I'd like to spend the next five minutes taking a meditative journey with you, a journey inward to the Silent center of our being.

Please, gently close your eyesÂ"relaxÂ"relax your bodyÂ"relax your mindÂ"do not chase your thoughts, let them come and go in the sky of your mind. Breathe deeplyÂ"breathe deeply once againÂ"let everything goÂ"do not worry about what has happenedÂ"do not worry about what might happenÂ"just sit in the presentÂ" allow yourself to be enveloped by SilenceÂ"just listen, just sit, just beÂ"fall deeply into your own Self, into that deep place of awareness, of stillness Â"of Silence. Silence is that place where all differences dissolve, where all conflicts cease, where all fear turns to love, and where all souls shine with the same single flame of radiance.

As you rest in Silence, I would like to talk to you about peace.

Today, there is perhaps no more urgent question than this: How can I make peace real? How are we to meet violence with nonviolence, to meet war with peace, to meet fear with love, to meet hatred with compassion? In this moment in which the world is trembling and reeling with angry passions and violent convictions, we must call for peace, stand for peace, and act for peace. We must accept only peace. But first, we must become peace itself, not an idea or image of peace, not the rhetoric of peace, but actual peace, the peace in which violence cannot arise.

We must seek that peace, know that peace, and become that peace. How do we do this?

We are doing it now. The peace that we must become, we already are, it is given to us by God. It is called the soul and it is given to all in equal measure as a flame of the Creator's fire, full of love and joyÂ--this is the soul, and this is peace.

And how do we find our way to the soul? We are doing it now, sitting together in Silence, entering the depths of our being, leaving behind all thoughts of self and other, of anger and retribution, of fear and hostility. Entering this Silence is discovering our soul, and from within the infinite beauty of our soul, we know peace, we become peace. And we are doing it now, for our own sake, and for the sake of our families, our communities, our world. Being peaceful within, we will create peace without.

Let us now resolve to enter the depths of Silence every day, let us resolve to purify our mind and heart in these still waters, let us resolve to wash away all anger and hatred and fear in these still waters, that we may find the peace, the love, the joy that God gave us to share freely with one another in friendship and mutual respect.

As we bring our attention slowly back to our bodies, to the room and to our surroundings, as we slowly open our eyes again, let us affirm that we are peace, and knowing that we are peace, let us also affirm that we will stand for peace, speak for peace, and create peace in each hour of each day.

May all beings be happy, safe, and free.

 © 2003/Robert Rabbin/All rights reserved
From www.robrabbin.com