Peacemaking doesn’t mean passivity. It is the act of
interrupting injustice without mirroring injustice, the act of disarming evil
without destroying the evildoer, the act of finding a third way that is neither
fight nor flight but the careful, arduous pursuit of reconciliation and
justice. It is about a revolution of love that is big enough to set both the
oppressed and the oppressors free.
Shane Claiborne, Common Prayer:
A Liturgy for Ordinary Radicals
____________________________
I am sick of injustice.
If the creator wants anything for the created
It is justice
Love would be nice too.
And peace
We all want world peace
But there is no peace without justice
And justice is loved lived out
Institutionalized
Systemized
Justice is evasive
Perhaps rare
It is when all things are equal
When everyone is treated the same way
When things are fair,
morally right, and have spiritual integrity
It is complicated
Very
Aristotle more than two thousand years ago
Said that justice is the principle that
"equals should be treated equally and unequals
unequally.”
Well crap
Apparently adjustments have to be made
Because some people have privilege
And some people have been systematically oppressed
And justice is not just about creating rules
That contain, control, and perhaps protect
It is not just about creating consequences for those who
behave
Poorly
But it can also be distributive and restorative
Correcting wrongs
Adjusting for privilege, or the lack of privilege
Justice is about interrupting injustice
It is a society, a culture,
Looking at prejudice, oppression, and worse
And saying “this stops here.”
But interrupting injustice is a tricky thing
It must be done with care
Yes, we need to create relief for those who have suffered
injustice
But we must do so without creating a new version of
injustice
We so easily slide into a justice that is retributive
That seeks not just to relieve, but to punish
Then the oppressor becomes the oppressed and the
oppressed the oppressor
And we have gained little (except a switch in roles)
True justice heals
It restores
It reconciles
Justice is embodied in the peaceable kingdom of God
Justice heals systems
It also heals souls, and relationships
True justice changes the rules,
It changes systems
But above all it changes people
Until the vision of Isaiah becomes more than a dream.
With Martin Luther King Jr., we must all have a dream
The dream of a world where,
“The wolf shall live with the lamb; the leopard shall lie
down with the kid;
the calf and the lion will feed[b] together, and a little
child shall lead them.
The cow and the bear shall graze; their young shall lie
down together; and the lion shall eat straw like the ox.
The nursing child shall play over the hole of the asp,
and the weaned child shall put its hand on the adder’s den.
They will not hurt or destroy on all my holy mountain,
for the earth will be full of the knowledge of the Lord as the waters cover the
sea.” (Isaiah 11)
May we be the ones who faithfully and arduously
Interrupt injustice
So that justice
May roll like a river
And righteousness like an everlasting stream (Amos)
