Recently I joined a friend for lunch in a small restaurant with tables fairly close together. The pleasant ambience was interrupted when a car began to back out into traffic from a space in front of the restaurant. The driver of another car laid on his horn, gesticulated angrily and drove the next 20 feet only to stop at a red light. Everyone in the restaurant turned to each other, wondering aloud, “what just happened?” “Why did the other driver need to be so rude?”? Heads were shaken, smiles were exchanged. But then the original car started backing up again, and proceeded into the opposite lane.
Continue reading “The Courtesy of Peace”Month: June 2024
Walking the Peacepath Home
Recently I had the honor of preaching at my 50th college reunion. While writing the sermon, I realized how foundational the quote at the core of my sermon is to my Peacepath. Ram Dass, who was an American Spiritual Teacher from the 70s who helped popularize Eastern Philosophy, particularly Hinduism, in the US, wrote, “We are all just walking each other home.”
Home means different things to each of us. Ideally, it is the place we feel most loved, safe, and able to truly be ourselves. Peace is the natural home of the human. Yet our world is anything but Peaceful. The news of war, political unrest, and the devastation of climate change is so overwhelming that we feel there is nothing we can do to make a difference.
As a Peacemaker, I believe, that, together we can change the world for the better. To come together, we must both invite people to accompany us and offer to walk alongside on their journeys. We must believe in Joyous Possibilities, rather than sad realities. We can and should acknowledge what is true now, yet understand that Peace demands looking beyond the present. Peace requires a new vision for how we exist together on this planet. Peace necessitates joining hands and working together to achieve a new reality.
When was the last time you walked with another? What did you talk about along the way? Were you awed by nature’s beauty? Did you listen to and support one another?
Walking together in Peace, we’d learn about each other’s values and what causes we are passionate about. We’d find each other’s cultures fascinating rather than frightening. We’d learn about our hopes and what each other needs to thrive. I’d teach your children walking songs and you’d help me carry my bag when my back is tired. We’d look for new people to join our band of Hope.
And as for home? It would keep evolving into something bigger, something more, something sweeter, something filled with Boundless Possibilities for connection, abundance, joy, and healing ourselves and our planet — and doing those things together.
Cat Stevens is still singing about the “Peace Train” that would take the world and him home.
Oh, I’ve been smiling lately
Dreaming about the world as one
And I believe it could be
Someday it’s going to come.
What we discovered at reunion is that, in college, intense times spent in one another’s company developed both a sense of self and the ability to trust. Gathering after 50 years meant time to remember, time to feel safe, time to mourn, time to laugh, and time to rejoice. There was Peace in reconnecting. It wasn’t a distant Peace, it was a road we traveled and a road we are traveling still — together.
Whether we are walking or riding the train, our destination is the same — we’re all on the Peacepath, headed toward that Peaceful Home — together we can find it; together we can create it. What are we waiting for? Time to stop railing against stupidity and greed. Time to walk the Peacepath together. You’re exactly the people I would like to journey with.
Salaam, Shalom, Peace, Blessed Be.