the middle of the service box cars filled with Jews screaming for their lives would pass by. The response by the Christians in the church? They’d sing louder to drown out the screams. And the German woman wrote we are doing the same thing in America now. The Holocaust of abortion goes on every day here (4,400 abortions a day in the U.S.). Yet for the most part, we frenetically rush about staying busy with work, with entertainment, with all sorts of extra-curricular activity… ‘Singing’ louder and louder — as the silent screams of these little babies continue.

While in South Bend, Indiana, I interviewed Professor Mike Griffin who teaches theology at Holy Cross College here. He is also quite active with the Catholic Peace Fellowship Group and believes there should be provision for those soldiers who believe in the “Just War Theory” to be able to opt out of wars they don’t believe are, well, “just.” As an example, prior to the recent Iraq War, Pope John Paul II declared a war on Iraq wouldn’t fit the criteria of a “Just War.” It’s the Catholic Peace Fellowship position that soldiers already in the military should be able to opt out of fighting in such a war because of “religious principle” — just like the Amish and Mennonite can be ‘conscientious objectors’ because of their non-violent religious principles. Note: Farther west in Beloit, Illinois, we saw the bumper sticker: “The Truly Educated — Never Graduate.”

In South Bend, Indiana, I interviewed Professor Margie Pfeil who teaches Moral Theology and Social Ethics at Notre Dame University. (She is also one of the founders of a Catholic Worker House here.) In regard to social ethics, she said the “elite” of the world are accumulating more and more land, material goods, and so on… while the poor, basically, get poorer. She told me there must be a grassroots paradigm shift, where people start engendering a “real spirit of compassion.” And as this internal, spiritual shift happens, people will then become much more apt to share resources, food, land… Note: In regard to this type of deeper sharing, Catholic Worker co-founder Dorothy Day said every home should have a “Christ Room” for those in need.