“Show Me the Ways to Peace!”

Karen Sloan 29/10/2023

Readings - There have been many poems and reading and prayers on my facebook feed, from those from the peace movement, many are people of faith.

Here is one..

When I was a child,

I learnt to count to five

one, two, three, four, five.

but these days, I’ve been counting lives, so I count

one life

because each time

is the first time

that that life

has been taken.

Legitimate Target

has sixteen letters

and one

long

abominable

space

between

two

dehumanising

words.

Luke 19:41-2

Jesus Weeps over Jerusalem

As he came near and saw the city, he wept over it, saying, ‘If you, even you, had only recognized on this day the things that make for peace! But now they are hidden from your eyes.

Matthew 22:34-40

The Greatest Commandment

When the Pharisees heard that he had silenced the Sadducees, they gathered together, and one of them, a lawyer, asked him a question to test him. ‘Teacher, which commandment in the law is the greatest?’ He said to him, ‘ “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind.” This is the greatest and first commandment. And a second is like it: “You shall love your neighbour as yourself.” On these two commandments hang all the law and the prophets.’

………

What readings was I going to use today? What can the scriptures tell us that we have not heard many times before? Mm some questions I had this past week.

Yet somehow the readings have grown a life and have come alive more in our current time and place. Especially the reading from Matthew, on the greatest commandment.

To what did I eventually come up with, well here goes.

We gather here as Jesus followers and acknowledge that the way he lived and what he spoke about was pretty radical. John Dominic Crossan calls him a non-violent revolutionary, who practised non-violent resistance to the powers of injustice until death. And in so doing revealed most fully the creative and life-giving presence of God in this world. Maybe this is a good summary of him. His life and teachings tell us so much about our response to war.

What about this from Dorothy Day…

Pretty powerful!!

More than a fluffy magician who takes people away to some other place, Jesus confronted the injustice and challenged and poverty and corruption of his day, coming from a long line of ancient prophets. People like Isaiah, Micah and Amos from the Hebrew bible, who were also non-violent, and called for peace and kindness and justice even if it was costly.

So the story of Jesus is a call to peace, both the peace that comes with loving ourselves and the peace that comes from loving others. And regardless of whether you believe in a God of the universe, a God within and between us, or not, war, violence is not the answer, is never the answer. What is the world we want to leave children , our children and grandchildren, and all the children that are to come after us. That’s a good question!

So I titled this sermon, “show me the ways to peace”, which was also the title of the first hymn we sang.

Show me the ways to peace.

When we think of our world now, maybe that’s a good question too. Show us the ways to peace.

My friends Rob and Pam have more gumption than me sometimes, more commitment. Recently they have attended both rallies in Perth in support of the Palestinians being blasted to death in Gaza. Not that they don’t feel pain and anguish for those killed in Israel by Hamas, but they understand the sheer horror of what has happened since.

For them no one is a winner, least of all those who are just trying to live a life in an occupied territory.

They don’t take sides, but rather are on the side of peace.

I remember some years ago going to a peace conference, which had an interfaith panel consisting of representatives from all the major religions, including a young Jewish rabbi, a Muslim woman, a Buddhist monk, a catholic nun, an aboriginal women doing a PhD on indigenous spirituality, a Uniting Church minister and a woman representing the Bahia faith. They were all required to say something about how their faith can add to the call for peace in our time

They all spoke about their faith as having a central message of peace and love, and forgiveness, both inward and outward. Some suggested this message gets distorted by those who seek to change things by violence. That this is a perversion of the message. In particular the Rabbi spoke not about tolerance but about love of the stranger, and how the Hebrew Scriptures mention this more than anything else.

It was a hopeful message from a hopeful panel. That making peace rather than making war is our mission, for all the faith traditions.

Yet making peace is well, pretty darn hard, as we can now see…

After the panel I went and listened to a young Australian Palestinian woman, speaking of the horrors that were happening at that time in Israel. The injustice and violence perpetrated on people, who once belonged to the land that they are now strangers in. The sorrow and grief and struggle of the Palestinians, a struggle that has been going on for a very long time. This is not a war between nations but a war within a nation, and it is killing everyone.

