CITIZENS FOR PEACE FEBRUARY MEETING
The Season of Nonviolence is from Jan. 30 - April 4!
Let us all make the commitment to practice nonviolence in our thoughts, words and actions every day.

Our February meeting has the theme "Choosing Nonviolence". We will be discussing 4 peacemakers:
Thoreau, Gandhi, King & Anderson Sa.

Think about how you practice nonviolence in your own life.

See you at our meeting at Unity of Livonia, Feb. 8th at 7 pm.

THE FOUR AGREEMENTS

BE IMPECCABLE WITH YOUR WORD
Speak with integrity. Say only what you mean. Avoid using words to speak against yourself or to gossip about others. Use the power of your word in the direction of truth and love.

DON’T TAKE ANYTHING PERSONALLY
Nothing others do is because of you. What others say and do is a projection of their own reality, their own dream. When you are immune to the opinions and actions of others, you won’t be the victim of needless suffering.


DON’T MAKE ASSUMPTIONS
Find the courage to ask questions and to express what you really want. Communicate with others as clearly as you can to avoid misunderstandings, sadness and drama. With just this one agreement you can transform your life.


ALWAYS DO YOUR BEST
Your best is going to change from moment to moment: it will be different when you are healthy as opposed to sick. Under any circumstance, simply do your best and you will avoid self-judgment, self-abuse and regret.

Don Miguel Ruiz

Peace to You and Yours with Love

Jerry

The only way to master love, is to practice love.
—Don Miguel Ruiz

Peace to You and Yours with Love
Jerry

Moveable Peace Presents a Letter Requesting a Michigan Commission of Peace and Justice!

The Citizens for Peace support the effort to "Move Peace" all over Michigan.
I have drafted a letter that will have a petition for the creation of the Commission of Peace and Justice. It will be presented on August 9th after a 10 day walk to Lansing. Here is the first draft. Comments are appreciated. Peace, Colleen


Letter of Petition for the Creation of a Michigan Commission of Peace & Justice

“The underlying key to success…is to change our culture. We need to go from negative to positive, we need to stop looking in the rear-view mirror and look toward the future. We need to stop being divisive and start being inclusive.” - Gov. Rick Snyder

The leadership expressed by our new governor gives hope to the 150 groups in the Michigan Peace Network – www.michiganpeacenetwork.com. It is time to celebrate the achievements of our citizens groups with the recognition necessary to continue moving Michigan in a positive direction. It is time to include the peace and justice community in the structure of our government. With the vision of changing our culture to one of peace, we submit this letter to Governor Rick Snyder.

To the Honorable Rick Snyder:

The Michigan Department of State Police posted the 2009 FBI Regional Violent Crime Report indicating that Michigan accounts for over 20% of the murders, rapes and aggravated assaults of the 12 Midwestern States.

The U.S. Census web site indicates that approximately 1,347,721 Michigan citizens live in poverty and about 1.8 million Michigan residents are the working poor without enough to cover their basic needs.

The peace and justice community sees a connection with the money spent on war, and the lack of money going to the State of Michigan to help with the human needs that must be met to assure a culture of peace.

By supporting and highlighting the work of the various organizations and groups working for peace and justice around the State, a Michigan Commission of Peace & Justice could be the catalyst for positive change.

It is time to raise our citizens’ awareness of the many peace and justice groups operating to improve the lives of all the residents of our state. Representatives from the groups could serve the State of Michigan by providing information, suggestions and alternative solutions to our problems. Utilizing the awareness of the grassroots network working in Michigan will assist our state in articulating and implementing positive changes to move Michigan closer to creating a culture of peace.

Therefore, we the people of the State of Michigan are respectfully calling on the Governor and the Legislature to create a State of Michigan Commission of Peace & Justice.

The miracle is not to fly in the air, or to walk on the water, but to walk on the earth.
~Chinese Proverb
Peace to You and Yours with Love
Jerry

Rabbi Michael Lerner
Join or Donate Now!
When Generosity, Love, and Kindness are Public Policy, the Violence We Saw in Arizona (& is pervasive in American culture) Will Dramatically Diminish
by Rabbi Michael Lerner

The attempted assassination of Congresswoman Gifford and the murder of so many others in Arizona has elicited a number of policy suggestions, from gun control to private protection for elected officials, to banning incitement to violence on websites either directly or more subtly (e.g., Sarah Palin’s putting a bull’s-eye target on Gifford’s congressional district to indicate how important it would be to eliminate her from the Congress).
On the other hand, we hear endless pleas to recognize that the assassin was a lonely and disturbed person whose choice of Hitler’s Mein Kampf as one of his favorite books reflects his own troubled soul, not his affinity to the “hatred of the Other” that has manifested in anti-immigrant movements that have spread from Arizona to many other states and in the United States has taken the form of anti-Islam, discrimination against Latinos, and the more extreme right-wing groups that preach hatred toward Jews.

The problem with this debate is that the explanatory frame is too superficial and seeks to discredit rather than to analyze. I fell into this myself in the immediate aftermath of the murders and attempted assassination. I wrote an op-ed pointing to the right wing’s tendency to violent language and demeaning of liberals and progressives, and its historical tie to anti-Semitism and anti-feminism. Once I heard that the arrested assassin had a connection to Hitler’s Mein Kampf, I reacted from my own childhood pain at realizing that most of my extended family had been murdered by the Nazis. So I pointed to the current violent language used by the right-wing radio hosts and some of the leaders and activists of the Tea Party, and how their discourse helps shape the consciousness of those in pain and provides them with a target. But the problem really is much deeper, so I’m sorry I put forward an analysis that was so dominated by my own righteous indignation that it may have obscured a deeper analysis, and mistakenly insinuated that all Arizonans were responsible for the racism in the current policies toward immigrants and that all people on the Right embrace the hate rhetoric of some of their most extremely popular hate addicts like Glenn Beck, or the ignorance of history that led Sarah Palin to label as "blood libel" the criticisms directed at her. I apologize again, as much for the tone of anger as for the content of that kind of generalization. And although Michael Bader has made a persuasive case that we must challenge media that pretends that use of threats of violence comes as much from the Left as the Right (see his piece at www.tikkun.org), I was very happy that President Obama's call for tolerance and mutual respect seemed to be getting a good response across the political spectrum (and only wish that his call to avoid violence was adopted by his own administration in Afghanistan, Iraq, Pakistan, Yemen and around the world--apparently unaware that if you train your own population to go kill people around the world, some will come home with a love of guns and a certainty that violence and toughness are the ways to deal with problems).

