I have just read an article by my friend, Cassidy Hall. She was reporting on a recent peacemaking conference held in Toronto. I was intrigued by the article and the conference for more reasons than simply the report by a friend of mine. My own Quaker tradition has always been associated with other so-called “peace churches.” I grew up hearing about our testimony against war and violence. Although Quakers recognize we cannot require individuals to adhere to this testimony, the group is clear this is the stand Jesus took and for which the Christian Bible argues.
My own commitment to this testimony was tested in the Vietnam War. During this time, I experienced first-hand the dilemma of knowing my own tradition and the peer pressure of fighting for one’s country. So often, peacemaking seems to be a choice between faith and nationalism. Perhaps that is an unfair characterization, but that can be discussed later. What I want to do now is see what the folks in Toronto were saying.
The minute I saw the article, I recognized the picture of the man speaking. Jim Forrest has been a long-time peace activist. I know him best from his early association with Thomas Merton. Forrest has written on Merton. But his peace pedigree is even more extensive. Forrest was also one who learned from Dorothy Day. You can add to the list of peace luminaries Forrest has known and with whom he is associated. He was friends of Daniel Berrigan, Thich Nhat Hanh and Henri Nouwen. Most of these figures were Catholic, but we all know that peacemaking is not solely a Catholic endeavor. Quakers have their own list of “peace saints.”
I liked the sharing that Cassidy offered from Forrest’s speech. Apparently his opening words were these. "What brought us here today?" Forest asked in his opening lecture, "In my own case, I've been thinking about war and peace since I was 8 or 9 years old. I'm now 76. How surprising it is to have reached such an age. In my twenties, I thought it very unlikely that I'd live to be 30." This got the appropriate laugh from the audience. But Forrest interrupted.
Forrest thought he would be dead long before his seventy-sixth birthday, as he said. "Anticipated cause of death: nuclear war," he said. "By the skin of our teeth we have lived with nuclear weapons without their being used in war since 1945 — 73 years." To read this is sobering. It means I have lived my entire lifetime in an environment of nuclear weapons. Even if our own times, the question about who gets to have nuclear weapons is being discussed. Of course, the United States has the weapons. And I know the rhetoric that justifies our having such powerful means of destruction.
We always assume some other nut from some other country will be the one to wreak havoc on the world. We would never see ourselves doing this. And I don’t think we would. But the minute we are talking about “we” and “others,” a potentially dangerous scenario is set up. Peacemakers want to defuse the situation and include everyone in the “we.” Of course, it will be objected this is short-sighted or unrealistic. Peacemakers are marginalized as idealists or stupid. Too often faith is unhooked from the issues of war and violence.
This unhooking cannot happen says Jim Forrest and others at the conference. I would agree. And I was intrigued by one other person at the conference that Cassidy cites. He was a person I did not know, but it is not surprising I did not know him. Kenyan-born Shad K, well-known hip-hop singer, also spoke. My friend, Cassidy, offers a synopsis of Shad K’s position. “He explained that the depth of connectivity between art and peacemaking is precisely what allows us to create rather than destroy, and that the epitome of creating is not only an allegiance to oneself but to our fellow human as well.”
I find it helpful to talk about the “connectivity between art and peacemaking” and linking that to creativity. And Shad K links this creativity to an allegiance to oneself and to every other created being. This becomes an apt for non-violence. Christian theology would talk about it in terms of all people are created in the image of God. We all are children of God. Some of us obviously are not very good kids! But we don’t kill (or nuke) bad kids!
Cassidy quotes a line from Shad K that I love and from which I got the title of this inspirational piece. He said, "Church at its best is like art school to me…Because we steep ourselves in story." I never thought about church as like art school, but it is a good analogy. But I really like understanding that we “steep ourselves in story.” I understand this in the way I think about steeping tea. You put the bag in hot water and let it steep. So it is that we soak ourselves in stories.
Perhaps the problem with our world bent on violence is people sometimes steep themselves in unfortunate stories. We can learn war, just as we can learn to be peacemakers. I can only understand terrorists if I can understand the stories in which they are steeped. And perhaps it is the story more than rationality or, even, logic that can lead people to become peacemakers.
