Last weekend, I walked through the streets of Toronto with a 12-foot puppet named Amal. Amal represents a 10-year-old Syrian girl who has lost her mother and is looking for a new home. It was wonderful to be part of the crowd that welcomed her with songs, food and love, and to share that sense of community with fellow Torontonians and newcomers.
Friends, I am excited to share recent and upcoming CryPeace activities with you, and to invite you to become a partner in CryPeace activities in new ways.
This summer, I explored new aspects of something that has long fascinated me — dancing for peace. Dancing is one of my favourite endorphin-enhancing activities that help me get out of my head and into my body. Invariably, dancing increases my joy and peace, along with my heart rate. So when Dances of Universal Peace practitioners met in Toronto's High Park, I joined them to incant peace into our circle, our souls, and the world. May our steps fall on fertile ground, producing a harvest of peace.
Three years ago, my heart pulled me to Israel and Palestine to experience the reality of this iconic conflict for myself, talk to Israelis and Palestinians, and search for ways to support peace. It is one of the hardest places I've ever been, where CryPeace means crying more tears and crying louder for justice than almost anywhere else. This week, as renewed tensions escalate over Jerusalem, my heart breaks that this city, holy to all three Abrahamic faiths, is a cause of hatred instead of love, violence instead of peace, war instead of worship.
In my recent post, God has blessed us to bless others, I told you about meeting Ian and José Carlos on the beach while they were doing an environmental survey to track global warming. After talking for a little while about their project, I told them about my passion for peace, and the storytelling project that I was conducting around the world. When I asked Ian what peace mean to him, I was struck by the answer.
My cheeks hurt. Not because of dental surgery, but because I can't stop smiling. I just got back from the Friday the 13th motorcycle rally in Port Dover, Ontario. I can't believe I rode for years and never made it before. This time I took a day off work, grabbed my camera, and had a fabulous day! Peace overflows abundantly on days like today, when thousands of people — most of them strangers, in leather, riding motorcycles — share friendship and love.
Reverend Désiré Rutaganda is the Coordinator of the Centre for Documentation and Training in Kigali, Rwanda. This interfaith organisation was established in 1999 to live out the Christian values of peace and reconciliation, which were disappointingly absent from some churches and believers during the genocide perpetrated against the Tutsi in Rwanda. Today, as people of God, they model how peace can transform communities for peace at the grassroots.
Modise Phekouyane used to be an angry, hateful young man who considered Nelson Mandela a traitor. Today, he embodies forgiveness and reconciliation so that neither he, nor his former oppressors, will remain victims of apartheid.
I have the audacity to believe that we can all make a difference, and I want to devote my life to promoting peace. Indeed, I believe it's the work God called me to do. I've spent years dreaming about what might make a difference, and people resonate with my passion and ideas. But alone, I can just blog, tweet, share my experiences, and fan the "smouldering wicks" of people whose faith in peace on earth is running out.
