Peace and the world

SONG by Deena Metzger (author of Writing for your Life)

There are those who are trying to set fire to the world
We are in danger
There is time only to work slowly,
There is no time not to love.



Dear Citizen of the World.

We have fifteen days to reverse the movement toward war.

We can establish roads to peace if all of us do it together in our own unique ways. All of us, everywhere, on the entire planet. We can do it. This is a call for radical individualism within radical cooperation.

We can find the roads to peace in fifteen days if we do it together.

A small junta cannot hold the entire globe captive to its wishes.

Everyone on the planet knows that no one can escape the individual and environmental consequences of the weapons, such as depleted uranium, that the United States has already used in Afghanistan and the last Gulf war.

There is a great blessing inherent in our common jeopardy that leads directly to a common benefit. There is a great blessing inherent in knowing that we share a common jeopardy with each other, the animals and the creatures of the natural world that can lead directly to our common flourishing and survival.

It is possible, directly and indirectly, to involve every citizen in the world on behalf of peace. Each individual finding his or her way to say No to these wars motivated by apocalyptic delusions and lust for oil and power. Each individual finding his or her way to say Yes to concerted efforts to bring a foundation of peacemaking to the world. Each individual finding exactly the right activity. A profound alliance between strategic activities and religious and spiritual invocations and the range of possibilities in-between.

This letter does not suggest any particular plan or form of action. But I am hoping that we can circulate this call so widely that everyone is brought into the activity on behalf of peace. We can, if we extend ourselves, reach almost everyone on the planet and partake of his or her knowledge, wisdom and unique vision.

Across the globe, in human history there have been so many effective activities undertaken by people in times of crises on behalf of peace, we cannot articulate them all. But all of them are appropriate to this moment. We need to use all of them and new ones as they come mind as we create this global council with each other. Each one of us, acting alone or in concert with each other in ways that accord with our minds, imaginations, hearts, spirits and souls.

Actually this is already occurring; we are being asked to make it universal. Unexpected agreements are surfacing in the United States between Republicans and Democrats, Christians, Muslims, Jews, members of every spiritual tradition, progressives and conservatives, religious and political leaders, all equally alarmed by the threats to democracy from Homeland Security and the Patriot Act, and by the Administration’s recalcitrant insistence on pursuing a pre-emptive war without the support of the United Nations, a war that many in the Pentagon, CIA and military oppose. A war that will undoubtedly inflame terrorist retaliation and so involve even more American and civilian causalities throughout the world.

Mobilizations for peace are occurring everywhere on the globe, marches and boycotts, conscientious objection, peace rallies and global prayer circles, rituals and ceremonies, pressures and influences, even as several British workers have already refused to transport munitions headed to the Gulf. We can join with the kin of American troops to protect the young people being sent to fight in Iraq so that they will not die there or return afflicted with the mysterious disabilities that have affected such great numbers of American veterans recently. Mothers for Peace and the Mothers of the Disappeared, Women in Black alongside other activities of liberation have set peaceful precedents for us. We can partake of their wisdom and strategies. In the history of the planet, every people have stories and traditions that speak of the success of making peace and the possibility of overcoming oppression. We must call on these histories now.

We have fifteen days. It is not too short a time if we extend ourselves to each other and do it together. If we do whatever we would do if our lives depended upon it, which they do.

In the fifteen days given to us, we can bring peace and then set out from there.

Deena Metzger