"Embodying Peace"
Boe Chapel, St. Olaf College; Wednesday, September 15, 1999
Susan Bauer, Co-Chair, Planning Committee of Peace Prize Forum

Striving for Peace: Risk and Reconciliation is the theme for this coming February's Peace Prize Forum 2000. The Forum is sponsored annually and hosted on a rotating basis by five ELCA colleges of Norwegian heritage in the Upper Midwest: Luther College Decorah, Iowa, Concordia College Moorhead, Augustana College Sioux Falls, Augsburg College Minneapolis and St. Olaf College, with invitations extended this year to Waldorf College, Forest Lake, Iowa and the University of St. Thomas St. Paul.

Peace Prize Forum 2000 honors the work of John Hume and David Trimble, 1998 Nobel Laureates, as it focuses our attention on the motivation for peace and the painstaking process of reconciliation. This Peace Prize Forum, therefore, considers the issue of wars within borders by looking at the roots of ethnic and partisan hostility and by asking how people can reconcile with enemies close to home. It explores issues of religion and peace, especially the risks that religious belief calls us to assume. And it examines strategies for peace, both personal and political, that provide all of us an arena for action.

Besides John Hume and David Trimble, other notable peacemakers have accepted our invitation to present:

Sissela Bok: an associate of the Harvard Center for Population and Development Studies will address the need for a careful strategy for peace and the ways it is possible for individuals to work for peace in their ordinary situations as well as bringing ethics to bear on public policy.

J. Bryan Hehir: a member of the Harvard Divinity School will address the dynamics of religious belief in national conflicts and their resolution.

John and Janet Wallach, Woodrow Wilson Fellows: co-authors of three books, most recently Arafat: In the Eyes of the Beholder, and founders of Seeds of Peace, an organization that brings together Arab and Israeli youths, will end the Forum with a Call to Action.

The Norwegian play Borders will be premiered as the Interim production under the direction of Pat Quade with a revised Rolvaag translation by Solveig Zempel; and the sculpture sitting here titled Bearing the Burden of Peace has been created by Mac Gimse for the Forum.

Embodying peace means we explore the rhetoric of politicians, theologians, economists and sociologists, and then construct a framework from which to actively participate in the peacemaking process.

St. Olaf College as a liberal arts college enables us to explore a wide range of subjects and viewpoints. General education requirements enable us to broaden and deepen our views of humanity. As you take these courses pay attention to the rhetoric of the political scientists, theologians, natural and behavioral scientists, economists and artists. What is their take on the world? How does it enhance or skew decision making? How does your understanding of the thoughts of others inform the way in which you view the world and make decisions to embody peace?

David Trimble in his address accepting the 1998 Nobel Peace Prize draws on three people to articulate his framework for coming to the table to risk reconciling two long opposing viewpoints: Edmund Burke an eighteenth Century philosopher, Amos Oz an Israeli writer, and George Kennan, a former US Ambassador to the Soviet Union. For David Trimble these three people in one way or another form a model for what Edmund Burke referred to as practical politics. Trimble takes the rhetoric and constructs it in such a way so as to embody it by developing "a sense of the unique, specific and concrete circumstances of any situation" as "the first indispensable step to solving the problems posed by that situation." (p. 3)

Sissela Bok in her book A Strategy for Peace, also draws on the writings of several people: Immanual Kant's article "Perpetual Peace" written in 1795 and Carl yon Clauswitz's piece On War first published in 1832. Through an exploration of their various perspectives she discusses the need for a "language of morality".., stressing character and principled conduct" and a "language of strategy' that emphasizes the need for ~competence, insight, and good planning". (p.22)

What is important to us in the liberal arts tradition is the ability to move beyond the reporting of noted thinkers as Trimble and Bok have, to an ability to compare, contrast, critique and then synthesize ideas. This process asks us to reshape and transform the ideas to both inform and provide direction for our role in embodying peacemaking.

This summer I had two occasions to be with my thirteen year old nephew. He is a Pokemon fan, well-versed in the strategies of how to play it electronically, intellectually and physically. Explaining to his Aunt was close to useless and even her movement skills at remembering and hitting the correct buttons were dismal. What disappointed me most was here was yet another game that relied on a strategy of fighting and killing one another to succeed. I tried to share with him my feelings but had little success in convincing him there may be other ways to succeed in such games. That is until I saw him the second time, this time with the Pokemon cards bewildering me even more. However, the figures were not killed this time as he further explained the the game but merely "fainted". A small victory perhaps - but when do we begin to combine the elaborate strategies of "war" with a language and respect for humanity - even in games.

While David Trimble and Sissela Bok outline a framework of practical politics, Bryan Hehir's approach is one of practical theology. His writings very much reflect the church's need to be in the world and our ministry to reflect the context in which we live. In his 1995 article "Identity and Institutions, Catholic Healthcare Providers Must Re-fashion Their Identify as Actors and Advocates in the World", Hehir states

"The fashioning of one's identity in an ecclesial institution like the Catholic Health Association is a theological task, but one that must be carded out in the context of the rational demands, the secular setting, the pluralistic context, and the scientific requirements of the world of healthcare. If we do not have a religiously grounded, theologically articulated understanding of who we are and what we are, we will lose our way in this complex context. At the same time, if we specify our identity but we cannot meet the standards of a rational, secular, pluralistic world, then our identity will not be effective." (p. 18, Health Progress, Nov-Dec 1995)

In our complex world this liberal arts tradition, grounded in the Christian gospel asks us to continually reshape and transform our thoughts as well as our academic and religious institutional identities. We do not need to wait until their is an opportunity for Ethical and Normative Issue class. The questions and discussion of issues that enable us to develop a framework for embodying peace should take place in every course from math to music, science to sports, and anthropology to the arts.

Bringing our sense of striving for and embodying peace closer to home. Mary Rose O'Reilley, a professor at the University of St. Thomas, in her book The Peaceable Classroom shares with us a question, a challenge given to her by Ihab Hassan, "Is it possible to teach English so that people stop killing each other?" (p. 9) Is it possible to teach math, chemistry, Spanish, music, you substitute the discipline, so that we stop killing each other? Do we even think about the possibilities?

Again our speakers in February provides us some insights. Bryan Hehir in discussing the writings of John Courtney Murray talks about the need to place 'the common good of the international community" above national interests. In making policy we need to focus on our interdependence with others which asks that we collaborate in working towards justice rather than using "military force as an instrument of policy" (p. 7, ) in meeting our national interests. We not only travel on our domestic and international off-campus programs but we also develop within particular contexts a more informed framework to make decisions as to how we will embody peace and how that may become a collaborative process.

John Hume in his address receiving the Nobel prize contributes to a process of collaboration by asking for a respect for diversity. Easier said that done as we strive to embody peace. Beginning in the classroom how do we as students and teachers learn and teach collaboratively with respect for differences?

The challenge before us is to be both abstract and concrete, general and specific in how we embody peace. Building houses for Habitat for Humanity is one way to embody peacemaking, however it is not enough to build and feel good about it. We must also understand the reasons for needing to bund and a framework for changing policies and attitudes that prevent more low income housing in our neighborhoods.

As we prepare for the February Peace Prize Forum 2000 in our academic, spiritual and personal lives let us shift between constructing frameworks and constructing ways to embody striving for global peace and justice.