Called to be Peacemakers
Posted: 8 February, 14:53 by Jon Dorsett
In the autumn of last year a number of Peace School participants attended the Fellowship of Reconciliation youth conference. Hiranya de Alwis Jayasignhe was one of those and wrote the following article for this site…
Called to be Peacemakers, the annual conference hosted by the Fellowship of Reconciliation, was held on October 26th – 28th last autumn, in a village suitably named, Hope. Meeting so many individuals dedicated to peace was indeed a cause for optimism. From those activity involved within the charity sector, to students of nonviolence, it was inspiring to hear everyone’s story.
The title of this years conference was, ‘Transforming Conflict: Peace by Peace’; a theme that was approached from an international, community and finally individual context.
Jacinta de Paor, coordinator of the Survivors and Combatants programme at the Glencree Centre for Peace and Reconciliation, led one seminar. She introduced us to her day-to-day work, and the theory behind it, that of brokering dialogue between all those affected by the Northern Irish conflict. One important theory she touched on was Arthur Mindell’s Role Theory – essential to ‘shalom activism’ – seeing the human being behind the masks of easily transferable roles. After this introduction, we undertook a role-play, whereby we all made up and shared stories: a moving experience.
Ray Gaston – longstanding friend of Peace School – and Annie Heppenstall covered the community context. He talked of his experience as vicar of All Hallows Church, and the community response to the 7/7 London bombings. He then proceeded to place this within the historical context of Islamo-Christians relations. Annie Heppenstall taught us songs from the three Abrahamic Faiths, which we later used in Peace Worship. Here, we were invited to the tent of Abraham, at the crossroads of Islam, Christianity and Judaism, where we shared bread, read from the three Abrahamic texts and recited some of the 99 names of God. The name I read out – As-Salaam: the One who is flawless, source of blissful peace – seemed particularly appropriate.
In the individual context, we were given a choice between ‘Tough Guise: Men, Masculinity and Violence’ with Chris Cole, (Director of FOR) and ‘Personal Conflict Resolution using NLP’ with Dan Storey. I chose the former as a follow on from our explorations of ‘Shalom and Gender’ at the Peace School Summer School. It was fascinating to consider the portrayal of masculinity in the media, where the biceps of GI Jones have increased from 12.2” in 1968 to 26.8” thirty years later!
All in all, I would recommend this conference to all Peace School attendees, both past, present and future. It is both a means of placing the ideas of Shalom into an activism context, and a fantastic opportunity to meet a group of like-minded individuals.
