Saturday, August 20, 2005

''Sheehan's protest on the minds of many''

"CRAWFORD – Standing on what has been called sacred ground, a group of clergy and military families worshipped together at an interfaith service under the noontime sun Friday at a protest site near the Western White House.

“We shall not any longer mourn alone and grieve alone,” said the Rev. Andrew Weaver of Brooklyn as he began a round of prayers. “This country is at war. People are suffering and it is not any longer right, or ever was, that we should only have a few families holding the weight and the burden of this war. So we are saying we are in solidarity with their grief.”

After the nearly hour-long prayer vigil, about 30 ordained and lay clergy took a letter to state troopers and U.S. Secret Service agents manning a blockade down the road from President Bush's Central Texas ranch.

The group was informed that no one was available to accept the letter, which called on the president to bring the troops home from Iraq. The clergy members then placed the letter and sprigs of carnations on the ground at the feet of a state trooper.

“I think if we wrote a letter (that said), ‘We support Bush,' 100 percent, we would be inside,” said Juan Torres, whose son, Army Spc. John Torres, was killed on a U.S. base in Afghanistan under questionable circumstances. “I don't think the president really cares about my life and the other families who are losing their kids in this war.”-from the story today in the Waco Tribune-Herald (TX).

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