For A Change articles from October 2005

For A Change archives from October 2005

Beds for all.(EAR TO THE GROUND: FROM ANN RIGNALL BEHIND THE SCENES IN CAUX, SWITZERLAND)(Brief Article)
October 1, 2005... The Caux conference centre could not function without all the people who work behind the scenes: most of them on a voluntary basis. I am part of the allocation team, which is responsible for finding beds for up to 400 people at any one time....

Change-over.(EAR TO THE GROUND: FROM ANN RIGNALL BEHIND THE SCENES IN CAUX, SWITZERLAND)(Brief Article)
October 1, 2005... Suddenly the whole place is full of children: the intergenerational session has begun. The make-up of the house changes completely--there are 92 young people aged under 17 and only 51 over 65. This is the biggest conference of the summer. With...

Hailstorm.(EAR TO THE GROUND: FROM ANN RIGNALL BEHIND THE SCENES IN CAUX, SWITZERLAND)(Brief Article)
October 1, 2005... One afternoon the sky goes as black as night and hailstones as big as golf balls begin to fall. All the lights go out and the computers go down. Some rooms become uninhabitable: windows are broken, or beds get wet because windows have been left...

Demands and requests.(EAR TO THE GROUND: FROM ANN RIGNALL BEHIND THE SCENES IN CAUX, SWITZERLAND)(Brief Article)
October 1, 2005... We get a few demands and many requests. The demands are for rooms with a better view and a bigger bathroom. We try to meet these, when possible. The requests are many and varied: a longer bed for a man well over 6 feet; a lower bed for a young...

Music makers.(EAR TO THE GROUND: FROM ANN RIGNALL BEHIND THE SCENES IN CAUX, SWITZERLAND)
October 1, 2005... Music always plays an important part in the conferences in Caux--violin, guitar, piano, flute, cello.... There is the Australian Johnny Huckle with his impassioned songs about healing and freedom for his Aboriginal people. And the Trio...

Caux is the place.(IN MY VIEW)(Caux conferences)
October 1, 2005... The guns of the Second World War had fallen silent at last. Battered nations dreamed of peace. Philippe Mottu, a young Swiss diplomat, had formed links with the German resistance during the war. As he searched for an answer, he sensed that the...

No one is to blame for their DNA: Rajmohan Gandhi warns against the poisonous wind which targets people for being born Muslim, American or Jew.(LEAD STORY)
October 1, 2005... Acts of terrorism engender a sense of us-versus-them which is in some ways reininiscent of perceptions during the Cold War. Yet there is a troubling contrast. During the Cold War the West tended to assume that the people of the Soviet bloc...

Breaking the silence: Mary Lean and Andrea Cabrera meet an artist whose work has given a voice to Holocaust survivors, and their descendants.(HEALING HISTORY)
October 1, 2005... Seven chairs stood in the exhibition hall: three wrapped in pieces of clothing, one embossed with fossils, one burnt and charred, one holding a thick book, in which visitors could write their responses.... From them emanated the voices of...

No bread without peace: Paul Williams discovers that security is not just a military issue.(CAUX 2005: GOOD GOVERNANCE AND HUMAN SECURITY)
October 1, 2005... Just how riveting, I wondered, would I find a conference with the term 'human security' right up there in the title? What did it mean anyway? And what sort of issues would we be dealing with? It soon became apparent that the issues were...

Europe is not for the lazy-hearted: what does it mean to be European today?(CAUX 2005: A HEART AND A SOUL FOR EUROPE)
October 1, 2005... The eight staff in the European Commission (EC) office where Peter Rundell worked until recently come from six countries, speak nine languages and include Christian and Muslim believers, left- and right-wing economists. This diversity--so...

Watering the seed: school leaver Eorann Lean gets a buzz out of a conference for young and old.(CAUX 2005: INTERGENERATIONAL CONFERENCE)
October 1, 2005... Entering Mountain House perched just above Lake Geneva, you can see children playing, teenagers learning drama and adults enjoying the children's games or going to workshops. The main concentration of the Intergenerational Experience of...

The man who set out to change the media: Bill Porter founded a global think-tank out of his concern about the media's influence. Michael Smith tells his story.(CAUX 2005: PROFILE)
October 1, 2005... If you are thinking that way, why don't you do something about it?' The words, spoken to publishing executive Bill Porter by his wife Sonja, remained ringing in his ears. When she died unexpectedly three weeks later, they came back to him with...

If I am killed, forgive: when Matthew Waletofea decided to work for peace in his country, he knew he was putting his life at risk. He talks to Caz Hore-Ruthven.(CAUX 2005: AGENDA FOR RECONCILIATION)
October 1, 2005... IN 1998 CIVIL WAR turned the paradise of the Solomon Islands into a living hell. Five years later, Australian peacekeeping troops brought an end to the killings, but the conflict and its consequences still lie heavy on the land and its people....

Ready and able: Pamela Jenner takes part in a conference organized by young Eastern Europeans.(CAUX 2005: SERVICE, RESPONSIBILITY AND LEADERSHIP)
October 1, 2005... Do good leadership skills have to go hand in hand with experience of life? While young people complain about not being given a chance to show initiative and leadership, many of the older generation say they feel marginalized by an increasingly...

Peace, conflict, Hakuna Matata! Jose Carlos Leon Vargas from Mexico took part in a month's course on conflict resolution at the Caux centre.(CAUX SCHOLARS PROGRAMME)
October 1, 2005... 4 am: suddenly my roommate's alarm starts to sound. Still in the mist of my dreams and the excitement of the first day of classes, I notice him spreading a mat on the floor to commence his morning prayers according to his religion, Islam. From...

The UN.(Letter to the Editor)
October 1, 2005... From Archie Mackenzie, Loch Lomond, Scotland Having spent many years working at the UN I appreciated greatly Sir Richard Jolly's evaluation of its 60-year record (FAC, Aug-Sept). Too often these days it is dismissed as a broken reed. But he...

'We shall not make the same mistake again'.(A DIFFERENT BEAT)(Hiroshima, Japan)
October 1, 2005... Nearly 50 years ago I participated in a wreath-laying at Hiroshima and saw for myself the inscription on the memorial to the first atom bomb. I was amazed at the lack of blame, and, with the passage of time, one can only marvel at the...

Don't give it up, make it sacred.(REFLECTIONS)
October 1, 2005... THE WORD 'SACRIFICE' is used in many different ways--often to mean 'giving up something'. So people 'sacrifice' their time, or their money, or even their lives as martyrs for a religion or cause. People of faith have often thought in terms...

Defusing the humiliation bomb.(GUEST COLUMN)(suicide bombers)(Column)
October 1, 2005... Humiliation is the 'nuclear bomb of feelings', in the words of the psychologist and peace activist, Evelin Gerda Lindner. I am sure that everyone has experienced an episode, if not more than one, when they have felt deeply humiliated. ...