New NCR series delves into questions of peace

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(NCR graphic; informational source: National Priorities Project)

Tom Roberts | Sep. 19, 2016

Peace.

Mention of it is everywhere one turns in the Catholic universe: It is invoked, prayed for, yearned for, counseled and envisioned as a condition of the reign of God. Our Scriptures are filled with references to it, we wish it to each other during our most sacred liturgical moment and we end that moment with an instruction to go in peace to serve.

It is a single term that, like love, is stretched to cover all human possibilities from the most intimate stirrings of the individual heart, to the world itself, to relations among nations armed with enough destructive power to obliterate that world many times over.

Like love, it is not meant to be a passive bystander, accepting what comes along or defined exclusively by moments of bliss. Jesus offered it as something other than that ordinarily known in the world and he used a term translated as "peacemaker," giving it a special place and blessing and clearly expecting his followers to do something about it.

https://www.ncronline.org/news/justice/new-ncr-series-delves-questions-peace#

https://www.ncronline.org/feature-series/making-peace