Watching the World
Mushrooming Nuclear Club
● Today six countries, the United States, the U.S.S.R., France, Britain, China and India, have produced nuclear weapons. But by the year 2000 that number could grow to 31, claim U.S. military analysts in a special report to The New York Times. Pakistan and South Africa are named. In the Middle East, Israel, Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Iran and Iraq are listed. In Asia, South Korea, Taiwan, Japan and the Philippines are potential nuclear powers. In Latin America, the intelligence survey lists Mexico, Brazil and Argentina. West Germany, Sweden, Italy and Spain are included for Europe. Canada and Australia have nuclear weapons capabilities too. What does this portend for the future since many of these countries have engaged in long-standing regional disputes?
The Churches and the Bomb
● The chasm between the Church of England and the Church of Rome is being bridged by the nuclear bomb issue. Both churches experience that their clergy boldly are speaking out against nuclear weapons. The bishop of Salisbury, John Austin Baker, representing a “working party” of the Church of England, stated: “Nuclear weapons are a direct denial of the Christian conception of peace.” (Its counterpart in the United States of America, the Episcopal Church, called for an immediate nuclear freeze during its governing body convention.)
The U.S. National Conference of Catholic Bishops in its proposed pastoral letter to the nation’s 51 million Roman Catholics stated: “We have judged immoral even the threat to use nuclear weapons.” Both the prime minister of England and the president of the United States take issue with the churches’ conclusions.
Scientists and War
● One half of the physicists in the world are involved in making war weapons, according to Australia’s leading scientist, Sir Mark Oliphant. In a speech given at the Fifth Biennial Physics Congress in Canberra, Australia, he said: “It is a sobering fact that the terrible new and accurate weapons of mass destruction now deployed in the world arose not from demands by the armed services, but from proposals made by men of science.” And Sir Mark raised a question for Australian scientists to answer: Should they oppose war or join the “technological destruction of human dignity and values”?
Catholic Holy Years
● Pope John Paul II declared the year 1983 a Holy Year. His announcement surprised Vatican sources. Since 1470, the Roman Catholic Church celebrated Holy Years every quarter of a century. Now it appears that Catholics will celebrate six Holy Years each century. For in 1933, Pope Pius XI announced a Holy Year to mark the 1,900th anniversary of Jesus Christ’s death. (But in fact it marked Hitler’s rise to power.) One reason for selecting 1983 is to commemorate the 1,950th anniversary of Jesus’ death (Redemption to Christianity). Thus a new pattern is emerging in which Holy Years will be observed every quarter of a century along with the ’33 and ’83 years for the Redemption celebrations. The other reasons the pope gave were: the coming Synod of Bishops, the “worthy preparation” for the Holy Year 2000 and for “a gust of spiritual renewal at all levels.” At the end of the last Holy Year in 1975, the Catholic magazine Commonweal stated: “The word of God is preached no more clearly and effectively than it was a year ago.” Will 1983 fare any better?
Harmful Toys
● Certain toy games may promote a linkage of sexual acts with violence, according to an article in The Vancouver Sun by Linda Hossie. One store, she notes, sells miniature figures of women in violent pornographic shapes for players of the fantasy game Dungeons and Dragons. These lead statuettes are potential dungeon victims and “are sexually explicit figures of women undergoing torture.” The figurines are naked and bound in sexually humiliating positions.
What effect may this have on youth? The director of adolescent psychiatry at Vancouver General Hospital, Dr. Sadi Bayrakal, says: “Those toys which desensitize children to any kind of violence are harmful. . . . Children are much more vulnerable [than adults]. They have difficulty differentiating between reality and fantasy. So that [the violence of a toy] might be seen as acceptable violence.”
Big Soviet Weddings
● “Nearly every wedding now is a fantastic waste of energy and finances,” complained a recent article in the Soviet newspaper Pravda. Noting that one rural wedding feast lasted four days, it said: “Milkmaids were doing the gopak [cossack dance] so long that they forgot about their cows. The combine and tractor drivers could not start up their machinery because their hands were trembling so much from hangovers.” The article pointed out that “in ancient Russia, the newlyweds never drank at their weddings, but now the organizers of the celebrations stock up with a minimum of a bottle of alcohol per guest for each day of the feast, including for children and old people.” The custom of trying to outdo one another by inviting hundreds of guests to receptions was also attacked by Pravda.
