This photo was taken October 28, 2011, of the leaders of three great branches of the Church (Roman Catholic, Eastern Orthodox, and Anglican), along with others, who gathered in Assisi for reflection, dialogue, and prayer for peace. This was a very significant, yet mainly overlooked, event that should have had world-wide impact.
In all of the noise and insanity of today's world, let us not forget the responsibility we have to pray and work for the peace and well-being of all of God's creation and all the nations and peoples. As people of faith, the task before us is to look for and expect to discover God in those around us -- in everyone -- not only those who claim to be Christian, but for all people everywhere. We spend so much time and energy criticizing, judging, and alienating those around us and we ignore that we are, in fact, all children of God. It is our responsibility, as a people of faith, to see the Holy in all of our brothers and sisters and to rejoice with them in our common heritage as creatures of God.
We cannot set limits or boundaries on our love and respect for others anymore than God's love is limited, earned, or qualified. In God there are no outcasts. Among us are the poor and the rich, those who morn and those who rejoice, the meek and the not so meek, the hungry and the satisfied, the merciful and the not so nice, the pure and the not so pure, the peacemakers and, yes, even the troublemakers, and we are all part of the family of God.
In the face of all, we must pray for peace, strive for the well-being of all creation, and work for justice for all peoples of the world. Living in God's creation we are all standing on "holy ground" where the boundaries between the sacred and the secular disappear and we are all one -- "spiritual beings," said Teilhard de Chardin, "having a human experience."
It is my thought that we Christians get so bound up with the action of "passing the peace" that we loose sight of what the word actually means. Peace is not some sort of idealistic calm and joli-bonhomme; it is a commitment to live in unity with each other and respect for our differences and otherness. This is clearly spelled out by Jesus in the Gospels and in our Baptismal Covenant. It is underlined by the Beatitudes. The world is a messy place and to bring peace means to create some sort of harmony end justice that includes all, and this is very hard work only possible through the grace of God.
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