So here is the analytic key to understanding what we must do:
We live in a society in which the fundamental framework of meaning to life has broken down as the ethos of selfishness, materialism, looking out for number one, and “making it” at all costs, endemic to the capitalist order and a part of all previous class based or patriarchal societies. People increasingly see each other through the framework of “what can YOU do to advance my interests, pleasures, or desires?” People are valued by the capitalist order to the extent that we can help the elites of wealth and power increase their wealth and power. When we no longer can, we find ourselves unemployed and desperate to survive economically, socially ostracized, and lonely. No wonder, then, that so many people decide that the only rational behavior is to maximize their own advantage and pursue their own self-interest without regard to the consequences for others. In so doing, we mis-recognize each other, and are in turn mis-recognized by everyone else. Instead of being seen as the embodiment of a sacred or holy or God energy (what religious people call “being created in God’s image”), we are seen as beings whose primary value is based on whether we can fulfill someone else’s agenda. And in that sense, we are not recognized for who we most really and deeply are! This misrecognition makes us feel lonely and misunderstood by almost everyone.

When surrounded by people who only see you in these narrow utilitarian or instrumental terms, many people feel lonely (even inside their own families) and devalued. Of course, this plays out differently for different people. Some will simply become depressed and withdrawn. Others seek comfort in alcohol, drugs, sexual promiscuity, or promiscuous consumption of material things. Still others will seek the momentary experience of solidarity with someone at a football or baseball game when their team is winning, or in a religious or political movement that affirms their value but demeans everyone outside their side, or even in the fantasized community they access through Facebook or other online adventures.

And then there are many who find no such compensatory framework for the real pain that they share with so many millions of others. They become lonely and withdrawn and retreat into their own fantasy world, and in more extreme cases become mentally ill or otherwise dysfunctional. It is a huge mistake to imagine that these conditions develop independent of the social order--just ask yourself why the proportion of violence in the US compared to our population is so much greater than that in other advanced industrial societies (clue: it is not in our genes, it is in the way we have organized our society).

We at the Network of Spiritual Progressives have called for a new kind of politics that seeks to build a society based on love, kindness and generosity — we call it “The Caring Society — Caring for Each Other, Caring for the Earth.”

Several of the people who knew the assassin said that they knew that he was acting weird and felt the need to stay away from him. A community college ousted him. No one thought to organize a group of people to reach out to him, to help him out of his isolation or to get him connected to professionals who might treat him. That is just not part of the ethos of a “looking out for number one” society. Too many people have been taught to think “don’t get involved with someone else’s problems — it might get you into trouble in unpredictable ways.”
So many people walk by the homeless, angry at them for having reminded us of the daily suffering caused by an economic system of which we are part but which we do not think we could change without spending a lot more energy than we have, and risking potentially dangerous confrontations with the rich and powerful forces that control our society. We don’t want to get involved with them, not only because doing so may open us to be vulnerable to their suffering, but also because we ourselves don’t feel that we’ve gotten the recognition we deserve for our own suffering, so “why should I spend my time involving myself with these strangers whose suffering would only add to my burden, particularly since I doubt I have the capacity to do much for them?”

Too many people imagine that we can simply turn our back on the suffering of others, or control it through a military, police, and psychiatric system when the daily barrage of media propaganda hasn’t been sufficient to keep the “dangerous others” in line. Yet we are mistaken, because the suffering of others cannot be escaped and manifests in the election of increasingly right-wing politicians, in crime, and in psychotic behavior from people who may someday enter our personal space in a violent way as did the assassin in Tucson! At your local supermarket, or on the highways, or in a movie theatre or coffee shop or in a shopping mall, or where your children go to school! It has already happened in all of these places, and it will get worse!!! Or perhaps you imagine you could just stay in your home and never leave, and thus be protected? A far more rational, though by no means easy, way to get lasting protection for yourself and your children or grandchildren is to create the Caring Society.

Creating a caring society would require a new bottom line so that every social and governmental policy, every corporation, every school and university, and even every personal behavior is judged to be rational, productive or efficient not only to the extent that it maximizes money or power, but also to the extent that it maximizes love and caring, kindness and generosity, and ethical and ecological sensitivity, as well as enhances our capacity to respond to the universe with awe, wonder and radical amazement at the grandeur and mystery of all that is. Allow yourself to imagine a society based on these principles, teaching them in schools, making them the core of the message of the media, and rewarding the behavior of those who embody this New Bottom Line in their work world and/or in their personal lives. This is the Public Policy that would make a huge reduction in violence in our lives and our society!!!

Two major policy initiatives embody this approach and need your support:

1. The ESRA (Environmental and Social Responsibility Amendment) to the U.S. Constitution being introduced into Congress this week on the first anniversary of the Supreme Court’s “Citizens United” decision. The ESRA aims not only to overturn that decision but also to eliminate all private money in national elections and replace it with public funding. It requires media to supply free and equal time for all major candidates while banning private advertising during the months before the election, and it requires large corporations to get a new corporate charter once every five years — a process that requires them to prove a satisfactory history of environmental and social responsibility to a jury of ordinary citizens using the new bottom line as their guide for assessing corporate social responsibility. The ESRA also requires teaching the values of caring for each other and for the earth at every grade level in any school receiving public funding directly or indirectly (please read it and ask your elected representatives and your city council and state legislature to endorse it — www.spiritualprogressives.org/ESRA and join our campaign to build public support).

2. The GMP (Global Marshall Plan) which would replace the strategy of domination as the way to achieve Homeland Security with a strategy of generosity. The GMP would commit the United States to dedicating 1-2 percent of our annual Gross Domestic Product each year for the next twenty to a program to eliminate domestic and global poverty, homelessness, hunger, and inadequate education and inadequate health care. The program would also seek to repair the global environment and enlist all the other advanced industrial countries in this same venture. (Please read it and ask your elected representatives and your city council and state legislature to endorse it at www.spiritualprogressives.org/GMP and join our campaign to build public support.)

