Reflections on the Fiftieth Anniversary of Gandhi's Assassination
Mairead Maguire
Mairead Maguire received the Nobel Peace Prize, along with Betty Williams, for their efforts for peace in Northern Ireland. The Peace People, as they called themselves, served as a catalyst to bring ordinary people into the struggle to end the violence and create a culture of peace in Northern Ireland. She is a member of the International FOR and honorary president of the Appeal of the Nobel Peace Prize Laureates for a Decade of Nonviolence, which the United Nations endorsed unanimously. She has traveled the world sharing the message of nonviolence. These reflections were addressed to the Gandhian movement in India.
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Gandhi realized that the spirit of nonviolence begins within us and moves out from there. The life of active nonviolence is the fruit of an inner peace and spiritual unity already realized in us, and not the other way around. I have come to believe, with Gandhi, that through our own personal, inner conversion, our own inner peace, we are sensitized to care for God, ourselves, each other, for the poor, and for our world. Then we can become true servants of peace in the world. Herein lies the power of nonviolence. As our hearts are disarmed by God of our inner violence, they become God's instruments for the disarmament of the world. Without this inner conversion, we run the risk of becoming embittered, disillusioned, despairing, or simply burnt out, especially when our work for peace and justice appears to produce little or no result, or seems trifling in comparison with the injustice we see all around us. With this conversion we learn to let go of "all desires"–including the destructive desire to see results.
For many people, this ancient wisdom of the heart, the wisdom of nonviolence, may seem too religious and too idealistic in today's hard-headed world of politics and science. But I believe with Gandhi that we need to take an imaginative leap forward toward a fresh and generous idealism for the sake of all humanity. We need to renew this ancient wisdom of nonviolence, to strive for a disarmed world, and to create new nonviolence cultures.
As we enter the third millennium, we need to apply the wisdom of nonviolence to politics, economics, and science. For many, particularly in the West, increased materialism and unprecedented consumerism have not led to inner peace or happiness. Although technology has given us many benefits, it has not helped us distinguish between what enhances life and humanity and what destroys life and humanity. The time has come to return to the ancient wisdom.
When we examine where we are today, given the politics and technology of violence, we can only conclude that we live in an insane world.
Is it not insanity to go on producing nuclear and conventional weapons that if used can destroy millions of people, if not the whole planet?
Is it not insanity to spend billions of the people's money to produce and maintain these weapons of mass destruction, while millions of children die of disease and starvation each year? When (according to the UN) 60,000 children die every day of starvation, even though the world's governments have the resources and capability of ending starvation and poverty immediately?
Is it not insanity to implement sanctions on some countries when their only effect is to punish the most vulnerable–as, for example, in Iraq, where because of US and UN sanctions 4,500 Iraqi children die every month?
Is it not insanity that the developed countries–including Britain, currently the third largest exporter of arms in the world–sell huge amounts of armaments to poor and developing countries, which in turn use much of the money allocated to them for aid to pay for these arms?
Is it not insanity that India's government–currently the third or fourth most powerful military machine in the world–continues to waste so many resources on militarism, while so many of their people are in need of the basic necessities of life?
Is it not insanity to continue destroying the environment by dumping radioactive materials and poisoning the oceans, polluting the air, and destroying the ozone?
Yes, it is insanity. I believe with Gandhi that the insanity of violence can only be stopped by the sanity of nonviolence. The time has come to renew our commitment, personally, politically, economically, and internationally, to the ancient wisdom of nonviolence.
As we move into the third millennium, we are beginning to realize that the human family is multi-ethnic, multicultural, and pluralistic in nature, and that if we are going to survive and develop, we need to learn to live together nonviolently.
In Rwanda, Bosnia, and to a lesser degree in Northern Ireland, we see the consequences of ethnic, political violence. We see how injustice and militarism breed fear and hatred and release murderous passions, drowning out all reason, compassion, and mercy. Many people prefer to believe that they are themselves too "civilized" to carry out such horrors, but we need honestly to face up to Gandhi's truth that each one of us, while capable of the greatest good, is also, given the right circumstances, capable of the greatest evil.
