The closer we look at decisions to deploy a second atomic weapon against Japan on August 9, 76 years ago, the more morally audacious the tactic appears. Step outside the American explanatory cloud—we bombed military installations to force unconditional imperial surrender—defining public understanding to see: the US Government explicitly targeted civilian populations, a violation of Read more
Wars have always caused needless suffering, destruction and death. But 75 years ago, the hell of war reached a new all-time immoral low when on August 6, 1945 a United States Boeing B-29 bomber dropped an atomic bomb on the Japanese city of Hiroshima instantly killing over 70,000 – mostly civilian – children, women and Read more
Pope Francis, Monday, travelled to Hiroshima and Nagasaki and standing before survivors of the 1945 atomic bombing, Francis said a world without nuclear weapons is possible. Francis said it is “perverse” to think the threat of nuclear weapons makes the world safer. Calling their use a crime against the dignity of humanity and against any Read more
Nagasaki atomic bomb victims were among those remembered on Tuesday at a prayer service in the Crypt Chapel of Westminster Cathedral. Besides marking the anniversary of Nagasaki’s victims, the service also recalled the execution of Blessed Franz Jagerstatter in 1943 for refusing to serve in Hitler’s army, and included prayers for all conscientious objectors and Read more
It is often the case that global events are best understood when viewed through the prism of the individual lives caught up in them. With the coming of the 70th anniversary of the bombing of Nagasaki, the life of Takashi Nagai, as told in Fr. Paul Glynn’s A Song for Nagasaki (Ignatius Press, 2009), does Read more
Father George Zabelka, the Catholic chaplain to the 509th Composite Group — the atomic bomb group — blessed the aircrews and their two missions before they set out to bomb Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Seventy years ago, on August 6, 1945, the single most destructive weapon ever unleashed upon human beings and the environment – the atomic bomb – Read more
After a typhoon chased us across the main island of Japan, my family and I found ourselves marching in the rain up a long hill in the middle of Nagasaki in search of the Urakami Cathedral. With the approaching 69th anniversary of the atomic bombing here in 1945, we felt a sense of awe and Read more
“Making every effort to maintain the spirit of unity in the bond of peace” (Ephesians 4:3b). Blessed are the Peacemakers Violence is something we live with on a daily basis. It can be felt as an unkind word, experienced as a physical injury or extreme hunger, or seen in spectacular actions of armed killers on the Read more