By The Rev. Peter Kakos
Practically all of us know the story of Christmas Day: the birth of a Jewish peasant-child who would become history’s most famous, if not beloved, person. Few, however, can recall the stated purpose of his mission: not to christen a faith better than the other religions, but to restore a reconciling order to a world fraught with the terror of ongoing war
For this very reason, a Gospel account of the spring or summer evening of the holy birth adds a scene portraying rugged, ordinary shepherds, “abiding in the field, keeping watch over their flock by night.” (they would never be outside in the bitterly cold winter season of December). Just then they become stunned by a bright, hovering chorus of angels, wishing for all a state of genuine reconciliation, singing “peace on earth, good will toward all.”
Now the word for peace comes from ancient Greek, transliterated into English as “irenic.” The strong sense is that both warring factions come to an understanding that each side is at fault; each share the blame for the horrific consequences rained down upon those each aims to conquer. Moreover, for the powers that be, doing so is more than just difficult. It is an admission of their brutal arrogance and its deadly costs, the hard swallowing of always false pride.
Considering the ongoing misery of our Ukrainian sisters and brothers, strenuous efforts to cease the carnage are as vitally needed today as they were two thousand years ago when the empire of Rome crushed all dissent with their infamous “iron fist.’’ The centuries long so-called Pax Romana came at a terrible price, particularly for the tribes of Judah and Israel. For that reason a day is set aside in the Christian calendar for the solemn observance known as “the slaughter of the innocents”.
The tragic crux of the matter today lies with the powers of Russia and America, both unwilling to face the errors of their ways. The West has blatantly failed to account for the reality that Russia, Putin led or not, will never tolerate a formal NATO-allied Ukraine. Likewise, for its part Russia needs to accept the truth that any form of victory would be pyrrhic, given the adamant resolve of Yelensky and his brave country. Only an honorable save-face agreement can put an end to this 21st century version of wholesale decimation.
As if this were not burdensome enough, both sides possess thousands of nuclear missiles which in and of themselves pose a grave problem, even if only one were accidentally deployed. We need only revisit the 1962 Cuban missile crisis to realize that it was resolved not by our show of force, however intimidating, but by Kennedy’s promise to withdraw our threatening warheads from neighboring Turkey. Thankfully, only the most intense negotiations brought about reconciliation, to the relief not only of both nations,and also the world, given the global fallout of even a limited exchange. Remember Chernobyl? Russia certainly does, her occupying troops evacuating it after soon realizing how deadly toxic the environment was, even 36 years later, from that meltdown so massive that at its height, one explosion registered a blast equivalent to two Hiroshima-detonations.
Irenic peace over the ruins of Ukraine could very well bring both powers and then all possessor nations to the table, with the aim of once and for all eliminating all nuclear weaponry. When you add up all the regional tensions mounting from North Korea, Pakistan-India, and perhaps Iran, no time is more ominously crucial than today.
A framework for this ” irenic” action has been carefully crafted by the U.N.’s, International Coalition Against Nuclear Warheads, ICAN. It has established that it is now illegal by international law to possess, manufacture, or sell them. Called the Treaty for the Prohibition of Nuclear Warheads, TPNW, no less than the parliaments of 68 nations to date have ratified it (50 were needed to do so), 27 more countries signing on and in the process of consideration.
It would be, however, the height of naivete not to see that resistance to this abolition is fiercely multi-faceted, if for no other reason than the military industries of each and every nation have a deeply vested interest, not only to maintain superiority, but also to expand every aspect. What does that diabolically cruel truism painfully remind us? “War is good for business”: be it Iranian sales of drones to Russia or state-of-the-art defensive rockets to Ukraine from America. Christmas bonuses came early in the form of additional contracts (Silently, how silently, the wondrous gift of billions is given, to paraphrase the pleasant carol!)
Irenic peace will come the morning we wake to see the light of a day when we no longer need to be weighed down by the wearisome prospect of global annihilation looming over us.
Irenic peace was, is, and ever will be, our only hope, a timelessly relevant angelic message for every season.
Rev. Peter Kakos, Northampton. From 1995-2011, he was minister of the new Edwards Church, built in 1958, designed and designated to be an official Civil Defense Shelter in the event of nuclear war.