He is Risen! He is Truly Risen!

 

He is Risen!  He is Truly Risen!

Fr. Malloy’s Midweek Message.  April 12, 2023

Friends,

This week we celebrate the event that changes all of human history, the event that gives meaning and hope to our world, a world so mired in despair, destruction and death.  Resurrection means the triumph of good over evil, the truth that in the end, love wins: love always wins.  After the resurrection, all of human history is bathed in the new light of peace, the new trust in our God who saves us.

Bishop N. T. Wright, the world’s leading scripture scholar, was interviewed by The New York Times about the reality of the resurrection.  He enthusiastically and cogently teaches that the resurrection is a real event.  https://www.nytimes.com/2023/04/09/opinion/jesus-rise-from-the-dead-easter.html

N.T. Wright: I’m well aware that many people — including some in churches — have treated the resurrection and Easter as a general way of talking about the rebirth of hope or a spiritual metaphor. Indeed, in the New Testament, the idea of resurrection is sometimes used metaphorically to talk about a new moral life, a life where everything is going to be different. But in the New Testament, that’s always rooted in the claim that when they’re talking about resurrection, they’re talking about something that actually happened.

In the first century, the word for resurrection, the Greek word “anastasis,” was never about a vague sense of possibility or the rebirth of hope or anything like that. It was always about people who had been bodily dead now discovered to be bodily alive. I’ve shown in great detail in the book that all the early Christians for whom we have any evidence, right through until around 150 years after the time of Jesus, when they’re talking about resurrection, that’s what they’re talking about.

It’s beyond question that when the first followers of Jesus used that language about him, they intended to say something definite about his being bodily alive, albeit in a whole new way. He seemed to have gone through death and out the other side, but into a new world in which he was emphatically embodied. Unless we are prepared to acknowledge that, we’re simply not taking their words seriously.

Then, as now, claiming that somebody was alive again — particularly somebody who made the sort of claims that Jesus made or were made about him — was revolutionary. It was dangerous talk. So if people don’t like dangerous talk, then stay away from Easter is my advice.

These days let’s get close to this “dangerous talk” of resurrection.  Let’s realize how revolutionary the proclamation of the resurrection was, and still is.  Jesus risen means we have to get busy building a world of peace and justice for all.  We must, as followers of the risen Christ, live the way he told us to live.  We need to forgive.  We must serve the poor and work to eradicate poverty.  We will be filled with peace and joy as we carry on the mission Jesus began, the mission God radically blessed through the Holy Spirit given at Pentecost. 

Alleluia!   Alleluia!! Alleluia!!!  Sing Alabaré

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sNi3lRWqWK4

Peace,

Fr. Rick Malloy, S.J.

Keep Safe.    Keep Sane.    Keep Smiling

        

Ha resucitado!  

Ha resucitado de verdad! 

El Miercoles Mensaje del Padre Malloy, S.J.  12 de Abril, 2023

Amigos y Amigas,

Esta semana celebramos el acontecimiento que cambia toda la historia de la humanidad, el acontecimiento que da sentido y esperanza a nuestro mundo, un mundo tan sumido en la desesperación, la destrucción y la muerte.  La resurrección significa el triunfo del bien sobre el mal, la verdad de que, al final, vence el amor: el amor siempre vence.  Tras la resurrección, toda la historia humana se baña en la nueva luz de la paz, la nueva confianza en nuestro Dios que nos salva.

El obispo N. T. Wright, el principal biblista del mundo, fue entrevistado por el New York Times sobre la realidad de la resurrección.  Con entusiasmo y contundencia enseña que la resurrección es un acontecimiento real.   https://www.nytimes.com/2023/04/09/opinion/jesus-rise-from-the-dead-easter.html

N.T. Wright: Soy muy consciente de que mucha gente -incluidos algunos en las iglesias- ha tratado la resurrección y la Pascua como una forma general de hablar del renacimiento de la esperanza o una metáfora espiritual. De hecho, en el Nuevo Testamento, la idea de resurrección se utiliza a veces metafóricamente para hablar de una nueva vida moral, una vida en la que todo va a ser diferente. Pero en el Nuevo Testamento, eso siempre se basa en la afirmación de que cuando se habla de resurrección, se está hablando de algo que sucedió realmente.

