The Gospel of Peace
Peace in this world is always under threat. There is no utopia, no final state of peace in a new political order. We look forward to the parousia, a new heaven and a new earth, but we have learned that that is kingdom come when all creation will be made whole. The ‘gospel of peace’, the message proclaimed by Christ, announces the presence of God’s rule. It brings about our reconciliation with God and people. However, the full realisation of God’s rule remains to be brought about in heaven. The old world of sin has not simply disappeared. We still have to struggle against the forces of darkness, a struggle which began with Adam and Eve, with Cain and Abel, and which will last until the end of time. Pride and disobedience harden the hearts of us all. Even Christ’s new creation, redeemed people, can yield to the temptations of power. War and enmity are still present, injustices thrive, sin still manifests itself. Hatred, oppression and violence lurk in the social, political and institutional spheres of our human existence. ‘All creation groans with pain, like the pain of childbirth’ (Rom. 8:22). There is evil in the world despite its redemption.
The final victory, however, is with Christ. The New Testament shows how people have experienced in Jesus ‘the kindness and love of God our saviour’ (Titus 3:4). Jesus himself is God’s messenger of peace. His words and deeds bring God’s liberating kingdom nearer. His words, especially as they are preserved for us in the Sermon on the Mount, describe a new reality in which God’s power is manifested and the longing of the people is fulfilled. In God’s reign the poor are given the Kingdom, the mourners are comforted, the meek inherit the earth, those hungry for righteousness are satisfied, the merciful know mercy, the pure see God, the persecuted know the Kingdom, and peacemakers are called the children of God. Jesus is a healer who takes care of people in their concrete situations in life. He gives both a physical and spiritual salvation. He gives sight to Bartimaeus. He consoles and praises the Syro-Phoenician woman. He interviews the woman at Jacob’s well by day and listens to Nicodemus by night. He forgives sin, ‘Young man, your sins are forgiven’. He makes a friend of Mary Magdalen. Jesus teaches people to pass on to others the reconciliation which they have gained, ‘go at once and make peace with your brother and then come and offer your gift to God’ (Matt. 5:24). In the eyes of Jesus peace is not something that is easy to obtain. He talks about a peace the world can not give. This peace does not afford protection against those who oppose it. Jesus himself achieved the reconciliation between God and people on the cross. When we look at a crucifix we understand the power of evil. Violence and injustice in our world are so great that Jesus had to die on a cross to bring about peace and justice. He who lived a life of non-violence became a victim of violence. The cross and resurrection of our Saviour: these are our peace. In his death there is life. In his defeat there is victory. As disciples and as children of God, it is our task to seek for ways in which to make the forgiveness, justice and mercy, and love of God visible in a world where violence and enmity are too often the norm. When we listen to God’s word, we hear again and always the call to repentance and to belief: to repentance because although we are redeemed we continue to need redemption; to belief, because although the reign of God is near, it is still seeking its fullness.
The Church and Peace
The Church of Jesus Christ faces a challenge to continue to testify to the peaceful words and deeds of Jesus and in a spirit of hope against hope to make them her own cause. She invites her members to become a community of reconciliation in practice. She invites all people to found the peace of the world on a relationship with God and in a spirit of trust in his commandments.
Archbishop Oscar Romero, the martyred bishop of El Salvador, said: ‘The way of Jesus leads to communion with all people. His enduring presence in the Church is the foundation of a profound brotherhood in the world just as God desires it. Love the Church as the Lord himself. Though she is burdened with the weakness and sinfulness of a long history, she is still the instrument of his Kingdom, his work of salvation for the world, the germ of a new creation.’
Moved by the example of Jesus’ life and by his teaching, some Christians have from the earliest days of the Church committed themselves to a non-violent life-style. Some understood the gospel of Jesus to prohibit all killing. Some affirmed the use of prayer and other spiritual methods as means of responding to enmity and hostility. When the wall dividing church and state fell in Roman times, Christians began to share the responsibility of wars. It is easy to see the weakness and sinfulness of the past. While making allowance for our difficulty to understand varied historical situations we would have to say that the Crusades to liberate the Holy Land were waged with great cruelty. Pope John Paul II has called on historians to prepare studies for the year 2000 and the new millennium, a recognition of errors committed by members of the church and, in a certain sense, in its name. I am sure it will include a humble repentance for the excesses of the Crusades, the religious wars of the sixteenth century, the Inquisition, and reviews of Galileo and Copernicus, Luther and Hus. The Catholic Church will look at its own witness, culminating in the martyrdoms of the last hundred years and perhaps produce an ecumenical martyrology which would include martyrs from all the Christian Churches and communions. Nearer to our own times the colonial wars were barbaric in nature. Spain, Portugal, Great Britain, France, Germany, Holland, Belgium, Italy can hardly lift their heads with shame for the violence and death and suffering they brought in brutal fashion to America, Africa, India, Australia, New Zealand, the Middle East and the Far East. These countries still feel the pain of the wounds. Even in Ireland today we still bear the scars of the genocide policy of the nation-state established by the Tudors. A letter appeared in a recent issue of The Tablet – ‘Why do Christians kill one another in Africa? is a question tormenting those attending the African Synod in Rome – in Europe have we become so hardened to the practice of Christians killing one another that we no longer bother to ask?’ Yes, Christians still succumb to the temptations of power and violence and thus disregard the word of the Lord.
