Coonridge Digest: World peace begins with you

Greetin’s from the Ridge.

I guess I shouldn’t have been surprised. I was visiting’ my friend Lois, a cook down at Coonridge Elementary, when the lunch bell rang. An eighth-grade boy grabbed his plate off the serving shelf, sniffed with disdain and said, "Same old slop?" The kid had lived for fourteen years without acquiring a hint of civility.

Little Delbert Dumbbutt had undoubtedly come from a ballgame the night before where he heard adults call the referees things a good deal worse than slop. And he might have gone home to watch the tail end of an NBA game where his prettily paid and pampered heroes were admired for the way they could get into the other team’s faces and shout obscenities at the crowds.

Delbert might just have stayed home and watched prime time television where the profanities are thrown in on a per-minute ratio and disrespect for authority has become the modern equivalent of pie-in-the-face humor.

And of course there’s the real possibility that Delbert heard that attitude displayed in his own family the night before. At least for Delbert, there’s to be no child left behind. The world provides plenty of opportunities for learning how to be a little jerk.

One of the biggest shocks of my life was to sit down at a meeting of so-called professionals recently and hear profanities thrown around like poisoned ping pong balls. I assume that they began as little boys in the lunch line talking about slop and their college degrees had entitled them to up the ante on their obscenities.

And all this while the nation teeters on the brink of war, more terrorism, with new threats popping up daily.

We used to have a preacher who’d make it a weekly habit to remind us, "World Peace begins with you." As a child I thought that was about the silliest thing imaginable. What could peace in my little Coonridge household possibly have to do with a war overseas? Frankly, I assumed the old minister was just using world hostilities as another excuse for me to behave.

You’ve heard it too…There can be no peace in the world ‘til there’s peace in our hearts. It still rings of pipedream…at least until you open your eyes.

Somewhere there’s a Johnny Soldier who slept in a tent on the Kuwaiti desert last night. His day is filled rumors of where he’s to go next, his lunch has been processed and freeze dried in a New Jersey depot, he’s just beginning to learn how to sleep in the heat, he can identify a horned viper or a black desert cobra at twenty paces, and he wishes he had a hot shower. And tomorrow…tomorrow Johnny may be lying on a street in Baghdad. How could he possibly feel if he learned that Delbert Dumbbutt rode to school on public transportation, sat all day in a temperature controlled classroom, then looked at a lady who’d spent all morning cooking and called her morning’s efforts slop?

How would Johnny Soldier react if he saw a professional ballplayer being paid $100,000 a game throw a tantrum because his shot was blocked?

It’s my guess that he’d give anything to be back in his hometown paying two bucks a gallon for gas, eating cafeteria food, and shooting hoops up against the garage…for free.

This morning a news report from Baghdad told of a young Iraqi family who were trying to decide whether to leave town and separated or stay put and die together. Their children, ages 3 and 7, ate their evening meal and didn’t call it slop.

One of the saddest tales in the New Testament tells the story of the night in the garden of Gethsemane when Christ simply asked his disciples to stay with him one hour while he prayed. When he returned he found his friends sleeping. He said, "Will you not stay awake with me one hour?"

It was the least they could do, as he was about to give his life for them. Can’t we do the same? At least while these awful times last, can’t we be civil? Can’t we be nice to each other…at least for this short time?

I have no idea what motives and forces move behind the scenes in peace negations, but I know my own motives when I speak to someone and I can control my own tongue. I’d make the poorest soldier imaginable when someone gives the signal to attack, but I have tools to heal, to comfort, and to encourage.

The old preacher may have been right. In some totally unexplainable and miraculous way, peace might actually have its genesis in a single soul.

Hate may be unable to grow in a soil saturated with kindness. If we can stay awake this one hour, peace may have a chance.

Praying for Peace in Coonridge. Hope you are too.