En el siglo I, la palabra resurrección, la palabra griega "anastasis", nunca se refería a una vaga sensación de posibilidad o al renacimiento de la esperanza ni nada por el estilo. Siempre se refería a personas que habían estado muertas corporalmente y ahora se descubría que estaban vivas corporalmente. He demostrado con gran detalle en el libro que todos los primeros cristianos de los que tenemos alguna evidencia, hasta alrededor de 150 años después de la época de Jesús, cuando hablan de resurrección, eso es de lo que están hablando.

Es incuestionable que cuando los primeros seguidores de Jesús utilizaron ese lenguaje sobre él, tenían la intención de decir algo definitivo sobre su vida corporal, aunque de una manera totalmente nueva. Parecía haber pasado por la muerte y haber salido por el otro lado, pero a un mundo nuevo en el que se había encarnado. A menos que estemos dispuestos a reconocerlo, sencillamente no estaremos tomando en serio sus palabras.

Entonces, como ahora, afirmar que alguien estaba vivo de nuevo -especialmente alguien que hacía el tipo de afirmaciones que Jesús hizo o se hicieron sobre él- era revolucionario. Era un discurso peligroso. Así que si a la gente no le gustan las palabras peligrosas, mi consejo es que se mantenga alejada de la Pascua.

Acerquémonos estos días a esta "charla peligrosa" de la resurrección.  Démonos cuenta de lo revolucionaria que fue, y sigue siendo, la proclamación de la resurrección.  Jesús resucitado significa que tenemos que ponernos manos a la obra para construir un mundo de paz y justicia para todos.  Debemos, como seguidores de Cristo resucitado, vivir como él nos dijo que viviéramos.  Debemos perdonar.  Debemos servir a los pobres y trabajar para erradicar la pobreza.  Nos llenaremos de paz y alegría al continuar la misión que Jesús comenzó, la misión que Dios bendijo radicalmente mediante el Espíritu Santo dado en Pentecostés. 

¡Aleluya!   ¡Aleluya! ¡¡¡Aleluya!!!  Canta Alabaré

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sNi3lRWqWK4

La Paz,

P. Ricardo Malloy, S.J.

Sigamos Seguro.    Sigamos Sano.    Sigamos Sonriendo

Quotes from Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr.

 

Brilliant thoughts from 

a Prophet for Our and All Times

Quotes from 

Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr.

“Every man must decide whether he will walk in the light of creative altruism or in the darkness of destructive selfishness. ”

“The function of education is to teach one to think intensively and to think critically. Intelligence plus character – that is the goal of true education.”

“An individual has not started living until he can rise above the narrow confines of his individualistic concerns to the broader concerns of all humanity.”

“Rarely do we find men who willingly engage in hard, solid thinking. There is an almost universal quest for easy answers and half-baked solutions. Nothing pains some people more than having to think.”

“The past is prophetic in that it asserts loudly that wars are poor chisels for carving out peaceful tomorrows”

“He who is devoid of the power to forgive is devoid of the power to love.”

“If you can’t fly then run, if you can’t run then walk, if you can’t walk then crawl, but whatever you do you have to keep moving forward.”

“Only in the darkness can you see the stars.”

“Let no man pull you so low as to hate him.”

“Never succumb to the temptation of bitterness.”

“Forgiveness is not an occasional act; it is a constant attitude.”

“Those who are not looking for happiness are the most likely to find it, because those who are searching forget that the surest way to be happy is to seek happiness for others.”

“Whatever affects one directly, affects all indirectly. I can never be what I ought to be until you are what you ought to be. This is the interrelated structure of reality.”

“I refuse to accept the view that mankind is so tragically bound to the starless midnight of racism and war that the bright daybreak of peace and brotherhood can never become a reality… I believe that unarmed truth and unconditional love will have the final word.”

 “Our scientific power has outrun our spiritual power. We have guided missiles and misguided men.”

“We must come to see that the end we seek is a society at peace with itself, a society that can live with its conscience.”

