Dublin Monthly Meeting Peace Committee plans to hold another Silent Quaker Peace Witness on Saturday Nov 8 from 11.30am to 12.30pm, outside the gates of St Stephen’s Green at the top of Grafton St, Dublin. Friends from all Meetings, and their friends, are once again very welcome.

We are mindful that the following Tuesday 11th November is Armstice Day, which commemorates the ending of World War One in which 15 to 20  million individual people lost their lives.  And how may individuals and families lived with severe physical and mental injury for the rest of their lives?  Was this the war to end wars?

I would like to share with you a reflection given by our Friend Fiona Murdoch recently to the Ireland Interfaith Forum on Peace. I hope you will find a way to share this with many people of all faiths and of none. 

Where do we find the divine — the source of peace?

Did Elijah hear God in the storm, the earthquake, or the fire?
No. It was only when silence fell, did “a still, small voice” emerge.

That same “still, small voice” lives in us all,
called God, Allah, Yahweh, or another name.
Small, yet powerful —
encouraging us to become channels of peace and love.

What if we took time each day to listen in stillness and silence to that voice?
And what if we dared to act on its promptings and leadings?

What if we listened to one another with empathy and respect,
seeing light in every soul,
embracing our differences,
treating all as equals,
speaking love, not fear?

Because the still, small voice is love.
Love for Earth
and for the web of life that holds us all —
human and other-than-human,
seen and unseen,
one sacred whole.

What kind of world might we create
if we tuned into that “still, small voice” within —
and followed its leadings?
If we chose to live with integrity and generosity,
seeing the world’s resources as something to share,
not fight over?

Could we — would we — find the courage
to fan the flames of justice and peace?
To rise, to speak, to act —
and begin to weave a new world?
One not built on fear or greed,
but rooted deeply in love?

It will be then—and only then—
that we can truthfully call ourselves peacemakers.

Thanks

Sean Kinsella, Dublin MM Peace Committee