Chapter 175 - Janesville, WI
new VFP banner in the Washingtonville, NY Memorial Day Parade.
Norm Aulabaugh
Chapter 972 - No. Colorado
Chapter 175 was asked to provide
an honor guard for Kathy Kelly on
April 28, 2016 in Rockford, Illinois. Kathy delivered a program on
her recent travels around the world
to work on peace projects. Kathy
Kelly is the founder of Voices for
Creative Non-Violence and does
tremendous good work to promote
peace. Brad Geyer, Lars Prip and
Norm Aulabaugh from Chapter 175
and Phil Fransen of Chapter 25 in
Madison, WI provided the honor
guard for Kathy. It was a great
pleasure to support the work of this
wonderful lady.
Chapter 177– HudsonValley, NY
Chris Antal
Our chapter received our charter
in February and we are off to a
strong start. Nick Mottern organized
a weaponized drone whistleblower
conference at University of Nevada
Law School on March 30 and Chris
Antal served as a panelist. On April
25 Nick and Chris attended the Honeywell shareholder meeting and
confronted CEO David Cote about
their profiting from weaponized
drones and nuclear weapons, and
on May 12 they presented on drones
at the UN Church Center to the
NGO Committee on Disarmament
Peace and Security. Everett Cox,
Nick and Chris marched with the
VFP flag in the Daniel Berrigan
Peace March through Manhattan on
May 6. Our chapter co-sponsored a
Service of Lamentation and Hope on
Memorial Day Sunday at the historic
Temple of Virtue in New Windsor,
site of the last encampment of the
Continental Army and the first Army
chapel that deepened collective remembering of war costs beyond
American casualties to include the
deaths of innocents in other lands.
Bryon Abrams, Chris, Everett, John
Kinney, Mike Landrum, Twila Smith,
and Greg Winner, Dottie Winner all
participated. Everett, Mike Twila,
Greg and Dottie proudly carried our
Paul Gessler
After 3 long years of perseverance, obstacles only PTSD could
create, Northern Colorado Chapter
of Veterans For Peace has been
recognized. In October of 2015,
Jack Manno, co-founding member,
passed away. Jack was a lifelong
jazz musician, singer and arranger.
In January we memorialized Jack.
A week later we had a VFP presence in the annual Martin Luther
King Day March in Fort Collins. Besides waging peace with pen and
keyboard, our chapter focus has
been Veterans Mental Health.
Much of this focus has been on
PTSD. and the stigma surrounding
it. Paul is on the Veterans Mental
Health Council put together by the
Cheyenne Wyoming VAMC, which
has clinics in Fort Collins and Greeley Colorado.
On June 5th, we celebrated our
first meeting as an official chapter
with our first President Marty Bates,
also a musician, whose skills as an
organizer have brought us over the
ridge into the Promised Land. VFP
will have had its 2nd appearance in
the July 4th parade in Fort Collins
thanks to the efforts of long time
peace advocate and VFP Member
Ken Tharp. Thank you to all who
helped make this possible.
mindfulness
xuan loc, viet nam 1969
at the orphanage
beneath the rubber trees
the monks cook rice
for hungry children
in huge flat pans,
eighty kilos per meal,
three times a day
softly, absent reproof
or bitterness,
they whisper
that just as fragrant rice
multiplies in volume
as it cooks
over the open flame
so, too, the orphanage
swells in numbers
of orphaned children
ever since the americans
came to help their friends
and set the land
so much to fire
John Buquoi
VFP Newsletter Spring 2016 19