Global Harmony: Realization of World Peace
TRANSCEND MEMBERS, 20 Jun 2011
Charles Mercieca, Ph.D. – TRANSCEND Media Service
In every era of history we notice people everywhere yearning for true peace that makes everyone a winner and no one a loser. The genuine path for a permanent peace has been provided to us by many religious leaders over the centuries. Those communities that followed their guideline did experience the joy of peace at one time or another. Peace is not something that comes by itself. We have to work for it with determination and perseverance.
Constructive Actions in Perspective
Everything gets boiled down to the kind of human actions we perform. If they happen to be negative and destructive then we may be convinced that we are on the road to struggles and wars. If they happen to be positive and constructive then we start soon to witness the benefits. To this end, we need to replace our bad habits with good ones. This means we need to replace hatred by love, anger by patience, pride by humility and selfishness by generosity.
Those that practice such virtues are always viewed favorably in virtually every community because they can never be viewed as a threat. On the contrary, they tend to be viewed as benefactors from whom everyone is bound to benefit. In their social relationship, they view all people from every walk of life and profession as members of one global community, one big happy family. People everywhere are judged by their character and personality. Anything else is viewed as irrelevant for all practical purposes.
In this world our challenge is simple. We need to retain among us anything that is conducive to peace while we try to eliminate anything that is conducive to war. As the Romans used to say, si vis pacem para pacem – if you want peace prepare for peace. And also, si vis bellum para bellum – if you want war prepare for war. Nowadays, our culture of war society has changed this dictum into: si vis pacem para bellum – if you want peace prepare for war.
Of course, this has been very unfortunate, which explains why no matter how hard we may try, as long as the mentality of the culture of war remains strongly in us there is virtually nothing substantial that we can do. While war seeks always for more armaments as to diffuse more conflicts, peace seeks always more constructive dialogues and improved healthy diplomacy as to avoid conflicts of any kind by all means. Global harmony becomes a reality if all human actions are directed toward the welfare of all people without exception.
Heavenly Gifts for Peace-Promoters
All those who work genuinely to bring about peace through global harmony are said to be soon gifted with the seven gifts of the Holy Spirit. These gifts may be viewed as effective instruments to facilitate the ultimate goal of peace-workers. They may be outlined as follows:
1. Wisdom: This consists of the ability to see things into true perspective same way as God sees them without any deception.
2. Understanding: This deals with our own ability to see things clearly from the perspective of others as to enhance better relations.
3. Counsel: This enables us to understand fully well the needs of others as to be more capable of helping them properly.
4. Fortitude: This instills in us the strength we need to do what should to be done effectively to the best of our ability.
5. Knowledge: This helps us acquire the indispensable insights we need to have in order to provide better help for those we come across.
6. Compassion: This gives us the opportunity to provide all available assistance to those that may have special needs.
7. Fear of God: This stems from the fact that God is so kind that the chance that we may displease Him makes us be more cautious in what we do.
In order to understand what steps should to be taken to bring about peace through global harmony, we need to realize the obstacles that must be overcome. Throughout history war has always proved to be the enemy of peace. There was a time when wars were waged to solve human conflicts that were viewed to be not possible to solve through constructive dialogues and healthy diplomacy.
Nowadays the manufacture and sales of weapons along with the promotion of struggles and wars have developed into a lucrative business. Hence, most of the wars that are being waged at this stage of history stem from greedy big industries that want to make money fast, regardless and of atrocities and pain that may be inflicted on millions of innocent good people. If we analyze the wars that took place in recent times, like the one of Afghanistan and Iraq, we discover that the reasons given were for such wars entirely false.
War as Lucrative Business
There was a hidden agenda meant to generate money fast and smooth. Those that waged such wars said it was due to “national defense and security,” when in practice it stemmed from corruption of one sort or another. The billions of dollars that were spent on these two wars could have been spent to provide free health care and free education to millions in addition to providing millions of homeless people with residential facilities. For money some governments betray their own people same way as Judas Iscariot did with Jesus Christ.
Luckily, today we have many organizations who are giving all of their energy to promote peace and harmony across every continent in spite of the many obstacles they encounter. One of these is the International Association of Educators for World Peace (IAEWP), which was conceived in 1967 and came to official existence in 1969 upon incorporation in the USA. Its peaceful goals and objectives, which are meant to bring global harmony, may be enlisted as follows:
1. Promotion of international understanding and world peace through education. The preamble of UNESCO runs as follows: “Since wars begin in the minds of men it is in the minds of men that the defenses of peace should be constructed.” This can only be done through a good education that is based on the ultimate achievement of global harmony.
2. Protection of the environment from air and water pollution. People are the most important element that exists in this world. Because of this we need to find ways how to keep them always healthy as to be fully productive in a constructive way. The best way is to make sure they breathe good air and drink pure water without any pollution whatsoever.
3. Safeguard of human rights as advocated in the United Nations Charter on human rights. Although all the nations of the world signed this document, yet there is hardly a nation that observes it fully as stated in the strict sense. For example, people have a sacrosanct right to move freely anywhere in the world. Some governments do prevent their people from traveling freely.
4. Disarmament and development of human resources for constructive purposes. We need to raise this simple question: If we are watching a stage show in an auditorium with 5,000 people what would make us feel safer, if each one is carrying a loaded gun or if no one is carrying any gun at all? The answer is obvious. People feel safer if we were to abolish all weapons and wars.
Feasibility of Global Harmony
In view of what has been stated, we need to establish direct dialogues with all responsible government officials as to give them insight and foresight into what needs to be done for the eventual creation of global harmony, which is an indispensable pre-requisite for permanent peace. Although the eventual achievement of world peace may be difficult, it is not impossible. When the saintly Pope John Paul II was asked in Mexico, during the decade of the eighties, as to whether world peace was possible, he answered in the affirmative.
He assured the people there that world peace would come “only after two of the greatest evils of the 20th century are gone.” He then pointed out that “these two great evils were communism and capitalism because both advance their causes through the exploitation of people.” Three years later communism collapsed and the world took a sigh of relief. People everywhere thought that the United States, being the sole world power then, would take the opportunity to bring about a genuine world peace.
To prove that the Pope’s statement was 100% correct, the United States almost immediately embarked upon the largest military build-up in the world. Every continent was literally polluted with US military bases that were viewed as a threat to quite a number of countries. And we know the rest of the story. Plenty of turmoil developed as a result, which led to many terrorist activities. The philosophy of both communism and capitalism has been deeply trenched into the culture of war whose motto is, as stated earlier, si vis pacem para bellum – if you want peace prepare for war.
Of course, all of us know very well that violence breeds violence and more violence breeds more violence. The military is trained to wage wars and not to perform humanitarian activities of the type of Mother Teresa of Calcutta. It is trained to destroy the infrastructure of cities and to kill, as a result, tens of thousands of innocent people amounting to millions on a global scale. It creates tens of thousands of refugees in addition to tens of thousands of orphans. It brings about enormous human suffering especially among women, children the elderly and the sick. May be after the collapse of capitalism global harmony will become fully feasible and world peace will reign for a very long time.
__________________
Charles Mercieca, Ph.D.
President
International Association of Educators for World Peace
Dedicated to United Nations Goals of Peace Education,
Environmental Protection, Human Rights & Disarmament
Professor Emeritus, Alabama A&M University
Hon President & Professor, SBS Swiss Business School, Zurich
This article originally appeared on Transcend Media Service (TMS) on 20 Jun 2011.
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