Richland/Hanford segment - Tuesday, July 27, 9:00 AM

John Dam Plaza, Richland

Monks from the Nipponzan Myohoji Buddhist Temple on Bainbridge Island will return on Tuesday, July 27 leading another Interfaith Peace Walk for the abolition of nuclear weapons. The walk will commemorate the 65^th anniversary of the catastrophic destruction of Hiroshima and Nagasaki by atomic bombs.

The Richland/Hanford segment of the walk will begin at 9:00 AM with a brief opening ceremony in John Dam Plaza. The walkers will then proceed to the Hanford 300 Area gate at the end of George Washington Way, a distance of about 7 miles, where chanting and interfaith prayers for peace will be said.

This year there will be no return walk. Following lunch, the visiting walkers will go on to Portland, Oregon. The walk will end on August 9 at the Trident nuclear submarine base at Bangor, Washington.

The Hanford Nuclear Site is where plutonium was produced for the Nagasaki atomic bomb and most of the U.S. nuclear arsenal. Bangor — located 20 miles across the water from Seattle — is the Navy base for eight nuclear submarines, 192 Trident ballistic missiles, and approximately 1,700 thermonuclear warheads (hydrogen bombs). It is the largest active nuclear weapons depot in the world.

Nipponzan Myohoji (Japan Buddha Brotherhood) is an international order of Buddhist monks and nuns that is dedicated to peace and nuclear disarmament. It is the same order that visited Richland in July 2009, 2007 and 2005 with previous Interfaith Peace Walks and in January 2002 on the five-month Hiroshima Flame Interfaith Pilgrimage from Seattle to New York. The order carries on its work through the constant practice of prayer, the construction of pagodas dedicated to peace, and through nonviolent walks all around the world as a gentle movement where people of all faiths are spiritually united toward the realization of world peace without nuclear weapons.

The Interfaith Peace Walk is open to all people of nonviolence who desire to extinguish the threat of nuclear annihilation. All are welcome to join the local segment of the Interfaith Peace Walk and walk for any distance of their choosing.

A support vehicle will carry bottled water for the walkers and be available for anyone who has to drop out.

“By far the single greatest danger facing humankind — in fact, all living beings on our planet —

is the threat of nuclear destruction.”

~ The Dalai Lama

Preaching peace

All are invited to hear Chairman Jim Stoffels give the sermon at the Community Unitarian Universalist Church on Sunday, June 27, 10:30 a.m. The church is located at 2819 W. Sylvester St. in Pasco.

Jim’s topic is “War vs. Peace: When will the battle end?”

Summary: The heroic view of war is contradicted by the reality of death and destruction. The trauma of returning troops is evidence of the dehumanizing activity we make them do. Peace will not replace war through governments but through peaceful, empowered individuals.