Lederach advocates peace through "moral imagination"
Maricor Coquia, Editor-in-Chief
Issue date: 10/17/07 Section: News
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The event was the first of this fall's Catholic Speaker Series, a line of presentations meant to inform students and the surrounding community of problems facing the Catholic Church today.
Paul Alexander, director of the Institute for the Common Good, introduced Lederach, noting his presence was "pleasantly appropriate," given the day was the feast day of St. Francis of Assisi, patron saint of animals. Alexander also thanked Lederach for having time to visit the university, given his busy schedule.
Several members of the audience, including students from the Colorado School of Mines, but mostly community members familiar with Lederach's work, expressed their excitement for the presentation.
Ed and Meridee Cecil, professors of a Conflict Resolution course at Mines, said they looked forward to hearing Lederach's perspective in person. Both had read Lederach's Building Peace, published in 1997.
"He looks at the bigger picture," Ed and Meridee explained. "We're excited to see what he has to say tonight."
Lederach began his presentation by posing this question, which is also the primary question posed in his book, Moral Imagination: "How do we transcend the cycles of violence that bewitch our human community while still living in them?"
Rather than delivering a lecture to address the question, Lederach told three stories, focusing on three individuals and their courageous actions against injustice.
"My goal with Moral Imagination was to figure out how exactly have people at moments when we least expect, find a way to transcend violence while still living in it?" he explained.
The first story was of Deca, a woman living in Wajir, a war-stricken district of Northern Kenya.
"One afternoon," Lederach began, "Deca was on her way to the market with her daughter, when all of a sudden, fighting broke out in the middle of the town. Deca ran back home with her daughter, fearing for their lives as they took shelter under the bed."
"Deca had a distinct memory of the same event with her mom," Lederach continued, pausing. "This has to stop, Deca thought."
After the fighting had temporarily subsided, Deca, along with four to five other women, decided to take action.
Their initial goal was to bring peace around the market place, first by noticing the signs when fighting was about to break out; and secondly by holding meetings to conduct peace talks between the fighting parties.
"They wanted a proactive solution. To talk out the problems," Lederach explained.
The women, over time, patiently tried to bring understanding and cooperation between the fighting groups. Eventually, by including the "elders" of the tribes in conflict, they formed the "Wajir Elders Peace Group," which now acts as a force for immediate conflict resolution.
"Although conflict is still present in the area," explained Lederach, "the amazing thing is that these women took steps toward change, by holding people responsible."
Deca however, remains the heroine of the story. Given that Wajir is no stranger to terrorism, Lederach added, "When asked about 9/11, Deca said to me: 'We need to talk to Bush and his ways on handling conflict.'"
The following stories also resonated with the audience, emphasizing the power of one individual to bring about change, especially where one least expects it.
For instance, the second story took place in Columbia, South America, in a district known to have the longest standing civil war in the Western hemisphere, explained Lederach. Jose Vargas, by standing up to the captain of the paramilitary force of the area, empowered others to fight against having their children kidnapped, women raped, and innocent killed.
Lederach demonstrated what many remember of Vargas' testimony: "Capitan, capitan! Please, I beg to differ. What do you have to forgive us for? We have done nothing wrong."
Vargas refused to commit himself to the captain's orders of either joining the paramilitary, joining the enemy forces, leaving the area, or to staying in the area (which meant to ultimately die.)
Vargas established a "peace zone" where all were welcome to voice their opinions. Although Vargas was later killed by the paramilitary, the efforts to prolong the "peace zone" still continue today.
After the three stories, Lederach summarized the issues brought forth by his presentation. He said, "As you can see, these people developed rich ways to respond to conflict. They challenged themselves to push toward answers, to transcend beyond the cycles of violence."
Lederach listed four points. "First is to imagine yourself in a web of relationships, to realize that we all affect each other. Second is to have an unbelievable curiosity, to realize how complex issues are," he said. "Third is to be creative, to have the motivation to bring to existence what doesn't exist; to burst forward, to transform. And last is to take risks, to realize that in doing so, you lose power, but in the same sense, allow for peace to enter into those ambiguous parameters."
Mines students Emily Przekwas, a senior physics major, Logan Rohnhovde, a senior mechanical engineering major, Hillary Brown, a senior physics major, and Paul Johnson, a senior materials and metallurgical engineering major, were moved by all three stories, they said.
"I liked how he approached the issue from many different levels," said Mines senior Roberta Martinez Hernandez, an environmental engineering major.
Przekwas continued, "His imagery was fantastic. He showed a different approach to conflict resolution, which I really appreciated."
The three stories left many in the audience optimistic. "I don't know about you, but I feel a profound sense of hope," Alexander said.
Lederach is a professor of International Peacebuilding at the University of Notre Dame in Indiana. He is also concurrently the Distinguished Scholar at Eastern Mennonite University. Lederach has written widely on conflict resolution and mediation and holds a Ph.D in sociology from the University of Colorado. Lederach's studies have brought him all around the world, including Somalia, Northern Ireland, Nicaragua, Philippines, and Columbia. In 2000, he received the Community of Christ International Peace Award.
All are welcome to attend the second presentation of the Catholic Speaker Series featuring Nobel Peace prize nominee Kathy Kelly on "The Further Invention of Nonviolence: A Catholic Pacifist View." The talk will be held on October 18 at 7 p.m. in the St. John Francis Regis Chapel. Kelly is co-coordinator of Voices for Creative Nonviolence, a campaign of resistance to end of the Iraq War and the "Global War on Terror."
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