Kathy Kelly

Kathy Kelly

Kathy Kelly (kathy@vcnv.org) co-coordinates Voices for Creative Nonviolence.

Articles by this author

Mourners carry the coffin of a child at the funeral procession for those killed in an airstrike on a bus carried out last week by a warplane of the Saudi Arabia-led coalition on August 13, 2018 in Saada, Yemen. (Photo: Mohammed Hamoud/Getty Images) Views
Thursday, August 06, 2020
A Reversal in the Name of Human Survival
Today, the seventy-fifth anniversary of the atomic attack on Hiroshima, should be a day for quiet introspection. I recall a summer morning following the U.S. 2003 “Shock and Awe” invasion of Iraq when the segment of the Chicago River flowing past the headquarters of the world’s second largest...
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The blue backpacks stand for each one of the children killed in the Saudi bombing attack on a school bus. They used a 500 pound bomb manufactured by Lockheed-Martin. Views
Wednesday, July 29, 2020
Yemen: A Torrent of Suffering in a Time of Siege
When evil-doing comes like falling rain, nobody calls out ‘Stop!’ When crimes begin to pile up they become invisible. When sufferings become unendurable, the cries are no longer heard. The cries, too, fall like rain in summer.” —Bertolt Brecht In war-torn Yemen, the crimes pile up. And children who...
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Photo: Promotional image of the Italian frigate the U.S. Navy is adapting for construction at Marinette. (Photo: Fincantieri) Views
Friday, June 26, 2020
Battleground States: The Time for Manufacturing Weapons of War Has Passed as a Viable Industry for Our Nation
The time for manufacturing of weapons of war has passed as a viable industry for our nation, despite the way some of our political leadership clings to economies of the past.—Lisa Savage, U.S. Senate candidate in Maine On Thursday, June 25 th , President Trump’s re-election efforts took him to the...
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Money entrusted to the Pentagon and a vast array of military contractors must be spent to meet human needs. (Photo: David B. Gleason/Flickr/cc) Views
Wednesday, June 10, 2020
Weapons That Protect White Privilege Prevent Sustainable Community Change
In her poem, “The Revolution Will Rhyme,” Buffalo Black Lives Matter activist Jillian Hanesworth writes about the movement for change we now see sweeping across the world: It will not be developed just to be displaced Its focus will not be extracted and refocused or repurposed And the burden of...
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Sanaa, Yemen. 30th Apr, 2020. A health worker wearing a protective suit sprays disinfectant on the hands of people at a market in the old city of Sanaa, amid concerns of the spread of the coronavirus (COVID-19). (Photo: Hani Al-Ansi/dpa/Alamy Live News.) Views
Monday, June 01, 2020
Our Disaster: Why the United States Bears Responsibility for Yemen’s Humanitarian Crisis
An entire generation of Yemeni children has suffered the traumas of war, many of them orphaned, maimed, malnourished, or displaced. The United Nations reports a death toll of 100,000 people in that nation’s ongoing war, with an additional 131,000 people dying from hunger, disease, and a lack of...
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On April 4, 2018, Mark Colville, Clare Grady, Martha Hennessy, Elizabeth McAlister, Patrick O’Neill, Carmen Trotta and Fr. Steve Kelly, S.J. prayed, poured blood, spray painted messages against nuclear weapons, hammered on a replica of a nuclear weapon, hung banners and waited to be arrested. (Photo: Kings Bay 7) Views
Saturday, May 30, 2020
The Glory and Duty of Beating Swords to Plowshares
Inscribed on a wall across from the United Nations in New York City are ancient words of incalculable yearning: “They will beat their swords into plowshares and their spears into pruning hooks. Nation will not take up sword against nation,nor will they train for war anymore.”—Isaiah 2:4 I’ve stood...
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Ideally, nuclear weapon arsenals will be recognized as a crazed burden we must finally shed if we’ve any hope of surviving our past recklessness. (Photo: A B53 nuclear bomb at the Pantex facility in Texas/NNSA/flickr/cc) Views
Friday, April 03, 2020
'He’s Got Eight Numbers, Just Like Everybody Else': An Anti-Nuclear Activist Behind Bars
On April 4, 2020, my friend Steve Kelly will begin a third year of imprisonment in Georgia’s Glynn County jail. He turned 70 while in prison, and while he has served multiple prison sentences for protesting nuclear weapons, spending two years in a county jail is unusual even for him. Yet he...
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Activists practice “physical distancing” at a Saturday morning vigil for Peace in Yemen, Union Square, New York City. (Photo credit: Bill Ofenloch) Views
Sunday, March 29, 2020
Vigil for Peace in Yemen, a New Norm
For the past three years, several dozen New Yorkers have gathered each Saturday at Union Square, at 11:00 a.m. to vigil for peace in Yemen. Now, however, due to the coronavirus, the vigil for peace is radically altered. Last week, in recognition of the city’s coming shelter in place program,...
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Protester’s sign decries sanctions, “a silent war” (Photo: Campaign for Peace and Democracy, 2013) Views
Tuesday, March 17, 2020
Stop Tightening the Thumb Screws, A Humanitarian Message
U.S. sanctions against Iran, cruelly strengthened in March of 2018, continue a collective punishment of extremely vulnerable people. Presently, the U.S. “maximum pressure” policy severely undermines Iranian efforts to cope with the ravages of COVID-19, causing hardship and tragedy while...
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Saturday, January 04, 2020
An Eyewitness to the Horrors of the US 'Forever Wars' Speaks Out
The 2003 "shock and awe" bombing of Iraq had finally stopped. From the balcony of my room in Baghdad's Al Fanar Hotel, I watched U.S. Marines moving between their jeeps, armored personnel carriers, and Humvees. They had occupied the street immediately in front of the small, family-owned hotel where...
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