01/10/2021
In case you can't access this tribute published in 2000, here it is: GENTLE WARRIOR. By CHARITY VOGEL AND PAULA VOELL, PAULA VOELL Dec 17, 2000. Buffalo News
After decades on the front lines of the struggle for worldwide peace and justice, Jim Mang is stepping down as director of the Western New York Peace Center. But he won't stop working, because what he does is who he is For more than 30 years, whenever a peace and social justice issue bubbled to the surface almost certainly, so did the name of Jim Mang.
The Vietnam War. The nuclear arms race. United States support for Nicaraguan rebels. Jobs headed out of Western New York and moving to Mexico. Mang was in the forefront of all those political actions, and many more.
For the past 21 years as the director of the Western New York Peace Center, Mang has not only spearheaded action in the street, he also has taken the more quiet route to change what he sees is wrong with the nation and the world.
Looking back on his career, Mang, 61, says, "When I see people continually struggling and wanting to make changes, that's where the satisfaction comes, seeing the faithfulness of people to a cause and seeing the goodness of people in trying to work with others.
"It's a lot more than just the issues. It's a belief that something can be better."
And though he still holds firmly onto that belief, Mang will retire at the end of the month.
His decision was prompted partly by the sense that it was time to step back from leadership, he said, along with concerns about his health. In March, he had a quintuple heart bypass operation, which took him by surprise.
"I was flabbergasted," said Mang, who regularly played tennis, basketball and volleyball and who hadn't experienced warning signs typically related to heart problems.
When Mang returned to work, two months after the operation, he no longer had the stamina for the long hours he had once taken in stride.
"In August, I was talking with Audrey," he said, referring to his wife of 23 years who has been his partner in many activities, "and I told her that things were different for me. That some of the things that would come up in terms of decision-making seemed much bigger to deal with."
He thought, at first, that he just needed time to regain his strength, "but after three months, I knew that it was something different."
Mang's activism began during the Vietnam War when he spearheaded Friend Shipment to raise money to rebuild bombed Vietnamese schools, hospitals and churches. After the war ended, he shifted his focus to include social issues, and he is never at a loss for places to focus his energy.
In 1977, he led a prayer service for victims of the bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. In 1981, he participated in a protest against the MX Missile system. In 1983, he lobbied in Washington for a bilateral nuclear weapons freeze and addressed the Christian Peace Conference in Budapest on the initiative. In 1985, he protested at the Federal Building against the United States' support for Nicaraguan rebels, for which he was arrested. In 1986, he and other sleet-soaked pickets objected to Trico Products moving some of its plants from Buffalo to Mexico.
"He's a moral giant," said the Rev. Richard Zajac, chaplain of Sisters Hospital. "He's the bar we all strive to reach when it comes to integrity and principles."
Nuclear freeze activist Jim Tomkins describes Mang as "the genuine article."
"He never opens up his mouth unless his brain is working first," said Tomkins, a general contractor who describes himself as a "tough-talking Irishman."
"He's not in it for the notoriety or power or any of that foolishness that goes down. I sometimes steamroll over folks, but Jim will finesse them."
Walter Simpson, the peace center's director for three years before Mang took over, finds it amazing that Mang held the position for two decades, saying that it requires tremendous psychological and spiritual fortitude.
"It's a subsistence wage, it's not a 40-hour-work week," said Simpson, now the energy officer at the University at Buffalo. "You have to sustain yourself while addressing some of the most difficult global problems that we face, problems that most people don't even want to face for five minutes."
For now, Mang said he doesn't have specific plans, other than to stay involved, catch up on reading, do some writing about his work.
"As I said to somebody, I just want to be for a while."
Confined to the rectory
Mang, who grew up in Kenmore, was influenced by the writings of the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. and Gandhi, whom he discovered as a seminary student.
"Everything I studied at the seminary then took on a different light," said Mang, who was ordained as a Catholic priest in 1965.
Ironically, in 1972, Mang and five other priests were suspended from the priesthood for doing what he thought it expected of him.
That year his anti-war activity included protesting in the U.S. Capitol Rotunda and being arrested. Though he was reinstated as a priest, he wasn't allowed to continue the work for social justice, even in his free time.
"The bishop wanted me to stay in the rectory," said Mang. "I was being called to do things because I was a part of the Church and yet I got called on the carpet when I did.
"At that time, and a couple of other times, it was a real temptation to wonder why I should bother, if the diocese didn't want me. Sometimes I stayed because of my stubbornness, but I always felt that if I ever decided to leave it shouldn't be out of anger or frustration."
In 1977, after 12 years of not being allowed to work on causes of social justice, Mang asked to leave the priesthood. His resignation came on good terms and the former Bishop Edward D. Head continued his salary for a time and helped with Mang's transition from priest to lay person, according to a previous interview.
Prior to Mang's decision to leave the priesthood, he had met Audrey, who was working at the seminary as a secretary.
"We got to know each other and she had a major role in my decision-making, along with the deepening call to do peace and social justice work," said Mang.
Mang continues to attend alumni meetings at Christ the King Seminary, and, in fact, was honored by the group for his work. He is an active member of St. Joseph University Heights Church and he cherishes his priestly ministry, which included working with impoverished people in Puerto Rico for a year, parish work and teaching at the seminary.
"In fact, some of the young men I taught in high school are teaching at the seminary now," he said.
During those years, Paul J. Bloom, now a counselor at Hamburg High School, had Mang as a basketball coach.
"I admire his tenacity and courage," said Bloom, who has also worked with Mang at the peace center. "When you get his monthly reports they are jam-packed with things he's done, day after day."
Frustrated, not discouraged
Mang, who was interviewed at the peace center on Bailey Avenue near Genesee Street, exudes a true serenity.
"He wasn't the angry rebel," said the Rev. John Mergenhagen, who directs retreats at various local sites. "There seemed to be so much rage in some of the people in the peace movement, with a chip on their shoulder. The thing about Jim is that he's always been gentle."
Others describe Mang as thoughtful, soft-spoken, focused, committed, steadfast, a "most unlikely radical," a voice for the voiceless.
"He's one of the most non-judgmental people I've ever known, and he's not into his ego," said Patricia J. Griffin, program director of Food for All. "You know you aren't being conned into anything. He's calling out of his true spirit and his true heart, which is always for the good."
Though Mang doesn't veer from his deeply held convictions, he's always open to suggestions, others say.
"I've always appreciated that he doesn't come across as having the answer," said Sister Bea Manzella, president of the Sisters of St. Joseph. "Even when he takes exception, he's not a bully. He's just a totally good person. He glows with goodness."
The peace center is one of this country's oldest, funded mainly through membership fees, grants and fund-raising events. Currently, Mang oversees programs related to nuclear disarmament, human rights in Latin America, economic justice for workers, prison action and non-violent conflict resolution.
During a recent week, he met with local church leaders, as well as a contingent of peace activists from 16 countries and representatives of Back from the Brink, a group concerned with nuclear weaponry.
And he talked with others about which issues might be most palatable to the new administration.
"We're not going to get congressional support for redirecting military spending for human needs, probably not for the land mine issue, not for comprehensive test ban, not for Iraqi sanctions, not for Cuban sanctions," he said, reiterating just a few of the battles he's taken on.
Asked if he gets discouraged, Mang said: "Basically not. Frustrated a lot of times.
"I can't think of any other work that I ever, ever would have wanted to do," Mang said. "I'm so fortunate that it's been my calling. Even if I wanted to get out of it, I couldn't.
After decades on the front lines of the struggle for worldwide peace and justice, Jim Mang is stepping down as director of the Western New York Peace Center. But he