This translation is not completely accurate as it was automatically generated by a computer.
Powered by
A UMNS Report
By Linda Bloom*
1:00 P.M. EST May 11, 2011
Jan Love served as chairwoman of the WCC’s Decade to Overcome Violence for five years. A UMNS 2006 file photo by Linda Bloom.
View in Photo Gallery
Back in the early 1990s, church people active in social-justice
issues began to realize that the promise for peace arising from the end
of the Cold War had not been fulfilled.
Even worse, remembers Jan Love, a United Methodist then active in the
World Council of Churches, was the growing concern “that religion would
be used as a means to incite more violence and create more tension
between ethnic groups and across nations.”
The WCC Central Committee grappled with how to address such concerns.
Eventually, the committee called for a “Decade to Overcome Violence” as
a way to create a “sustained focus” on efforts for peace, said Love,
who served as chairwoman for five years after the decade-long campaign
launch in 2001.
The decade itself will culminate with the May 17-25 International Ecumenical Peace Convocation
in Kingston, Jamaica, which Love, dean of Candler School of Theology in
Atlanta, and a number of other United Methodists will attend.
But the work is far from over, as David Wildman, who oversees human
rights and racial justice issues for the United Methodist Board of
Global Ministries, can attest.
“With many governments still relying on military might to try and
solve problems, it’s more important than ever for followers of the
Prince of Peace to meet and share ways we as the church can know and
live out ‘the things that make for peace’ in our day,” he wrote in a May
10 email message from Kabul, Afghanistan, one of the regions where war
continues today.
“Let us pray that the time in Jamaica will bring renewed commitment
and shared actions to putting an end to war and the massive military
spending that destroys lives and communities and wastes so many of God's
resources,” he added.
Observing May 22 as ‘Peace Sunday’
More than 1,000 people from around the world are expected to attend
the peace convocation at the Mona campus of the University of West
Indies. The event is a collaborative effort of the Jamaica Council of
Churches, Caribbean Conference of Churches, and local churches and
community groups.
The gathering will celebrate the achievements of the Decade to
Overcome Violence and encourage individuals and churches to renew their
commitment to nonviolence, peace and justice.
Events include the planting of peace trees, a peace concert in Kingston and the celebration of May 22 as Peace Sunday. Churches around the world can join in prayers, special events and worship services including the use of a Caribbean prayer for peace, which has been translated into more than 20 languages.
Jorge Lockward (center) leads a rehearsal before a morning service at
the 2006 assembly along with the Rev. Tercio Junker (left) and the Rev.
Michael Hawn (right). A 2006 UMNS file photo
by Linda Bloom.
View in Photo Gallery
The Rev. Stephen J. Sidorak Jr., top executive of the United
Methodist Commission on Christian Unity and Interreligious Concerns and a
convocation participant, encouraged local churches to both celebrate
Peace Sunday “and to consider seriously a systematic study of the paper
the International Ecumenical Peace Convocation will issue — ‘An
Ecumenical Call to Just Peace.’”
“Inspired by the example of Jesus of Nazareth,” the document’s
purpose, as stated in its preamble, is to make Christians aware of the
promise of peace as a core value of all religions. A related resource
document, the Just Peace Companion offers biblical, theological and ethical considerations.
An Ecumenical Call to Just Peace
presents “another perspective” on peace, according to Mark Harrison, a
convocation participant and director of the peace with justice program
for the United Methodist Board of Church and Society. “It reengages us
to look at peace as more than just the absence of war,” he explained.
Issues related to just peace, for example, are not just about
disputes among nations but also can filter down to what is happening in a
local community, he pointed out.
The themes of the convocation — Peace in the Community, Peace with
the Earth, Peace in the Marketplace and Peace among the Peoples — are
taken from the document. One theme will be developed each day, beginning
with related prayer and Bible study.
“A church that prays for peace, serves its community, uses money
ethically, cares for the environment and cultivates good relations with
others can become an instrument for peace,” the document states.
“Furthermore, when churches work in a united way for peace, their
witness becomes more credible.”
Setting the tone for prayer
Times of prayer at the peace convocation will reflect “the voices of
people around the world,” particularly local voices, says the Rev. Susan
Henry-Crowe, a United Methodist and dean of the chapel and religious
life at Emory University in Atlanta.
“We really have tried to be proactive in setting a tone — deepening
the understanding of things that make for peace,” said Henry-Crowe, part
of the convocation’s planning committee. On Sunday, participants will
worship with local congregations, and the convocation’s closing prayer
service will take place on the beach.
Jorge Lockward, an executive with the United Methodist Board of
Global Ministries, will help lead worship and song in the plenary
sessions exploring the themes. He thinks the peace convocation can
provide “hope” because it is listening to the voices of those who
usually “are the recipients of the violence.”
Lockward will be joined in Kingston by Andrew Donaldson of Toronto,
who was commissioned in January as a missionary for the Board of Global
Ministries. Donaldson — a musician, worship leader and past president of
the Hymn Society in the United States and Canada — will move to Geneva
in June to serve as a WCC consultant in the area of worship and
spirituality.
Among the other United Methodists participating in the International
Ecumenical Peace Convocation are the Rev. Liberato Bautista, who heads
Church and Society’s U.N. office; Adrienne Fong, a Church and Society
board member; the Rev. Mark Reisinger, peace with justice coordinator
for the United Methodist Susquehanna Annual (regional) Conference; and
Tom Porter, co-executive director of JUSTPEACE, the denomination’s center for mediation and conflict transformation.
Also attending are two representatives from the denomination’s
Philippines Central Conference — Jonathan Ulanday, a Commission on
Christian Unity and Interreligious Concerns board member, and Gladys
Mangiduyos, a deaconess and professor of education at Wesleyan
University, Philippines.
No compromise on the call
What makes the International Ecumenical Peace Convocation timely is
the fact that peace with justice ministry “is a primary calling” for all
of Christ’s disciples — a calling that cannot be compromised by “the
penchant for war and the marketability of conflict,” Bautista said.
Participants march for peace in Porto Alegre, Brazil,
during the 2006 WCC ninth assembly. A web-only
photo courtesy of WCC/Paulino Menezea.
The Kingston event offers an opportunity for networking among peace
builders on how to improve advocacy for peace with justice, he said,
making peace “a primary proposition,” not an alternate one.
“Peace advocacy anywhere will be a lasting solidarity everywhere,
especially in the difficult places around the world where witness to
God’s peace with justice means risking life and limbs,” Bautista said.
“That is why witness to peace with justice is equally, and even
importantly, a witness to human rights and dignity.”
When she spoke about the impact of the Decade to Overcome Violence during the WCC’s ninth assembly in Porto Alegre, Brazil, in 2006, Love said the observance was “shifting the terms of debate over issues related to war and peace.”
Now, at the peace convocation, people from very different religious traditions can “challenge each other” about those issues.
“It’s an opportunity for the decade to have a powerful defining moment,” she said.
*Bloom is a United Methodist News Service multimedia reporter based in New York. Follow her at http://twitter.com/umcscribe.
News media contact: Linda Bloom, New York, (646) 369-3759 or newsdesk@umcom.org.
Glad you liked it. Would you like to share?
Add New Comment
Showing 0 comments