by Anna Zaros
Advent begins the new liturgical year. The word advent means coming. Advent is the season that prepares us for celebrating Jesus’ comings among us—first as his birth in Bethlehem, ultimately at his second coming in glory, and today in every Eucharist and every person.
During the season of Advent we prepare and wait for Jesus with great anticipation because as Christians we believe that the birth of Jesus will bring renewal to the earth. With Jesus comes new hope for the salvation of humanity.
Hope for a renewed, peaceful world is not new. In this Sunday’s first reading we learn about the prophet Isaiah and his description of Israel’s ancient longing for peace.
As a prophet, Isaiah spoke for God to the king and the people of Israel for more than 40 years (742-700 B.C.). In his lifetime Assyria became a superpower, defeated the northern kingdom of Israel, destroyed its orchards and olive trees, and brought in new settlers. In Sunday’s first reading, Isaiah envisions nations no longer studying war but “walking in the light of God.”
In the days to come
the mountain of God’s house
shall be established
as the highest mountain
and shall be raised above the hills.
All the nations will stream to it.
Many people will come and say,
“Come, let us go up
to the mountain of God,
to the house of the God of Jacob,
that the Holy One
may teach us God’s ways
and that we may walk in God’s path.”
For from Zion
shall go forth instruction:
the word of the Holy One,
from Jerusalem.
God will judge between nations
and arbitrate for many peoples.
Nations will beat their swords
into plowshares,
their shears into pruning hooks;
nation shall not raise sword
against nation, neither
shall they learn war any more.
Isaiah 2.1-5
In this image Isaiah envisions the low hill on which the temple stands in Jerusalem as Earth’s highest mountain—an Everest of peace. He imagines the peoples of the whole world streaming up its paths to learn the way of peace. He hopes for a time when nations will no longer have a need for weapons like spears and swords, but will instead turn them into tools for farming.
Isaiah’s ancient image is still relevant today. Numerous wars and violent conflicts among and within nations continue to plague the world’s peoples. Today many peace activists use this passage from Isaiah as a rallying cry for change, “We are going to study war no more!” Our Catholic Church, drawing on the wisdom of Isaiah and other biblical teachings, calls for peace among nations and an end to war in our world.
While an end to war is an important goal, Isaiah’s image also indicates the need for peace among people. In his image, not only do nations cease fighting, but individual people choose to walk in God’s path of peace. For true peace to come about in our world an absence of fighting is not enough, instead we need what peace studies scholars call a “positive peace.”
To have positive peace means that there is an absence of all forms of violence, not only physical violence, whether that be discrimination or inequality, or forms of psychological violence. A treaty that stops a violent war brings about an incomplete peace as long as people in that country are still suffering from poverty or oppression.
A positive peace can be brought about when there is an end to injustice, inequality, and discrimination in all aspects of society. When the world attains positive peace, all humans will be able to flourish to their fullest potential.
Positive peace starts with each person. We can mirror the world we would like to see in our personal relationships. Being just and loving towards people we encounter in our daily lives, like friends and family, is the first step in spreading peace throughout the world.
Building peace in Isaiah’s time was a monstrous, but with God’s help, possible task; this is still the same today. To achieve peace, we have to work both in ourselves and in our common life in the world.
A firm determination to respect the dignity of other individuals and peoples along with the deliberate practice of friendliness are absolutely necessary for the achievement of peace.
Catechism of the Catholic Church #1914-1915