YES, we need to understand peace
first before we can live
it and, more importantly, spread it around. We need to know what it
truly is, what it requires, where it comes from, how to sustain it,
etc.
Nowadays, many people mouth the mantra of peace. That, in
itself, is a good development, except that such passionate desire for
peace should be accompanied by an earnest effort to know what it
really is. There, unfortunately, are many misconceptions about it or
at least shallow understanding that cannot cope with the challenges
and trials of our day-to-day life.
Peace, like anything else that is of true value to
mankind, can only come from God who gives it to us through Christ, the
Son of God who became man to save us from our sin and our doom. Peace,
which characterized the life of our first parents before the fall and
thus they enjoyed it effortlessly, can only be attained by us now
after some struggle, following Christ’s example.
That is why it can only be had if we get it from Christ
our Redeemer, who won it for us through the cross. He himself said so.
“Peace I leave with you, my peace I give unto you. Not as the world
gives, give I unto you. Let not your heart be troubled, neither let it
be afraid.” (Jn 14,27)
There, we have in a nutshell where to look for if we want
true peace. It’s not a peace that comes as a result of human effort
alone. It has to come from Christ who actually gives it to us
abundantly, but which we have to receive and keep faithfully. The
problem is that we often mess it up, and follow our own version of
peace.
In that famous Latin line about peace, “Opus iustitiae
pax” (Peace is the work of justice), a major distortion is made
because justice is understood mainly as human justice, relying simply
on our legal and judicial systems, our culture and other social norms.
It’s an understanding that does not go far and deep enough
to reach its true source who is God as revealed to us in full by
Christ. It simply depends on our human consensus which can go in any
which way, depending on the changing circumstances.
And so with the foundation of peace and justice unclear or
mainly rooted on shaky grounds, peace and justice remain elusive, and
can even produce the opposite effects while pursued under their name.
It’s truly ironic!
Thus, in the psalms, we can read the following: “Shall the
throne of iniquity have fellowship with you, which frames mischief by
a law?” (94,20) Christ himself also warned us about this: “A time is
coming when the one who kills you will think he is serving God.” (Jn
16,2)
We need to be truly identified with Christ to have peace
in ourselves and in everybody else all over the world. It is a peace
that comes as a result of reconciliation. It therefore involves
repentance, conversion, struggle, that Christ has shown to us by
embracing the cross and dying on it.
The cross of Christ is all at once the summary of all our
sins as well as the supreme act of love of Christ for us. It is both
the tree of death and the tree of life. It’s where all the malice of
man meets the tremendous mercy of God. Christ is asking us to carry
the cross also with him. Only then can we have true peace that comes
from Christ.
This is the peace that cannot waver even under the severe
assaults of trials, difficulties and failures. It is the peace that
involves a certain abandonment of everything in our life in the hands
of God, even as we do our part of dealing with them.
We have to learn to receive and keep this peace that
Christ gives us. We might have to pause from time to time to make this
truth of our faith sink deeply in our consciousness and be the guiding
principle of our life.
This is the peace that leads us to joy. They actually go
together—“gaudium cum pace,” joy with peace, as one prayer in
preparation for celebrating the Mass would put it.
But let’s remember that the peace that we enjoy here on
earth can only come as a result of some interior or spiritual warfare,
the warfare of love, the real love versus the many forms of false
love.
It is this peace that we have to spread around, convincing
everyone of its true nature, source, resources, purpose, etc.
it and, more importantly, spread it around. We need to know what it
truly is, what it requires, where it comes from, how to sustain it,
etc.
Nowadays, many people mouth the mantra of peace. That, in
itself, is a good development, except that such passionate desire for
peace should be accompanied by an earnest effort to know what it
really is. There, unfortunately, are many misconceptions about it or
at least shallow understanding that cannot cope with the challenges
and trials of our day-to-day life.
Peace, like anything else that is of true value to
mankind, can only come from God who gives it to us through Christ, the
Son of God who became man to save us from our sin and our doom. Peace,
which characterized the life of our first parents before the fall and
thus they enjoyed it effortlessly, can only be attained by us now
after some struggle, following Christ’s example.
That is why it can only be had if we get it from Christ
our Redeemer, who won it for us through the cross. He himself said so.
“Peace I leave with you, my peace I give unto you. Not as the world
gives, give I unto you. Let not your heart be troubled, neither let it
be afraid.” (Jn 14,27)
There, we have in a nutshell where to look for if we want
true peace. It’s not a peace that comes as a result of human effort
alone. It has to come from Christ who actually gives it to us
abundantly, but which we have to receive and keep faithfully. The
problem is that we often mess it up, and follow our own version of
peace.
In that famous Latin line about peace, “Opus iustitiae
pax” (Peace is the work of justice), a major distortion is made
because justice is understood mainly as human justice, relying simply
on our legal and judicial systems, our culture and other social norms.
It’s an understanding that does not go far and deep enough
to reach its true source who is God as revealed to us in full by
Christ. It simply depends on our human consensus which can go in any
which way, depending on the changing circumstances.
And so with the foundation of peace and justice unclear or
mainly rooted on shaky grounds, peace and justice remain elusive, and
can even produce the opposite effects while pursued under their name.
It’s truly ironic!
Thus, in the psalms, we can read the following: “Shall the
throne of iniquity have fellowship with you, which frames mischief by
a law?” (94,20) Christ himself also warned us about this: “A time is
coming when the one who kills you will think he is serving God.” (Jn
16,2)
We need to be truly identified with Christ to have peace
in ourselves and in everybody else all over the world. It is a peace
that comes as a result of reconciliation. It therefore involves
repentance, conversion, struggle, that Christ has shown to us by
embracing the cross and dying on it.
The cross of Christ is all at once the summary of all our
sins as well as the supreme act of love of Christ for us. It is both
the tree of death and the tree of life. It’s where all the malice of
man meets the tremendous mercy of God. Christ is asking us to carry
the cross also with him. Only then can we have true peace that comes
from Christ.
This is the peace that cannot waver even under the severe
assaults of trials, difficulties and failures. It is the peace that
involves a certain abandonment of everything in our life in the hands
of God, even as we do our part of dealing with them.
We have to learn to receive and keep this peace that
Christ gives us. We might have to pause from time to time to make this
truth of our faith sink deeply in our consciousness and be the guiding
principle of our life.
This is the peace that leads us to joy. They actually go
together—“gaudium cum pace,” joy with peace, as one prayer in
preparation for celebrating the Mass would put it.
But let’s remember that the peace that we enjoy here on
earth can only come as a result of some interior or spiritual warfare,
the warfare of love, the real love versus the many forms of false
love.
It is this peace that we have to spread around, convincing
everyone of its true nature, source, resources, purpose, etc.
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