Peacebuilding—especially interfaith peacebuilding—is a field of endeavour that not many people seem to appreciate or care about. I realize this by people’s responses to various postings on this. I guess such postings come across perhaps as unrealistic, overly optimistic, or boring to some; or perhaps something that is far removed from people’s daily concerns because it pertains to a rather specialized field (like “brain surgery” is to medicine) that not many are interested in or wish to understand, much less appreciate. This article by Matthew Albracht of the Peace Alliance (published in the Huffington Post) is something I resonate with. I appreciate that in his article he begins by acknowledging that there is a “prevailing notion and dominant cultural story” that “violence is inevitable and there is really nothing significant we can do about it.” He writes that this is a “false assumption” and that “conflict may be inevitable, but violence does not have to be.” I learned, from experience, that there is a prevailing notion that conflict is “bad.” So people tend to perceive conflict in a negative light and expend all efforts to either avoid it, or pretend that it does not exist. As a result, rather than perceiving conflict as a turning point in human relationships that bring opportunities for growth in those relationships, fear and anger gets in the way. This results in conflict being grossly mishandled and left to escalate, even to the point of violence. Here, I appreciate the teachings of John Paul Lederach (international trainer in peacebuilding, and author of many books) concerning the endeavour of CONFLICT TRANSFORMATION. I realize that it is not enough to mediate, manage, or resolve conflict. We, in our human relationships, need to accept the fact that conflict will always be part of our experience because of our differences. And as peacebuilders in our daily lives, we need to take courage to find humble albeit bold and co-creative ways of addressing our differences so that our experiences of conflict become opportunities for growth. May our tribe increase!
Posted on: Thu, 13 Mar 2014 02:36:44 +0000
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