December 5, 1999
Second Sunday of Advent

Non-Violence for the Next Millennium

I was a high school student out on a date, probably my junior year of high school. I remember coming out of the theater. While we had been watching the movie the snow had begun to fall. There was no wind at all. The snow was in huge flakes. Just falling gently, silently, lit by the streetlights, falling to the ground without a sound. There was a blanket of white over everything. It was like a fairy land. Peaceful and quiet. I remember another time. Cindy and I were with the kids in Northern Michigan. We’d rented a cabin along the shores of Lake Superior. That afternoon the kids played in the sand and we walked up and down the beach, gathering pieces of driftwood. It seemed like that afternoon just went on for ever and ever. I felt relaxed and comfortable and at peace. Together with those I loved and far, far away from all of the trouble of the world.

We all have our ideas about what peace means. Sometimes it’s an individual peace, getting away from the tension of life, finding a place where we can feel relaxed, where we can feel at ease, where we can finally let go and enjoy ourselves. Sometimes peace has to do with a cessation of war, no more fighting. John McCutcheon tells a story called, “Christmas in the Trenches.” He talks about the armies in World War I. The Americans in one trench and a stone’s throw away, the Germans in another. On Christmas Eve a voice began to sing out in the darkness, “Stille Nacht.” “Silent Night.” The Americans heard the song and recognized the tune and began to sing in English, “Silent Night, Holy Night.” Somehow, in the magic of the moment, men from both sides came out of the trenches and joined together in a lamp-lit game of soccer. When the game was over and pictures had been shown and hands had been shaken, they returned back to the trenches to face the war once again. Images of peace. What peace can mean to us in our lives. The scriptures offer some similar ideas. “A time when there will be no more war, where God’s love will be upon us in it’s fullness.” “A time where everything that is difficult will be smoothed out. All the pathways will be easy. The roads will be simple to travel. The differences that separate us will be wiped away.”

In the face of this second Sunday of Advent with the candle of peace, we have images that have filled our television sets this past week. Across the large pond to the west, downtown Seattle, the streets that we know well, that we have walked many times. Filled with protesters and pepper gas, rubber bullets and tear gas, broken windows and sprayed graffiti. It was almost like watching another world to be sitting here in Kirkland and seeing the images of what was going on in response to the World Trade Organization meetings. It was difficult to make sense of all of it. Yet I had no desire to go down and get a first hand report. Certainly there were excesses on the part of the protesters. The border ruffians that came up from Oregon. Anarchists striking a blow at the system. Most probably there were also excesses on the part of the authorities. Unwise decisions by the mayor or excesses by the police. All that will be sorted out, but a stark image contrasting the biblical call to peace on earth and goodwill for all people. Yet there are other images in the scripture. Jesus says some contradictory things. When he meets with his disciples for the last time he says, “My peace I give you. Not as the world gives do I give you, but I give to you peace.” But when challenged he also says, “I have not come to bring peace, but a sword. Mother will be against daughter and father against son.” That doesn’t sound like a quiet star-light evening. Not peace, but a sword. Frederick Buechner suggests that when you look at what Jesus is talking about, that you begin to understand that Jesus doesn’t mean the absence of struggle, but instead is talking about the presence of love. The last quote I read from “The Children as Teachers of Peace” touched directly on that point. “What would I do?” this twelve year old said, “If I were in charge, if I were an ambassador to the world, if I were making decisions? What would I do to bring about peace?” She said, “I would start with love. Because if there is love, then there is peace.”

If we can look beyond the vandalism that took place during the protest marches, we find that the vast majority of the protesters were non-violent. In fact, many of the protesters tried to stop those who were breaking windows and spray painting buildings. Some of those protesters returned the next day with gloves and scrub brushes to clean up the damage that had been done the night before. If you read any of the articles or listened to the radio about the issues that were being raised by the protesters, you realize that those issues are critical ones. A global economy which we know is already reality. Major international corporations producing products in third world countries, treating their employees as if they are slaves with no protection from unions, no protection from labor laws, receiving not only a very low wage compared to what our workers are paid, but also receiving a wage that is only a third or quarter of what it takes to live in their own country. A hundred dollar pair of Nikes with two dollars worth of labor and five dollars worth of materials and a couple dollars more of shipping. Where does all the money go? If not to the workers, it’s going to the multi-national corporations who have the power to make decisions that are in their benefit. The protesters have said that if we are going to live together on this planet, that we need to care about each other. We cannot just care about ourselves and cheap clothes for our family. If we don’t care about others around the world, if we don’t care about our planet there is going to be no future for any of us. For any of us. If the gap between rich and poor continues to grow, the chaos that you saw in the streets of Seattle will be in the streets of every city across this country and around the globe. If we do not figure out a way to share the blessings of this planet with all of God’s people, there will be warfare that will tear apart humanity.

During this month, Susan Stamberg, a well loved correspondent for national public radio was doing a special series. She’s interviewing influential thinkers and asking them their thoughts on the millennium. The question that came this Monday to the first thinker was, “What thing has happened during this century which will have enduring value into the next millennium?” Howard Zinn is the author of a book called, “A People’s History” which shares, not the sanitized history of our country but instead explores the struggles of everyday people to make their lives better. Zinn had a surprising response which was not something that occurred recently, but something that he deeply hopes will continue. His answer was, “Non-violence.” He said, “We have the example of Ghandi, of Martin Luther King, of many others who have demonstrated what non-violence can do to bring about needed change. We have examples all around our world of what damage violence can do and how much harm violence does to human relationships.” He said that what will endure, what has to endure is a commitment to non-violence. Non-violence doesn’t mean doing nothing and hurting no one and keeping to myself. Non-violence includes acting for change in a non-destructive way, living out love. If we are to continue as a people, if our grandchildren and our great-grandchildren are going to be able to live their lives with the freedoms that we have enjoyed, we are going to have to strengthen our commitment to non-violence. We are going to have to strengthen our commitment to the people of the planet, to the planet itself. We are going to have to act to protect human dignity and human rights and the environment of this home that God has given us.

This is peace. This is the peace that we yearn for and cry for. This is the peace that God holds out to us. Thanks be to God. Amen