Why Love is a Necessary Factor to Create Peace

By Michael Brant - President of WISE-ED

Introduction – the Problem

                There have been many efforts to create peace in modern times, but our world remains a place of conflict, tensions, and wars declared and undeclared, disguised, unconventional, unrestricted.  When one situation seems to be settled, several new situations arise, like weeds in a garden.  These have the common roots of ambition for power and wealth, greed, fear, vengeance, desperation, and frustration.  Farmers and gardeners understand that they must get to the roots, to rid themselves of the weeds.

                Leon Tolstoy, in his book War and Peace, wrote that Marx’s proposed method to rid the world of evil by destroying all evil men was implausible because all men are evil at times and to some degree.  We would have to annihilate humanity.  By contrast Tolstoy proposed that we need to ask and let God destroy the evil in all our hearts.  Tolstoy was Christian.  In our world there are many religions and philosophies, even those who do not believe in a higher being or creator of our world and universe.  Still, we must find solutions to our problems together and one seemingly common denominator is love in some form.  The acknowledgment of and need for love seems to be hardwired into the human psyche and even animals.

The Hypothetical Solution

                The theme of our conference is “Re-examining Education and Peace in a Divided World”, which implies that we need to take another look at how this is going.  I propose that an effective way for Peace Education to make a change in society is to couple the studies with actions of loving care and friendship.

We are at War – defining the problem

We agree that it is impossible for man to be happy when continually hungry, enslaved, oppressed, exploited, in ill health, or living in perpetual fearful insecurity.  We acknowledge that much of this is caused by man’s lack of love. But we must not only know what we are fighting for or against, but also how we must fight. This is war, but not just a war of weapons and armies, not between man and man, nation and nation, race and race, rich and poor, political systems, or even religions.  This is not a war of hate and bitterness, killing, revenge and vindictiveness, nor for possessions and lands and pride of man.  Such wars have never solved man’s problems, but rather perpetuated them.

                Ours is a war to win the minds and hearts as well as save the bodies of men; to free them from the evils which cause them to be selfish, cruel, or even indifferent towards each other, man’s inhumanity to man.  We are literally in a war of the worlds—a war between good and evil, some would say between God and the Devil, but however one expresses or understands, it is real as seen in the world today.  Our weapons must be words of truth and love, as well as deeds of kindness and compassion.  Even if we were to solve all the physical problems and needs of humanity, man would never be truly happy with a heavy heart, and therefore we must add inclusion, friendship, and hope for a brighter future.

Kenya Example – Football for Peace

                Bridge of Hope Kenya recently organized a football league composed of teens from the countryside of jungles and deserts, and city slums.  Some of these teens are from tribes who are in contention with each other, sometimes for rights over pasture and water for their herds or longstanding feuds.  Some interns of the World Institute for Social Education Development were visiting from Denmark to practice social work, and took the initiative to train the teens in football.  They solicited donations to supply uniforms and other football basic equipment, which raised the moral of the youth, along with their self-esteem.  The interns also gave classes on sports ethics, social-emotional learning, and useful vocational training.  The teens were touched, most of all that these new friends took such an interest in them.  Tribal rivalries were quickly forgotten, overshadowed by these new goals and the fun and friendship they were experiencing.

                The project snowballed and soon there were twenty teams.  Perhaps the most outstanding phenomenon was the ripple effect amongst the parents, watching their teens change.  The ladies started to cook together for the practice events.  The men, also from rival tribes asked if they could make a league for themselves and friendships were starting to form.  These all expressed that they would like to have Bridge of Hope Community Centers, something like a Boys and Girls Club in their area so that they could have a place to meet, learn, and grow together.  This phenomenon caught the attention of the local and national government, we hope this will spread to neighboring countries.  The teams just had a friendly championship tournament in the capital, Nairobi.

Lessons the Teens Learned

1.      All have faults and offenses, so humility is necessary to acknowledge this.  Love is an essential factor to facilitate this because in laying down our pride and image to acknowledge wrong-doing, we are willing to put the other person first, above our image and ask forgiveness.

2.      Forgiveness: Granting forgiveness is not easy and requires caring for the other person enough to give the forgiveness so that all sides can move forward to a better situation.  Forgive does not mean to agree or forget, necessarily.

3.      Love is willing to look on the things of others and not only on one’s own point of view.

4.      Peace can be enforced for a time, but it is not true peace because the hatred is still there, but stifled for fear of punishment from those in authority.  This could be a stop-gap measure, but not long-lasting.

Conclusion

This is a simple, yet effective example of how love, in the form of fun and friendship can be a powerful tool for positive change in a community, a region, and we hope, a nation.