Only within a society whose economic and political institutions are reshaped around this new bottom line do we have a chance of dramatically reducing violence and increasing our safety as individuals or our “homeland security” as a society. It’s not enough to have love in our hearts, because the assumptions and consciousness that is shaped by our contemporary schools, media, and daily experience in the world of work dramatically shape the minds of everyone around us in ways that make it near impossible for anyone but the most privileged or the born saints to keep true to the values of love, kindness, generosity, and caring for each other and the earth while we maneuver through daily life and try to make a living.
Anything short of that societal transformation toward the Caring Society is actually utopian and fanciful, and leads to blaming each other or some group or policy option for the irrational behaviors that are tearing our society apart. So, yes of course, gun control would be helpful as would more psychological support services. Yes, the violent discourse of the Right, like the violence that young men are taught to esteem as they are given the option of “serving their country” through the armed services with its legalized murder of Afghanis and Iraqis, and the media saturation with violence all contribute to our normalizing individual and social pathology, are not just “background” but infuse the consciousness of everyone with the notion that violence is the “realistic way” to deal with whoever is deemed “the enemy.”

We Americans shut our eyes to the 12,000-20,000 children under the age of five who die each day (approximately 12 million a year) from hunger or diseases related to malnutrition and inadequate health care facilities around the world. We don’t even count this as violence, though the mal-distribution of wealth and hence of food and health care are part of the system in which we daily participate and to which we pay our taxes and support by our consumerism. We shut our eyes to the suffering of the poor in our own society, not realizing that in so doing or in supporting lower taxes and cuts of government services we are striking out against the poor in violent ways, guaranteeing that they will be thrown from their homes and denied adequate food, shelter, and health care. We refuse to see the structural violence built into the daily operations of the global economic system of which we are a central part and the violence that we do when we vote against those who would provide adequate support for the poor, the homeless, the downtrodden.

Yet we must not forget that all this violence is only a manifestation of the violence to our humanity that occurs daily in a society in which each of us is constantly being devalued and mis-recognized unless we clawed our way to the top of the economic or political ladders to become “successful.” So I understand and sympathize with those on the Right who say, “hey, don’t blame me” because in fact their behaviors are just another part of the cry of pain that so many people feel deeply and have no way of understanding or dealing with. Our society is bursting with the silent screams of tens of millions of people suffering systematic and daily assaults on their dignity, their humanity, and their capacities to be loving, kind, gentle, and generous. So much unrecognized and pervasive pain! Until we transform this big picture, all the little efforts, all the noble reforms, all the good intentions, will amount to little. Moreover, and this is the point missed by those who say “later we’ll deal with that pain, but first we must defeat the Right and provide jobs and food and shelter,” we will never be in a position to deliver on people’s material needs until we build a movement of the majority of Americans to do that, and we will never succeed in building such a movement until we can effectively address this pervasive pain and provide adequate alternatives to the pain reduction provided by fundamentalist religions, drugs, alcohol, profligate materialism, and politics aimed at blaming some relatively powerless group for all the pain whose origin actually lies in the fundamental ethos of our global economic and political system. And that, more than anything else, is why we need a worldwide tikkun olam (healing, repair and transformation of the world). How to get there is described in the Spiritual Covenant with America that guides Tikkun's action and education arm: The Network of Spiritual Progressives.

Rabbi Michael Lerner is editor of Tikkun, chair of the interfaith Network of Spiritual Progressives, and rabbi of Beyt Tikkun synagogue. To see how to turn these ideas into actual political practice, read the Environmental and Social Responsibility Amendment to the U.S. Constitution (ESRA) and the Global Marshall Plan (GMP), and then please join as a member of the Network of Spiritual Progressives (all can be found at www.spiritualprogressives.org).

Slow down, pause, become still. Notice your breath and breathe.
With softness and tenderness bring awareness to
How we focus on our differences rather than our similarities
How we find guilt in our brothers/sisters rather than their innocence
How we seek for all the answers outside our self when all the answers are within
How we come from a space of lack or deficiency rather than a space of fullness and completeness
How we are always complaining, finding fault, and criticizing rather than knowing our experiencing through love, appreciation, and gratitude
What would it be like if you could interpret your experiences through the lenses of the latter?
What could your reality be?
Take a moment to imagine, to visualize, what it would look like, and then rest in this space.
Can you touch the preciousness, the gentleness, the warmth of your inner experience?
Can you sense your inner peace, serenity, your love of self.
Trust and know that it is already there.

Peace to You and Yours with Love
Jerry

Public Invited to First AAUW Meeting of 2011

“How to Decrease Violence against Women and Girls through Education” will be the topic of the AAUW, Livonia Branch January 18th meeting. Colleen Mills, president of the Citizens for Peace, will share possible solutions to the violence plaguing women and youth in the U.S. The fifty minute presentation is designed to increase awareness of the severity of the problem.

The question” Why are we violent, but not illiterate?” posed by Coleman McCarthy, a peace educator, will be discussed during the presentation.

This meeting is open to the public and will be held at Emmanuel Lutheran Church located at 34567 Seven Mile Road, west of Gill. It begins at 7 p.m.

The Livonia AAUW promotes lifelong education, and positive societal change to enhance the quality of life for women and girls.
For more information contact Colleen Mills at 734-425-0079.

Being worried pretends to be important and necessary, but it is futile serving no useful purpose.

Echkart Tolle

Peace to You and Yours with Love
Jerry

Citizens for Peace Ring in the New Year!


“Ring the Bell”, a program focused on putting a stop to domestic violence, will be highlighted at the first Citizens for Peace meeting of 2011, Tuesday, January 11th.

The work of Mallika Dutt, the founder of Breakthrough, an international human rights organization, will be shown in a video presentation. Mallika has been using media and education for 30 years to change the culture of violence. Her innovative program involves encouraging the partnership of men and boys to stop the cycle of domestic violence.

“Ring the Bell, or, “Bell Bajao”, began in India, and with the help of the Clinton Global Initiative and the support of the U.N. Secretary General, Ban Ki-moon, is going global.

The meeting will start at 7 pm. at Unity of Livonia, located on Five Mile between Middlebelt and Inkster. All are welcome. For more information contact Colleen Mills at 734-425-0079.

