Universal Peace

PEACE WITH GOD THE CREATOR,
PEACE WITH ALL OF CREATION


Message of His Holiness Pope John Paul II
for the celebration of the WORLD DAY OF PEACE, January 1, 1990

Satish Kumar is an Indian, currently living in England, who has been a Jain monk and a nuclear disarmament advocate, and is the current editor of Resurgence, founder and Director of Programmes of the Schumacher College international centre for ecological studies and of The Small School. His most notable accomplishment is a "peace walk" with a companion to the capitals of four of the nuclear-armed countries - Washington, London, Paris and Moscow, a trip of over 8,000 miles.  He insists that reverence for nature should be at the heart of every political and social debate. Defending criticism that his goals are unrealistic, he has said,

"Look at what realists have done for us. They have led us to war and climate change, poverty on an unimaginable scale, and wholesale ecological destruction. Half of humanity goes to bed hungry because of all the realistic leaders in the world. I tell people who call me 'unrealistic' to show me what their realism has done. Realism is an outdated, overplayed and wholly exaggerated concept."

An idea

of how you might
share
in your trying-striving-for-genuine-dialogue-group

~ explore, engage ~
something of the ideas
shared in this our guide
to the last of The 12 Challenges:
First, separate – divide –
the words of Satish Kumar
cited above ~ so that your group might try
putting them together in some order
- a kind of word puzzle!
Enlarge – with your computer tools and printer –
or by making your own hand-made really large size of Kumar's  words -
dividing them
into phrases of just 2 or 3 words.
Paste or already write these out in your own hand
onto pieces of cardboard
and invite your group to try putting
the word puzzle pieces in some order
that makes sense!
You'll need  three or more sets
of this word puzzle – so that your group can divide
into several smaller groups, each one working on the puzzle ~ with not more than four or five people
in a sub-group.
Then come together as your one group everyone together – to share what each group came up with. Then handout to everyone the words as Kumar wrote them ~
and discuss, share thoughts suggested, evoked by his words.
Then – prepare beforehand some selected passages from Erich Fromm's 'The Sabbath Ritual' and from Pope John Paul 's message on peace with the environment. The Dalai Lama's words we've cited are already short enough to set out on your handout pages as they are ~
give out your several pages of these texts
to your fellow participants and discuss ~ see what they suggest to people.