Reflection: Peace
At the 11th hour of the 11th day of the 11th month in 1918 the guns finally fell silent. The “war to end all wars” was over, although the peace treaty would not be finalised until 1919. Is the cessation of war peace? Well, it’s a good start. The problem is that it keeps having to be done, over and over again. Not only have many more wars occurred since 1918, the aftermath of each echoes on for generations.
“They make a desert and they call it peace” are words recorded around 2000 years ago, and are as true today as when a Scottish warlord resisted the Roman invasion of Britain. Restoring the built environment and making farmland productive again are only the first steps. Healing the broken bodies and minds of the survivors takes much longer and may last a lifetime. The reconciliation of peoples who have been enemies and learned to hate each other is a lengthy and tortuous process. Sometimes mutual suspicion, even in the absence of actual conflict, carries on indefinitely.
Peace has to be more than a state in which we are no longer lobbing shells (or worse) at each other. It must include secure space – no one can feel safe if they have nowhere to call home, or if the doors of that home can be broken down by armed intruders at any moment. That safety is crucial to our well-being. It is underpinned by a just rule of law. That means a fair society, where everyone has the right of appeal to an impartial judiciary. It also means a nation governed by a benign and democratically elected government, where the armed forces are oriented towards defence rather than attack, and have a right to refuse to obey illegal orders. It means that laws are there to protect citizens, not to harm them, and to protect our basic freedoms – the right to worship as we please, to pursue an education as far as we wish and can, to join whatever communities of politics or charity or campaign groups that appeal to us (provided we do not harm others). These are freedoms that have been hard won and we must preserve them.
If we have peace in our society (and that may well be a triumph of hope over experience), what about peace within ourselves? Perhaps that too begins, tentatively, with an absence of war within ourselves. It could start with the rejection of hatred in favour of loving kindness, and progress through forgiving ourselves and others for the damage we all do and experience simply through living and being in relationships of all kinds. Forgiving others does not necessarily mean that they deserve forgiveness, but that we deserve peace, so the “blame-game” has to stop. Such a process could be aided by spiritual practices, such as meditation, prayer, or simply going out to walk in nature. It could be assisted by being part of a community of like-minded people who value peace, both personal and social, and by hearing or reading the valuable insights of wise and learned teachers of the spiritual way.
I dare to hope that is what Unitarian Community is about: Peace in the world, Peace in our society, Peace within ourselves.
Kay
Find out about the Unitarian Peace Fellowship at https://www.ukunitarians.org.uk/peace/
e to edit.
At the 11th hour of the 11th day of the 11th month in 1918 the guns finally fell silent. The “war to end all wars” was over, although the peace treaty would not be finalised until 1919. Is the cessation of war peace? Well, it’s a good start. The problem is that it keeps having to be done, over and over again. Not only have many more wars occurred since 1918, the aftermath of each echoes on for generations.
“They make a desert and they call it peace” are words recorded around 2000 years ago, and are as true today as when a Scottish warlord resisted the Roman invasion of Britain. Restoring the built environment and making farmland productive again are only the first steps. Healing the broken bodies and minds of the survivors takes much longer and may last a lifetime. The reconciliation of peoples who have been enemies and learned to hate each other is a lengthy and tortuous process. Sometimes mutual suspicion, even in the absence of actual conflict, carries on indefinitely.
Peace has to be more than a state in which we are no longer lobbing shells (or worse) at each other. It must include secure space – no one can feel safe if they have nowhere to call home, or if the doors of that home can be broken down by armed intruders at any moment. That safety is crucial to our well-being. It is underpinned by a just rule of law. That means a fair society, where everyone has the right of appeal to an impartial judiciary. It also means a nation governed by a benign and democratically elected government, where the armed forces are oriented towards defence rather than attack, and have a right to refuse to obey illegal orders. It means that laws are there to protect citizens, not to harm them, and to protect our basic freedoms – the right to worship as we please, to pursue an education as far as we wish and can, to join whatever communities of politics or charity or campaign groups that appeal to us (provided we do not harm others). These are freedoms that have been hard won and we must preserve them.
