Thursday, April 24, 2008

peace and common humanity

In the opening sections of the Dalai Lama's How To See Yourself As You Really Are, he discusses the importance of the recognition of our common human desires, and their connection to the potential for world peace.

He begins:

"Happiness is a combination of inner peace, economic viability, and above all, world peace. To achieve such goals, I feel it is necessary to develop a sense of universal responsibility, a deep concern for all, irrespective of creed, color, sex, nationality, or ethnicity" (5-6).

I really love this idea of universal responsibility, because it necessitates treating the people around us like community members rather than the "public," which is a distinction made in Wendell Berry's Sex, Economy, Freedom and Community. Being a community means issues of like "justice" and "rights" ("I have a right to this cookie!") rarely come up, because, like in a family, sharing and being generous come naturally. As we discussed in class when Meg used the example of the stolen camera in New Orleans, it is also through conversation that this community is built, not through fighting or worrying about "just" distribution of goods. Justice becomes unnecessary when its advantages come naturally.

As we discussed after my presentation on just war, it is also conversation that begins to prevent the necessity of war. The Dalai Lama continues,

"If the twentieth century was the century of bloodshed, the twenty-first has to be the century of dialogue" (9).

He recognizes that it is through discussion that people work out their differences, acknowledging them without needing to reconcile them. We don't need to combine our religions in order to prevent problems, we simply need to listen. Also, by noting similarities, most importantly the recognition of the humanity of the other, we open the door to peace.

The Dalai Lama writes,

"Every being wants happiness and does not want suffering" (6).


He says our ignoring this fact is what allows for such suffering, because we forget that we are all human, and to thus treat each other as we want to be treated. The Dalai Lama writes, "we really are part of one big human family" (7). Thus, we must recognize our oneness to begin to converse about our similarities and differences, so that rather than falling into a trap, the pattern of war, we can instead live in peace, a hope of the Dalai Lama and of Jesus Himself.

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