The following prayer was written by Maggie Hindley, a reservist with CPT Palestine.
God, I love this place.
I love its scents and its tastes,
its limestone and its olives,
its baking hot days, its blue sky, its sunsets;
its language and its people,
its welcome,
its deep longing for the peace its prophets sang of;
peace with justice,
peace with security,
peace between peoples,
lasting peace,
a peace that is ours to make.
Mine to make?
God, I’m a fake peacemaker.
I carried a stone of fear in my guts as I planned my journey,
my fear and the fear of others;
a bag of stones as I faced the oppressor’s gatekeeper.
I’m afraid of the guns, the drones, the cameras,
the searchlights, the boots and the hard faces.
Afraid.
Not peaceful at all.
But, God, I love these people.
I love the kids, tormented daily on their way to school
but persevering with their schooling;
I love my friends who put their fear aside
every day, every hour,
in order to model life
as it might be lived,
with courtesy, and hospitality, and courage and peace,
in the face of evil.
I love this team of real peacemakers.
So, I breathe in, and out,
letting the stones of my terror dissolve.
Peace is real.
Peace is stronger than the cruelty
that grows out of a greater terror than mine,
deep rooted and all-destroying,
that is choking the oppressor.
Let me catch peace.
Let me nurture it.
Let me live it.
In my deepest being.
Here.
Today.
Let me be a full-time peacemaker.
