2009 Walk for A New Spring

 

 

This year's  Walk for A New Spring began on February 13 at New England Buddhist Peace Pagoda and concluded on April 8 in Washington, DC.  On , banging on their prayer drums, the Buddhist Peace walkers crossed the Ben Franklin Bridge, many of them in the ropes of a Buddhist monk or nun.  

 

March 19 -

As part of the Brandywine Peace Community's facilitation of the walk through the Philadelphia area, the walkers joined the Brandywine organized rally on the west side of Phila. City Hall commemorating the 6th Anniversary of the Iraq war and the start of the U.S.occupation. 

 

No sooner than we had set up the banners and sound equipment than the rains began in earnest and so we moved our rally underneath the archways of City Hall and commenced with a program of speakers (see Gold Star Mother for Peace Celeste Zappala's brief talk below) and music that concluded with a wet walk-around of Phila. City Hall to illustrate that it is our cities that need the billions of dollars now going for wars in Iraq and Afghanistan and the war profiteering of Lockheed Martin and other weapons contractors.  

 

March 20 -

The morning of March 20th, the Buddhist Peace Walkers left Philadelphia and crossed into Delaware County, where with Brandywine arrangement, they were hosted for lunch at the Garden Church in Lansdowne, PA and had supper and overnight hospitality provided at the Peace Center of Delaware County.  That evening the walkers joined Brandywine in another vigil commemorating the 6th anniversary of the Iraq War at a site of the corporation that profited from the "shock and awe" bombardment of Iraq six years ago and continues to profit from U.S. war policy: Lockheed Martin in Valley Forge, PA.  Names of the war death - PA and Iraqis - were read, a bell was intoned, the walkers chanted, and Tom Mullian ("Six Strings Against War") brought our message home in song.

 

On March 21, after a wonderful breakfast provided by members of the steering committee of the Peace Center of Delaware County, see photos at www.delcopeacecenter.org,  the walk departed the center making its way to Chester County and eventually onto its destination of Washington, DC.

 

Celeste Zappala, Gold Star Mother for Peace, March 19, 2009, at memorial event on the 6th Anniversary of the start of the U.S. war in Iraq and occupation, sponsored by the Brandywine Peace Community, at the west side of Phila. City Hall.

 

Thank you for being here.

 

Thanks to  bob smith  and all the Brandywine people for faithfully doing the work of peace for so many years.

Sadly today, we are here for a terrible occasion, marking the 6th anniversary of the war in Iraq.

Watching the 7th year of this misbegotten war begin- and hearing it can not end till 2011- I do not find that acceptable.

 

Most of you know me, know that my son Sherwood Baker was killed on April 26  2004 – know that he was the first PA national guardsman killed in combat since 1945- you may know he was killed in an explosion as he was looking  for the weapons of mass destruction,  long after every one  knew that they never did exist,

 

You may know my good son left behind a wife and son of his own, and a family who loved him dearly and who vowed in his memory to do everything we could to bring this war to an end, and to speak the truth for Sherwood Baker.

 

But we are just one story of the 4259 who lost their lives and their future in Iraq-  just on Monday -  think where you were on this past Monday, 25 year old Gary Moore from Oklahoma was killed in Baghdad

 

45,583 soldiers have been air lifted out for injuries from Iraq- 45, 583 with injuries so severe they had to leave the country, and at least 20% of all injures are brain injuries- brain injuries do not heal like broken bones, or bullet wounds-

 

Numbers -  hundreds of suicides,  thousands of children without parents, tens, hundreds, thousands, maybe a million Iraqis injured and killed  Shamefully no one really keeps count

 

But we all must be a witness to the horror- the stupidity.

 

I know that not many people are paying attention to the war in Iraq now, for so many people in their minds it is over,

 

It is not, I have come to understand that once a war begins it is never really over,  its devastation goes on for every one touched forever,  for many the war in Vietnam continues to rage and chafe in the hearts and minds of so many – at so many levels.

 

Yet now so many people pay no attention to the war in Iraq because they are preoccupied with the financial crisis

They look for villains; Fannie May, AIG, Wall Street

 

Include in that list the war in Iraq, 720 million dollars a day, for 6 years and counting,  has surely helped to bankrupt this country, and continues to drain our treasure, our youth and our integrity.

 

 

Don’t get me wrong I am glad president Obama has set and end date for occupation, I am grateful that stop loss will be eliminated, I want to see our returning soldiers cared for, honored and supported for their courage and decency.  I want to see them with all the benefits they signed up for,  I want to see homeless vets and injured vets getting the care and help they deserve, no questions asked

 

And I want all of us to make a promise to them, to the fallen,  to the orphans, to the maimed, to the those whose lives are shattered in concrete ruble, or hospital beds,  

 

We  will not be silent, we will not rest till all our soldiers are home, we will not forget, we will not be complacent, we will be the voice that says war is not the answer,  we can overcome violence - and we must vow to never again allow our country, our beloved country to go to a war based on lies

 

We owe no less to Sherwood, to his brothers in arms and to the future.

 

Celeste Zappala

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