Looking back on the history of the Church, on the good side one can say that Christians have struggled hard from Augustine to Thomas Aquinas to debate the problems of war and peace. Pacifism has gained ground, especially in the recognition of personal conscientious objection. The theory of a just war was always something incomplete. Today it is heavily limited with the presumption against war, the immorality of nuclear warfare, and the immorality of conventional defensive strategy which violates the principle of proportionality, going beyond the limits of legitimate defence. There have always been movements and figures within the Christian denominations which have been exemplary in their fulfilment of Christ’s testimony that we must love our enemies and practise peace. Such a spirit is embodied in St Francis and in the Franciscan prayer ‘Lord make me an instrument of your peace’. Many Christians have proved themselves peace-makers in the midst of violent confrontation. The modern popes from Benedict XV to Pope John Paul II and other Christian leaders have grown louder in their calls for disarmament as the threat of annihilation of entire peoples and states by nuclear weapons has increased. They have deplored the incessant arms race, promoted world authority for the regulation of conflicts, directed attention towards promoting human rights and establishing humane conditions of life.
The World Today
It is difficult for us to understand the world we live in. Missiles and weaponry of all kinds abound, the cost of which would feed the world many times over. And yet one half of the earth, the northern hemisphere, prospers and the southern hemisphere is starved of rice, bread and medicines. The great economic powers of the world, USA, Europe and Japan and its neighbours may fight their trade wars out, or they may make a global agreement to share, but will they exclude the underdeveloped southern hemisphere? Is the power of Christians now so weak in the developed countries that it will not be possible for them to get these great powers to really accept that the globe is inhabited by
a single family in which all have the same basic needs and all have a right to the goods of the earth, an interdependent world with a common nature and destiny?
Europe is still in a process of healing in the wake of the horrors of two world wars. Gorbachev and Pope John Paul, mighty giants of peace, have by their influence in Poland and Russia helped to end the east-west conflict. The United States and Russia have given new hope to the world, and to the planet, by their programme of progressive nuclear disarmament, begun by Kennedy and Kruschev and bearing fruit with Reagan and Gorbachev, with the present governments and we hope into the future. Surely there is tremendous moral pressure on the United States of America, Russia, France and Britain to destroy their nuclear weapons – in the absence of that surely it is hypocritical to comment on North Korea, India, Pakistan, Iran, Iraq and Israel?
There have been more than 130 wars in the Third World since 1945 which have cost the lives of 35 million people. Through television, the media and missionaries we have felt the human suffering in Nicaragua, El Salvador, Peru, Guatemala, Mexico, Ethiopia, Somalia, Liberia, Angola, Mozambique, the Sudan, South Africa, Bosnia and many other places in recent years. The Palestine-Israeli conflict seemed perennial. Their present peace evolution seems like a miracle. F. W. de Klerk has been magnanimous in his tribute to Nelson Mandela – ‘You have come a long way’, a far cry from Ian Smith’s ‘Not in a thousand years’.
Not all attempted solutions are praiseworthy. Sometimes we are deceived by the rhetoric of propaganda. The Roman historian Tacitus gives us the response of Calgracus, a British chief in the north of England to the conquest of the Roman legions under Agricola – ubi solitudinem faciunt, pacem appellant ‘they make a wilderness and they call it peace’. His remark can be applied to wars today. We hear often that fifty thousand American troops died in Vietnam; we are seldom told that three million Vietnamese died. A million Algerians died in their war of independence. Robert Fisk has revealed the savagery of the Israeli invasion of Lebanon and the siege of Beirut in his book Pity the Nation. However just in principle the offensive against Sadam Hussein, the Gulf War in terms of civilian casualties resulted in perhaps the greatest single western atrocity since the devastation of the atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, which latter events were once described by Pope Paul VI as a ‘butchery of untold magnitude’.
How do we face the tremendous discord in our world today? – ferocious new means of warfare threatening a savagery surpassing that of the past, deceit, subversion, terrorism, genocide, and forms of structural violence where resources and the control of resources are the property of one group who use them not for the good of all but for their own profit.
I think that since the last Great War the concept of ‘Peace’ has ideologically replaced the glorification of war. Slowly different governments have made public declarations of their past inhumanity to man. Reconciliation requires repentance as a first step. How can we repent for the enslavement of Africans, for the genocide of the Indians of North and South America and other indigenous peoples, for colonialism, for domination, oppression and aggression? Germany has done it for the immeasurable suffering it caused. Could the former allies not also ask forgiveness for the fire storms inflicted on Hamburg and the bombing of Dresden? Consider the magnificent words of John Baker, Anglican bishop of Salisbury. ‘I consider it is perfectly right for Englishmen – as I and some of my friends have done – to go over to Ireland and say, “Look I am sorry”. Not just we are sorry, but I am sorry for what we have done to bring about the problems you now face. And I believe that it would be an enormous step forward in the whole situation if our own political leaders, preferably the Prime Minister – I tried this on when Margaret Thatcher was in power – were actually to say something like that in a speech. Not to say we think that everything we’re doing at the moment is wicked or anything like that, but to accept responsibility for having brought the situation or contributed to bringing the situation to where it is now. And that in itself is very important. You can’t make other people forgive you, but you can at least say, “we need to be forgiven”, and I think that is a very important Christian insight.’