This season give your enemy, forgiveness.
To an opponent, tolerance.
To a friend, your heart.
To a customer, service.
To every child, a good example.
To all, charity.
To yourself, respect.
~ Oren Arnold
Remember, the greatest gift is not found in a store nor under a tree but in the hearts of true friends.

Peace to You and Yours with Love
Jerry

Thanks to Lynda Herman for sharing this lovely poem at our meeting!

What Do You Want For Christmas?
By Maureen Killoran

Headphones to grant me some private space…
tickets to some far-off exotic place…

What do you want for Christmas?

Clothing to dress me to paint the town red…silk
sheets to wrap me when I go to bed…

What do you want for Christmas?

Harry Potter’s a good one…the kids will go wild…
and I love him too, ‘cause I’m really a child…

What do you want for Christmas?

There’s camera equipment, that’s sure to appeal…
there’s software galore at really good deals…

What do you want for Christmas?

I look in my closets, I look at my house, there’s
nothing I need,…no, not even a mouse…

What do you want for Christmas?

Would it mater, I wonder, if there under the tree,
was a wee tiny package all wrapped up for me, and
when opened, ‘twas empty, no present I’d see…just
a feeling of peace and…serenity.

What do you want for Christmas?

And maybe compassion, wrapped up with a bow, a
gentle enfolding so really I’d know what could and
what couldn’t, what is and what ain’t. Just some
understanding. (I won’t be a saint.)

What do you want for Christmas?

It’s asking too much, now, to ask for world peace, but
on my list it’s up there, that wars may soon cease.
and justice, for children, that all may be fed, and
wanted, and cuddled and tucked into bed.

What do you want for Christmas?

The economy needs us, or so we’ve been told…
spending our dollars in purchases bold..but still,
in the silence of this holy night, I know what I want
most is not sold with bright lights. What I deeply
need is to set aside fear, to let myself reach out in
this coming year…to know with my heart the
whole world as my kin…that Love may be born,
and Peace may begin.

What do you want for Christmas?

Rev. Dr. Maureen Killoran is now serving in Vero Beach, FL as
an Interim Minister in the Unitarian Universalist tradition.

What you react to in others you strengthen in yourself;
What you do to others, you do to yourself
Echkart Tolle

Peace to You and Yours with Love
Jerry

Only the truth of who you are, if realized, will set you free

Echkart Tolle

Peace to You and Yours with Love
Jerry

Don't Miss the Last Meeting of the Year!!

Imagine being able to control stress, boost your immune system, improve your memory, and increase your happiness! Come to the last Citizens for Peace meeting of 2010 on Tuesday, Dec. 14th and learn about Heart Math and "Be Peace"! The focus is on living from the heart. The meeting begins at 7 pm.
See you there!
Peace,
Colleen

You do not become good by trying to be good, but by finding the goodness that is already within you, and allowing that goodness to emerge.

Eckhart Tolle

Peace to You and Yours with Love
Jerry

"Organizing for Peace" Video

Colleen Mills, President of the Citizens for Peace in Livonia, Michigan, shares her strategies and visions for organizing for peace with respect to the campaign for a United States cabinet-level Department of Peace in the video "Organizing for Peace".

When you can no longer feel the life that you are, the more likely you are to fill up your life with things
Eckhart Tolle


Peace to You and Yours with Love
Jerry

SEEDS OF PEACE

Peace made the front page of the Observer today, Thanksgiving Day!
The Churchill High School students wrote messages of peace on colorful paper & planted their "seeds of peace" with bulbs around their beautiful peace pole!
Here is a link to the article:
http://www.hometownlife.com/article/20101125/NEWS10/11250595/Churchill-students-plant-seeds-of-peace.
I'm very thankful to all of the seeds of peace our group has planted for the last seven years! As we watch our seed grow, we can all be grateful for our commitment
to peace.
HAPPY THANKSGIVING!
Colleen

No problem can be solved from the same level of consciousness that created it.
Albert Einstein

Peace to You and Yours with Love
Jerry

It is not just a person's physical constitution, their intelligence, their education, or even their social conditioning that enables them to withstand hardship. Much more significant is their inner development. And while some may be able to survive through sheer willpower, the ones who suffer the least are those who have a high degree of patience and courage in the face of adversity.
The Dalai Lama

Peace to You and Yours with Love
Jerry

What a fun 7th Anniversary Party!
Thanks to Linda for organizing the wonderful event. Here are the quotes with Native American Wisdom we shared in our four groups. We could select one a day to think about & share with others.
Thanks to Nancy for the presentation on the Medicine Wheel. It was a terrific visual with so much information included. I learned a lot!
Thanks to Caroline for her thoughtful reading!
Thanks to Lynda for leading us in the relaxing yoga flow with the Native American music. How perfect to conclude a great celebration!
Thanks to the planning committee: Dottie,Tada, Gloria and Becky for the planning, shopping, decorations, etc.
Thanks to everyone who brought delicious food to share!
Thanks to everyone joining the Citizens for Peace as we work to educate ourselves on ways to create more peace in the world, starting with each one of us!

HAPPY THANKSGIVING!!

Thanks & Peace,
Colleen

Citizens for Peace 7th Anniversary Party!

We will celebrate our 7th year of working together to create a culture of peace at our meeting on Tuesday, November 9th at 6:30 pm. The theme is "Peace & Gratitude".
It is a potluck party, so we will have dinner before we enjoy the surprises the party committee has planned for us. See you Tuesday!
Peace, Colleen

Love is what we are born with. We don’t learn love; it is already etched in our heart.

However we do learn fear. Fear is the obstacle that blinds us to the love in our heart.
So to experience our love in its fullest authentic capacity, we must unlearn our fear.

Our spiritual journey, the meaning of our life, is the unlearning of our fears and prejudices, to reacquaint our self to the ever present beauty of the love in our heart.

Paraphrased Marianne Williamson

Peace to You and Yours with Love
Jerry

We may judge a nation by the way it treats its children

Gandhi

Peace to You and Yours with Love
jerry

Holding onto anger is like is like grasping a hot coal with the intent of throwing it at someone else; you are the one who gets burned

Buddha

Peace to You and Yours with Love
Jerry

Fear is to love as darkness is to light. In the presence of one the other disappears.
We don’t learn love. It is already etched in our heart. We do however unlearn fear.

