Elizabeth Wotring moved into Shalom House in April. She has blessed our community with a deep ability to listen & care for those around her. She’s also brings invaluable skills in graphic & interior design. We’re so glad she’s taken the plunge and joined us. Here’s more about Elizabeth in her own words.
I’m not a [...]
I’m in a time when I find the complexity of the world’s ills to be more disabling than I like to admit. I know that I’m not alone in this. Cell meetings, peace talks, or any spontaneous conversation with a group of peace and justice-minded people can quickly digress into an airing-of-grievances session, where people [...]
I’ve been thinking a little bit about the scope of things recently. The question of large-scale or small-scale, macro or micro, individual or systemic change has been a continual one for me over the past several years. The tide has ebbed and flowed. My heart-strings are tugged on by the individual and the specific, and [...]
The Shalom House Festival. This is only the second one we’ve done, and so for many of you, you may be saying: What the heck is it? The festival is generally a venue for the community members and guidance team of Shalom House to share what we’ve been up to, where we’re headed, and to [...]
Most of us who live in Philadelphia have heard about recent gatherings of young people being referred to as “flash mobs”. This term is being given to events as disparate as high-schoolers getting into an argument and fighting inside a Macy’s to a few thousand youth getting [...]
from the Conscience in War website:
Current requirements for Conscientious Objector status require opposition to “war in any form.” This requirement denies freedom of conscience to any service member who believes that some wars may be morally justified while others are not. Service members who oppose a particular war, such as [...]
Every morning, at 7am, the community members of Shalom House rise from our slumber to pray together. This morning’s reflection offered a prayer that struck me :
Christ of the cross and of the empty tomb, strengthen us to bear the burdens of the day, to seek You amidst the hurts and questions, and to trust [...]
Leotah’s Place is our dear friend and fellow church community member, Brittney Lewis’s, traveling coffee house with a big mission. It is “More than a coffeehouse…a motherly inspiration…a warm place to unite, engage, and empower you and your neighbor.
This weekend marked the 4th anniversary of Hurricane Katrina.
A report came out yesterday in the New York Times Sunday Magazine, “Strained by Katrina, a Hospital Faced Deadly Choices” that reveals how 45 patients died at a New Orleans hospital. The report asks, “Overtired after the hurricane, doctors and nurses in New Orleans injected some patients [...]
Working for peace all too often reminds us of the suffering and grief associated with loss, violence, injustice, and exploitation. We experience these emotions in so many places and on so many levels throughout our lives.
Very recently I found myself grieving for a friend over the sudden loss of his father. The day I got [...]