“History will have to record that the greatest tragedy of this period of social transition was not the strident clamor of the bad people, but the appalling silence of the good people.”

“A nation or civilization that continues to produce soft-minded men purchases its own spiritual death on the installment plan.”

“No, no, we are not satisfied, and we will not be satisfied until justice rolls down like waters and righteousness like a mighty stream.”

“The hope of a secure and livable world lies with disciplined nonconformists who are dedicated to justice, peace and brotherhood.”

“It may be true that the law cannot make a man love me, but it can keep him from lynching me, and I think that’s pretty important.”

“Of all the forms of inequality, injustice in health care is the most shocking and inhumane.”

“Never forget that everything Hitler did in Germany was legal.”

“Nonviolence means avoiding not only external physical violence but also internal violence of spirit. You not only refuse to shoot a man, but you refuse to hate him.”

“At the center of non-violence stands the principle of love.”

“Violence as a way of achieving racial justice is both impractical and immoral. I am not unmindful of the fact that violence often brings about momentary results. Nations have frequently won their independence in battle. But in spite of temporary victories, violence never brings permanent peace.”

“Returning hate for hate multiplies hate, adding deeper darkness to a night already devoid of stars. Darkness cannot drive out darkness; only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate; only love can do that. Hate multiplies hate, violence multiplies violence, and toughness multiplies toughness in a descending spiral of destruction.”

“Mankind must put and end to war or war will put an end to mankind.”

“I have the audacity to believe that peoples everywhere can have three meals a day for their bodies, education and culture for their minds, and dignity, equality, and freedom for their spirits.”

“By opening our lives to God in Christ, we become new creatures. This experience, which Jesus spoke of as the new birth, is essential if we are to be transformed nonconformists … Only through an inner spiritual transformation do we gain the strength to fight vigorously the evils of the world in a humble and loving spirit.”

“Now there is a final reason I think that Jesus says, ‘Love your enemies.’ It is this: that love has within it a redemptive power. And there is a power there that eventually transforms individuals. Just keep being friendly to that person. Just keep loving them, and they can’t stand it too long. Oh, they react in many ways in the beginning. They react with guilt feelings, and sometimes they’ll hate you a little more at that transition period, but just keep loving them. And by the power of your love they will break down under the load. That’s love, you see. It is redemptive, and this is why Jesus says love. There’s something about love that builds up and is creative. There is something about hate that tears down and is destructive. So love your enemies.”

“The God whom we worship is not a weak and incompetent God. He is able to beat back gigantic waves of opposition and to bring low prodigious mountains of evil. The ringing testimony of the Christian faith is that God is able.”

“The first question which the priest and the Levite asked was: ‘If I stop to help this man, what will happen to me?’ But… the good Samaritan reversed the question: ‘If I do not stop to help this man, what will happen to him?’

Homily Sept 11, 2016. Fifteen years. The Father of the Prodigal and Elder Son

The Father: Compassionate, Caring, Challenging us to respond and reconcile, not retaliate.

Rick Malloy, S.J.  -  24^th Year C Prodigal Son Sept 11, 2016

  

(prenote.  I didn't say all of this in the homily...)

A father passing by his 16 year old son's bedroom was astonished to see the bed was nicely made and everything was picked up. Then he saw an envelope propped up prominently on the center of the bed. It was addressed, "Dad". With the worst premonition, the father opened the envelope and read the letter with trembling hands:

Dear Dad, It is with great regret and sorrow that I'm writing you. I had to elope with my new girlfriend because I wanted to avoid a scene with mom and you. I've been finding real passion with Joan and she is so nice even with all her piercing, tattoos and her tight motorcycle clothes. But it's not only the passion dad, she's pregnant and Joan said that we will be very happy. Even though you don't care for her as she is so much older than I, she already owns a trailer in the woods and has a stack of firewood for the whole winter. She wants to have many more children with me and that's now one of my dreams too. Joan taught me that marijuana doesn't really hurt anyone and we'll be growing it for us and trading it with her friends for all the cocaine and ecstasy we want! In the meantime, we'll pray that science will find a cure for Herpes so Joan can get better; she sure deserves it!!