Marianne Williamson
A COURSE IN MIRACLES

Peace to You and Yours with Love
Jerry

People have a hard time letting go of their suffering. Out of a fear of the unknown, they prefer suffering that is familiar."

— Thich Nhat Hanh

Peace to You and Yours with Love
Jerry

Volunteers Do Make a Difference

Volunteers give their time and share their expertise, education, and talent. What motivates them to provide such a service? Come to a presentation by one couple, Ann and Rick Abdoo, who volunteered for twelve years at a Boys and Girls Club located on the Pine Ridge, South Dakota Indian Reservation. Hear their story, see the pictures of their journey, and learn about the Lakota culture.

Attend the Citizens for Peace meeting on Tuesday, October 12th 7 pm at Unity of Livonia. The meeting is open to the public. For more information, call Colleen Mills at 734-425-0079.

Don’t just sit there, do something
Anxiousness, agitation, tightness, constriction, harried, impatience, tension, nervousness, panicky, restlessness, uneasiness, uptight



Don’t just do something, sit there
Serenity, tranquility, calmness, stillness, peacefulness, relaxation

Peace to You and Yours with Love
Jerry

Tweets | Peace Week

Tweets Peace Week: "Do you know what astonished me most in the world? The inability of force to create anything. In the long run the sword is always beaten by the spirit. -Napoleon #peace"

Meeting Minutes for August 2010

For those who would like to know what happened at the August 2010 meeting click Here

Citizens for Peace Meeting Highlights Book Collection
Readings of selections from the Livonia Civic Center Library Peace Collection will highlight the Citizens for Peace meeting on Tuesday, Sept. 14.
The meeting begins at 7 p.m. at Unity of Livonia, located on the north side of Five Mile road between Middlebelt and Inkster. The public is invited.
The Peace Collection, comprised of several hundred books on peace and nonviolence, was funded by the Citizens for Peace. The library has established a “Peace Center” in the middle of the upstairs adult books section. The books are identified by a blue dove on the spine. Peace books suitable for children are located in the children's section on the main floor.
The Livonia collection is believed to be one of few if not the only public library collection featuring books with the theme of peace and nonviolence, according to Citizens for Peace President Colleen Mills.
The brief oral readings will be by members of Citizens for Peace and include both adult and children's books. For more information, contact Mills at (734) 425-0079.

My Declaration of Self-Esteem
by Virginia Satir

I AM ME
In all the world; there is no one else exactly like me.
There are people who have some parts like me, but no one adds up exactly like me.Everything that comes out of me is authentically me because I alone chose it.

I own everything about me.My body, my mind, my feelings, my mouth, my voice, all my actions, whether they be to others or to myself

I own my fantasies, my dreams, my hopes, my fears.
I own all my triumphs and successes, all my failures and mistakes.
Because I own all of me, I can become intimately acquainted with me.
By so doing I can love me and be friendly with me in all my parts.
I can then make it possible for all of me to work in my interest.

I know there are aspects about myself that puzzle me, and other aspects that I do not know.
But as long as I am friendly and loving to myself, I can courageously and hopefully look for solutions to the puzzles, and for ways to find out more about me.
However I look and sound, whatever I say and do, and whatever I think and feel at a given moment in time, is authentically me.

If later some parts of how I looked, sounded, thought, and felt, turn out to be unfitting, I
can discard that which is unfitting, keep the rest, and invent something new for thatwhich I discarded.
I can see, hear, feel, think, say, and do, I have the tools to survive, to be close to others, to be productive, to make sense and order out of the world of people, and things outside of me.

I own me, and therefore I can engineer me.

I AM ME !

I AM OKAY!

Peace to You and Yours eith Love
Jerry

"Inner peace can be reached only when we practice forgiveness. Forgiveness is letting go of the past, and is therefore the means for correcting our misperceptions."

Gerald Jampolsky

Peace to You and Yours with Love
Jerry

ATTITUDE
by
Charles Swindoll

"The longer I live, the more I realize the impact of attitude on life. Attitude, to me, is more important than facts. It is more important than the past, than education, than money, than circumstances, than failures, than successes, than what other people think, say or do. It is more important than appearance, giftedness or skill. It will make or break a company... a church... a home. The remarkable thing is we have a choice every day regarding the attitude we embrace for that day. We cannot change our past... we cannot change the fact that people will act in a certain way. We cannot change the inevitable. The only thing we can do is play the one string we have, and that is our attitude... I am convinced that life is 10% what happens to me and 90% how I react to it.
And so it is with you... we are in charge of our Attitudes”


Peace to You and Yours with Love
Jerry

If someone criticizes me, I am not any less because of that. It is not criticism of me, but critical thinking from him. He is expressing his thoughts and feelings, not my being.

Hugh Prather

Peace to You and Yours with Love
Jerry

ONE PEACE 2010 Celebrates the UN International Day of Peace

The third annual ONE PEACE event celebrating the United

Nations International Day of Peace, will present two visually stunning films at the Livonia Civic Center Library on Tuesday, September 21st from 6 - 9 p.m.

The program will begin with, “The Awakening Universe,” a short film by award-winning writer and filmmaker Neal Rogin, and Drew Dellinger. This beautiful film takes the viewer on the ultimate journey —from the birth of the universe, through the arising of galaxies, the formation of the earth, the emergence of life, and finally to the development of human consciousness. Using awe-inspiring images and a sweeping original score, this amazing film shows how science, spirit and ancient wisdom are all converging, revealing an entirely new context for human life.

The next film, “Visions of a Universal Humanity,” is the second movie in the award-winning Humanity Ascending Documentary Series produced by the Foundation for Conscious Evolution. In this riveting film, futurist Barbara Marx Hubbard brings together some of the finest minds of our time, including world renowned physicist Freeman Dyson, biologist Bruce Lipton, scholar Jean Houston and others who present cutting edge perspectives on humankind's potential to create a positive future for the earth. The film was inspired by a personal experience Hubbard had many years ago. “I felt every basic social system shift simultaneously as innovations and
breakthroughs seemlessly connected,” she said. “We are all members of one living planetary body—our story is the birth of a new humanity.”

The evening will be hosted by ONE PEACE, a local non-profit group dedicated to bringing people together to help spread peace throughout the world. This event is a rare opportunity for participants to experience beauty, inspiration, hope, awe, intellectual stimulation and mind-expanding possibilities.

