PEACE is very meaning of the word Islam. When its three operative consonants, S, L, and M, are combined with a variety of vowels, they spell "peace" across the whole spectrum of human speech. SALEM is the word for peace in English. SHALOM means peace in Hebrew, while SALAAH is peace in Arabic. (In the native language of Gandhi, the word for peace is SHANTI). Peace is a longing that connects the human family in a common depth of soul. The hope for peace surges in the collective unconscious. It is for the generations now living to bring this hope to consciousness and build the structures that will give it operative vitality.
Lead me from death to Life, from falsehood to Truth. Lead me from despair to Hope, from fear to Trust. Lead me from hate to Love, from war to Peace ... Let Peace fill our heart, our world, our universe ...
~ from WORLD PEACE PRAYER by Fellowship of Reconciliation
The Peace of God resides deep within each individual, given to each spiritual being at its creation, to remain in their inner consciousness structure forever. No one can give it to you, no one can take it away. If you have not done so already, please give yourself the priceless gift of inner silence, That silence is the way that the very atoms of energy and love that surround you and are part of God can enter and give you the inner peace that you hunger for with all of your heart and mind.
Peacemakers are called the children of God, because that is precisely what they are: the conscious offspring of the creator. Peacemakers are men and women who have adventured down the avenues of healing and caught the current of their divine identity. Peacemakers have internalized the seven steps to wholeness outlined in the Beatitudes:
They recognize their faults and long for what they need to change; they are gentle, unpretentious and nonviolent; they pursue right livelihood and have compassion for others; their motivation is pure as they offer unconditional love to all.
BLESSINGS of a peace-filled heart be with you! For PEACE is a double blessing radiating inward as a life-giving force and radiating outward as gift to the world. Those silent spaces of the heart is where peace dwells and grows.
Divine peace has an inner and outer manifestation. Exteriorly, it manifests as fire, as zeal, as transformation, as death and rebirth. Interiorly, it manifests as silence, as knowledge, as joy, as union with the Beloved: a joy of union that is capable of communicating itself to others.
~ from "Zeal In Detachment" by Stratford Caldecott in "Parabola", Fall 1996
