The UUA is currently beginning its second year of a four year process known as the Congregational Study Action Issue (CSAI). Within this period, UU congregations and communities will be studying the topic of Peacemaking with the hopes of creating and passing a Statement of Conscience in 2010. It is the intention of this process that the UUA will be able to make a comprehensive statement on the role of the Church in Peacemaking and the role of Peacemaking in the Church. And while many questions arise in this process, it seems to me that the most important and first question is: Why study peace at all?
There is of course, the immediate answer: Peace is preferable over war or violence. The ability to resolve or transform conflict without the use of violence—whether it is physical, economic, or psychological—is a goal that many strive to achieve. However, there is more to it than that, I believe. There must be much more to studying peace than simply being “more desirable”.
The President of my college once said: “The university system is bad business. Every year, we take a quarter of our institution; the ones with the most knowledge of how things work here and we send them away, only to replace them with people who have absolutely no institutional knowledge.” In many ways, that is how the world works. Everyday the most educated, experienced, and knowledgeable people in our world leave; only to be replaced by blank slates. The people with the most institutional knowledge of life leave us—never to return. And it is up to those who are currently in the process of gaining that knowledge to teach those who have none. We must teach the newcomers about things like cucumbers and the Pythagorean Theorem and the horrors of genocide. It is up to us to shape the young—and maybe not so young—minds of what it means to be human in this world.
And to think about all that brain drain. Within thirty years, a whole generation’s worth of knowledge can be forgotten. Within one generation, society’s expectations and desires can be completely reformed. To study peace is not merely to improve our own current situations. To study peace is laying the ground work for a new world future. Teaching a child to use their words instead of their fists on the playground not only changes conflicts today or next week, it also changes conflicts twenty years from now.
To study peace is more than just anti-war rallies and conflict resolution trainings; it is modeling the world we want to have. Peacemaking is not merely a means to an end; it is the constant cycle of work. It is like an infinite row of dominoes, each touching another. Each act of peace work is not taking away from the mountain of violence, it is adding to the stack of peace. This is why we must study peace.
For the next three years, individuals, communities, districts, and the denomination in its whole will be questioning what peace is and what we can do to promote it. This will not be any easy process. We have given ourselves a Herculean task. Conflicts are bound to arise. Indeed, some have already. But it is a task that we must take on in order to achieve greatness. And when General Assembly comes in 2010, it is the hope of many—including myself—that we will be able to stand as one, diverse voice and speak to the importance of peace in all its complicated forms. So, in a spirit of love and openness, let us work together by listening and stretching. Let us, to quote the Mahatma Gandhi, “be the peace [we] want to see.”
