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by Michael White, Guest Blogger
On Friday night, after the meet and greet that opened the Department of Peace Conference, we were honored with a performance of a new played called the Gift of Peace, by Stacey Martino and Tova Epp.
A troup of actors from LA were finishing a national tour of 8 cities with their final performance here at the conference. The play was inspired by the Department of Peace legislation, and was about the journey of America to realize the dream of peace through passing this legislation.
The play opened with the actors toning the universal sound of AUM, as in ancient eastern traditions, and gradually began adding in the word Peace, spoken in different languages. They proceeded into the conference room from the lobby and onto the stage, singing the word Peace. With song and drums, they gathered around in a circle and began to recite the opening declaration of the U.S. Constitution, though they changed the wording slightly and added that "all men and women are created equal".
The play continued with speeches from form U.S. Presidents, like Abraham Lincolm and Thomas Jefferson, speaking about the ideals of peace and freedom that are at the heart of America's purpose. The central character steps forward, a young woman representing the writer of the play, expressing her own moral challenges with the state of the nation and the world, and seeking to reconnect with the dream of the the Founding Fathers and the Mending Mothers of this nation.
She completes her speech by describing that she was forced to turn within and listen to the silence, and to find peace within herself first, and how her hope for America and the world was restored when she heard about the bill for establishing the Department of Peace. This was the answer that she was searching for.
The play went on to show many different angles of perception around the bill, the possibilitiy of a peaceful world, and the challenges of conflict today. Each person in the play reflected part of America's journey to find peace within and realize the dream of the founders of a nation of peace through understanding the many aspects of the proposed legislation. This is a very comprehensive plan for reducing and preventing violence in schools, communities, families and internationally, and we heard from actors representing teachers, students, parents, grandparents, police officers, business professionals, Iraq veterans, and people of all religious and cultural backgrounds. They were all struggling to find the same Peace, and found in the bill a way forward.
I have never seen a more passionate and convincing group of actors in my life! Many of their speeches seemed to reflect the deepest emotions that flow from the heart of this nation about the challenges we face with violence in our communities, and what is being done in our name. I was on the verge of tears through the whole play. There was laughter and tears in the audience, and the hope of the nation spoke clearly about the call for supporting this legislation.
At the end, one of the actors pointed out that "the Department of War was created during peace-time. Wouldn't it be ironic if we created a Department of Peace during war-time?"
The excitement from the audience was tremendous, and there seems to be a feeling in the air that we are here to put America back on course with its destiny. This legislation reflects what the founders of this nation were calling for and dreaming of for the world.
I talked to many people afterwards and documented statements from some of the actors, and everyone felt like something amazing was happening in history that would change the world forever. I interviewed the director of the play and asked him if he could leave a message to the humanity of the future, what would he say? He said that in the future he knows, humanity is enlightened and would not be able to understand the world we live in today. They would not be able to understand the reality of the ego structures that create conflict, because the consciousness of conflict, and thus war, would be ancient history.
Everyone I talked with shared a single insight, that each person must take responsibility for their own inner conflict and create peace within themselves instead of projecting inner conflict onto the world.
This is exactly the kind of peace empowerment that we want to teach in schools, empowering all people to build peace in their communities, families and schools, starting from within. There are new techniques for teaching the application of such insights that can change the world if we can bring peace education into our schools. We have new solutions that are not being applied on a large scale yet, but will ultimately create a global culture of peace, not to mention saving the taxpayers trillions of dollars that are now been spent through forms of domestic and international conflict that could have been prevented. We must start now on a new path forward.
I hope and pray with all my heart and mind and might, that the American people will embrace this bill and become part of the legacy of peace that we are here to leave to future generations, and that people all over the world will support the global effort to establish departments and ministeries of peace in all nations. Now is the time to make our voices heard!
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