2^nd Sunday year C, 2007.

 

This Sunday is Peace Day and we are encouraged

to keep the peace today;

to make peace by offering or accepting peace;

to meditate on peace

and seek the truth about where I stand with peace.

For example am I at peace with myself, with God,

with my neighbour?  And wars

Is there peace in my heart or is there dissatisfaction or resentment or anger or war in my heart?

The saying goes that charity starts at home.

Peace also starts at home and world peace begins in my heart and your heart.

 

Television news almost daily brings us images of conflicts and wars and informs us of the threat of violence. We say that the world seems less safe now than in the Cold War years. We have escaped the big stick of the threat of nuclear war between two superpowers but have to fear the many small sticks of terrorist attacks from almost anywhere.

How long will this go on? Are we disinterested in peace?

 

Many of us say:

Wouldn’t it be wonderful if war and terrorist attacks

were no longer hanging over our heads?

If the old could walk anywhere anytime

without fear of being mugged or murdered?

If people who say: you could build a school for the price of a jetfighter would have their way

and the money spent on armaments now

would be spent on improving the human condition.

 

If the thousand billion pounds spent on military purposes

around the world would be redirected,

famine, homelessness, the lack of healthcare and education could be eliminated everywhere without any of us giving up

a single penny.

What is required to achieve this

is not just a political change at government level

but a spiritual change at our own level.

 

You and I need to strive to reach a state of being

when we can honestly say that there is perfect peace within us, in our hearts and in our minds; that we are not in conflict

with anything or anybody.

 

We need to desire, hope and pray for that peace

which is far beyond a mere absence of strife

or the sense of well-being that flows from good health,

financial security and success in the world.

It is the peace that St Paul described as

the Peace of Christ that is beyond all understanding.