Today marks a year and three quarters since the Russian Federation launched a brutal war against Ukraine. Russian officials repeatedly denied preparations for the invasion, labeling information about troop withdrawals to the Ukrainian borders as hysteria, provocation, and Western disinformation. On the very first day of the war, Russians arrested more than 1,700 of their own citizens who publicly opposed the aggression. Just uttering the word "war" carries the threat of several years in prison in Russia, yet many people continue to protest very bravely. For reflection, we offer an excerpt from the closing statement of Ms. Saša Skočilenková, who was sentenced last week (after nineteen months in custody) to seven years of imprisonment for changing five price tags in a convenience store to short sentences condemning the war. You can find the entire speech (in Czech and in Russian) at the link below.
Ask, just ask the person who has just had a cancer tumor removed, what life is and how valuable it is… Why fight in this world full of trials, disasters, and tears, if we are everything to each other? No, no power, no wealth, and not even the whole universe can redeem your neighbor from the captivity of death.
Yes, I believe that life is sacred. Yes, life! When you set aside all the trinkets of this world, such as cars, apartments, wealth, power, success, social status, social networks, … then in that dry remnant, only it remains. Ah yes, life! So incredible, so amazing, so unique, so resilient and powerful...
