"True Peace is Always Possible"

The other night I attended a memorial service to commemorate the lives lost in Iraq this past year. It was a small gathering. Not many people seemed to know about it, though as always some good souls from our congregation turned out, and I was happy to see them. But it was lonely to stand on the grass in front of the Westwood Federal Building, as darkness and fog set in.

Our little group listened to the names of the dead and heard scripture read by earnest representatives of different faith traditions. I stood and fidgeted, without even a candle to hold, fighting my desire to leave. What's the point, I thought. Nothing ever changes.

But then came the closing words, sending us forward "cleansed and pure of heart," and I realized that such sad little gatherings do have a certain power. They affect us. They change us. They dissipate our cynicism. They work on us a little and hand us back more hopeful. We wouldn't be there if we didn't believe, somewhere deep down inside, that such small, individual gestures make a difference.

Thich Nhat Hanh has built his life around this belief. For him, true peace comes from the individual practice of a nonviolent way of life. Thich Nhat Hanh's philosophy pays careful attention to the spiritual, social, and psychological dynamics of this practice. In his book, "Creating True Peace," he shows how people can learn to live in the spirit of nonviolence. He offers exercises, such as meditation, to nurture love, understanding, and compassion, and to manage difficult emotions and live in the present moment.

The meditations are simple enough, just as you heard earlier. But they are not easy. I have been using the "breathing in, breathing out" meditation for years, but only for a few minutes at a time. Staying in the present moment takes a lot of practice. I read Thich Nhat Hanh's book while we were in Spain last month. I practiced the meditations late at night, wide-awake because of jet lag. The present moment is not very appealing when it is 3 a.m. and you'd rather not be aware of it, preferring to be asleep.

Even more challenging are the "five mindfulness trainings" Thich Nhat Hanh sets forth. "Mindfulness trainings" are teachings of the Buddha, translated into contemporary, secular language. They spell out the attitudes and habits of a healthy person: reverence for life, generosity, sexual responsibility, deep listening and loving speech, and mindful consumption.

"Mindfulness trainings" are rigorous self-disciplines. They penetrate the deep structures of the psyche, where growth and change take place. If any one of us were to follow the five mindfulness trainings, we would be very different from who we are today.

Mindfulness also has broad social and political implications, including a vow not to kill or condone killing of any kind. It requires awareness of suffering: "suffering caused by exploitation, social injustice, stealing, and oppression;" "suffering caused by sexual misconduct," "suffering caused by the inability to listen to others," and "suffering caused by unmindful consumption." Awareness of suffering motivates change, not only in one's personal habits but in one's view of the world.

Mindfulness is clearly a highly evolved consciousness. You can't read Thich Nhat Hanh and not conclude that his way of life is deeply spiritual. The world would be a very different place if more people followed his teachings. But the question we might ask is whether any spiritual practice will bring about world peace. Inner peace, yes. But peace in a world with sharply divided values, economic imbalances, and conflicting loyalties? It's much harder to say.

Thich Nhat Hanh makes a good case for the power of mindfulness to avert violence and misunderstanding. In the account of the Buddhist sister meeting the American soldiers in the village of Thao Dien, we see how spiritual strength handles confrontation. "Bloodshed was avoided and peace was restored," Thich Nhat Hanh writes, "thanks to the mindfulness and calmness of a young lady who knew how to breathe, how to look deeply, and how to communicate compassionately . . . ."

Inner work produces the outer behavior that brings understanding and reconciliation. This is how we tap into our courage. This is how we make peace.

Thich Nhat Hanh writes, "If we transform our individual consciousness, we begin the process of changing the collective consciousness. Transforming the world's consciousness is not possible without personal change." Find a practice that helps you overcome your internal conflicts, he says. That is where peace always begins.

Not all confrontations end as humanely as the one between the Buddhist sister and the American soldiers. Thich Nhat Hanh is no stranger to violence, war and terrorism. But his stance remains the same, whatever the circumstance.

His reflections on terrorism illuminate the challenge and the wisdom of his philosophy. "Although the place of true peace exists within each of us," he writes, "the seed of violence that we also contain within us can sometimes overgrow and choke the seed of compassion." We need to understand what causes people to commit acts of terrorism, what misunderstanding, fear, and ignorance drive them, what convictions make them believe they are doing the work of God.

Striking back only escalates the problem. It is by "looking deeply into the human condition," he concludes, that we will learn how to bring an end to terrorism. Even if we are hurt, we should respond with compassion.

He tells a powerful story from the Vietnam war, when his group provided social services to people in the villages. Many of the young people who worked with him were exposed to danger. "One night in 1966," Thich Nhat Hanh writes, a group of armed men came to a village where six of our young men were staying. They went to the house, woke them up, tied their hands, and brought them to the riverbank. Although they took our workers by force, they did not speak harshly to them. At the riverbank, the armed men asked our workers whether they were part of the School of Youth for Social Service. They answered yes. The men asked a second time to make sure and then said to our friends, ‘We are very sorry, we have to kill you.' They then shot all six of them on the riverbank."

"After each attack Sister Chan Khong and other leaders of the School organized funerals where they read a text confirming that our intention was only to love and help, not to hate or kill. They would read, ‘Dear friends, you don't understand us, and that is why you have killed us. Our intention is not to do harm to anyone. We only want to help.'"

Nonviolent practice asks us to forgive those who attack us. It asks victims of violence "to prepare to die without hatred." If you can die, Thich Nhat Hanh told his young followers, smiling "with forgiveness, you have great power."

Not many will be convinced that such a way of life is desirable, let alone possible. Lots of people regard pacifists as chumps, even dangerous if they let others go down with them. And most of us doubt our ability to produce a consistent, compassionate response, especially if our loved ones or we were threatened.

And yet, the power of nonviolence offers a glimpse of a different way of life – and a different world. It is grounded in forgiveness and understanding. It throws its lot in with the potential for goodness in humanity. It looks deeply "into the nature of fear, anger, hatred, and violence." It asks us to be honest with ourselves.

What do we really want? Thich Nhat Hanh tells us that if we want peace in the world, we must each look inside ourselves. Each of us possesses the ability to bring forth acts of violence or works of peace. Each of us must deal with our own destructive and self-destructive impulses, negative habits of the heart and mind. Through spiritual practice, we manage our inner conflicts and learn to live in the present moment. We make peace with ourselves, one at a time.

It is work we can do, whoever we are, whatever our struggle. How good it is to know there is something we can do. Perhaps that does make all the difference.

The reference for this sermon is Thich Nhat Hanh's "Creating True Peace" (New York: Free Press, 2003).