Europe Going Jobless
● For the first time since World War II, unemployment has reached “10.1 percent of the working population of nine European nations,” reports Daily Telegraph of London. The number of unemployed soared to over 11 million in the European Common Market countries last September. Britain has the largest number out of work among the Common Market countries—3,343,000 unemployed. Belgium’s jobless rate is 14.8 percent of workers—the highest percentage of unemployment of the nine countries.
Dangerous Leftovers
● Over and over again, German children have been injured or killed while playing with World War II ammunition or weapons they have found. An official of the State of North-Rhine-Westphalia reported in the newspaper Die Welt that the search along the Rhine and the Ruhr rivers for leftovers from World War II will have to go on “for decades.” Between 1949 and the end of 1981, at some 300,000 different locations, about 30 million bombs, mines, rockets, grenades and other explosive devices were unearthed. The find of small arms munition has been put at a weight of 5,718 tons. Experts say that the bombs will “remain live for at least 65 years.”
World in Debt
● “More than 40 countries are falling behind in their international debt payments,” reports The Courier Mail of Australia. Mexico, Argentina and Costa Rica are negotiating with the World Bank to delay their payments. In Africa many countries are being buried under a mountain of debt. Canada’s economy also has a 20-percent chance of collapsing in the next six months, according to Peter Martin, chief economist with a Toronto investment firm. He declared: “Never in the past 50 years have we been closer to the abyss than we are right now.” Unemployment, loss of business profits and consumers with little money contribute to Canada’s economic problems.
Chewing Saves Money
● According to researchers, the soft refined foods eaten in most industrialized nations may be responsible for making orthodontists wealthy. They fed 43 squirrel monkeys either artificially soft foods or naturally chewy foods. As reported in the journal Science, 19 of 22 monkeys raised on the tough diet were found to have healthy jaws and teeth, whereas 14 of the 18 soft-diet monkeys had abnormalities similar to common defects suffered by many Americans: buck teeth, impacted and crooked teeth and twisted incisors. The researchers said more chewing could save millions in orthodontic bills.
“Never Had It So Bad”
● “During my 30 years in the police,” states the chief constable of Greater Manchester, James Anderton, “recorded crime in England and Wales alone has risen from half a million to almost three million . . . We have never had it so bad.” He says that every citizen of Manchester will be a crime victim by the year 2000 if the present crime rate continues, according to Liverpool Daily Post. Anderton continued: “Perhaps the saddest reflection on our times is the fact that the more enlightened and educated we are and the better our standards of living, the worse our crime problems become.” Adding to the problem, statistics indicate that crime committed by handguns increased 80 percent over the year in England and Wales.
Zambian Crime “Alarming”
● “We are reaching a breaking point,” says Samuel Mbilishi of the Zambian Central Committee. “Crime, lawlessness, anti-social activities, et cetera have reached a very alarming stage and are retarding development,” he states in Times of Zambia. Independence was gained so that Zambians could live a happy and peaceful life, Mr. Mbilishi said in his Independence Day speech: “We did not achieve Independence to live in perpetual fear and misery all the time.” Not only people in Zambia but many in nations the world over are caught in fear’s grip due to increases in crime. The Bible predicted such ‘an increase of lawlessness’ as an indicator pointing to the near end of wickedness.—Matthew 24:3, 12.
Antidotes for Loneliness
● For many, loneliness can be lessened by acknowledging the problem and putting forth a real effort to change, according to the authors of a new book, In Search of Intimacy. They liken loneliness more to a hunger than an illness. When the body needs nourishment, hunger is its signal. When the body has psychological needs, a feeling of loneliness is the sign. They have found that too much television watching for too long a time period can increase loneliness. Suggested antidotes are: learn how to listen, avoid blaming self, keep busy in upbuilding activities and get involved in organizations.
Physician on Phone
● Most people who telephone their doctor for advice or reassurance about a medical problem “don’t know how to use the phone effectively,” states Dr. P. Bruno. How can one prepare to talk to a physician on the phone? The following six suggestions from the Brooklyn Lung Association appeared in Self magazine: 1. Take your temperature before you call. 2. Make a list of your symptoms and when they started. 3. Give information about symptoms without self-diagnosis. 4. Be specific with information. 5. Write down what the doctor says. 6. Talk to doctor yourself if at all possible.