An infallible method of conciliating a tiger is to allow oneself to be devoured.

Peace, n.: In international affairs, a period of cheating between two periods of fighting.

Peace is defined not by the absence of hate, but by the presence of love.

Variety may be the spice of life, but it is not life itself. It is that bread of life, that peace of God which is the very staff of life itself, for which men's souls are starving in these days.

Not long before his death, Henri Nouwen wrote a book called Sabbatical Journeys. He writes about some friends of his who were trapeze artists, called the Flying Roudellas. They told Nouwen there's a special relationship between flyer and catcher on the trapeze. The flyer is the one that lets go, and the catcher is the one that catches. As the flyer swings high above the crowd on the trapeze, the moment comes when he must let go. He arcs out into the air. His job is to remain as still as possible and wait for the strong hands of the catcher to pluck him from the air. One of the Flying Roudellas told Nouwen, "The flyer must never try to catch the catcher." The flyer must wait in absolute trust. The catcher will catch him, but he must wait.

During the Gulf War of 1991, Iraq launched a series of Scud missile attacks against Israel. Many Israeli citizens died as a result of these attacks. After the war was over, Israeli scientists analyzed the official mortality statistics and found something remarkable. Although the death rate had jumped among Israeli citizens on the first day of the Iraqi attacks, the vast majority of them did not die from any direct physical effects of the missiles. They died from heart failure brought on by fear and stress associated with the bombardment. Psychological studies conducted on Israelis at the time showed that the most stressful time was the first few days leading up to the outbreak of war on January 17th and peaking on the first day of the Scud missile attacks. There was enormous and well-founded concern about possible Iraqi use of chemical and biological weapons. The government had issued to the entire Israeli population gas masks and automatic atropine syringes in case of chemical attack, and every household had been told to prepare a sealed room. After the first Iraqi strike turned out to be less cataclysmic than feared, levels of stress declined markedly. As in other wars, the people adapted to the situation with surprising speed. Then as the fear and anxiety subsided, the death rate also declined. There were 17 further Iraqi missile attacks over the following weeks, but Israeli mortality figures over this period were no higher than average. It was fear and the psychological impact of the missiles, not the physical impact, that claimed the majority of victims.

It seems some people in Afghanistan are preparing for peacetime, as weapons are going for bargain prices these days. According to Time magazine, prices on knives, Kalashnikov rifles, and rocket-propelled grenades have dropped 50 percent since December: One dealer tried to interest a Time reporter in a Kalashnikov for the bargain price of $200, with 100 rounds thrown in "to close the sale." The man, who identified himself only as Abdul, said he wouldn't need his weapons anymore. "Peace has come to Afghanistan," he says. "The King is coming home, and people are sick of fighting." [note: this is as the war was winding down]

“War is an ugly thing, but not the ugliest of things. The decayed and degraded state of moral and patriotic feeling which thinks that nothing is worth war is much worse. The person who has nothing for which he is willing to fight, nothing which is more important than his own personal safety, is a miserable creature and has no chance of being free unless made and kept so by the exertions of better men than himself. “

The Lord bless you and keep you, The Lord make his face shine upon you, and be gracious to you. The Lord lift his countenance upon you, and give you peace.

Anxious nothing, prayerful anything, thankful everything, peace. -- 1st Century summary Philippians

Let him who desires peace prepare for war. – Vegetius,375

One sword keeps another in the sheath. – George Herbert, 1651