Ask your bishop to endorse the Bread Not Stones sign-on statement

January 2024 update

• Click here to read a report on the 2023 Bread Not Stones campaign and the bishops’ sign on statement.
• Click here to read about Pope Francis’s December 2023 Urbi et Orbi message, where he compared global spending on war and weapons with the failure of governments to fund human needs like food and shelter.
• Click here for a Bread Not Stones prayer service to use between Epiphany and Martin Luther King Jr. Day (January 15). [If you prefer a version in MSWord to edit as-needed, use this link to download it.]
• Click here for the most recent version of the bishops’ sign on statement. [Use this link to see a complete list of bishops who were contacted.]
• 18 Catholic bishops join letter calling for US to cut military spending (National Catholic Reporter, January 22, 2024)
• Tobin supports Pax Christi’s call for reduced military spending (NJ.com, April 7, 2024)

Although the campaign has officially ended, we welcome any additional signatures to the bishops’ statement.

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Pax Christi USA’s Bread Not Stones campaign — which advocates for a transformation from a militaristic economy to one that supports human needs — is excited to announce a new sign-on statement especially for Catholic bishops in the United States.

Too many Church and religious leaders of all stripes have remained silent in response to the scandal of unfettered military spending. Pax Christi USA urges our faith leaders to commit to the Church’s social vision and to an authentic witness to the Gospel of Jesus. 

We invite Pax Christi members and supporters to ask your bishops to add their names to the new Pax Christi USA Bread Not Stones bishops’ sign-on statement.

As of April 13, 20 bishops have signed onto the statement! See the list of signatories at the bottom of this webpage. Thank you to all the Pax Christi USA members who contacted their bishops and dioceses! Although the campaign has officially ended, we welcome any additional signatures to the bishops’ statement.

By inviting our bishops to add their names to this sign-on statement, we hope to begin a larger conversation in the Church around the connections between issues such as war and peace, nuclear deterrence, nonviolence, and economic justice.

Local Pax Christi groups, Pax Christi regions, and individual members are asked to either 1) set up an in-person meeting with your bishop OR 2) send a letter/email to your bishop within the next month to invite him to sign the statement.

• Use this PDF to find talking-writing points/suggestions for contacting your bishop(s).
• Use this link to download a PDF version of this statement.
• Use this link to find additional resources for this visit/letter.
• Questions? Find answers to FAQs here.

>>IMPORTANT: Use this form to record your contact with your bishop.

Can you take action now and contact your bishop? Need your bishops’ contact information? Find the names of every bishop in every diocese by state alphabetically at this link. The website for every diocese is listed there; go to your diocesan website and find your bishops’ email address, diocesan contact form, postal address, and/or phone number.

If you have already done outreach — whether by email, letter, meeting or phone call — PLEASE DON’T FORGET TO LET US KNOW! Take two minutes right now and fill out this Google form here.

If you have any questions about the Bread Not Stones campaign or the bishops’ sign-on statement, contact Tom Cordaro at cordarotom@gmail.com.

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Bread Not Stones bishops’ sign-on statement

Use this link to download a PDF version of this statement

In the preamble of Jesus’ teaching of the Golden Rule, He asks his followers, “Which of you, if your child asks for bread, will give them a stone?” (Matthew 7:9)

The growing gap between the rich and the poor is compounded by a growing gap between our nation’s spending on weapons and preparations for war and our commitment to end poverty. Our poor and marginalized brothers and sisters cry out for the bread of compassion and justice. Shall we continue to offer them stones?

We are told that our military spending secures peace for our people and the Church recognizes the legitimate need for the adequate defense of nations. But our reliance on unfettered military spending is rooted in a mistaken notion of peace and an erroneous understanding of what constitutes true security for our people. 

As Pope Paul VI made clear, “For peace is not simply the absence of warfare, based on a precarious balance of power; it is fashioned by efforts directed day after day toward the establishment of the ordered universe willed by God, with a more perfect form of justice among men.” (On the Development of Peoples, 1967)

At the gathering of the world’s bishops during the Second Vatican Council in the early 1960s, the Church made clear that, “The arms race is one of the greatest curses on the human race; it is to be condemned as a danger, an act of aggression against the poor, and a folly which does not provide the security it promises.” (The Pastoral Constitution of the Church in the Modern World, #81).

The Church has repeated many times that “the arms race is to be condemned unreservedly,” “it is an injustice,” “it is a form of theft,” “it is completely incompatible with the spirit of humanity and still more with the spirit of Christianity.” (The Holy See & Disarmament Reply to an invitation by the General Assembly of the United Nations, 1975)

In our dioceses we hear the cry of the poor who hunger for the bread of compassion and justice. We hear that cry in our Catholic Charities offices, in our food pantries, in our parish St. Vincent de Paul ministries. We hear that cry in our schools, hospitals, homeless shelters, and immigrant outreach efforts. 

The U.S. federal budget is a moral document that identifies what we value. We cannot remain silent while our nation squanders hundreds of billions of dollars every year on weapon systems that add little to our nation’s national security while neglecting the poor and marginalized in our dioceses and around the world. 

Our misplaced reliance on new and ever more lethal conventional and nuclear weapons will never bring us the peace for which we long. If we want genuine peace, we must seek justice for the “least of these” (Matthew 25) by beating our swords into ploughshares, and our spears into pruning hooks. (Isaiah 2:4)

Signatories (as of January 3, 2024):

1. Bishop John Stowe, Lexington, KY
2. Bishop Emeritus Thomas Gumbleton, Detroit, MI
3. Cardinal Robert McElroy, San Diego, CA
4. Cardinal Joseph W. Tobin, C.Ss.R., Newark, NJ
5. Archbishop John Wester, Santa Fe, NM
6. Archbishop Thomas Zinkula, Dubuque, IA
7. Bishop Steven Biegler, Cheyenne, WY
8. Bishop John Michael Botean, Eparch of St. George, Romanian Greek Catholic Church
9. Bishop John Dolan, Phoenix, AZ
10. Bishop Daniel Garcia, Monterey, CA
11. Bishop Joseph R. Kopacz, Jackson, MS
12. Bishop Mark Seitz, El Paso, TX
13. Bishop Anthony Taylor, Little Rock, AR
14. Bishop Louis Tylka, Peoria, IL
15. Auxiliary Bishop Matthew G. Elshoff, OFM Cap., Los Angeles, CA
16. Auxiliary Bishop Anthony C. Celino, El Paso, TX
17. Bishop Emeritus Donald Hanchon, Detroit, MI
18. Bishop Emeritus Richard Pates, Des Moines, IA
19. Bishop Emeritus Peter Rosazza, Hartford, CT
20. Bishop Emeritus Richard Sklba, Milwaukee, WI

Use this link to download a PDF version of this statement