The Road to Peace

Recently, I came across a book called "Road to Peace" and "Peacework" by Henri Nouwen, a priest considered to be one of the greatest figure on spirituality inside the Catholic Church. Although peace work does restrict itself to only religions, the thoughts that Nouwen suggested in his book was ideal and similar to what the Chairman was doing. In "Peacworkd", Nouwen wrote, "For Jesus, there are no countries to be conquered, no ideologies to be imposed, no people to be dominated. There are only children, women and men to be loved." Jesus Christ also taught of peace and to love your neighbors as yourself, in a time where conflicts persist, just as today. In other words, I would like to say, in terms of peace, there are no countries to be conquered, no ideologies to be imposed, no people to be dominated. When everyone is under the banner of peace, nothing matters, in terms of political ideology or religion. There are only children, women and men, who are our neighbors, waiting to be loved. 

Peace does not restrict itself to one type of group. It approaches all people in same way and thought. But, no matter how much the thought of peace visits our minds, if we do not act upon it, will we reach our destination? We have to start walking. We have to start meeting different people, who have different ideals and views about the world. This reflect the actions of the Chairman, who have been travelling around the world, in order to make peace a reality. Peace, in other words, is love and grace. The Chairman addresses, "Dear global family, I know that we have many things to learn from the heaven. The heaven provides human with light through the sun, moon, and stars. This life given to us is grace. And we, who live on earth with this grace of heaven, must also love one another and become the messenger of peace, by showing grace to others, in order to walk the path of prosperity".

In addition to Nouwen's love of our neighbors, the Chairman extends the idea of love and peace, insofar as the origin. He exaggerates the grace that we have received from heaven and how it provided mankind with sunlight, rain, and wind for sustaining life. Likewise, we must also show our love, since we received love from heaven. Nouwen also wrote, "Peacemaking can be a lasting work only when we live and work together [and that] community is indispensable for a faithful and enduring resistance." As we see a common ground in two figures, who are both Christians from different denominations, we can see that the road to peace comes to us in same path. Although our starting points maybe different, because of our different backgrounds, our ending point, which is peace, is same. It does not mean that we will all end in our each destination of peace. It all leads to the same ending, when peace is achieved.

The sense of community is portrayed through the vision of HWPL by gathering different people from different background. I hope that people can accept the difference, but recognize the love for peace, in order to work together with HWPL and the Chairman.