The Meddlesome Priest :

"The Face of War" by Daniel Ursino, acrylic on canvas Are we so recently from our turd fights in the trees that we cannot forsake war for just one year in 2020? This question prompted the four previous posts in this series; 2020 A Year Without War .  These views are my own about this project, and they do not necessarily reflect the views of anyone else associated with the global project 2020 A Year Without War . Nevertheless, over 118,000-page reads for all four in the series indicate these views have some traction. Thank you for reading and commenting. The last post on ‘War and Acceptance in 2020’ should have been the most difficult to write as most of us have a problem with enduring the unendurable to the point of accepting the unacceptable. Once it rattled around in my brain for a week, the post wrote itself. So too with this one i.e. War and Peace in 2020. What is clearly seen is clearly expressed. Writing this series has made it abundantly clear how we wil...

It is the mark of an educated mind to be able to entertain a thought without accepting it. --- Aristotle Dialogue is the reciprocity of acceptance, and it begins with the 'selfie'. Climbing any high mountain is most arduous at the very last step. Why? It's something psychologists call ‘approach-avoidance’ that often prevents us from taking that last step to secure our long-cherished goal. Fear of both failure and/or success stunts many victories. Reaching the panicle of A Year Without War in 2020 requires that last step we most want to avoid; acceptance. This fourth in the five-part series was supposed to be the hardest to write. Instead, it wrote itself. As demonstrated in the previous three posts, forgiveness requires mercy , and reconciliation requires forgiveness, so too acceptance requires reconciliation to arrive at peace for one year in 2020. But acceptance seems a step too far. It seems to demand more than what we are able. The price seems too...

--- Dachau Memorial Sculpture 1968 It starts in the family and spreads to all humanity. After Mercy and Forgiveness , Reconciliation is the next necessary step to 2020 A Year Without War . Part religious sacrament, part family legacy, part civic virtue, reconciliation is our conscious choice to actively  “…forgive those who trespass against us” . But it can’t merely be a mental attitude. Actions are required to restore peace and harmony between divided peoples. The ‘Prodigal Son’ parable is the most famous religious context where father and son are reconciled over the objection of other relatives. Famously depicted in art, sculpture even parks, numerous acts of reconciliation have guided human history away from feuding families to warring nations. Here are just a few over the centuries c.1510   -   Il Figlio Prodigo   / The Prodigal Son , Museum Boijmans Van Beuningen, Rotterdam (Netherlands). By Hieronymus Bosch [c1450-1516].   ...

"An eye for an eye ends up making the whole world blind." --- Mahatma Gandhi Part II of the V Part Series: Mercy, Forgiveness, Reconciliation, Acceptance and Peace in 2020 There's the forgiveness that never forgets. There’s the forgiveness that never remembers. And then, there’s the forgiveness practiced for its own sake.  Unless we daily and individually practice this forgiveness for itself alone, all that will remain are the ashes of a world in flames and the blood of innocents. When you arrive at the ripe age of 71.9 years (I count womb time), as will happen to me this Friday, you think a lot about forgiveness. My mother had three children each by a different sire. She never forgave my older brother’s father for abandoning her literally pregnant on the church steps. She kept this hidden ‘unforgivable’ from my brother and me until her death gave us access to her letters and papers. This unforgiving dominated her character and our colored our chil...