Open to the public. $5.00 Donation Appreciated. Come early and browse the tables. Films will be available for sale. This is the third year the Citizens for Peace is sponsoring the ONE PEACE event. Please join us.

Contact: Colleen Mills
Phone: (734) 425-0079
Website: www.OnePeace.us

Take my hand
We will walk
We will only walk
We will enjoy are walk
without thinking of arriving anywhere
Walk peacefully
Walk happily
Our walk is a peace walk
Our walk is a happyiness walk

Then we learn
that there is no peace walk;
that peace is the walk;
that there is no happiness walk;
that happiness is the walk.
We walk for ourselves.
We walk for everyone
always hand in hand.

Walk and touch peace every moment.
Walk and touch happiness every moment.
Each step brings a fresh breeze.
Each step makes a flower bloom under our feet.
Kiss the Earth with your feet.
Print on Earth your love and happiness.

Earth will be safe

when we feel in us enough safety.

Thich Nhat Hanh

Peace to You and Yours with Love
Jerry

"When another person makes you suffer, it is because he suffers deeply within himself, and his suffering is spilling over. He does not need punishment; he needs help. That's the message he is sending."

Thich Nhat Hanh


Peasce to You and Yours with Love
Jerry

2nd Annual Vegetarian Potluck Tuesday, August 10th!!

Join us for our Second Annual Vegetarian Potluck on Tuesday, August 10th at 6:30 pm.
There will be lots of healthy, delicious vegetarian food to enjoy as we think about the impact of the consumption of meat in the US. Bring a dish to share or make a donation.
We will view the talk Ocean Robbins gave at last year's Peace Alliance Conference in DC. Ocean founded YES (Youth for Environmental Sanity) when he was only 16!
See you Tuesday!

Stopping Nukes, Stopping Wars

Phyllis Bennis will be the keynote speaker at the annual Hiroshima/Nagasaki event on Thursday, August 5th at 7:30 pm at the Zion Lutheran Church, 143 Albany, Ferndale
(3 blocks south of W. Nine Mile, west side of Woodward). We are cosponsoring this event. The indoor program will be followed by a Peace Walk in downtown Ferndale.

The most precious gift we can offer others is our presence. When mindfulness embraces those we love, they will bloom like flowers.

Thich Nhat Hanh


Peace to You and Yours with Love
Jerry

Compassion is like a sense of caring, of concern for others’ difficulties and pain. Not only family and friends, but all other people, even enemies. If we think only of ourselves and forget about other people, our minds occupy a very small area and even tiny problems appear very big. When you develop concern for others, your mind automatically widens; your own problems, even big ones, will not be so significant.

Dalai Lama

Peace to You and Yours with Love
Jerry

FILM: COUNTDOWN TO ZERO

It is predicted that this must see movie will have a similar impact on the nuclear threat as The Inconvenient Truth did for the environment. The film features an array of international experts and statesmen and ends with a powerful message: no country should have nuclear weapons! Showing at the Royal Oak Main Art theater with discussion following the 4:30 p.m. shows on Friday & Saturday July 30 & 31.
To register for the event and get FREE tickets, go to the
website of the Interfaith Council for Peace and Justice: www.icpj.net/countdown

Acceptance of suffering does not mean we should not do everything in our power to solve a problem whenever it can be solved. However, acceptance of the suffering that we are already undergoing helps us not to make it worse with the additional burden of mental and emotional suffering. For example, there is not much we can do about old age. Far better to accept our condition than to fret about it.

The Dalai Lama


Peace to You and Yours with Love
Jerry

Peace does not mean no more conflict among humanity. Conflict is bound to happen, so in order to keep peace in spite of conflict, the only realistic method is the spirit of dialogue, respecting the other side and understanding their viewpoint. We need to try and solve problems in a spirit of brotherhood and sisterhood, in a spirit of reconciliation and compromise.

Dalai Lama

Peace to You and Yours with Love
Jerry

First Step’s Domestic Violence Work Topic of Citizens for Peace July Meeting

Learn about the work First Step is doing in our community to help end domestic violence on Tuesday, July 13th at the Citizens for Peace meeting. Carmen Dominguz, a social worker at the Redford and Plymouth offices of First Step, will discuss the prevention domestic violence.

First Step believes that prevention is a key component to ending violence in our communities and manages innovative violence prevention and intervention programs. Since 1978 First Step has been working in 35 communities of Wayne County to assist families dealing with domestic violence. In 2007 – 2008, First Step staff and volunteers touched the lives of over 15,493 people. Prevention of domestic violence through education, advocacy and appropriate intervention is their ultimate goal.

Support the efforts of First Step by coming to the meeting and finding out how to help reduce domestic violence in our community. The meeting begins at 7 pm at Unity of Livonia, located at 28660 5 Mile Rd.

Within you there is a stillness
and a sanctuary
to which you can retreat at anytime
and beyourself.
~Herman Hesse~

Teachers who inspire
realize there will always be rocks in the road ahead of us.
They will be stumbling blocks
or stepping stones'
it all depends on how we use them.

~Unknown~

Peace to You an Yours with Love
Jerry

The secret of attraction is to love yourself. Attractive people judge neither themselves nor others. They are open to gestures of love. They think about love, and express their love in every action. They know that love is not just a mere sentiment, but the ultimate truth of the heart of the universe.

Deepak Chopra


Peace to You and Yours with Love
Jerry

If we have no peace, it is because we have forgotten that we belong to each other.
~Mother Teresa~

Peace to You and Yours with Love
Jerry

The U.S. Department of Peace: A Brief History and Bright Future
by Antony Adolf



George washingtonJohn F. Kennedy, that great orator if not practitioner of peace, once said: "Peace is a daily, a weekly, a monthly process, gradually changing opinions, slowly eroding old barriers, quietly building new structures."

But what most Americans don't realize is that this gradualness as manifested in the initiative to create such "new structures," a federal U.S. Department of Peace to coordinate and fund peace work nationally, has been part of the American Dream since the country was founded.

