Mr. Loney, you are a girlie man!
Posted on 03/26/2006 4:53:52 PM PST by Loyalist
This is a transcript of a statement made by James Loney upon his return from Iraq, where he had been held hostage for nearly four months. Loney made the statement on March 26 at Pearson International Airport.
I heard there might be some interest in my arrival so I wrote down a couple thoughts. I’ll just read it so I can get through. During my captivity I sometimes entertained myself by imagining this day. Sometimes I despaired of ever seeing it. Always I ached for it. And so, here we are.
For 118 days I disappeared into a black hole and somehow, by God’s grace, I was spit out again. My head is swirling and there are times when I can hardly believe it’s true. We had to wear flak jackets during our helicopter transfer from the international zone to the Baghdad airport and I had to keep knocking on the body armour I was wearing to reassure myself this is all really happening.
It was a terrifying, profound, powerful, transformative and excruciatingly boring experience. Since my release, my rescue from captivity, I have been in a constant state of wonder, bewilderment, surprise, as I slowly discover the magnitude of the efforts to secure our lives and freedom: Tom Fox, Norman Kember, Harmeet Sooden and myself. A great of hand of solidarity reached out for us; a hand that included the hands of Palestinian children holding pictures of us and the hands of the British soldier who cut our chains with a bolt cutter. That great hand was able to deliver the three of us from the shadow of death. I am grateful in a way that can never be adequately expressed in words.
There are so many people that need this hand of solidarity, right now, today, and I’m thinking specifically of prisoners being held all over the world. People who have disappeared into an abyss of detention without charges, due process, hope for release, some victims of physical and psychological torture, people unknown and forgotten. It is my deepest wish that every forsaken human being should have a hand of solidarity reaching out to them.
My friend and fellow Canadian in captivity, Harmeet Sooden, showed me something yesterday. Our captors gave us notebooks and Harmeet opened his notebook to show me two fractions, three quarters and four quarters, that Tom had written. It was the only thing he wrote in my book, he said. Tom, who had been a professional musician, wrote them as part of a lesson he was giving Harmeet in music theory - three quarter time, four quarter time. Harmeet put his finger over the three quarters and said, in the beginning, we were four quarters. Then he put his finger over the four quarters and said now we are only three quarters. Tom is not coming home with us. I am so sorry that’s the ending.
People have been asking what’s the first thing you’re going to do when you get home. All I really want to do is to love and be loved by the people that I love. The one specific thing might be to wash a sink full of dirty dishes. After this I’m going to disappear for a little while into a different kind of abyss, an abyss of love. I need some time to get reacquainted with my partner, Dan, my family, my community and freedom itself. I’m eager to tell the story of my captivity and rescue but I need a little time first. That’s a subtle hint to anyone out there who might happen to have a big camera or notebook.
For the British soldiers who risked their lives to rescue us, for the government of Canada who sent a team to Baghdad to help secure our release, for all those who though about and prayed for us, for all those who spoke for us when we had no voice, I am forever and truly grateful. It’s great to be alive. Alhamdulillah.
This guy writes for the Catholic New Times , is a Catholic Worker and an unrepentant homosexual passing himself off as a faithful Catholic at the same time.
Even Dorothy Day might have felt like letting the Iraqis keep him.
Scuse meee! Didn't the Americans rescue his group, too? That's what I heard. Where is the gratitude for the American soldiers?
"Alhamdulillah"
Remind me again why Coalition soldiers risked their necks to save these assholes?
Remind me again why Coalition soldiers risked their necks to save these assholes?
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Sickening, ain't it? Listening to what came out of the mouths of these looney-tunes made we want to air-drop them into a marine camp. That would be the end of these morons.
I thought I read yesterday that no Americans where involved in the rescue.
Do you think he plans on going on another one of these "peace missions" anytime soon?
Can we give them back?
>>>>>>>A joint U.S.-British military operation freed Kember and Canadians James Loney, 41, and Harmeet Singh Sooden, 32, on Thursday. They were rescued without violence from a house west of Baghdad.<<<<<<<<
The date of the article is March 25 -- yesterday!
Ok - I either misread the article or it was something completely different - sorry
I make mistakes, too. Besides... I'm really pissed, but not at you.
Because they are far better people than these guys will ever be.
Don't get mad - get even !!!
Reminds me of the two female Italian communist anti-war activists who where kidnapped and the Italian government paid over a million to the iraqi kidnappers for their release.
The minute they arrived on Italian soil, they started bashing the government and shocked many Italians.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/3635304.stm
http://www.smh.com.au/articles/2004/09/28/1096137236503.html
Thanks the Brits and Canadians who rescued him and does a back-handed slap to the Americans under the guise of our "illegal" imprisonment of terrorists and their supporters.
Mr. Loney, you are a girlie man!
I'm sorry, maybe I've been living under a rock - what is a "Catholic Worker"? I've never heard of the term or that website, and I'm Catholic!
"Catholic Worker" is probably a liberation theoloy, i.e. socialist publication.
"I'm sorry, maybe I've been living under a rock - what is a "Catholic Worker"? I've never heard of the term or that website, and I'm Catholic!"
New Age for "I do whatever I want".
http://www.catholicworker.com/cwo015.htm
info on the Catholic Worker, started by Dorothy Day in the 30s. Social justice, peace activism, etc. Copies of the mag are 1 cent apiece and not online.
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