Honor moms by working for peace

5/31/2008

The original Mother's Day founder had a very different vision than Anna Jarvis, profiled in The Blade's May 11 article as creator of the holiday.

Long before Jarvis popularized the idea of a day honoring mothers, 19th-century human rights and peace activist Julia Ward Howe campaigned for an annual Mother's Day for Peace, focused on bringing women's unifying family perspective and compassionate values in the public sphere to bear on the man-made problems of war and injustice.

In 1870, appalled by the carnage of the civil and Franco-Prussian wars, she published an eloquent Mother's Day proclamation, an impassioned plea for women everywhere to work together to find the "means by which the great human family can live in peace." She wrote, "Our sons shall not be taken from us to unlearn all that we have been able to teach them of charity, mercy, and patience. We women of one country will be too tender of those of another country to allow our sons to be trained to injure theirs."

Her impassioned plea for women's participation in the struggle to end war led to an annual Mother's Day for Peace observed on June 2 for about three decades.

Just as Anna Jarvis became unhappy with the commercialization of her holiday honoring mothers, Julia Ward Howe would surely be disappointed that today's observance is a private family affair, while war-making has become our largest industry and a threat to families everywhere.

What better way to honor mothers today than to work for a more secure, just, and peaceful world for all children?

Phyllis Palmer

Lambertville, Mich.

The mayor of San Francisco screeched with joy. "It's a great day for California. It's a great day for America," he said as he applauded the state high court's decision to allow homosexual marriages. In reality, it's a sad day in California and America.

People do not realize that the highest court known to man did not pass a positive ruling on homosexual marriages. God has never ordained it nor will he ever do so. Homosexuality is a sin. No matter how loving a God people think God is, he still calls homosexuality what it is: sin. He loves the sinner but despises the sin and he expects all Christians to do the same.

Let us pray for those who fail to read the scriptures and understand what God has said or simply ignore God's word. Let us pray for America. Too many people are buying into this new-age religion pushed by the likes of Oprah Winfrey, that "I'm OK, you're OK" mentality. We continue to manipulate the word of God into what we want it to be, not what God intended it to be.

America, let's fall on our knees and seek the Lord's forgiveness. Jesus said, lest we repent, we too shall perish (Luke 13:5). What a sad day that will be.

Larry Snow

Wauseon

Sen. Ted Kennedy's legacy will live forever: Chappaquiddick.

Robert Koszycki

South Detroit Avenue