Peace

Violence is everywhere in the fictional media we consume. Not only do we have violent movies and video games, but even some books contain pretty descriptive scenes of violence. The rise in popularity of things like Ultimate Fighting Championship events is making real violence increasingly normal through sports, which already included injury-filled contact sports like football. The news blows up stories of violence, making mass shooters infamous enough to nearly become household names. 

I don’t think that these things cause us to be more violent, but I do think it is interesting. If we are so bothered by how much violence there is in the world, why do we spend so much time looking at it? Why are we so obsessed with consuming images and stories of horrible violence?

I can see two likely explanations. On the one hand, we may be addicted to violence. It gives us a thrill to see it, but it also provides a sense of relief. When we see fictional or managed scenes of violence, we can work through the feelings we have about it in a safe and low-stakes environment. On the other hand, we might look at scenes of violence because we see it as a solution to problems. Most of the fictional violence we enjoy involves to some extent a hero using justifiable violence for righteous ends. We see them fighting clear enemies for the good of the world, and then wish we could do that ourselves, but our own lives are complicated. We aren’t sure that we would want to use violence even if we were sure it would work. We feel conflicted, so we watch heroes who aren’t. Violence, for us, is something to aspire to. It’s a way of fixing things when nothing else works, and sometimes we wish we could be the ones to properly wield it.

Last week, the blog considered hope. This week, we need to take a look at the idea of peace. Our whole world needs to take a long hard look at peace, something we often say that we wish for, but something that we rarely portray. What is the meaning of our love/hate relationship with peace? What is our problem with peace?

One reasonable but scary possibility is simply this: peace is boring. As stated by the villain of the film Sherlock Holmes: A Game of Shadows, James Moriarty, “Hidden within the unconscious is an insatiable desire for conflict.” That sounds horrible, but to some extent it's true. A movie in which there is no conflict, is hardly a movie worth watching. And even if the hero wins as a pacifist, we find ourselves unsatisfied if there isn’t some sort of fight, or at least a rhetorical struggle. We love stories in which a good underdog triumphs over a dominant bad guy. We are drawn to struggle. Scenes of peaceful tranquility make for good paintings, but they rarely make good stories. We want dynamic characters. We want plot movement. We want conflict.

But aside from being boring, there is another reason we don’t want peace. Peace often equates with compliance with the way things are. If you are living in a perfect utopia, peace is great, but when we face the realities of a harsh, unjust world, peace feels like giving up. The world faces some big problems, and doing nothing about them isn’t going to make them go away. We know this, so we desperately search for some way to fix things. That solution often means struggling against powers that are bigger than us, and when that happens, like a frightened animal the first thing we think of is lashing out with claws and teeth.

This self-preservation instinct is something true on all levels for us. In casual conversation with friends, we will take defensive measures when we think we are being criticized. To protect our self-esteem and justify our own worth, we aggressively protect our behaviors. Someone might offer a perfectly valid criticism, but we can’t help but go on the offensive, sometimes reacting in ways that can harm our friendships or at least leave us with our foot in our mouth. At the same time, on the societal level, we react strongly to things that we perceive as threats to our bodies, futures, or ways of life. Sometimes, these responses can result in violence between citizens when worldviews collide. We have seen numerous examples of this over the years.

So, we use violence as a means to a good end. We fight to have a better future. Maybe it is our dissatisfaction with the present that leads us to be so excited by conflict, struggle, and violence. Maybe we are contentious and even violent because we realize that peace won’t fix our problems, and we don’t want to wait around for someone else to do it. But here’s the question: is a world that can only be saved by violence, worth saving at all?

I think most people would say, “No,” even if they don’t mean it. That seems like the correct answer here. We would almost feel guilty for saying anything else. But, while I think this may be surprising, Jesus might say, “Yes.”

Matthew 10:34-39 sees the otherwise gentle and peaceful Jesus abandon that path. Jesus proclaims that he is not bringing peace, but the sword. Jesus comes with violence, disunity, discord as families are torn apart over their allegiance or lack thereof to Jesus. This may certainly have Christian persecution in mind, but I think there is more here. God’s very coming into the world is an act of violence against the evil forces therein. God doesn’t speak peace to corrupt structures and idols that turn people away from God. While God may wait patiently to uproot them, God isn’t extending an olive branch to sin, death, and evil.

The world we live in exists in conflict and God is part of it. Society is conflicted. Our personal relationships face conflict. We can’t even escape it in our own minds as we doubt and judge ourselves, but maybe a lack of conflict isn’t what God wants us to be searching for. We bear our crosses. We participate in the conflict between God and the evil powers of the world. Peace is a goal that will come in the celestial tomorrow, when God’s kingdom arrives in full and all enemies of God are defeated. For now, peace looks different than a lack of conflict.

If violence is interesting because it is dynamic and ever changing, a wild story to follow, then peace is static and calm in opposition. Peace is lasting, unchanging, and steady. Perhaps a lack of conflict is a fake peace, an idol in our time in which we hope to bring us joy. Maybe the peace that we really hope for is God, unchanging, pure, eternal. While God may be engaged in conflict with evil throughout the world, God comes to us in the Word and Sacraments always sounding familiar, preaching a message of enduring love and grace. We are loved, through no merit of our own. We are saved, through no work of our own. God gives us an enduring promise of hope and joy. God is our peace.