Let There Be Peace

Peace

Yes, we see it every day in the news. It seems to come at us from everywhere.  What is the reason, why is it happening.  How do we stop it.  Well, it starts with the individual, with the family.  We must embrace peace, spirituality, goodness, kindness, and love. 

Our culture has adopted violence as a means to sell a product.  From television, to video games, to music, to movies, to sports we glorify violence. We must take another path for the well being of our children, families, ourselves, and our society. 

The same time the Oregon incident happens,  we see on ESPN a movie advertisement with a graphic commercial detailing the life of gangster Whitey Bulger.  Children see 100's of murders on TV before they are ten years old.  The top selling video games are Grand Theft Auto and Halo, Ultimate Fighter where men and women beat and hurt each other are treated as entertainment, the football games where multiple players are carted off the field with major injuries,  it appeals to our base emotions.

We know that as violence increases in our entertainment and sports, violence increases in our real lives.  Like the Romans gathering to watch the Gladiators duel to the death, or Christians being fed to the lions.  This increased violence leads to a degradation of society and unravelling of civilization. 

We have to remove ourselves and family from the gratuitous ubiquitous violence.  We have become numb and immune to tragedy.  It's everywhere, commonplace in our culture and society, and we have to make a conscious effort to disconnect from it to seek a place of love, light, and peace.  The idea that if we taught our children to pray and meditate for an hour each day that the world would be a more peaceful place. As St. Francis said, make me a channel of your peace, we need to start with ourselves and be more peaceful, understanding, and tolerant of ourselves and others. 

Don't be fooled by the media.  Most people are loving, caring, and peaceful.  We need to choose and focus on uplifting and positive experiences and entertainment. 

And as the saying goes 

Let there be peace on earth and let it begin with me. 

With Love,

Coach K

Tom Kaufmann