Don't worry Dad. Someday I'm sure we'll be back to visit so you can get to know your grandchildren

Your son, Roy

P. S. Dad, none of the above is true. I'm over at the neighbor's house. I just wanted to remind you that there are worse things in life than my report card that's in my desk center drawer. I love you! Call when it is safe for me to come home

Another story.  Jim asks his teen age son about Spanish grade.  I’m doing fine Dad.  Two days later the report card comes.  Jim runs up stairs.  “Damn Jimmy.  I asked you about Spanish and you said you were doing fine. Now I see you’ve flunked.  What the hell?”  “Gee Dad.  To tell you the truth, I didn’t want to get yelled at twice”

1.  What’s going on in these readings?  God is calling us to forgiveness and reconciliation.  Moses pleads for the bozos who made the golden calf.  St. Paul admits that he was a horrible sinner and that Christ has come to save us all.  Jesus tells the most famous parables of all.  We know it as the prodigal son, but it would be better titled Two Lost Sons; One Incredibly Forgiving, Compassionate and Understanding Father

Some awareness of cultural conflicts going on help us appreciate what Jesus is doing here.  He’s being attacked by the Pharisees for hanging out with sinners.  So, he responds directly and strongly, insulting the learned and pride filled Pharisees.  Reference to shepherds is an insult.  Pharisees considered shepherds “unclean, members of a despised and forbidden profession” (Pilch 1997:136).  So when Jesus says, “Which one of you having one hundred sheep…” he’s really giving it to them.  It would be like someone addressing a bunch of Catholic Bishops saying, “Which one of you having one hundred prostitutes…”  To use the example of a woman is also a pretty direct insult when directed at this group of Pharisees.  This was a world where women weren’t even considered persons.

So realize the parable of the prodigal son is told in a situation where people don’t want to hear it.  The Pharisees find Jesus’ way of being religious offensive.  Jesus is all about forgiveness and reconciliation; the Pharisees are all about enforcing rules and regulations, bolstering their own self-esteem and sense of importance by being religious the “right” way.

The son who takes the money and runs is a real mess.  He’s squandering not just his inheritance; he’s putting his father in jeopardy because his father may have no one to care for him when he’s old.  The son’s actions insult and repulse not only his father; he alienates his older brother and the entire village.  That’s why the father’s killing the calf is so important.  It’s not just a goat or a sheep, which would be like serving burgers and hot dogs.  To kill a calf meant the whole village would feast; it’s like a big expensive wedding party.  The father generously and emphatically announces to the world that the ruptured relationship with his son is reestablished.  His son was dead and is now brought back to life.  This is more than the boy could have dreamed of or hoped for.

The older son doesn’t get it.  He insults his father by addressing him without a title.  He sneers, “I have slaved for you…”  Has he worked for his father, or just for himself?  The older son continues to insult his father by comparing the calf killed for the younger son to a goat he never got (“MARCIA! MARCIA! MARCIA!” or whining “He’s your favorite”).  He slanders his little brother by bringing up an unsubstantiated charge about playing with prostitutes.  The father addresses him with a title: “Son.”  The father invites him to join the feast. 

“The two sons in this parable are essentially the same and equally offensive.  They differ only in their response to unexpected and undeserved love demonstrated by their humiliated father.  Like these sons, all who hear this story must decide how they should respond to forgiving love” (Pilch 1997:138).

2.  What was going on with the Son and why was the Father so forgiving?  The younger son goes off and gets all screwed up.  Soon he’s got a lousy job, hanging out with the pigs (today, to convey the foulness of his situation, we’d say he’s eating spam and living in a cockroach and rat infested apt.).  In the Greek text it says, literally, “he came to himself” and realized how stupid and stubborn he has been.  He decides to go back and beg his father’s forgiveness.

His father is waiting for him, sees him afar off and pulls all the plugs and throws a party to welcome the kid home.  Maybe the father was feeling he hadn’t done a good job as a parent.  Maybe he realizes he’d screwed up by giving the kid half of the inheritance.  Maybe he realized he’s been too indulgent with the boy.  Or maybe he knew the boy lived in a world that mitigated against his growing happy and healthy and holy and free.

