The Path to Peace

Since 1968, the Catholic Church has dedicated a day to prayer for world peace on January 1. Popes from Paul VI forward have marked the day with a special message. Pope Francis’s 2021 message—his eighth—is titled A Culture of Care as a Path to Peace. My first reaction on reading it was, “he’s not saying anything new.” But if that’s true, how could it be, if we have known what the Church teaches about peace for decades, even centuries, that human beings have been unable to stop killing and maiming each other, creating wastelands and refugees, in near-constant wars all over the world? How can it be that war, violence and hatred are simply facts of our lives?

Or can it be that Catholic teaching about peace is still one of the so-called ‘best-kept secrets’ of its moral teaching? Most of us know very well the sins that we are to avoid—the ‘thou shalt nots’, the seven deadly sins, the pre-eminent evils of our day. But do we know as well the good that we are to pursue, our moral obligation to seek peace? Do we know that we must actively seek peace in our personal lives and also as members of our communities and citizens of our country?

Most of us have heard about the Church’s teaching on avoiding and limiting war, which is known as just war theory. We might not be able to name all its specific requirements, but we understand the broad strokes: Only legitimate governments should wage wars, and no nation should go to war without a reasonable chance of successfully re-establishing peace. We know that the conduct of war must protect innocent noncombatants. We know that strategies and tactics of warfare must be proportionate to the injuries suffered, not an escalated response. And as US citizens, we can ask ourselves how well our nation has met these moral standards in the 21st century.

Less well known is how the Church’s teaching has gone beyond the just war theory of what to avoid and—in the last century—more and more frequently focused on what we are to do. This is what Pope Francis is doing in his message, A Culture of Care as a Path to Peace. He tells us that we must follow “a grammar of care: commitment to promoting the dignity of each human person, solidarity with the poor and vulnerable, the pursuit of the common good and concern for the protection of creation.”

In his October 2020 encyclical Fratelli Tutti, Pope Francis described the path to peace as “getting people to work together, side-by-side, in pursuing goals that benefit everyone.” In this brief phrase, Francis makes three important points: peacemaking is hard work, a craft that is learned and practiced over a lifetime. It includes everyone, recognizing “our interdependence and shared responsibility for the whole human family.” And peacemaking requires cooperation, which the Pope understands in a particular way. Francis seeks cooperation based on dialog, on the kind of listening that builds a shared memory from the experience of powerless and suffering people and from people who live at the centers of power and privilege. Such truth, says Pope Francis, “is an inseparable companion of justice and mercy. All three together are essential to building peace.”

So the path of peacemaking leads not only through our personal lives, but through our lives as citizens and economic actors as well. As Catholics and US citizens, we need to ask ourselves what we must do so that our nation is known for protecting human dignity, practicing solidarity, pursuing the common good and caring for all of creation. It’s a constant task, at many dimensions of our lives, and as Pope Francis points out, it is hard work.

There is still more that our Catholic faith teaches us about peace, and it is what helps us to remain faithful in a world full of scary headlines and annoying people. In addition to our moral teaching, we have the Scriptures, and our rich tradition of liturgy and prayer. Even those who don’t know what the Church teaches about peace know the words we pray just before we share the Eucharist, “Peace I leave with you, my peace I give to you.” This phrase comes from the 14th chapter of John’s gospel, from Jesus’ final prayer for his disciples. The prayer is three chapters long, a meditation on Jesus’s life and work and the relationship with his disciples that will continue after his death and resurrection. His gift of peace is an invitation to share his life: to preach the good news of the nearness of God’s reign; to heal the brokenness and satisfy the hungers of the people around us; to love God and our neighbors as he himself did. After the words we pray at Mass, Jesus continues “not as the world gives do I give it to you,” and then he concludes, “Do not let your hearts be troubled or afraid.”

Knowing that we possess the peace of Christ doesn’t explain why there is no more peace in the world or excuse us from the work for peace that his followers are called to do. Rather, it helps us understand that peace is a gift from God and all our work for peace is our response, our thanks for what God has done in Jesus Christ.

Christ’s gift of peace assures us that God is our companion on the path to peace. It promises that God’s grace will outlast whatever evil, chaos, pride and sheer stupidity that we human beings can come up with. It is our sure guarantee that God’s love is stronger than death and following Jesus is our path to peace.

Read the full text of Pope Francis’s 2021 World Day of Peace message here: http://www.vatican.va/content/francesco/en/messages/peace/documents/papa-francesco_20201208_messaggio-54giornatamondiale-pace2021.html