Religious leaders denounce nuclear weapons

WASHINGTON — An international group of religious leaders and scientists says nuclear weapons in the United States and around the world should be eliminated on moral grounds, warning that possessing them would encourage more nations and even terrorists to follow suit.

“We call on our government and the Bush administration to take leadership in global nuclear disarmament,” Robert Edgar, general secretary of the National Council of Churches, said March 8 at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. “We must ask ourselves why we continue to construct weapons that have the power to destroy us, rather than to build systems and structures that will save lives and help all persons reach the potential for which God created them.”

Edgar and 70 other religious leaders and scientists recently signed a petition titled “A Moral Appeal for a Safer World without Nuclear Weapons” that denounces nuclear weapons as “horrific devices.”

It also urges countries with nuclear weapons to eliminate their arsenals under terms of the Treaty on the NonProliferation of Nuclear Weapons, which has been signed by 188 nations.  (TAB)