Pope John Paul in his homily at Coventry Cathedral said, ‘Peace is not just the absence of war. It involves mutual respect and confidence between peoples and nations. It involves collaboration and binding agreements. Like a cathedral, peace must be constructed patiently and with unshakeable faith’.
Because of the interdependence of the world we look to international organisations for solutions. They have mushroomed since the end of the last world war. Pope Paul VI called the United Nations the last hope for peace. However, it is clear that its bureaucracy and outdated Security Council greatly hamper its work. I think public opinion is more than disappointed in its failure to act in Rwanda. The same pope once said, ‘If you wish peace, defend life’. He would be more than disappointed at the United Nations Preparatory Committee’s choice of death rather than life in its contraceptive proposals for African countries for the International Conference on Population and Development to be held in Cairo.
The anxiety and impatience world disorder creates must be met personally with a spirit of strength. The temptation to shut ourselves off from the magnitude of the problem must be met with the toil of taking one small step at a time. The temptation to look only to our own welfare must be matched with a spirit of love which esteems the dignity, the rights and liberty of each individual and which protects our neighbours against degradation, bondage and injustice. Can we make the tender mercy of God present in a world of violence, oppression and injustice by our active forgiveness?
And as little individuals faced with such huge problems what can we do? A little story to end – ‘It was a chilly, overcast day when the rider saw the little sparrow lying on its back in the middle of the road. Reining on his mount he looked down and inquired of the little creature, ‘Why are you lying upside down like that?’
‘I heard the heavens are going to fall today,’ replied the bird.
The rider laughed. ‘And I suppose your spindly legs can hold up the heavens?’
‘One does what one can,’ said the little sparrow.
Northern Ireland
In Northern Ireland there are some welcome signs of peace:
1. The major developments in Europe, namely the creation of a Single Market and the drive towards European political union, have profound implications for relations between Great Britain and Ireland. Britain is no longer interested in Ireland from its national security point of view. The forces of history and the forces of economics are marching with great speed in Europe and they will take us along with them. The fear of Ireland’s links with her European enemies once led Britain to colonise Ireland. Now the reverse is happening. Ireland’s renewed links with Europe will draw us not only into friendship with Britain, witness the Anglo-Irish agreement, but into friendship with other European states. As Germany increasingly becomes the economic centre of Europe the Irish population in Germany will increase. The old German-Irish friendships of the early and late middle ages are reawakening. The Irish government should promote these Irish-German cultural links. They could bring German investment in Ireland and the north would certainly look towards a south that is economically sound.
2. Cultural groups in the north are engaged in a quiet revolution – They are searching deeply in their hearts – Who are we? What are we? Are our traditions necessarily opposed as in the past? Could we share our heritage and enrich one another?
3. Dialogue is the new bright word. It has burst upon the media with the news that Protestant ministers have engaged in talks with loyalist paramilitaries. We remember, however, that the Secretary of State, Mr Peter Brooke, the former Taoiseach Mr Charles Haughey, and recently Cardinal Cahal Daly, have hinted at a place at the negotiation table for republicans should the IRA call a ceasefire. Now is the time for this dialogue to gain momentum. Church leaders and political leaders can not move the dialogue unless the groundswell of freq
uent and varied talking on the ground brings them along. On this subject I would recommend that the south should form a Peace Corps, modelled on the good aspects of the American Peace Corps founded by President John F. Kennedy. Peace must not be confined to fine words and fine gestures. Our Christian testimony must be reaffirmed by deeds. This Peace Corps would work for justice and peace. Young professionally trained southern Irish men and women of all religions, and none, could give years to the investigation of complaints of injustice and discrimination in Northern Ireland. They would be the living alternative to the use of violence. By the dynamism of spiritual and ethical forces allied to professional skills they could reassure people that their problems will not be forgotten. The Peace Corps could win the trust of all in Northern Ireland, Catholic and Protestant, in working with the governments in Dublin, London, and Belfast, with Amnesty international and the United Nations, to restore a sense of trust and confidence among all the people of the north.
The Eucharist
This evening we personally receive the peace of Christ in the celebration of the Eucharist. We thank God for peace and beseech him time and time again to grant us peace. We ask for the grace to be witnesses to peace before the world, to serve the Church in peace, to serve our community in peace, to serve our country in peace.
Sermon preached in St Francis Church, Cork, Sunday 8 March 1992, organised by PEACE (Prayer Enterprise and Christian Effort). Expanded for International Conference on Religion and Conflict, Armagh, 20–21 May 1994.
I am indebted to the Pastoral Letter of the German Bishops, Gerectigkeit schafft Frieden, 18 April 1983, and the Pastoral Letter of the USA bishops, The Challenge of Peace, God’s Promise and Our Response, 3 May 1983, for many of the ideas in this paper.
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