I was recently invited to speak on peace activism, peace professionalism and peace journalism (no, the three aren't mutually exclusive) at the Midwest U.S. Department of Peace Conference in Detroit. The experienced vitality of the attendees who came in from six states and dozens of cities re-energized me, and I returned home reminded that there are a lot of people who work proudly and effectively for peace despite still being in the shadows of most media. To be among them, sharing stories and ideas, was a privilege I am unlikely to forget, and with a bright future ahead, neither will the history of which we are a part.

Not only are there a lot of Americans working for peace right now, there has been ever since there has been Americans. Peace isn't just a fad that came and went with hippies in the 60s; it is part of the very fabric of this country, if also one we often forget or are made to. In a powerful presentation by the charismatic President of Citizens for Peace, Colleen Mills, our host along with sponsor The Peace Alliance, a perhaps surprising brief history of the U.S. Department of Peace initiative was given.

1783: George Washington called for a proper “Peace Establishment”.
1792: Benjamin Banneker and Dr. Benjamin Rush call for an “Office of Peace” with peace education in all schools.
1936: Dr. Frederick Kettner publishes essay “The Need for a Secretary of Peace”.
1943 -1968: Eighty-eight Congressional bills are introduced calling for a Department of Peace in the House or Senate.
1961: President John F. Kennedy launches the Peace Corps.
1969: Senator Vance Hartke (IL), and Rep. Seymour Halpern (NY), introduce a Bill for a Department of Peace with a Peace Academy.
1984: The U.S. Institute of Peace created (its beautiful new building is currently under construction).
1993: President Bill Clinton launches Americorps.
2001, 2003, 2005, 2007, 2009: Rep. Dennis Kucinich (OH), and Sen. Mark Dayton (MN) introduce Bills calling for a Department of Peace.
2010: The U.S. Department of Peace is named in Change.org's "Ideas for Change in America."

Of particular note is that peace has always been a bipartisan issue insofar as both Republicans and Democrats have been involved in the U.S. Department of Peace initiative throughout its long and distinguished history. The initiative is also global, and with successes in a few countries already. Will Americans lead or follow when it comes to peace in the 21st century?

As campaigning for the November elections picks up steam, we can each do our part to make some of it push the gears of the U.S. Department of Peace forward. We're in good company, there's lots of us if you look, and it's part of our and peace history, too.


Antony Adolf is the author of Peace: A World History

Photo of Mares and Chuck's grandchildren after putting together the Peace Puzzle we received at the Midwest Conference.

Date of doing the puzzle-May 18th, 2010

Brennan, Colin, Audrey with Grandpa

Peace
Do you think peace requires an end to war
Or tigers eating only vegetables?
Does peace require an absence from your boss, your
spouse, yourself?
Do you think peace will come some other place than
here?
Some other time than now?
In some other heart than yours?
Peace is this moment without judgement.
That is all.
This moment in the heart-space where everything
that is, is welcome.
Peace is this moment without thinking that it should
be some other way
That you should feel some other thing
That your life should unfold according to your plans.
Peace is this moment without judgement.
This moment in the heart-space where everything
that is, is welcome.
- Dorothy Hunt

Peace to You and Yours
Jerry

If we can change ourselves, we can change the world.
We are not the victims of the world we see.
We are the victims of the way we see the world.

Dennis Kucinich

Peace to You and Yours with Love
Jerry

Citizens for Peace Meeting June 8th

Join us for our monthly meeting as we write postcards to our Congressman requesting support of the Youth Promise Act. If you have not signed the petition yet, please do at http://www.youthpromiseaction.org/. We will also hear a report from the National Student Peace Alliance Conference from Meredith, an officer of the Student Peace Alliance at Schoolcraft. This important bill is ready to pass in the House. We need more Senators to support it. It could pass this year! We need your help to make it happen!
See you at Unity of Livonia (Five Mile between Middlebelt & Inkster) at 7 pm!

“Practice watering seeds of joy and peace and not just seeds of anger and violence, and the elements of war in all of us will be transformed,” says Thich Nhat Hanh. You water seeds of anger and violence by deciding to stay angry and act violently. You water seeds of joy and peace by deciding to be peaceful, no matter what is happening to you. Peace does not mean to be in a place where there is no noise, trouble, or hard work. It means to be in the midst of those things and still be calm in your heart, and then respond in a nonviolent way

Thich Nhat Hanh.

Peace to You and Yours withLove
Jerry

Hometownlife Newspapers Reports the 2010 Midwest Peace Conference

Thank you Hometownlife Newspapers for the very informative feature article in today's (May23, 2010) newspapers on the 2010 Midwest Peace Conference. The supporting photos depict the dedicated supporters of a Department of Peace and Nonviolence.

“Forgiveness is the fragrance that the violet sheds on the heal that has crushed it."

Mark Twain


Peace to You and Yours with Love
Jerry

Midwest Peace Conference Was a Huge Success!