If we have peace in our society (and that may well be a triumph of hope over experience), what about peace within ourselves? Perhaps that too begins, tentatively, with an absence of war within ourselves. It could start with the rejection of hatred in favour of loving kindness, and progress through forgiving ourselves and others for the damage we all do and experience simply through living and being in relationships of all kinds. Forgiving others does not necessarily mean that they deserve forgiveness, but that we deserve peace, so the “blame-game” has to stop. Such a process could be aided by spiritual practices, such as meditation, prayer, or simply going out to walk in nature. It could be assisted by being part of a community of like-minded people who value peace, both personal and social, and by hearing or reading the valuable insights of wise and learned teachers of the spiritual way.
I dare to hope that is what Unitarian Community is about: Peace in the world, Peace in our society, Peace within ourselves.
Kay
Find out about the Unitarian Peace Fellowship at https://www.ukunitarians.org.uk/peace/
e to edit.
Poem of the Month: Everyone Sang
Everyone suddenly burst out singing;
And I was filled with such delight
As prisoned birds must find in freedom,
Winging wildly across the white
Orchards and dark-green fields; on-on-and out of sight.
Everyone's voice was suddenly lifted;
And beauty came like the setting sun:
My heart was shaken with tears; and horror
Drifted away ... O, but Everyone
Was a bird; and the song was wordless; the singing will never be done.
Siegfried Sasson
Everyone suddenly burst out singing;
And I was filled with such delight
As prisoned birds must find in freedom,
Winging wildly across the white
Orchards and dark-green fields; on-on-and out of sight.
Everyone's voice was suddenly lifted;
And beauty came like the setting sun:
My heart was shaken with tears; and horror
Drifted away ... O, but Everyone
Was a bird; and the song was wordless; the singing will never be done.
Siegfried Sasson
Words to Ponder
“When I was 11 my father announced one of his surprise trips. We were going, he explained, to visit a dry-stone waller who lived in the Black Mountains in Wales. ‘He used to be a priest,’ Dad explained, ‘but he’s moved on from that.’ This invited me to imagine a superficial narrative: that his friend had given up God, but instead found nature, and with it a peculiar and hardy craft. But as the experience unfolded the superficial narrative gave way to a more subtle and interesting one: that the purposeful mingling and interaction of both nature and craft could lead to its own kind of transcendence. As we drove away from his friend’s house nestled in the hills, it seemed less a question of religion vs craft and instead more a matter of religion via craft.”
Ed Smith, from The Quiet Power of Noble Craft,
a review of James Fox’s Craftland
Closing Prayer
O God of all hope and peace, we bring to you the needs of our broken
and hurting world.
Our hearts are breaking with images of lives lost and torn apart.
We pray for an end to violence and warfare so that the challenging
work of renewal may begin.
Help us to affirm our common humanity so that despite our differences we
may build together for justice and peace. Amen.
Fellow Seekers ©2025
Published by the Bath Unitarian Fellowship, c/o 26 Fountain Court, Westbury BA13 3JY. Contributions to [email protected] by the first Sunday of each month, please.
“When I was 11 my father announced one of his surprise trips. We were going, he explained, to visit a dry-stone waller who lived in the Black Mountains in Wales. ‘He used to be a priest,’ Dad explained, ‘but he’s moved on from that.’ This invited me to imagine a superficial narrative: that his friend had given up God, but instead found nature, and with it a peculiar and hardy craft. But as the experience unfolded the superficial narrative gave way to a more subtle and interesting one: that the purposeful mingling and interaction of both nature and craft could lead to its own kind of transcendence. As we drove away from his friend’s house nestled in the hills, it seemed less a question of religion vs craft and instead more a matter of religion via craft.”
Ed Smith, from The Quiet Power of Noble Craft,
a review of James Fox’s Craftland
Closing Prayer
O God of all hope and peace, we bring to you the needs of our broken
and hurting world.
Our hearts are breaking with images of lives lost and torn apart.
We pray for an end to violence and warfare so that the challenging
work of renewal may begin.
Help us to affirm our common humanity so that despite our differences we
may build together for justice and peace. Amen.
Fellow Seekers ©2025
Published by the Bath Unitarian Fellowship, c/o 26 Fountain Court, Westbury BA13 3JY. Contributions to [email protected] by the first Sunday of each month, please.
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