‘Blessed
are the peacemakers, for they will be called children of God’ – Matthew 5:9
‘Isn’t
peace wonderful?’ – Fred Rogers
This past week, the United States and Iran journeyed to the
brink of war. Thankfully, it seems that cooler
heads have, at least for the time being, prevailed. While I decry the appalling lack of foresight
and impulsivity that led to the crisis, I am thankful to leaders on both sides for
their willingness to find an off ramp to what might otherwise have been the start
of WWIII.
The crisis of the past week has made me think of how nations and
individuals need to look for such off ramps in the face of impending
violence. Which of course leads me to
think of Mr. Rogers.
You would have to be living under a rock right now not to
know who Mr. Rogers is. Even if you didn’t
grow up watching his show, Mister Rogers’ Neighborhood, he is all over the
cultural landscape. Tom Hanks’s biopic, A
Beautiful Day in the Neighborhood is a big hit, as was the 2018 documentary
Won’t You Be My Neighbor? Fred Rogers exemplified decency and kindness
and generosity, things in short supply these days, and so it isn’t surprising
that America is taking a nostalgic look back to the life of a man who taught a
whole generation how to be decent, kind and generous.
What many don’t know about Mr. Rogers, (although the movies are
making people aware) is that Mr. Rogers was subversive. Quietly so, but subversive all the same. His show’s first week on the air coincided
with the Tet offensive in Viet Nam. While
America debated the wisdom of the conflict, Mr. Rogers made no bones about
where he stood, opening his children’s series with a weeklong ode to peace.
The plotline for that first week of programming focused on a kingdom
in crisis. The Land of Make Believe
had become a warzone. King Friday,
fearful of changes in his kingdom wrought by Lady Elaine Fairchild, has become
convinced that foreign devils are at work.
His response bears an eerie similarity to today’s headlines. To prevent further change, he increases
security at the border, commences military exercises, and otherwise prepares for
war. What was once a peaceful kingdom turns
into a dominion of fear.
As terror descends upon the land, many of the King’s
subjects, chiefly Lady Aberlin and Daniel Striped Tiger, become increasingly concerned. Lamenting the situation, Daniel has a wild
idea (what other kind would you expect from a tiger?). Turning to Lady Aberlin, he suggests they float
‘peace balloons’ over King Friday’s castle to let him know that his subjects
want peace. It seems silly, but the dissenters
get to work, filling balloons with helium and writing messages on them: ‘love,’
‘peaceful coexistence,’ ‘tenderness,’ and most obviously, ‘peace.’ They then send the balloons Friday’s
way.
The balloons land inside the castle grounds. At first, the paranoid Friday thinks they are
enemy paratroopers. But as he reads the
messages, he comes to his senses. ‘Stop all the fighting!’ he shouts. Repenting of his foolishness, he calls off
all preparations for war, and restores peace to The Land of Make Believe.
Now, this is where the cynic rolls his or her eyes and says, ‘That’s
a nice story. But for crying out loud,
it’s a children’s TV show, and it takes place in The Land of Make Believe! It doesn’t work that way in the real
world, bub. In the real world, those who
turn their swords into plowshares wind up plowing the fields of those who didn’t. Better to be ready. To do it to them before they do it to us.’
But the cynic is wrong.
G.K. Chesterton famously quipped, ‘Christianity has not been
tried and found wanting. It has been
found difficult and left untried.’ For
the most part, we can apply this to the quest for peace. War seduces us by promising results. It’s an effective way, so the argument goes,
to deal with your enemies. Never mind
the carnage it leaves behind. It’s the
price you pay to protect yourself. But there
is another option, the option of nonviolence.
And oddly enough, when it is tried, nonviolence works.
Consider Gandhi’s nonviolent revolution in India (built upon
the teachings of Jesus in the Sermon on the Mount), a revolution that took on
an empire and won without firing of a shot.
Or look to the Civil Rights Movement in America in the 1960’s, when the
Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King and many others armed themselves with nothing
but love and determination and brought about positive change. Go further back in time to Saint Patrick’s missionary
work in Ireland, when he helped change a savage land into the pacific outpost
that saved civilization (see Thomas Cahill’s masterful book, How The Irish
Saved Civilization). Read the
stories of how the Iron Curtain and Communism fell in Eastern Europe before
candles and prayers. Or the story of the
five martyred missionaries in Ecuador whose nonviolence became the catalyst for
the transformation of a culture that was perhaps the most violent on earth into
a community of peace (you can watch the movies, The End of the Spear or Beyond
the Gates of Splendor to learn about that amazing story).
The truth is that when people creatively seek peaceful resolutions
to conflict, incredible things happen. Yes,
it is often at a cost. But a far lower one
than the cost of war. Nonviolence and
peace may seem silly and difficult, as ridiculous even as floating balloons
over a castle to prevent a war. But
history shows that when people seek creative and ridiculous solutions, they
often wind up changing the world.
Anyway, that’s what Mr. Rogers thought.
And guess what? It’s
what God thinks too. For when God established
his plan to save the world, he did something as nonviolent and ridiculous –
perhaps more so – as floating balloons over a castle. He sent a baby into the heart of the Roman
Empire, a baby who grew to face the world with no weapons but prayer, unlimited love, and the guidance of his
heavenly Abba, a baby who grew to be a man who would courageously embrace death
upon a cross as the way to crush evil.
Yeah, God is pretty crazy.
As crazy, if not more so, than Daniel Tiger. But he is also pretty darn creative in his response
to a sinful and violent world.
Which is why, when danger lurks in our world, when change
threatens to undermine our ‘kingdoms,’ we can’t respond as king Friday
originally did. We need to be more like
Daniel Tiger. We need to be ridiculously
creative and try crazy things in order to achieve peace. Because believe it or not, doing crazy things
is God’s way of doing things. And
believe it or not, it works.
Maybe it’s time we all started floating some balloons of our
own.
Under Christ’s Mercy,
Brent
Note: Story from Mr. Rogers’ first week of programming is adapted
from Michael Long’s Peaceful Neighbor: Discovering the Countercultural
Mister Rogers.
