peace place

peace in our time and place Please.

What did YOU do today to further the cause of peace in your home, your town, your workplace, your nations?

I wept when I read about the young Afghan convert to Christianity who is being persecuted because it is a crime to do so in the Islamic society in Afghanistan.

There are so many other countries where Christians are persecuted, we hardly even know. And yet when the story of one young man hits the press, we at least are made aware of it.
So what do we do?
Prayer is certainly our universal vehicle of communication.
So. Pray Daily for the health, well-being and protection of persecuted Christians around the world.

Actually, why stop at persecuted Christians? WHY not pray for peace and healing for all of the hated and misquided and oppressed peoples of our planet? In some small way, our prayer energies may counterbalance the evils we see around us.

What did I do today? I rejected a violent response. Friends and family were irate about the first robbery at gunpoint in our little town, in the Walmart parking lot. All sorts of evil and angry thoughts bounced around the conversation in the room.

I listened. I thought. What would be my appropriate non-violent response to a situation in this small town?
Peace. So fragile. A single lunatic or drug addict can turn us all upside down and inside out. So critical for each of us to be strong enough in our convictions that PEACE is worth it that we can and (we hope we will) stand firm and bless those who offend us and pray for their guidance.
NO. Not in some holier than thou sanctimonious way.

Just simply. As one human to another.
So what? You say we have no common ground with THEM?
I say... Who among us does not have a belly button?
Is that not evidence of common beginnings?

Can be start where we are now, today and absolve centuries of hatred overnight? Unlikely. But perhaps in our little circles of friends and families we can learn to have the courage to speak out and shake the silence. Speak against the mainstream when it screams retribution without thought.
Be gentle with our victims and treat our criminals as misguided fellow humans, not as animals.

Seek Peace and pursue it.

A couple of websites that help guide my path:

http://www.eriebenedictines.org/st_benedictine/

http://www.paxchristiusa.org/

http://www.thebiblesite.org/ Click here to donate translations for free.

http://thehungersite.com feed hungry people with your free clicks.

http://www.care2.com Click here for eco-justice

http://stopthehunger.com