Invasion day +45 The plea from Ukraine yesterday to cut off the gas and oil blood money flowing to Putin's war machine is also a call for peace.
This is 2022. We have said this before but we repeat it and will keep on repeating it. With all our knowledge, with all our skill, with all the technological power at our fingertips, our wealth, our humanity, how is it that despite all this, one single man using tactics from the middle ages, can seek to destroy the world?
We have to find the answer and quickly. Time is running out for the world and we are now facing a long war of attrition with all his bloodshed, misery and hopelessness. This war must be stopped..
Today, we passed 750 site visits to this blog, now fifty people a day are reading and spreading the words of peace for Ukraine, an extraordinary commitment to which we give thanks and humility for the power and yes, at times the awesome beauty of the thoughts of peace being expressed. These words do matter. Thank you everyone.
And amazingly perhaps, Hoggy not being a massive supporter of Mr Johnson's way of doing things, we acknowledge him for his visit to the heroic Volodymyr Zelensky yesterday in Kyiv and for his commitment of the UK to continue supporting Ukraine in its fight for peace, justice and democracy. It may seem odd that we are supporting military action given this is a peace blog, but we have long come to realise that the only way peace, sadly, can be obtained in Ukraine is by the defeat and downfall of the dictator, Putin.
Those who may not agree with this stance we hope will bear with us as we acknowledge your equally powerful intentions and hopes for peace. Mahatma Ghandi might not have taken this stance either and we do believe in the power of non-violence. But Putin has completely re-written the laws of life and death and we sadly can see no other way to stop him right now than by the military defence of democracy. It is a fight for peace. But we will let Ghandi have a word, for he surely was a great man for peace.
'War is an unmitigated evil. But it certainly does one good thing. It drives away fear and brings bravery to the surface.'
'If we are to reach real peace in this world and if we are to carry on a real war against war, we shall have to begin with children; and if they will grow up in their natural innocence, we won't have to struggle; we won't have to pass fruitless idle resolutions, but we shall go from love to love and peace to peace, until at last all the corners of the world are covered with that peace and love for which consciously or unconsciously the whole world is hungering.'
We are not there yet, but after this terrible war and its even more terrible threat is over we beg that the quietude of those who campaign so tirelessly and often silently for peace will be the voices that are heard loudest. Voices like the inspiring Peter Millar and his late wife Dorothy, who we publish here again today as he reminds us of John Marsden's poetic words:
'May the bombs rust away in the bunkers, And the doomsday clock be rewound.'
These are the voices we need to hear.
Please keep writing: together we are making a difference. Hoggy.
Today's letters:
From Peter Millar, Peace Campaigner and Author, Edinburgh
Dear Hoggy,
A Candle in the Window: Words to encourage us in these uncertain times.
An interlude from all our thoughts about our fearful world:
Introduction:
It is an early spring afternoon here in Edinburgh. All of us I am sure, are often linked into the tragic news from Ukraine. The last Candle in the Window was in a way honouring all our sisters and brothers in Ukraine as they go through this nightmare; a nightmare for the human race.
This month also marked the 21st anniversary of my dear Dorothy’s very sudden death from a massive blood clot on the morning of March 9th 2001 at our then home in Inverness-shire. Shortly after Dorothy’s death, my daughter-in-law Ange brought together a small booklet containing a few of Dorothy’s favourite thoughts, reflections and poems.
That booklet was called Seeds for the Morrow and over the years, has had twenty four reprints. I hope these thoughts which inspired Dorothy will give us strength as our thoughts turn to Ukraine and to the many other parts of our shared, often tender world, where human suffering is great and ongoing.
** * My heart is moved by all I cannot save: so much has been destroyed.
I have to cast my lot with those who, age after age, perversely,
with no extraordinary power, reconstitute the world.
(Adrienne Rich)
*** We do not see things as they are: we see things as we are.
(The Talmud)
*** This present day is now all that matters:
here fingers touch tasselled eternity,
and self-importance blows away in tatters,
but love stands by to bless mortality. (Bruce D. Prewer)
*** Then, as now, I have no earthly idea who it is I am thanking, or maybe I do know a
little, and would like to know more. But I think I know what I am thankful for: the
privilege of being a small, frail, faulted, but integral part of the magic of life on
earth. You can do worse.
(Author not known.)
*** You are a wayfaring people, strangers perhaps, never rooted in one place, but pilgrims moving towards an abiding city further on.
(from South Africa)
May we be still for a moment each day and visualise our connected world.
A poem/prayer for our times:
Written many years ago by John Marsden
May the road be free for the journey
May it lead where is promised it would,
May the stars that gave ancient bearings
Be seen and be understood:
May every aircraft fly safely
May every traveller be found,
May the sailors crossing the seas
Not hear the cries of the drowned.
May gardens be wild, like jungles,
May nature never be tamed,
May dangers create of us heroes
May fears always have names:
May the mountains stand to remind us
Of what it means to be young,
May we be outlived by our daughters
May we be outlived by our sons.
May the bombs rust away in the bunkers
And the doomsday clock be rewound,
May the solitary scientists, working,
Remember the holes in the ground:
May the knife remain in the holder
May the bullet stay in the gun,
May those who live in the shadows
Be seen by those in the sun.
Peter,
Peter Millar
Edinburgh
Dear Peter,
Thank you again for your continued insight and inspiration to us all here at Hoggy. We are seeking to forge alliances wherever we can in order to try and unravel the mysteries of peace and educate ourselves into any practical possibilities.
In order to help.
Your words bring us hope for the present and for the future. We thank you and acknowledge you and Dorothy's wonderful legacy for the world.
With every good wish from us all,
Hoggy
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