Thanksgiving is this week, which is a time of gratitude and joy and family and connection and also, perhaps, a time of stress and anxiety. Perhaps your family is, like mine, diverse in its political and religious beliefs and conversations may often arise when you all get together that seem to spark division and frustration. As I’ve been thinking about the greater political divisions in our country and the fierce divides among my fellow Mormons, I’ve been trying to come up with ways to make, or wage, peace.
I’m still not sure how to do this on a national scale, but I think I’ve come up with something for local, family-sized peacemaking, so I’ll sketch out some thoughts here, which draw from Mormon Women for Ethical Government (MWEG)’s Essentials: The Little Purple Book, published by BCC Press. Some brief thoughts before we dig into the suggestions I have for bringing this to pass. Diversity in our families and our world is a strength. We need diversity of thought to find innovative solutions to complex problems and it is our differences that make us strong, not our similarities. We all have something to offer each other and something to learn from each other. This doesn’t mean that there’s some magical moderate middle that we’re striving for, but simply that we can all teach each other something and learn something from one another.
Hard Work
I often have associated peacemaking with peacekeeping, but I think that these are two different tasks. Peacemaking is about establishing and creating a true sense of peace, rooted in justice, whereas peacekeeping is far more concerned with maintaining a sense of peace and an environment free from contention. Peacemaking is hard work.
“The life of faith—particularly when under moral siege—must be muscular, active, educated, and informed…We are called to have courage and confidence in God as we arm ourselves to wage peace.” (27)
It is a work of battle, a work that requires us to arm ourselves, to prepare. To fight. Perhaps a fight that we cannot win, but one worth fighting nonetheless.
Speak
Often when I am confronted with a family member saying something that I find shocking or hurtful or misguided, my response is to ignore it and just roll my eyes. Sometimes this may be the correct response. Yet, other times I should speak. What can my small words do? Who knows. That’s not up to me. I am responsible for doing what I feel is right and for speaking in love and truth.
“We each do what we can and God makes it all holy.” (28)
I offer my small effort to God and if I act with a pure heart, God consecrates my actions and makes them holy, however small they may seem. This first speaking doesn’t need to be a teaching or a correction, but a beginning.
Listen
Far too often we don’t listen to one another. I posted on facebook not too long ago about the increasing political divide that I have noticed (and also some fairly strong condemnations of antisemitism and how I’ve seen that linked to Trump, etc.). The comments were fierce. Quickly it became apparent that the political divide I was talking about was real. The conservatives and liberals that were debating in the comments were describing two separate realities. There was no true listening.
I’m reminded of this quote from MWEG:
“Altars are places of listening more than places of preaching.” (79)
Altars here refers to any place that is marked by pain and suffering. Our divergent political opinions are often caused by a different understanding of the world and a different view of the suffering that we and others experience. If we want to understand what is happening around us and to begin to heal, we must listen to one another. This doesn’t mean you need to subject yourself to abuse and hate speech, but to engage in thoughtful, sincere dialogue. Listening doesn’t mandate our agreement with what is said, but simply that we create a space for thoughts to be shared.
If you cannot fully engage and listen and create that space, take a break. We can’t always listen and be fully present and that’s ok. Sometimes we need to take time to recharge so we can listen later. Take care of yourself.
Humility
For such dialogue to take place and for our listening to have true power, we need to approach each situation with humility. We can’t know everything. No matter how many statistics you can cite, you don’t know what others have lived or what they feel. And remember that your beliefs are the result of your own complex mix of emotions and your understanding and interpretation of a selection of facts. Which is the exact mix that created your family member’s beliefs.
Feelings are valid. That doesn’t make them factual, but they must be acknowledged and worked through or they fester and become something dark—like Anakin’s fear (for more great thoughts on fear and anger read this fantastic post by my friend Chris).
Dialogue
To have a fully productive dialogue, we have to engage once we have listened. We need to dialogue with one another. We need to ask questions, to try and understand the feelings and emotions and values that are behind the behaviors and beliefs that we don’t understand. Then, we can share our own thoughts and feelings and emotions and values and the ways that those interact with what our family members have shared with us.
Love
Throughout all of this, love is paramount. We must listen and respond in love. True love. Pure love. After all, as MWEG reminds us:
“In his sermon on the mount, Jesus taught that the higher law requires us not just to love our neighbor, but also to love our enemies. It is interesting to note that he doesn’t tell us not to have enemies, but rather to love the enemies we will undoubtedly encounter.” (48)
My family is not my enemy. Even if they may vote somewhat like them. But if I’m called to love my enemies, then I sure as hell need to love my family. And I do. And they love me. Despite (and perhaps because of) our ideological, political, and religious differences. Everyone needs a fringe-y, radical relative, right?
Challenge
Love challenges us. It accepts us as we are and pushes us to be more. Love requires work from us. Love challenges us to work for peace.
We must hope for peace and claim peace and proclaim peace and proliferate peace. That is challenging work and requires engaging with those around us. We cannot proliferate peace alone. We must work together to bring it to pass. Afterall,
“not only can we hope for peace, but we must. When we kneel before the Prince of Peace, we renew our covenant to hope for peace, to claim and proclaim peace, and to proliferate his peace.” (55)
Indeed, “our Christian covenant is one of connectivity, companionship, co-mourning and compassion” (76). It is only together that we may successfully wage peace. We need each other to fight injustice. Let us put away our weapons of war, and begin to make peace.
Conor Hilton 