7 December Put peace into each other’s hands (StF 712)
I first came across this song when I was living in Christian Community at Scargill House. The new chaplain asked me to take part in a ‘dance’ with her. It was mostly just hand movements, holding our hands out, cupping the space around an imagined candle. Face-to-face, hands touching, it was a very intimate portrayal of peace. Two people, close together, working together to express the meaning of the song through movement.
So often I think about peace in the places where its absence is most acute. Perhaps, this Advent, most especially in the Middle East. In the destruction and loss of life the calls for a ceasefire and for peace are nothing like as intimate as this portrayal. Yet I’ve attended some of the Methodist Liaison Office’s Zoom prayer meetings where we’ve heard from organisations working across boundaries, in non-violent ways, to build the conditions for peace to be possible. Letting people meet and hear the stories of others, providing space to grieve the lost together and to work to find a new way.
It’s a challenge to hear this because it seems too small and fragile, and yet also it is so amazing that in the face of everything, there are people holding onto this with faith.
Janet Green
Prince of Peace,
we pray for the peacemakers,
those working at an international level
and those working in their communities,
with others like and unlike them,
but with the goal of finding a way to peace,
justice and safety for all. Amen.
