Peace Coalition Vigil: Choose Beloved Community over Militarization in 2026

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Date(s) - 01/03/2026
12:00 pm - 1:00 pm

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MONTHLY PEACE AND JUSTICE VIGIL:
CHOSE “BELOVED COMMUNITY” OVER MILITARISM IN 2026
SATURDAY, JANUARY 3, 2026 NOON TO 1:00 PM
The Peace Coalition of Southern Illinois will hold the Monthly Peace and Justice Vigil on Saturday, January 3, Noon to 1 P.M. at the corner of Main and Illinois Ave., Carbondale. On Sunday, January 4 at 1 P.M. join the weekly Rally for Peace in Gaza, corner of Main and Illinois Ave in Carbondale.
Pace Bene notes: “When Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. spoke about the Beloved Community, he…was naming something deeply practical: the kind of world that becomes possible when people choose connection over domination, courage over indifference, and shared humanity over fear…For him, nonviolence was not only a method of social change; it was how communities learn to stay connected even when they disagree, struggle, or fail.”
If our federal budget is a blueprint for collective goals, we fail in promoting a beloved community. The FY 2026 National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA)is a bonanza for weapons and prison contractors as the first $1-trillion war budget since World War II, authorizing more than $900 billion in military spending on top of the $156 billion approved by Congress earlier this year.
The NDAA culminates a year of hyper-militarized spending. While the MAGA regime boosted investment in the war machine to historic highs, it simultaneously made devastating cuts to social services that, without further action, will negatively affect American lives for decades to come.
The National Priorities Project has shown what $1 trillion could do for the country: from ending the nursing shortage to insuring uninsured children, preventing evictions, and replacing lead pipes, every dollar the Pentagon wastes is a dollar that isn’t helping Americans get by. Instead, while obliterating U.S.AID and programs to save lives around the world, we continue to terrorize our immigrant communities, arm, bomb, blow-up, blockade and threaten more war. It is the antithesis of building a peaceful and just world and becoming “beloved community.”
Appropriate signs will be provided at the vigil, but all are invited to bring their own. The next monthly meeting of the Peace Coalition will be held on ZOOM, Wednesday, January 21, 2026, 6pm. For information about joining, contact georgeannhartzog@gmail.com.