Peace in our times…

The noise of foreign wars and the sounds of violence on our streets at home, come together to disturb the peace we all should hold.  Newspapers and news broadcasts constantly remind us of our failings as a human family… not only due to our weapons of destruction but also because of our weapons of neglect.

“Poverty is the worst form of violence”, Mahatma Gandhi reminded us.

“Men like war: they do not hold much sway over birth, so they make up for it with death. Unlike women, men menstruate by shedding other people's blood.”

The author of “Dot in the Universe” Lucy Ellman …

“True peace is not the absence of tension, but the presence of love and brotherhood [and sisterhood].” We were told by Martin Luther King, Jr. 

Pope Paul VI pontificated, “If you want peace, work for justice” and the Hip Hop generation warns us “No justice, no peace!”

We must work our way back to the biblically, symbolic Garden of Eden, a truly peaceful place in God’s mind: where humankind respected each other and the needs of all were cared for… where animals were treated as equals in their right to co-exist with humanity and where the environment was used  for the good of all and not abused for the sake of a few.

Each of us is called upon to tune our soul-instruments and practice the music we call peace.  We must fill the air with sweet sounds… with notes of creativity and caring, with the melody of banishing poverty and therefore, serenading violence elimination. 

The peace songs must be more certain than the noise, not louder,  just more sure… Our determination to send forth sweet sounds to the ears of everyone: our children and grandchildren, the elderly, the hungry, the sick, the victims, those in need and those who simply want the noise to go away… must be moved not with weapons or heavy hands but with the sweet chords of soul force—the rightness of the cause.

Blessed are the peacemakers:  the Community Mediation Program  primary among them.  They teach peace, they make peace, they enlist peace makers to their cause (our cause) and thereby they show us the way.  Their work is real education… their efforts show true leadership. 

And they need our help to stop the noise.  We can achieve the sweet lullabye of peace in our times!

Believe that, if you will.  Then, go forth and ask the Lord to make you an instrument of his- of her peace…and how will we get there to the much desired, much needed Peaceful Place?  The same way you get to Carnegie Hall:  practice, baby practice…and by letting the music begin with you.

Ralph E. Moore, Jr.

November 15, 2007

Community Mediation Program’s

Annual Meeting, where I accepted their 4th Annual “Peacemaker of the Year” award