Peace is an attitude

As the world observes today as Peace Day, India and Pakistan find themselves in a belligerent situation which may soon escalate into a war.  No country can choose its neighbours and India is unfortunate to have such neighbours as Pakistan and China one of which is steeped in medieval darkness and the other has a soul that is afire with territorial greed.  Both these infelicitous neighbours will unite against India in case of a war.  Is the Third World War taking shape at the Indo-Pak borders?

On the occasion  of the World Peace Day, the UN General Secretary Ban Ki-moon said, “Peace is not an accident.  Peace is not a gift.  Peace is something we must all work for, every day, in every country.  Peace is not just about putting weapons aside.  It is about building societies where people share the benefits of prosperity on a healthy planet.”

Peace is an attitude, in other words.  Peace is an elevated level of consciousness.  Peace comes from the heart.

Can hearts guided by words written thirteen centuries ago by a man who was struggling to import peace among warring tribes understand what the UN General Secretary is saying?  When truth still belongs to scriptures that are interpreted by people whose attitudes and awareness are groping in medieval darkness, will weapons be put aside?

The world stands in need of liberation first of all from its gods and scriptures.  Or at least from the people who are currently holding gods captive and interpreting the scriptures to suit their nefarious purposes.

Ban Ki-moon focused more on the inequalities created by the present economic system that dominates the whole world.  In fact, Islamic terrorism is mostly a fight against that economic system and the western civilisation which upholds it.  The fact is that neither Islam with its terror nor globalisation with its greed has done any good to the world. 

We can’t surrender our civilisation to terrorists.  We can’t surrender our civilisation to traders.  We need to redeem ourselves from both.  We need to think.  Think about real remedies.  And speak out boldly.  Cowardice can only create more terrorists and traders.