Blessed are the peacemakers
for they shall be called children of God.
Matthew 5:9
Peace on Earth
Goodwill to all
Luke 2:14
Could it be that we are teetering on the brink
Of an outbreak of peace?
Could it be that by embracing one another
Deep peace could be known,
Here and now?
Where we work against the tyranny of war
and delight in our humanity.
Where suspicion and terror
Are replaced with trust and hope.
Let us take the risk To make peace with one another
Live in peace with one another
And be at peace with ourselves.
Anthea Cox
‘How does peace come about?
Through a system of political treaties?...
Through the big banks, through money?
Or through universal peaceful rearmament
in order to guarantee peace?
Through none of these,
for the single reason that in all of them
peace is confused with safety ...
peace must be dared. It is the great venture.
It can never be safe.’
Dietrich Bonhoeffer
MILITARISM
KILLS WITHOUT WAR…
Current global spending
on HIV/AIDS, a disease that
claims 3 million lives a year
represents 3 days worth of
military spending.
Source: United Nations Human Development Report 2005
Following the government’s decision to invest in a replacement
to the Trident nuclear weapons system, we pray:
Forgive
our confidence in weapons of mass
destruction,
our reliance on the politics of fear.
our dependence on the use and abuse of
power.
Discover
conflicts resolved without resort to violence,
barriers of hate torn down
a common humanity
Learn
ways that make for peace.
Graham Sparkes
They will hammer their swords into ploughshares
and their spears into pruning-knives.
Nations will never again go to war,
never prepare for battle again.
Isaiah 2:4
Know this:
We have not come into this world for
the sake of strife and division.
Nor for hatred and envy,
provocation or the shedding of blood.
We will not trade violence for violence,
or hatred for hatred.
For we are come into this world
to know God,
in the love of stranger,
the caring for neighbour,
the compassion of community and
the struggle for justice.
Nigel Varndell, Christian Aid
Imagine…
Your life in pieces and your life with no peace.
Being afraid to wake up and afraid to go to sleep
Facing the constant threat and the ever present reality
of abuse
Having nowhere to go and no one to tell.
In the silence, the sound of crying.
A woman weeps for herself and her children.
Pray for all whose home has become a prison,
Pray for all who are abused and are trapped in self
blame,
Pray for all whose lives have been left numb by
brutality,
May we discover the strength of survivors,
and together break the silence,
with voices of anger and compassion,
with hearts of tenderness and peace.
Graham Sparkes
1 in 4 women
experience domestic
violence during their
lifetime.
Make me an instrument of your peace.
Where there is hatred, let me sow love;
where there is injury, pardon;
where there is doubt, faith;
where there is despair, hope;
where there is darkness, light;
and where there is sadness, joy.
Grant that I may not so much seek
to be consoled as to console;
to be understood as to understand;
to be loved as to love.
For it is in giving that we receive;
it is in pardoning that we are pardoned;
and it is in dying that we are born to
eternal life.
Adapted from Prayer of St. Francis of Assisi
Inspire in me the ability 2live a life of peace through the
people I meet remembering always the beauty diversity
and fragility of this world.
X
John Cooper
Universal Prayer for Peace
Lead me from death to Life,
from falsehood to Truth.
Lead me from despair to Hope,
from fear to Trust.
Lead me from hate to Love,
from war to Peace.
Let Peace fill our heart, our world,
our universe.
Peace, peace, peace
Satish Kumar
The Decade to Overcome Violence:
Churches Seeking Reconciliation and
Peace 2001-2010 (DOV) is an
initiative of the World Council of
Churches.
It is a global movement that strives to
strengthen existing efforts and
networks for overcoming violence, as
well as inspire the creation of new
ones.
The annual focus for 2007 is Europe.
God weeps over God’s world, aching
because of conflict in Darfur, in Beslan, in
Harare, in Columbia, in Jerusalem, in Belfast.
God depends on you to use your influence on
the powerful to use their power for justice, for
peace, for compassion, for gentleness, for
caring, for sharing. God - Emmanuel, God
with us, with you - has no one but you to help
God make this world hospitable to peace and
justice.
God bless you.
Desmond Tutu Message delivered on
21 September, 2004, to mark the observance of
the International Day of Prayer for Peace.
© Trustees for Methodist Church Purposes 2006