Peace

Peace is such a small word -- easy to say, easy to oversimplify, easy to underestimate. My thoughts about peace have been challenged and stretched in the 3 years I've been worshiping with Friends. The peace testimony has been the only one of the Quaker testimonies I've had reservations about. I'm coming to realize that I've confused peace and non-violence with passivity and naivete. As I come to recognize the spiritual underpinnings of peace, I see the strength and power of true Peace. Frankly it scares me a little! Genuine peace-making requires boldness and resolve, humility, love, courage and mental toughness. If we let the peace makers have some space to do their thing, (or better yet, if more of us join them) perhaps there will yet be an Earth worth inheriting.

The Tikkun Community is circulating an ad calling for a new approach to peace in the Middle East -- one that is based on the principle of the sacredness of all human beings, rather than who is in the "right" and who is in the "wrong". I encourage anyone who has been sickened by the reports of the death and suffering of innocents in Lebanon and Israel to take a look at it. You may be moved to add your signature to this effort which appears to me to be truly Spirit-led. In addition, though it is not a document crafted by Quakers, it could be. The approach of mutual accountability and responsibility, and the call to address the root *causes* of war are very much a part of the Quaker peace tradition.

Peace to you all -- in your hearts, in your homes, in the world.