moere thoughts from Jean Vanier
ron ellingson
If we are to work for unity and peace in the world, we must begin at
home. How can we help to make peace in distant countries if we are
waging wars at home, with our family or neighbors, at work, at school or
in our own particular human community? Working for peace in distant
places can be a way of running away from ourselves and refusing to look
at what is broken within us and around us. Working for peace means
welcoming the people close to us, those who annoy us or disagree with us
and seem to put us down, people who provoke anguish in us. It means
neither judging nor condemning these people because, like us, they are
human beings who want life and peace but also have their brokenness.
They are not first and foremost enemies, but brothers and sisters in
humanity, wounded like ourselves.
- Jean Vanier, Our Journey Home, p. 205