It is impossible to speak of peace without speaking of justice. The two are inextricably bound. As Dwight D Eisenhower said, “they are two sides of the same coin.” As such, peace is more than individual inner tranquility or a sense of well-being.
Peace, in the biblical sense is not primarily personal. It is communal. Some of us know the Hebrew word for peace as “shalom.” It means more than an absence of war, though I suspect most of us would settle for that. It means a well-being that is primarily a state of affairs. In includes the personal understandings of peace, but extends to the communal. It includes security and safety. It also includes all people, not just individuals. For there to be true shalom, all must be cared for and treated with justice. Shalom assumes a level of wholeness that leads one to give back so that others might experience wholeness.
And there’s the rub. A small percentage of the world’s population owns the majority of the world’s wealth. They will not go quietly to the place of equitable sharing. Our capitalist roots (at least in the US) run far too deep. It is very much a “What’s mine is mine and tough munchies for you” mentality. It is the root of shaming and blaming the poor: the notion that I worked hard and if you do, you can succeed too. If you are poor you must be lazy or stupid or…pick a derogatory adjective.
Embodying a path to equitable distribution of goods and services is part of the United Nation’s 16 goals for sustainable development.
Goal 16 states, “Peaceful societies and countries depend on sustainable development and effective accountable inclusive institutions for all.” This means that individuals must have equal access. As long as a few people control the majority of the world’s wealth, there will be no peace and there will be no justice.
In the Advent season we prepare to meet the one who came to radically remake the world economy. That the known world was a lot smaller than it is now is not relevant. It was the same system” a wealthy few controlled access to the majority of goods and services. The poor were left to fend for themselves. The radical peace, the deep Shalom, that Jesus came to bring was and is possible only when there is enough for everyone.
There is enough for the world’s need, not the world’s greed.
The Irreverent Reverend 