3.  What does this say to us today?  One key to the parable’s message is the curious phrase describing the son’s realization of the way out of his predicament: “he came to himself.”  The root of the younger son’s problem was that he had lost his self, or maybe he’d never developed a sense of self, a robust confidence in who and what he was. 

Today many young adults suffer the younger son’s affliction.  Despite all the Mr. Rodgers’ messages of self-worth and self-esteem, too many teens and young adults exhibit symptoms of severe unhappiness, deep depression and a real sense of being lost. 

Today, 15 years after 9/11 it can seem that our people in the USA feel unhappy with our politics, are deeply worried about the direction of the country.  We’re told too often and too loudly that we are lost.

4.  Hope:  If you are one of these people who feel lost, there is hope.  If you are one of those who have been lucky enough to escape such a fate, don’t feel superior.  You are called to show your “younger” brothers and sisters the way.  We are all called to not be like the older brother.  We are called to be like the Father.  Caring, Compassionate, Challenging.  We need to come to ourselves.  To respond and reconcile, not just “respond and retaliate” as the Defense Secretary Ash Carter said this morning in NYC.

The way is found in creating a good and just world for one another.  America is great when America makes the whole world great for all.  The way is found in knowing who we are and letting the wonder of our being fill us with faith and hope and love.  Stop looking for love in all the wrong places.  Start looking for God.

What if on September 12, 2001, we had responded by saying, “We are largely a Christian nation.  As a people, we want to respond to the atrocities of 9/11 with forgiveness.  Jesus says, ‘Love your enemies.  Pray for those who persecute you’ (Matt 5:44).  Yesterday, those who desecrate the name of Allah, murdered almost 3000 innocent Americans.  We will not retaliate in kind.  We will not allow terrorists to turn us into revengeful people.  We do not live by the law of an eye for an eye, for such a law leads to a world gone blind.  We welcome and respect people of all religions that teach peace, mercy, forgiveness and love.”

Such a response would have been truly revolutionary.  Such a response would have made the ideologies of Al Queda and ISIS less attractive to young Muslims.  Such a response would have held forth the possibility of peace.  Such a response would have saved us upwards of some three trillion dollars.  And such a response would have saved the lives of thousands and thousands who have died since September 11, 2001. 

It is not too late to change our ways.  We can peer into our souls and see things afresh.  In this Year of Mercy, we can look on ISIS with compassion and love instead of fear and hatred.  The young people in ISIS need to be converted to the true meanings and values of Islam.  Deep in our souls we find a desire to treat ISIS as Jesus would.  Rather than trumpeting the need to retaliate with bombs and boots on the ground, imagine risking relationship with those in ISIS rather than maintaining an eternal stalemate of us v. them.

When threatened with death Jesus said, “Put your sword back in its sheath, for all who take the sword will perish by the sword” (Matt 26:52).  The Good News is that we do not have to remain trapped and enslaved in modes of violence and retaliation.  We can choose to do things differently.  We are free to be loving, peaceful and joyful.  We need not cower in fear.

The crisis of ISIS is rooted in ideas of God, who God is and what God wants.  We need to flood the Middle East with ideas that challenge ISIS’s misreading of the Quran.  Islam is a religion of peace.  So too is Christianity.  It is time, and has been for forever, to put down the guns. 

Pick up the scriptures and start talking.  Stop fighting.  Give peace a chance.  Young, radical Muslims think they are doing good by killing us.  The more we kill in retaliation, the more their insane misreading of Islam is reinforced.  If we stop killing terrorists, it would force those blinded by Wahhabist ideology to rethink their interpretation of Islam.

We should flood the Middle East with ambassadors of peace.  Get thousands of young American Muslims, Jews and Christians to go there and engage the Jihadists in transformative conversation.  You cannot easily lop the head off of someone who comes, speaks your language, and simply wants to live in peace.  Let us strive together to bring justice and peace to those war torn lands.

