Poverty blights the lives of billions of people throughout the world: in developing countries, where it is acute, and industrialised nations, where it’s hidden but growing. It rises out of social injustice, makes exploitation and abuse inevitable, brings death and disease, robs people of opportunity and dignity, feeds anger and resentment.
Death. Readiness Is All *
It is the one great certainty in life – the shared inevitability for all humanity, and yet death and dying is rarely discussed. In the west and Christian countries more broadly it’s largely feared, pushed away until the body falls into fragility, the urge to rest becomes overwhelming and we’re no longer bothered. Then death becomes a blessing, a ‘merciful release’ as a dear friend use to say.
Ethiopia: Peaceful Protest to Armed Uprising
What began as a regional protest movement in November 2015, is in danger of becoming a fully-fledged armed uprising in Ethiopia.Angered and exasperated by the governments intransigence and duplicity, small guerrilla groups made up of local armed people have formed in Amhara and elsewhere, and are conducting hit and run attacks on security forces. Fighting at the beginning of January in the North West region of Benishangul Gumuz saw 51 regime soldiers killed, ESAT News reported, and in the Amhara region a spate of incidents has occurred, notably a grenade attack on a hotel in Gondar and an explosion in Bahir-Dah.
Maitreya: The Coming One for all Humanity
Bombarded with one negative news story after another, many people feel a pervasive pessimism close at hand. Fear and mistrust, uncertainty, are some of the results. Debilitating conditions, which sap the joy out of life, and strengthen materialistic demands of escape: alcohol, drugs and endless consumerism, which in turn feeds climate change and ecological destruction.
President Trump: The Final Assault on Human Kindness and the Environment
A silver lining of action and fury is bubbling inside the prevailing gloom that is the election of Donald Trump. His presidency may prove to be the final straw in the decades long assault on brotherhood, human kindness, cooperation and society inculcated during the Thatcher/Reagan era; the ultimate action that triggers an unstoppable popular uprising, uniting people in common cause against the abhorrent ideals that are causing despair and anger amongst millions of people. A global campaign, based on and calling for unity, tolerance, cooperation and social responsibility.
Climate Change: The Potential Impacts of Collective Inaction
In the early 1900s when the idea that industrialisation could potentially result in global warming was first posited, the consensus was that it was unlikely, and in any case, an increase in temperature was to be welcomed. What possible harm could it do?
Well, we are now witnessing the widespread consequences of climate change. Destructive, life-threatening effects, which demand a fundamental shift in the way we are living if we are to preserve the integrity of the planet, and protect the rich abundance of life on Earth.
Rapacious Consumerism and Climate Change
Commercialisation has poisoned all areas of contemporary life, and together with its partner in crime, consumerism, is the principle cause of man-made climate change. Operating under the suffocating shadow of neo-liberalism, the market forces of commercialisation act blindly and indiscriminately. The presiding deity is money; the goal of endeavour quick profit and limitless growth – no matter what the human or environmental costs may be.
Worldwide Air Pollution is making us Ill
The man-made environmental catastrophe is the severest issue facing humanity. It should be the number one priority for governments, but despite repeated calls from scientists, environmental groups and concerned citizens for years, short-term policies and economic self-interest are consistently given priority over the integrity of the planet and the health of the population.
Searching for Peace in a Troubled World
Throughout his Christmas message and in keeping with the hymn of the time, Pope Francis repeatedly called for Peace in our World. “Not merely the word, but a real and concrete peace” brought about by changing those attitudes, patterns of behavior and socio-economic systems that bring about conflict. Peace not simply in relationship to armed conflict, but peace for all people in a range of situations.
Unjust and Dysfunctional: Asylum in the UK
Imagine you wake one fine morning and find you are living in a war zone, aerial bombardments are a weekly occurrence, family members have been killed, tortured or imprisoned and the children’s school destroyed. You love your country, but frightened and desperate you decide to leave in search of a new home, in a peaceful place, where you can study, work and have a chance to live out your days happily.
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