“On the evening of that first day of the week, when the doors were locked, where the disciples were, for fear of the rulers, Jesus came and stood in their midst and said to them, ‘Peace be with you.’ When he had said this, he showed them his hands and his side.” “Thomas, called Didymus, one of the Twelve, was not with them when Jesus came” and “said to them, ‘Unless I see the mark of the nails in his hands and put my finger into the nailmarks and put my hand into his side, I will not believe.’”
Betty Reardon (1929-2023) received Jesus’ gift of peace and shared peace with others. She knew the violence done by warmakers to peacemakers. She decided to be a teacher of peacemaking. Betty was the founder of Peace Education enterprises and centers across the U.S., notably at Teachers College, Columbia University. She critiqued schooling for being militaristic. It coerces for warmaking. For example, it requires the student’s submission to rulers, to external positional authority. In such a model, students are unlikely to nurture conscience. Students are unlikely to question society. But students need to question a society that makes war – as there is likely no end to the enemies chosen to wage war against – the poor, immigrants, a free press, middle class workers, the people’s government, Gazans, student protestors,… Our peacemaking therefore must always be organic. For Reardon it means peacemaking is always developing. Peacemaking is an evolutionary process not a fixed state. We are always making peace, sharing peace, especially with supporters of a society that is always making war. In one sense then, we can never be surprised when we need to, yet again, call the lion to lay down with the lamb. Peacemakers know it is not our job to be eaten by the lion but rather it is our job to tame the lion. Even the most vicious of lions can be tamed, because, in truth, no person we meet is a lion. They are a human being, one single human being. They perhaps have a cohort but it is weak one. The weakness is evident in the boasting and in the obedience that must be demanded from others because it is not organic. So too we are not a lamb. Though we are also a single human being, we live not among a weak cohort but within a powerful community. All of humanity is organically a peacemaking community. Sometimes we just have to be reminded of it. Like Thomas in the Gospel, we need to know the reality of the suffering warmakers cause – we need to see the hands and the nailmarks. We need to know with even greater certainty that peacemaking is our powerful response.
“We cannot achieve peaceful change unless we think we can.” (Betty Reardon)
Prayer: Spirit of Peace, guide us in the power of peace.
Question: When have I experienced the power of peacemaking?
Apr 27, 2025 Gospel John 20:19-31 Second Sunday of Easter