And if such ambassadors of peace are killed, their blood will water the plants of reconciliation and peace.  Where have we seen such before?  When the child in the crib grew and was crucified by the brutal Roman Empire.  Jesus’ death transformed our war, weary world.  The true and living God would rather be killed, than kill.  Jesus shows us the way to be truly human.

Can we dare to believe the radical Jihadists are human?  Can we see and trust that deep in their souls reside desires for the same peace and order we desire?  We must be courageous enough to go, extend an olive branch, and say, “Let us sit together, talk and work this out.” 

To some degree, we must admit we created this monstrous band.  Our disastrous wars in Afghanistan and Iraq and our flooding the region with weapons have spawned the terrorists bent on destroying us.  Honestly admitting our sins can lead to reconciliation.  Asking forgiveness would signal to the terrorists our willingness to change our warlike ways.

The only way to stop terrorists is to make the terrorists want to stop killing.  The ideology of ISIS will wither if there is no enemy attacking.  We need to disarm ISIS by taking away not only their arms, bank accounts and lines of credit, but ultimately their reason for being.

Israel too must practice peace.  And wouldn’t Israel lay down arms immediately if peace could be established and assured?

I can hear you now: “Father, this is stupid.  We can’t even imagine doing what you suggest.” 

So.  What’s the plan?  What is the alternative to practicing peace?  Endlessly wage war?  Are the one percent of Americans who do all our fighting going to be at war in Syria, Iraq, Afghanistan, on and on, for the next five, ten, twenty-five, fifty years?  Will we spend three, nine, eighty one trillion dollars more and still not achieve peace?  Is there any strategy to end this insane, constant war on terror?  Dare we hope for and choose peace?

In response to ISIS, our practicing non-violence and peace can end the conflict.  With such practices, Jesus, Gandhi, Martin Luther King and their followers changed the world.  So too must we.  If we laid down our arms, true followers of Islam would be required to do so as well: “If the enemy desists, then you must also cease hostilities” (Quran 2:193)  [Aslan, Reza  (2005).  No God but God: The Origins, Evolution and Future of Islam.  New York: Random House.  P. 134].

Forgiveness, reconciliation, love and justice, are the answers.  It is not crazy to propose that the practice of Jesus’ teachings are the solution to the crisis of ISIS.  Forgiving, reconciling, responding with love, establishing justice, are the only strategic, safe and sane alternatives (The section in italics appeared in the National Catholic Reporter Feb 2016.  https://www.ncronline.org/blogs/soul-seeing/mercy-can-overcome-even-islamic-state)

Hope heals and love lies in re-establishing relationships.  We need to heal and strengthen relationships with others, with ourselves, and with God.  WE NEED TO COME TO OURSELVES.  WE need to Wake up.  Realize we are all the loved daughters and sons of God who is love.

The way to do this is to pray.  Real Prayer forces us to get in touch with reality.  Real Prayer opens us to the transformative grace of God.  Real Prayer helps us come to ourselves and then we can do what we need to do to establish the relationships that make for peace and prosperity, joy and justice, faith and freedom, hope and healing, love and life.  Dare to pray.  Have the courage to pray.  Pick up and read the Bible.  Pray the rosary.  Go to daily Mass.  Learn about the Examen and Centering Prayer.  Risk coming on the silent retreat this October.

Hope lies in getting some time to reflect on who and what you are.  Hope lies is “coming to yourself,” in the hard, but so joy filled work of coming to know and love yourself.  There’s a great person in each and every one of us.  God has graced us with his divine presence living vibrantly and freely on the heart of each of us.  We’ve all been given a marvelous gift: life.  Open the gift.  Play.  Be Happy.  Enjoy life.  Live free.

And keep your parents happy.  Get a good report card.

The Encyclical "Laudato Si": THE MOVIE

Great Video Commentary on Baltimore by Loyola University

Pope Francis's Common Sense Approach = 2014 A Great Progressive Year for the Catholic Church

Love thy neighbor

2014 was the most progressive year for the Catholic Church

Catholicism 2.0(AP Photo/Ahn Young-joon)

Written by

Paul MosesProfessor, Brooklyn College/CUNY

December 15, 2014

Pope Francis initiated a revolution in the Catholic Church in 2014—a revolution of common sense rather than ideology or doctrine.

