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An excerpt from His Holiness the Dalai Lama's views on war and Iraq conflict shared with Buddhist devotees and others on the first day of the Great Prayer Festival

11 March 2003, in Dharamsala

"But what can we do? What can we do when big powers have already made up their minds? All we can do is to pray for a gradual end to the tradition of wars. Of course, the militaristic tradition may not end easily. But, let us think of this. If there were bloodshed, people in positions of power, or those who are responsible, will find safe places; they will escape the consequent hardship. They will find safety for themselves, one way or the other. But what about the poor people, the defenseless people, the children, the old and infirm? They are the ones who will have to bear the brunt of devastation. When weapons are fired, the result will be death and destruction. Weapons will not discriminate between the innocent and guilty. A missile, once fired, will show no respect to the innocent, poor, defenseless, or those worthy of compassion. Therefore, the real losers will be the poor and defenseless, ones who are completely innocent, and those who lead a hand-to-mouth existence."

No war?



I can only...


...Imagine






(j/k, John)

thank you Cate

Imagine.........................................


Imagine there's no countries
It isn't hard to do
Nothing to kill or die for
And no religion too
Imagine all the people
Living life in peace...

You may say I'm a dreamer
But I'm not the only one
I hope someday you'll join us
And the world will be as one (John Lennon)

Isn't anyone listening...................

Thanks Cate

tikitatas wrote:An excerpt from His Holiness the Dalai Lama's views on war and Iraq conflict shared with Buddhist devotees and others on the first day of the Great Prayer Festival

11 March 2003, in Dharamsala

"But what can we do? What can we do when big powers have already made up their minds? All we can do is to pray for a gradual end to the tradition of wars. Of course, the militaristic tradition may not end easily. But, let us think of this. If there were bloodshed, people in positions of power, or those who are responsible, will find safe places; they will escape the consequent hardship. They will find safety for themselves, one way or the other. But what about the poor people, the defenseless people, the children, the old and infirm? They are the ones who will have to bear the brunt of devastation. When weapons are fired, the result will be death and destruction. Weapons will not discriminate between the innocent and guilty. A missile, once fired, will show no respect to the innocent, poor, defenseless, or those worthy of compassion. Therefore, the real losers will be the poor and defenseless, ones who are completely innocent, and those who lead a hand-to-mouth existence."

Unfortunately we do not live in ideal or a perfect world.
W e have crime and we have crimminals. We have good guys and bad guys at all levels.

Yes the innocent suffer, yet who protects the majority of the innocent? Were the innocent protected under Hitler, Stalin, or Pol Pot? What about Rhwanda or the Balkans?

War, may well not be the answer, to protect and to defend what we have from the bad guys, but it the only way we know that ultimately works.

I would love for us to live in a world that did not have war or famine or genocide or innocents killed at the whim, of some dictator or religious fanatic and to have no need of police or military. However there are bad guys in this world and as long as they are there, they will do what bad guys do and thus bring about the need of the police or the military to take action to protect and to defend the innocent and the way of life.

We simply cannot ignore the bad guys and let them run roughshod over the rest of the world or destroy our way of life.

It's a shame that the ones who get to go to war are not the ones who send people to war! If they were Perhaps there would be less wars!

parrothead216 wrote:It's a shame that the ones who get to go to war are not the ones who send people to war! If they were Perhaps there would be less wars!

I think His Holiness agrees.
If there were bloodshed, people in positions of power, or those who are responsible, will find safe places; they will escape the consequent hardship.