For many of us, we are steeped in the stories of the New Testament and the actions of Jesus. Perhaps we need conferences, like the one in Toronto, to gain more stories. There is work to do.
My own commitment to this testimony was tested in the Vietnam War. During this time, I experienced first-hand the dilemma of knowing my own tradition and the peer pressure of fighting for one’s country. So often, peacemaking seems to be a choice between faith and nationalism. Perhaps that is an unfair characterization, but that can be discussed later. What I want to do now is see what the folks in Toronto were saying.
The minute I saw the article, I recognized the picture of the man speaking. Jim Forrest has been a long-time peace activist. I know him best from his early association with Thomas Merton. Forrest has written on Merton. But his peace pedigree is even more extensive. Forrest was also one who learned from Dorothy Day. You can add to the list of peace luminaries Forrest has known and with whom he is associated. He was friends of Daniel Berrigan, Thich Nhat Hanh and Henri Nouwen. Most of these figures were Catholic, but we all know that peacemaking is not solely a Catholic endeavor. Quakers have their own list of “peace saints.”
I liked the sharing that Cassidy offered from Forrest’s speech. Apparently his opening words were these. "What brought us here today?" Forest asked in his opening lecture, "In my own case, I've been thinking about war and peace since I was 8 or 9 years old. I'm now 76. How surprising it is to have reached such an age. In my twenties, I thought it very unlikely that I'd live to be 30." This got the appropriate laugh from the audience. But Forrest interrupted.
Forrest thought he would be dead long before his seventy-sixth birthday, as he said. "Anticipated cause of death: nuclear war," he said. "By the skin of our teeth we have lived with nuclear weapons without their being used in war since 1945 — 73 years." To read this is sobering. It means I have lived my entire lifetime in an environment of nuclear weapons. Even if our own times, the question about who gets to have nuclear weapons is being discussed. Of course, the United States has the weapons. And I know the rhetoric that justifies our having such powerful means of destruction.
We always assume some other nut from some other country will be the one to wreak havoc on the world. We would never see ourselves doing this. And I don’t think we would. But the minute we are talking about “we” and “others,” a potentially dangerous scenario is set up. Peacemakers want to defuse the situation and include everyone in the “we.” Of course, it will be objected this is short-sighted or unrealistic. Peacemakers are marginalized as idealists or stupid. Too often faith is unhooked from the issues of war and violence.
This unhooking cannot happen says Jim Forrest and others at the conference. I would agree. And I was intrigued by one other person at the conference that Cassidy cites. He was a person I did not know, but it is not surprising I did not know him. Kenyan-born Shad K, well-known hip-hop singer, also spoke. My friend, Cassidy, offers a synopsis of Shad K’s position. “He explained that the depth of connectivity between art and peacemaking is precisely what allows us to create rather than destroy, and that the epitome of creating is not only an allegiance to oneself but to our fellow human as well.”
I find it helpful to talk about the “connectivity between art and peacemaking” and linking that to creativity. And Shad K links this creativity to an allegiance to oneself and to every other created being. This becomes an apt for non-violence. Christian theology would talk about it in terms of all people are created in the image of God. We all are children of God. Some of us obviously are not very good kids! But we don’t kill (or nuke) bad kids!
Cassidy quotes a line from Shad K that I love and from which I got the title of this inspirational piece. He said, "Church at its best is like art school to me…Because we steep ourselves in story." I never thought about church as like art school, but it is a good analogy. But I really like understanding that we “steep ourselves in story.” I understand this in the way I think about steeping tea. You put the bag in hot water and let it steep. So it is that we soak ourselves in stories.
Perhaps the problem with our world bent on violence is people sometimes steep themselves in unfortunate stories. We can learn war, just as we can learn to be peacemakers. I can only understand terrorists if I can understand the stories in which they are steeped. And perhaps it is the story more than rationality or, even, logic that can lead people to become peacemakers.
For many of us, we are steeped in the stories of the New Testament and the actions of Jesus. Perhaps we need conferences, like the one in Toronto, to gain more stories. There is work to do.
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