In April of this year, four members of Pax Christi, Rhode Island travelled to New York to take part in a demonstration against nuclear weapons in obedience to Pope Francis’ call for nuclear abolition. We met many new friends and were inspired by the demands for peace spoken from scientists, politicians, artists, and activists.
On Sunday we participated in an eight thousand-strong march to the United Nations. We walked alongside activists of all kinds — Christian and Buddhist monks, veterans of the Civil Rights Movement, and over one thousand who travelled from Japan to give their message: “No more Hiroshimas. No more Nagasakis.”
Eighty of these men and women were survivors of the atomic strikes. Their bodies were frail, but they led the march. Since the fall of the Soviet Union many of us have forgotten the shadow of nuclear war — they do not have that option.
The nuclear bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki likely killed about 200,000 people. Those near ground zero disappeared in a flash of light and heat which vaporized and evaporated their bodies. Those further away received terrible burns in the immense heat of the explosion. Many who escaped the initial blast with their lives died in the coming days and weeks from radiation sickness. Hiroshima and Nagasaki were of extremely limited military value. More than 97% of those killed were civilians.
August 6 will be the 70th anniversary of the first nuclear attack. In the past seven decades nuclear arms have spread across the developed world and even to unstable states like Pakistan and North Korea. In contrast to the media image of nuclear weapons as a carefully guarded secret weapon, these doomsday bombs are dangerously available. During the chaos of the early 1990s, some of the Soviet Union’s nuclear materials simply went missing. In the United States, an 82-year-old nun named Megan Rice was able to break into a Tennessee nuclear facility with a compass and wire cutters in order to show how unguarded our atomic weaponry truly was.
Let it be clear that the modern day nuclear bomb is much different than the ones from seven decades ago. The modern hydrogen bomb each has one thousand times the power of the bombs that destroyed Hiroshima and Nagasaki. A single exchange of nuclear strikes between warring nations would cause destruction on a global scale, leading to worldwide famine. A full nuclear war would likely lead to an end to human civilization.
The closest humanity came to that nightmare scenario was during the Cuban Missile Crisis in 1962. Pope Saint John XXIII, who mediated between the United States and Russia to prevent the catastrophe, recognized how close disaster had come. In his encyclical, “Pacem in Terris,” he said that “nuclear weapons must be banned.” Each Pope since has renewed this call.
In his new encyclical “Laudato si’,” Pope Francis condemns the sinful philosophy of “might makes right” which lies at the heart of our possession of these weapons. “Completely at odds with this model are the ideals of harmony, justice, fraternity, and peace as proposed by Jesus. As he said of the powers of his own age: ‘You know that the rulers of the Gentiles lord it over them, and their great men exercise authority over them. It shall not be so among you; but whoever would be great among you must be your servant.’”
As with Pope Francis’ new encyclical, there is an environmental aspect to the call for nuclear abolition. The disasters at Three Mile Island, Chernobyl, and Fukashima illustrate that nuclear energy has dangers that far outweigh its benefits. There is still nowhere safe on the planet to dispose of the radioactive waste created by these plants. This waste will remain dangerous for over a hundred thousand years. And yet, we still harvest more uranium from the Earth to feed the plants and create new bombs. This mining has ruined huge areas of the American West, spoiling drinking water and exposing people and animals to radioactivity.
Besides the risk to people and our environment, nuclear weaponry “squanders the wealth of nations,” according to Pope Francis.
Last year the United States began a trillion dollar program to update its nuclear arsenal. Our society faces major problems, from our crumbling infrastructure to hunger and ballooning student debt. Rather than confront these problems, we have allocated funds to build and maintain weapons that could destroy the world many times over. To waste our collective incomes on weapons that we hope to never use is simply madness. To possess them is increasingly being exposed as immoral.
We must bring the Gospel to bear and pray to make Saint John XXIII’s dream of nuclear abolition a reality. These weapons hang over us threatening to shatter human society and lay a curse on the ground itself. Many of us have become accustomed to the presence of this shadow — convinced by our leaders that they are necessary for our security. Let us pray that we may all, one by one, encounter Christ’s message anew and walk the strange and difficult path which leads to the Kingdom. No longer can we celebrate the ones who build the bombs and wield them in our name. Blessed are the makers of peace.
Robert Short is a member of Pax Christi, Rhode Island.
