War Springs from Ignorance
by Rev. Cory Coberforward
Readings
Ecclesiastes 3:1-8 (responsive reading for live service)
There is a time for everything,
and a season for every activity under the heavens:
a time to be born and a time to die,
a time to plant and a time to uproot,
a time to kill and a time to heal,
a time to tear down and a time to build,
a time to weep and a time to laugh,
a time to mourn and a time to dance,
a time to scatter stones and a time to gather them,
a time to embrace and a time to refrain from embracing,
a time to search and a time to give up,
a time to keep and a time to throw away,
a time to tear and a time to mend,
a time to be silent and a time to speak,
a time to love and a time to hate,
a time for war and a time for peace.
What do workers gain from their toil?
I have seen the burden God has laid on the human race.
He has made everything beautiful in its time.
He has also set eternity in the human heart;
yet no one can fathom what God has done from beginning to end.
Luke 23:26-34
As the soldiers led him away, they seized Simon from Cyrene, who was on his way in from the country, and put the cross on him and made him carry it behind Jesus. A large number of people followed him, including women who mourned and wailed for him. Jesus turned and said to them, “Daughters of Jerusalem, do not weep for me; weep for yourselves and for your children. For the time will come when you will say, ‘Blessed are the childless women, the wombs that never bore and the breasts that never nursed!’ Then “‘they will say to the mountains, “Fall on us!” and to the hills, “Cover us!”’For if people do these things when the tree is green, what will happen when it is dry?”
Two other men, both criminals, were also led out with him to be executed. When they came to the place called the Skull, they crucified him there, along with the criminals—one on his right, the other on his left. Jesus said, “Father, forgive them, for they do not know what they are doing.” And they divided up his clothes by casting lots.
Read the written message below with music videos
War is on our doorsteps more often than we admit, as it’s a small world and it is always at war. But a type of war often churns in our minds as well, springing from a similar cause: ignorance of our true nature and our oneness as the Self. Vladimir Putin’s atrocious war on Ukraine scrapes the barrel of degradation and even toys with catastrophic nuclear destruction, and yet shares in the root cause of a false idea of self – one that seeks to defend from, attack, control, relish in, judge, fear, and subjugate all things that touch its fancy, as this is the nature of this inverted wisdom itself. Yes, our minds jump from one ignorant type of modality to the next as there is a time for all these things when we stay centered in non-centeredness. Often these things feel out of our control – types of impulsive, habitual drives leading some of us even to murder – and many of these traits can be written off as normal as it is the common modality of our unawakened minds. But, in a way, this offers a solution in and of itself: all of our issues spring from our embodied ignorance of our shared Divinity, and can be tackled at their core with God’s sword of peace and truth (no matter our tradition), if we employ it.
Fighting our thoughts and emotions strengthens our mind in the worse possible way, continuing the cycle that we are often yearning to break out of. But often we don’t know any other way to escape some of our more unpleasant feelings. Further, many destructive modes of thought and motivation have fallen into a category where we believe that we fundamentally desire them, from wanton lust to seeking to control and dominate. We become so habituated to our addictions to these things, that we start to act as though they are a part of us although rooted in transience and changefulness itself.
We can see the worse of the cascading effect of this type of egocentrism in Putin today, who has convinced himself that his murderous invasion of Ukraine is for the best and is perhaps justified in his eyes. Unfortunately, this type of embattled action ropes in many innocent others, just as Christ was unjustly crucified. This war serves, if nothing else, as a catalyst for our world to awaken to greater compassion and an active peace, which at its best will be actively in tune with the will of the Great Spirit, who is the Prince of Peace.
Our scriptures and the sages, including Christ, call on us to let go of our war-heartedness. We often don’t realize we’re in the midst of our battles, so entrenched we’ve painted ourselves to be. These sources of wisdom point us back to see within ourselves the peace-filled awareness that allows for all perception, even the perception of who we think we are and the elaborate stories about our lives that we become attached to and defensive of. It is our concoction of ourselves that becomes defensive, attached, and controlling according to these sages, and not the reality of who we are – which is always at Sabbath and at rest, with the light of transcendent joy and compassion shining through it.
This wisdom serves as our invitation to come to be aware of our identification with a false idea of self, ignorant of our true fundamental nature rooted in God, known by many names. They say that turning from this ignorance is no different than finally finding that place of rest within, as our true Self in and as God takes no effort to build or to craft since it is never apart from the Eternal One. This description also indicates a healthy practice for us to better find ourselves: consistently taking moments to clear our minds and notice the peaceful spaciousness of life without our mind’s clutter, which it tries to convince us is necessary (and often doesn’t have to try too hard). Another practice is to come into a place where you perceive your mind without identifying with what comes up. Coming into moments like these helps us become aware of the ease of peace at our fingertips, and also helps us notice all the ways that our minds like to distract us with worry and yearning, gearing for a fight, turmoil, or self-centered preening, defensiveness, and control – which we find to ultimately be sides of the same coin (or dice).
It's funny that the part of us that knows relatively little but may believe it’s always right and knows a lot is the core of ignorance in our being, what we often centre in and call “the mind” even if only a small part of our minds. And also that the part of us that seems at first to be empty and with no opinion is the wellspring of all love and wisdom in its open spaciousness and all-embracing light and compassion. Our minds balk at the idea of spending any time here in meditative or prayerful spiritual practice, but even this balking is seen by this peaceful beingness and can be held and dismissed lightly, even in its warmongering, when this is seen. This is the power of the peace of Christ and Krishna within, and is always with us even to the close of the age and when we’re too distracted to notice. When you take some time to notice this peace, setting aside all other thoughts for a moment, note that you didn’t concoct it but uncovered it, and that you can still live your life with a growing awareness of this peace.
As we seek to empower further peace in this world, we must also continue to live within it and with ourselves. Uncovering this peace allows us to not only shirk our own most hurtful, destructive habits, but it also helps us in the meantime to live with them without so much embattled strife, without so much judgment and grief over ourselves even if our minds continue to tell us that we’re not good enough. This also extends to our world, for to love the world we must be willing to give up ourselves to it, as we read in John 3:16, loving it in fullness and in truth, with the patience of God shining within even as we accept any Divine call to action or to sacrifice. It helps to note that the scriptures are typically in sync in saying (from Buddhist texts to Christian, Hindu, and Muslim) that all things flow according to the will of God, also called Life Itself, the Living Lord, the Self, Divine Love, our Intrinsic Awareness, the Tao.
As Lau Tzu in the Tao Te Ching asks, “Do you have the patience to wait until your mud settles and the water is clear? Can you remain unmoving until the right action arises by itself?” War is present throughout many scriptures, notably the Bible, the Qur’an, and the Bhagavad Gita. And yet, each of these also paints a picture of an escape from war into heart and compassion and the peace of wisdom, even if war still rings around us and our hands raise a sword to defend. Although Christ went with acceptance and peace to the cross, we know that he prayed to ask if there was any other way. Non-violence may or may not always be the way that the Lord leads us when violence is presented to us, but it is a moot question if we are not in a place to be receptive to God’s will in the light of peace within. We can debate the theological underpinnings of non-violence, but there is no debating the flow of God’s will from our heart when we truly perceive it without our mind’s biases, without the need for dallying or conflictual ponderings. This is what these sages say arises when our hearts finally break open, often with the help of these practices that return us to the heart and through the open door where God already sits with us, as us.
Peace is with you,
Rev. Cory