Click here to read more... http://qz.com/310652/2014-was-the-most-progressive-year-for-the-catholic-church/ 

The Jesuit Post Highlights McCutcheon's Christmas in the Trenches

This is a most moving Christmas Song.  The Jesuit Post kind enough to add it to their list.  Look for Dec 13th entry on this list.  http://thejesuitpost.org/site/christmas-2013/

Pope Calls for Prayer to End World Hunger

Pray with the Pope today.  He is calling us to end World Hunger.  St Ignatius says, "Love is best expressed in deeds."

Every year, authors, journalists, teachers, researchers, schoolchildren and students ask us for statistics about hunger and malnutrition. To help answer these questions, we've compiled a list of useful facts and figures on world hunger.

842 million people in the world do not have enough to eat. This number has fallen by 156 million since 1990.

 

The vast majority of hungry people (827 million) live in developing countries, where 14.3 percent of the population is undernourished.

 

 Asia has the largest share of the world's hungry people (some 552 million) but the trend is downward.

 

 If women farmers had the same access to resources as men, the number of hungry in the world could be reduced by up to 150 million.

 

Poor nutrition causes nearly half (45%) of deaths in children under five - 3.1 million children each year.

 

One out of six children -- roughly 100 million -- in developing countries is underweight.

 

 One in four of the world's children are stunted. In developing countries the proportion can rise to one in three.

 

 80 percent of the world's stunted children live in just 20 countries.

 

66 million primary school-age children attend classes hungry across the developing world, with 23 million in Africa alone.

 

WFP calculates that US$3.2 billion is needed per year to reach all 66 million hungry school-age children.

http://www.wfp.org/hunger/stats 

http://www.cathnewsusa.com/2013/12/catholics-across-us-join-pope-francis-prayer-end-world-hunger/ 

Gun Violence: 47,856 killed by firearms from 2006-2010. A Jesuit's perspective

It's hard to say, and we all are suffering for and with the multiple victims of Newtown, but the brutal slayings of those wonderful little kids are just the tip of the iceberg. How respond to atrocities like Sandy Hook and the ongoing daily slayings in our society?   (1) We must deal with mental health issues more quickly and efficiently, (2) get reasonable gun control functioning in our society and (3) de-glamorize and confront the culture of violence.   

Guns in the home (47% of Americans legally own a gun.  How many illegal firearms are out there is anyone's guess) is a bad idea and a worse practice.   The gun in your house has a better chance of killing someone you love than it has of hurting an intruder.  10,000 people a year are killed by guns.  Suicide by guns are are almost double that: 18,735 in 2009.

The 2nd amendment gives one the right to bear a musket.  Just as no one has a right to own a tank, a bazooka or an atomic bomb, no one should have the right to weapons of mass slaying.  Let the hunters have their shotguns.  There's no need for a AK-47 or Tech 9 anywhere in the USA.

Back in 1994 the U.S. Catholic Bishops put out a prophetic document, Confronting a Culture of Violence (1994) .  That prescient and cogently argued booklet noted:

"Between 1979 and 1991, nearly 50,000 American children and teenagers were killed by guns, matching the number of Americans who died in battle in Vietnam. It is now estimated 13 American children die every day from guns. Gunshots cause one out of four deaths among American teenagers" (USCCB 1994)

"Our entertainment media too often exaggerate and even celebrate violence. Children see 8,000 murders and 100,000 other acts of violence on television before they leave elementary school." (USCCB 1994)

The children of the 1990s are today's adults.  We reap what we sow.

Guns and Violence in USA:   47,856 killed by firearms from 2006-2010.  Almost 10,000 a year.

Gun Homicides (average annually):

Less than 50: Japan

Less than 150:  Germany, Italy, France, etc.

Less than 200:  Canada

More than 10,000: USA  Source: IANSA (International Action Network on Small Arms of the United Nations)

U.S. lifetime medical costs for gunshot injuries total an estimated $2.3 billion

 U.S. taxpayers pay for almost half ($1.1 billion or 49%) of lifetime medical costs for gunshot injuries.

