Thoughts on Peace

This being the season of peace, I thought I'd share a personal thought/theory on the subject.  It stems from my personal experience with the Catholic church.  No, this is not a post to bash or even critique the Catholic church.  There are plenty of other places you can go for that.  Neither is this a post intended to defend or heap praise on the church, or to try and get you to convert (I haven't).  It is mostly positive, but in my own (hopefully) unique way.

For starters, I'm not Catholic, but I have been attending Catholic mass services for about 14 years.  You see, about 24* years ago, I fell in love with this girl, who happened to be Catholic, and, well, one thing led to another.

So, I haven't studied the Catholic church, its history or its practices, but I'm a pretty good listener.  Here's one of the things I hear frequently - "Peace."  Some examples:

"May the peace of the Lord be with you."
"Let us offer one another a sign of God's peace."
"Peace be with you."
And my personal favorite: "Grant us your peace."


The word "Peace" shows up a lot in a Catholic mass.  And not only in the rituals - it's a frequent topic of prayers and homilies as well.  I don't know the exact rationale (like I said, I don't study the church, I just listen), but I've come to like it, and here's why.

First off, what's not to like about the concept of peace? I think it's safe to say that most of us could use a bit more in our lives. Whether it's world peace, seeking peace with someone with whome we've had a dispute, or inner-peace.  I think they're all pretty good ideas.

But here's another thought that's gone through my mind, and why I think the Catholic church in particular has the potential to create so much power behind this idea.

So, again, once you set aside any biases - positive or negative - for the Catholic church, the first thing that comes to mind to me is scale.  The church is big - in fact, it's the world's largest religious body.  So, it has incredible reach.  Second, it's centralized and organized, meaning it has a great way to control and direct its message (yes, I know this is probably one of the critiques of the church - let's view it as a positive in this instance).  Next, the church is old - it has seen most of the world's wars, crimes and atrocities (once again, let's set aside any role the Catholic church may have played in these for a moment).  You put all that together, and you've got a group that is highly organized, has a huge, loyal membership, an efficient and effective means of reaching that membership, and a simple, powerful message.  The potential to litterally change the world is huge.  If they can get enough members to truly commit to the concept of peace, they could (and perhaps have/do) drastically reduce violent conflict on the planet.  Imagine if people in decision-making positions (e.g., political leaders who decide whether or not to engage in war) actually committed to the church's adherence to peace.  What if those leaders' constituents were even more fervently committed to the concept?

This, to me, is remarkable.  You have a single organization that can reach over 1 billion people around the world, encouraging them to commit to peace.  Think about that!  That's potentially 15% of the world's population!  Just set aside the various concepts, arguments and interpretations of Christianity and religion for a moment (forgive my sacrilege, but none of us were there).  You can doubt, question, argue, or debate many points of religion.  But you really can't debate the potential power of this message and this network.  Maybe it's the marketer in me, but I find it incredibly impressive.  We marvel at the growth of social networks, and Facebook with over 800 million users.  But here's a network with an incredibly simple, powerful message that has the power to eliminate war, conflict, and violence (ok, probably not eliminate, but severely diminish.  Humans are, after all, flawed and one of the few animals besides our cousins the chimps to go to war.  And we still can't account for the other 85% of the world.  And I readily acknowledge that Catholicism doesn't have a lock on the concept of peace - many of the world's religions including Buddhism and Hinduism seem to profess peace.  Again, I am NOT a scholar.  So if I've misrepresented your particular religion, I apologize).

(Some people who loved, lived and died for peace).

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But alas, not everyone goes to church regularly (I don't).  And in the end, the church can tell you anything, but the individual has to make the choice (free will and what not).  So, I'm making the choice to pursue peace in my life.  Remember earlier when I said my favorite was "Grant us your peace"?  It's cuz I'm in pursuit of inner peace - trying to  let go of the things that bother me, or annoy me, or cause me to be unkind to others.  My life is pretty darn good, yet I still find myself giving in to petty grievances and aggravations, and then behaving in a way that simply creates more petty grievances and aggravations.

So, I'm going to try peace.  With this post, I am committing to 30 days of peace, during which I will seek to reduce, if not eliminate, conflicts in my life.  Not by being a pushover, mind you.  But by being more patient, smarter, and considerate of how I respond to a potential conflict.

I'll be sending out some thoughts on my pursuit of peace over the next 30 days.  So, follow along if you'd like to see how it goes.

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* Mathematical discrepancy resolved as follows:  24 - 6 years dating - 4 years before birth of first daughter = 14.

Friends Wanted. Willing to Pay.

A few years back, a good friend of mine introduced me to the New Year's Eve run on Belle Isle.  Unfortunately, he's moved out of the area.  So, I'm now looking for some friends to join me.  And I'm willing to pay!  Here's how.

Come out and run with me on New Year's Eve, and I'll pay $10 to the charity of your choice - assuming your choice is from one of the four below:

So come join me!  We'll have fun together celebrating New Year's Eve with a little 4 mile run.  And You get to feel good knowing that you've helped support a worthwhile organization.  As they say in the business world - it's a win-win!

Yeah, Cancer Sucks. And It Makes Me Crazy Sometimes.

So this thing happened today.  I'm driving home, sitting in a traffic jam on I-275.  So naturally, I'm scanning Facebook updates on my phone right?  (I hope there are no police officers or authority figures whom I revere reading this post.  I'll be so ashamed).

Anyway, enough about my emotional hang-ups.  I came across a post someone put up about the crapiness of cancer, and how it had just taken a friend.  This is never something you want to hear/read/know.  But for some reason, it really hit me today.  Just thinking about this - the loss of life; another person grieving; the feelings of remorse, confusion, anger.  It all just boiled up inside.  I could literally feel my body-temperature rising, sitting there, in traffic, on I-275, on a Friday afternoon.

Cancer. It doesn’t rest. It doesn’t slow down. It knows no limits. It knows no boundaries. It doesn't sleep.  It never quits. It morphs.  It attacks before we know it.  It has an unfair advantage.  Which is why we can never let up. It’s an ongoing and constant effort. There’s no other way to stop it.

I felt sad.  Then I felt angry.  Mad at cancer.  And mad at myself.  For not taking better care of myself.  For not being more appreciative of the fact that I'm healthy and my family is healthy.  That's not something to be taken for granted.  By some accounts, cancer incidence rates are projected to increase 45% over the next 20 years.  Health is something to be treasured, valued and nurtured.

So, if you're reading this (and I guess by default, you are) and you want to make a difference, here's two things I suggest you do.

1. Take care of yourself.  This might be the most effective way you can fight cancer.  Thanks to the work of many brainy scientists (who are much smarter than me, and worked much harder than I did growing up) many forms of cancer are treatable if caught early.  There are plenty of screening methods out there, and new treatment methods are developed every year.  So, if you haven't had an annual check-up in a while, make an appointment.  Got a habit you need to break, keep working at it, you'll get there.  Been sitting on the couch too much, see my Team In Training friends who will turn you into the endurance athlete of your dreams.
2. Be an advocate.  Got a friend who's fund-raising to fight cancer.  After you've made a donation, tell all your other friends to do the same.  Really encourage them and help spread the word.  Read and learn about cancer and share what you learn across the interweb via your TwitterBook account.  If  you're really motivated, take on a fundraising effort yourself for any one of the worthy cancer-fighting groups out there: Team In Training, Livestrong, Komen, ACS.

My conclusion?  I can do more.  I need to do more.  The way I felt today makes me more certain than ever.