The contrast was stark.

I was and am so torn. On the one hand what this young woman spoke about with passion was so moving. How can Jewish Israel be doing this to its fellow citizens? What about loving the stranger? These are not even strangers. Rob and Pam have friends who are Palestinian, I have travelled with Marg and Nev to Israel and seen in the west bank the terrible conditions, and this is not even Gaza.

Yet I have also seen the passion there amongst the Jewish population, the grief and sorrow they have suffered after so many centuries of pogroms and massacres and death and destruction, and the fear that now resides in their hearts. You cannot go to the holocaust museum and not be shocked and changed by it. They would say, they have to protect themselves and their homeland.

In the end there are two sides, there is always 2 sides, two warring sides that may never come together in peace, especially now. There is suffering and grief on both sides, and terrible, terrible things being done.

How do we find peace in a situation where peace seems so far away? And particularly when one has so much power and one has so little, or has no control of the powerful groups that dictate to them.

There is a pre harry potter movie , meaning set before the time of harry potter, called Fantastic Beasts, Crimes of Grindelwald. In it the main character, Newton Scamander is asked to choose a side when a battle between good and evil looms. His response.... “I don’t do sides”.

I don’t do sides. Rob and Pam, my friends, don’t do sides.

Maybe we don’t do sides either, maybe we choose peace and love instead. Certainly Jesus did.

This is such a radical message, a confronting message. And one the world doesn’t always agree with.

How do we respond to so much pain and anguish and desperation and evil in the world?

Jesus calls us to respond with nonviolence and love. For all sides!

The magazine Sojourners, which Matt and I still get, in hard copy, has featured a number of articles addressing the current crises but has wisdom for all places where war is raging.

One article features Rev Mae Elise Cannon who is executive director of Churches for Middle East Peace. She has met with many faith leaders, and with more than 30 different Christian denominations to grieve, to lament, to pray and to work together for all people in the conflict, both Israelis and Palestinians. They have people in Gaza and in the west bank and in Jerusalem and other cities of Israel. Advocating for de-escalation and peaceful responses as opposed to more violence. Speaking with both Israeli and Palestinian peace activists and the need for constructive dialogue alongside action.

I won’t read you the entire interview, but a few things spoke out..

“For those who are Palestinian solidarity activists, part of what peace building work looks like is [recognizing] this: Grieving alongside Jewish families who have lost loved ones and abhorring the violence of Hamas in no way means compromising on issues of justice for Palestinians. Peace building can be completely condemning taking civilians as hostages and still working for an end to occupation.

The world is saying “Israel has the right to defend itself.” We, as peacemakers and peace builders, would say that violence should be the last response. Can we please try to pursue diplomatic means?

It’s important to differentiate between the State of Israel and the people. I think that’s a very important distinction. Acknowledging that antisemitism exists does not in any way negate advocating for human rights for Palestinians. Whenever there’s a zero-sum game or a false binary, that is not constructive towards peace. We need to deconstruct those false binaries. It’s not an either/or.

People say: “To honor God, we need to pray for Israel.” I’m not asking people to not pray for Israel — people should pray for Israel. I ask them to pray for Palestinians, too.

[Human rights groups] like HaMoked or B’Tselem or Breaking the Silence — an incredible organization that is former soldiers that are telling the stories of their experiences as soldiers in the Israeli Defense Forces — these groups are courageous, prophetic voices within Israeli society. They are not only marginalized, in moments like this, they’re viewed as traitors. Those communities can absolutely use international support.

I believe that Israel absolutely has legitimate security needs. If people care about the legitimate security needs of Israel, the legitimate needs of the Palestinian people also need to be addressed. And that does not in any way justify the Hamas attacks; I abhor them, and I condemn them. But to understand what a comprehensive peace would look like, the context of the conflict must be understood. A comprehensive and just peace, through diplomatic means, has to be pursued.

You were asking what role Christians can play: Christians can play a prophetic role. Christians, historically, have been very supportive of the state of Israel; perhaps we are in a unique place where Israel might listen to us because of our historical allegiances.

