The Resume

(June 22, 1929-June 8, 2022)
Former Roman Catholic priest (1958-87)
Chair (1977-79,1987-90) and general secretary (1980-85) of the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament (CND)
President of the International Peace Bureau (1985-92) and the National Peace Council (1999-2000)
British coordinator for the Hague Appeal for Peace (1999)

Why he might be annoying:

Despite his future pacifism, he was an officer in the Royal Tank Regiment (1947-49).
He left the priesthood rather than comply with instructions from Cardinal Basil Hume to avoid involvement in the 1987 UK general election.
He ran unsuccessfully for Parliament as the Labour candidate for Oxford West and Abingdon (1992).
Bruno Heim, the Vatican ambassador to the UK, called him 'a useful idiot' for the Soviet Union.

Why he might not be annoying:

He had a life-changing experience when he traveled to Nigeria during the Biafra War and witnessed mass starvation caused by a blockade imposed by the government using weapons purchased from Britain (1969).
He said, 'Biafra taught me the importance of fighting injustice's causes, not just its symptoms.'
During his tenure, membership in the formerly moribund CND increased twelvefold: 'The graph we had on the wall [charting membership] outgrew the wall and had to be taken across the ceiling.'
In the 1980s, he presciently argued that the Soviet Union was on the verge of collapsing from its internal problems.
He walked 800 miles from Warsaw to Brussels calling for a nuclear-free Europe (1988).
He was the target of a letter bomb (intercepted by postal authorities).

Credit: C. Fishel

Featured in the following Annoying Collections:

• C. Fishel's Profiles [Series 88]
• I Attended Oxford
• I Died in 2022 (Ranked: 92)
• I Married in 1988
• I Sought Political Office
• People with Bruce, Marc or Keith in their Names
• Profiles 54501-54750 (Ranked: 54698)

Year In Review:

In 2023, Out of 3 Votes: 33.33% Annoying
In 2022, Out of 208 Votes: 50.0% Annoying