Nobel Peace Prize laureates, religious leaders arrested in D.C. action

Catholic New Times, April 20, 2003

WASHINGTON, D.C. -- Mairead Corrigan Maguire and Jody Williams, two former winners of the Nobel Peace Prize, and dozens of religious leaders jumped barricades close to The White House to protest the Bush administration's war against Iraq. Maguire, the 1976 Nobel Peace Prize winner, and Williams. the 1997 recipient, joined United Methodist Bishop C. Joseph Sprague, Roman Catholic Bishop Thomas Gumbleton, and former Defense Department official Daniel Ellsberg in leading a group of 68 demonstrators arrested on March 27 by D.C. Park Police.

"I am here to break the law because my conscience tells me I must, and because each of us has a moral responsibility to do all we can, in a nonviolent way, to oppose the evil of this immoral act of aggression and war by the United Kingdom/United States administrations, against the will of we the people of the world," said Maguire.

Bishop Gumbleton of Detroit, who traveled to Iraq in January, was among those arrested in Wednesday's action. "As people of faith and conscience, we proclaim that it is a grave sin to support this war," said Gumbleton. "We cannot stand silent while the Bush administration murders innocent men, women and children."

The 68 arrested were charged and released by 9 p.m. Ten of those charged were instructed to appear in court on April 18, while the remainder were ordered to appear May 29.

"Nearly every religious denomination in the world has condemned the Bush administration's war against Iraq as a crime against peace," said Dave Robinson, national coordinator of Pax Christi USA. "Today, Buddhists, Jews, Christians, Muslims, human rights and peace activists united our voices against a war which is immoral, unjust, unethical and unnecessary."