In facing such problems we know that the "old" ways of violence, war, and militarism do not work. Fifty years after Gandhi's death, we are faced with a choice. Gandhi said, "There is no hope for the aching world except through the narrow and straight path of nonviolence." If we want to reap the harvest of peace and justice in the future, we will have to sow seeds of nonviolence. All of us need to take responsibility for the world's violence, and like Gandhi, pledge our lives to the nonviolent transformation of the world.
Gandhi taught that nonviolence does not mean passivity. It is the most daring, creative, and courageous way of living, and it is the only hope for the world. Nonviolence demands creativity. It pursues dialogue, seeks reconciliation, listens to the truth in our opponents, rejects militarism, and allows God's Spirit to transform us socially and politically.
But Gandhi's message of nonviolence is a challenge to the whole of humanity. Fifty years after his death, Gandhi challenges us to pursue a new millennium of nonviolence. This it not an impossible dream. In order to create a new culture of nonviolence, each of us can take several basic steps forward to help fulfill that dream.
First, we need to teach nonviolence to the children of the world–in India, in Northern Ireland, and everywhere. Recently, twenty-two Nobel Peace Prize Laureates asked the UN to declare the first decade of the new millennium as "a decade for a culture of nonviolence for the children of the world," in the hope that every nation will begin to educate their children in the way of nonviolence, in schools and homes. I was pleased during my visit to India to launch this movement, and to see the Gandhian movement giving an example to the world in the teaching of nonviolence in schools.
Second, as individuals, we can exorcise the violence and untruth from our own lives. We can stop supporting systemic violence and militarism, and dedicate ourselves to nonviolent social change. We can take public stands for disarmament and justice, and take new risks for peace.
Third, we can urge the media to stop sensationalizing violence and instead to highlight peaceful interactions, promote nonviolence, and uphold those who strive for real peace.
Fourth, we can embrace the wisdom of nonviolence that lies underneath each of the world's religions. Every religion contains the ancient truth of nonviolence. Every religion needs to begin more and more to teach and promote nonviolence, and to worship the God of nonviolence. Gandhi said, "If religion does not teach us how to achieve the conquest of evil by overcoming it with goodness, it teaches us nothing." The world's religions need to come together in dialogue and respect, because there can be no world peace until the great religions make peace with one another. Perhaps the greatest contribution that those of us who come from a Christian tradition can make is to throw out the old just war theory, embrace the nonviolence of Jesus, refuse to kill one another, and truly follow his commandment to "love our enemies."
Fifth, we need to pursue Gandhi's dream of unarmed, international peacemaking teams which resolve international conflict not through military solutions but nonviolent means. The world's governments need not only to reject military solutions, but to create and finance international nonviolent conflict resolution programs.
More than anything else, Gandhi inspires me by his great love for the poor. Perhaps the greatest contribution we can pay to Gandhi is to work to eliminate poverty from the face of the earth. Gandhi said that poverty is the worst form of violence. His memorial in India contains his parting advice, which we need to keep before us every day of our lives: "Recall the face of the poorest person you have ever seen, and ask yourself if the next step you take will be of any use to that person."
As we remember his death and celebrate his life, we dedicate ourselves to the wisdom of nonviolence. Shortly before his death, Gandhi said, "We are constantly being astonished these days at the amazing discoveries in the field of violence. But I maintain that far more undreamt of and seemingly impossible discoveries will be made in the field of nonviolence."
With Gandhi we can share great hope in a future filled with peace. Like Gandhi, we can make that hope a reality by pursuing new discoveries in the field of nonviolence, building a culture of nonviolence for the new millennium, and becoming, like Gandhi, teachers and prophets of nonviolence.
As we exit the second millennium we can take great hope, too, from the many excellent achievements and discoveries made by millions of our brothers and sisters before us. They have, by their examples, enriched, inspired, and encouraged us to build lives of joy and peace for ourselves and for each other.
May the God of Mahatma Gandhi, the God of nonviolence, bless us all with peace, fill us with hope, and lead us and all humanity into a new world of nonviolence.
©2001 Fellowship of Reconciliation