ABC News reports there are 129,817 federally licensed firearms dealers in the U.S., including 51,438 retail gun stores.  There are 36,569 grocery stores and 14,098 McDonald's restaurants.  (Do we really need three times more gun shops than Mickey D's?)

TIME Magazine reports  ( http://business.time.com/2012/12/18/americas-gun-economy-by-the-numbers/#ixzz2HgN8ODw3 ) 

-  47% Percentage of Americans have a gun

-  $6 billion Estimated revenue generated by the gun and ammunition industry in the U.S.

-  310 million Estimated number of firearms in the U.S., 114 million handguns, 110 million rifles, and 86 million shotguns

-  17-to-1 Ratio of gun-rights lobbyist spending to gun control lobbyist spending in 2011.  Gun rights groups spent $4,212,996; gun control groups spent $240,000.

-  $14 million Amount of money the National Rifle Association spent during the 2012 election in an attempt to defeat President Obama, according to The New York Times

CDC Center for Disease Control Reports:  Firearm suicides.  Number of deaths: 18,735

 The New England Journal of Medicine reports:  [NEJM (2008)

http://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJMp0805923 ]

Deciding whether to own a gun entails balancing potential benefits and risks. One of the risks for which the empirical evidence is strongest,1 and the risk whose death toll is greatest, is that of completed suicide.

In 2005, the most recent year for which mortality data are available, suicide was the second-leading cause of death among Americans 40 years of age or younger. Among Americans of all ages, more than half of all suicides are gun suicides. In 2005, an average of 46 Americans per day committed suicide with a firearm, accounting for 53% of all completed suicides. Gun suicide during this period accounted for 40% more deaths than gun homicide.

Why might the availability of firearms increase the risk of suicide in the United States? First, many suicidal acts — one third to four fifths of all suicide attempts, according to studies — are impulsive. Among people who made near-lethal suicide attempts, for example, 24% took less than 5 minutes between the decision to kill themselves and the actual attempt, and 70% took less than 1 hour.2

Second, many suicidal crises are self-limiting. Such crises are often caused by an immediate stressor, such as the breakup of a romantic relationship, the loss of a job, or a run-in with police. As the acute phase of the crisis passes, so does the urge to attempt suicide. The temporary nature and fleeting sway of many suicidal crises is evident in the fact that more than 90% of people who survive a suicide attempt, including attempts that were expected to be lethal (such as shooting oneself in the head or jumping in front of a train), do not go on to die by suicide. Indeed, recognizing the self-limiting nature of suicidal crises, penal and psychiatric institutions restrict access to lethal means for persons identified as potentially suicidal.

Third, guns are common in the United States (more than one third of U.S. households contain a firearm) and are lethal. A suicide attempt with a firearm rarely affords a second chance. Attempts involving drugs or cutting, which account for more than 90% of all suicidal acts, prove fatal far less often.

The empirical evidence linking suicide risk in the United States to the presence of firearms in the home is compelling.3 There are at least a dozen U.S. case–control studies in the peer-reviewed literature, all of which have found that a gun in the home is associated with an increased risk of suicide. The increase in risk is large, typically 2 to 10 times that in homes without guns, depending on the sample population (e.g., adolescents vs. older adults) and on the way in which the firearms were stored. The association between guns in the home and the risk of suicide is due entirely to a large increase in the risk of suicide by firearm that is not counterbalanced by a reduced risk of nonfirearm suicide. Moreover, the increased risk of suicide is not explained by increased psychopathologic characteristics, suicidal ideation, or suicide attempts among members of gun-owning households.

Three additional findings from the case–control studies are worth noting. The higher risk of suicide in homes with firearms applies not only to the gun owner but also to the gun owner's spouse and children. The presence of a gun in the home, no matter how the gun is stored, is a risk factor for completed suicide. And there is a hierarchy of suicide risk consistent with a dose–response relationship. How household guns are stored matters especially for young people — for example, one study found that adolescent suicide was four times as likely in homes with a loaded, unlocked firearm as in homes where guns were stored unloaded and locked.