My mantra in the last year or two has been: “Despair is the luxury of the privileged.” That is more true now than ever before. In these moments, we cannot despair. One of our obligations — for those of us who are not in the middle of this — is to hold on to hope and encouragement and solidarity in prayer and in advocacy.

For people wondering what they can do, supporting groups that are doing peace building or building bridges is really important in this moment — perhaps now more than ever.”

It’s not an either/or, it’s both. We don’t take sides because God is within every human person, not just one side or my side. We are called to love everyone, friend or enemy. Those who love us in return and those that don’t. That what makes us stand out, or should, that’s what challenges us, that’s why it’s so so hard!!!

Let me also read a bit from another article…by Wesley Granberg-Michaelson, entitled, “Amid the horrific violence, the gospel of peace feels foolish, it’s not”. A great title.

“What, then, might guide the Christian community in its words, witness, and action in this terrible hour of terror and devastation?

Violence begets violence

First, we must renounce violence — all violence, from all perpetrators, for any cause, without exception. It always sounds foolhardy to appeal to nonviolence in the face of wanton and morally depraved terror, yet this is the message of the gospel. Further, what we see happening in Israel, Gaza, and beyond demonstrates what happens when we use weak and irrelevant arguments to justify violence; violence begets violence.

Reject nationalistic religion

Second, Christians must detach nationalistic religion from our politics, everywhere. Political conflicts leading to miliary violence are difficult enough to solve, but when religion is added as a justification, such conflicts become nearly intractable. We see this happening throughout the world, but particularly in this present onslaught: Whether through cries of praise to Allah, invoking divine sanction to territorial ambition, or desecrating holy sites to arouse the deepest fears of enemies, such misuse of religion becomes deadly. This also includes attempts of some U.S. evangelicals to baptize the territorial expansion of the State of Israel. God is not a real estate agent and we demean the biblical witness by claiming so.

God's presence in ‘the other’

Finally, a Christian witness to unspeakable violence recovers the most radical, counter-cultural truth of all, which always is repressed in such onslaughts: the presence of the image of God, resting at the heart of every person, beneath all else that would cover or blaspheme it. Always, at the heart of the “other,” the image of God is there. In the end, our addiction to violence violates God, whose love remains linked to all that God has created.”

As Nev said a long time ago, but still relevant today,

“Jesus walked to a different drum beat. That’s why they crucified him, and why the Christian faith is far more than loving one another. Even non-believers do that. Rather we are called to love our enemies, to love those who differ from us, to render no one evil for evil, to love one another as I have loved you. The Christen faith is about taking up a cross and seeing Jesus as the way the truth about life. We are called not to love but to love as he loved”.

For Jesus saw the God of his heart and soul as the God presence in all of creation, not just some.

In the end we can find strength in the truth of Jesus` message. God gives life and this life involves peace and justice and nonviolence. Violence only leads to heartache and pain and darkness and death, as so many others have discovered. As Christians, our call to carry the cross of Christ is a call to carry the cross of nonviolence and love. It is a call to be co-creators with God and with Jesus into a new way of living. A way which involves practising justice, service and conflict resolution in our daily lives, and empowering others to engage in peacemaking as an alternative vision for the world.

We start with one another, with our children and our communities.

We and our society may be surprised at the ending!!!! By the way of love.

Amen

Let me read one more thing, that I have discovered in the past week..

A quote from Howard Zinn…

“To be hopeful in bad times is not just foolishly romantic. It is based on the fact that human history is a history not only of cruelty, but also of compassion, sacrifice, courage, kindness. What we choose to emphasize in this complex history will determine our lives. If we see only the worst, it destroys our capacity to do something. If we remember those times and places – and there are so many – where people have behaved magnificently, this gives us the energy to act, and at least the possibility of sending this spinning top of a world in a different direction. And if we do act, in however small a way, we don’t have to wait for some grand utopian future. The future is an infinite succession of presents, and to live now as we think human beings should live, in defiance of all that is bad around us, is itself a marvellous victory.”

Amen Amen!