Peace with Dialogue – 2009-04-20

I was listening to an interview recently with the current mayor of Belfast, Northern Ireland. He was a member of Sinn Fein during the bloody years of hostility and hatred in Northern Ireland between Protestants and Catholics. He said something – out of his experience – that all world leaders should take note of.

He said: you cannot have peace if you do not have dialogue. And that struck a chord with me. I have heard that before. I heard that from Barack Obama when he said in his campaign messages, that we need to speak with our enemies in order to make progress and resolve issues.

This is not the normal human reaction. Our normal reaction in every day life is that if someone antagonizes us, we avoid them. We shut off all relationship and interaction with them. We cut them out of our lives, and we go on with our own.

But what works in our personal lives, with our friends, neighbours and family, does not really apply in the world of international relations.

It took a man from Belfast, which has suffered for decades in struggle, to open my eyes and my mind to this fact. I repeat his message: "You cannot have peace without dialogue". It is a simple statement, but hard to live by.

The current President of the United States, appears to understand this.