Livonia was the destination of choice as Peace emissaries from five Midwestern states and throughout Michigan attended the Midwest Regional Department of Peace Conference hosted by The Citizens for Peace. The May 14 – 16 weekend event, held at Madonna University, attracted more than 100 advocates of Peace and non-violence from all walks of life.
With the conference theme being “Making Peace a Priority: Vision; Experience; Practice,” conference organizer Colleen Mills created a weekend program that exuded passion and humor with several presentations evoking tears from more than one member of the enthusiastic audience. “We wanted a balanced program with hands on activities and useful ideas that they can return home with” said retired Detroit teacher Colleen Mills, President of the Citizens for Peace.
Highlight of the conference was auxiliary Bishop Thomas Gumbleton’s thought provoking and comprehensive analysis of the consequences of war and the history of peaceful overtures in the U.S.
A surprise guest was Congressman John Conyers, head of the House Judiciary Committee, who came unannounced Sunday, and heard Bishop Gumbleton. Colleen Mills reminded the Congressman of the Citizens for Peace request that he work to get a “Peace and Non-violence” category added to the Library of Congress. He brought the house down when he promised to have Bishop Gumbleton meet with President Obama.
Focus of the opening Friday night activities was the need for legislation to prevent youth violence – The Youth Promise Act. Polly Anna Burnette-Egan, president of the Schoolcraft College Peace Alliance, recognized as the most active group in the nation, reported on the National Student Peace Alliance Conference in Austin, Texas. Hers as well as that of two other club officers’ transportation was funded by Citizens for Peace.
Colleen Mills opened Saturday’s program with the overview of the Department of Peace legislation. Other activities and topics ranged from “Students Empowering Students” by Northville’s Kevin Szawala to “Sharing - Idea Exchange” led by attorney Dennis Mazurek of Redford, who was responsible for initiating the first City Council endorsements for the Department of Peace, now numbering more that 38 nationwide.
A special video from Congressman Dennis Kucinich, author of the Department of Peace Bill, was viewed.
Restorative Practices, a technique of using peer influence in “Conferencing Circles” with adult facilitators, as a means of combating bullying behavior, was graphically demonstrated by Livonia resident Rosemary Doyle and a group of volunteers who played the roles of involved sixth graders and school personnel.
Chicago based journalist and Tribune Media Service Editor Robert Koehler led the group in putting their passion for peace into words. Another Chicagoan, Antony Adolf, author of the book “Peace: A World History”, discussed how we can prepare for a “Department of Peace.” Illinois State Coordinator of the Department of Peace Campaign, Karen Johnson, explained the Peace Alliance’s Strategic Plan.
Popular meditation teacher, Kathy Henning of Livonia, closed the main part of the day with a meditative experience.
The presentation of the Upper Penninsula’s Sue Belanger was by definition a unique “hands on” activity. She supplied all those attending with a 108 piece “Global Peace(s)” Puzzle, a depiction of earth from outer space. Then, working in teams of 6-8 members, the audience completed the puzzle as Sue narrated techniques for peaceful teamwork.
Westland participant Jeanette Scott described the conference as “awesome!” A Missouri PHD who attended with two of her students vowed to put into practice immediately her newly learned peace methods. One student said “This was a transformative experience for me. My life will never be the same!”
Another Livonia resident observed people from Kansas, Indiana, Illinois, Missouri and all over Michigan will be talking about the wonderful hospitality shown here, as well as peace.

Mourning and suffering -- with both experiences there is a loss or absence of something valued or precious. In suffering there is the absence and a rejection of the absence. Such rejection always involves a story or thought about the loss. In mourning, there is the absence held with the preciousness of that which is held dear. There is deep sadness, but it is held with an awareness of the presence of fullness of what is precious.

Robert Gonzales

Peace to You and Yours with Love
Jerry

Congratulations 2010 Essay Contest Winners !

High School Division

First Place Winner: Amany Killawi

Second Place Winner: Zeinab Bazzi

Third Place Winner: Doaa Al-Howaishy

All three winners attend Star International Academy

College Division

First Place Winner: Polly Anna Burnette-Egan, Schoolcraft College

Second Place Winner: Christa Mann, Davenport University

Third Place Winner: Rebekah Terry, Davenport University

Cash Awards

First Place Winners: $250

Second Place Winners: $100

Third Place Winners: $ 50

Citizens for Peace Meeting Highlights the Work of Riane Eisler

The keynote presentation Riane Eisler gave at the National Department of Peace Conference last year will be viewed at the Tuesday, May 11th Citizens for Peace meeting at Unity of Livonia at 7 pm. The theme was “From Domination to Partnership: Building Foundations for Peace”.
As a young girl, Riane and her family narrowly escaped Nazi Germany. Her exposure to extreme violence led her on a quest to change the violence motivated by domination. Dr. Eisler is a social scientist, attorney, and author whose work on cultural transformation has inspired both scholars and social activists. She has been a leader in the movement for peace, sustainability, and economic equity, and her pioneering work in human rights has expanded the focus of international organizations to include the rights of women and children.

Dr. Eisler is internationally known for her bestseller The Chalice and The Blade: Our History, Our Future and her newest book, The Real Wealth of Nations: Creating a Caring Economics – hailed by Archbishop Desmond Tutu as “a template for the better world we have been so urgently seeking.”
In her talk, Dr. Eisler says “we must shift from the focus on family values to valuing families.” She believes the real wealth of a nation is caring for its people and nature. The emphasis on creating “caring economics” will be clarified in her talk.
The meeting is open to the public. It is an opportunity to learn from a brilliant woman who has dedicated her life to research and promotion of a better world. For more information call Colleen Mills at 734-425-0079.

There are no mistakes
There are no coincidences
All events are blessings given to us to learn from

Elisabeth Kubler-Ross

Peace to You and Yours with Love
Jerry

Midwest Regional Department of Peace Conference Agenda
Our conference begins Friday night at 7 pm.
We hope everyone can come early to register and enjoy our continental breakfast on Saturday & Sunday so we can begin our conference on time. Also, note that there will be an Open Mike all three days so we can share our favorite quotes, inspirational thoughts and creative ideas!
Friday, May 14
6:00 pm Registration
7:00 Welcome – Description of Conference - Colleen Mills
7:10 Getting to Know You – Meet & Greet
7:35 Film – “Garden of Life”, Message from Azim Khamisa
8:00 Report from the Student Peace Alliance Conference - Polly Anna Burnette Egan
8:20 Change.org. - Author Antony Adolf
8:40 Open Mike

Saturday, May 15
8:00 am Registration & Continental Breakfast
9:00 Welcome & Poem (Common Sense)- Colleen Mills
9:15 The Power of Peace- Colleen Mills
10:00 Peace: A World History - Antony Adolf
10:30 Break
10:45 Restorative Practice Circle - Rosemary Doyle
11:45 Sharing - Ideas Exchange – Dennis Mazurek
12:00 Lunch – Working on Sharing Ideas
12:45 Sharing of Ideas - Reporter from each table.
1:15 Students Empowering Students - Kevin Szawala
2:00 Writing your heart's desire for peace - Robert Koehler
2:45 Break
3:00 How to use the Peace Puzzles - Susan Belanger
3:10 Peace Alliance Strategic Plan - Karen Johnson
4:20 Present Moment Meditation - Kathy Henning
4:45 Closing Remarks
5:00 Dinner on your own
7:00 “The Gift of Peace” Play
8:00 Open Mike

Sunday, May 16
8:00 am Registration & Breakfast
9:00 Welcome – Colleen Mills
9:15 Bishop Gumbleton’s Words of Peace
10:15 Taking it Home - Practicing Peace
11:15 Global Peace(s)– Sue Belanger
12:15 Open Mike
12:30 Final Thoughts

The People Speak
This is a link to the information I sent to The People Speak website. You can listen to the sixteen minutes that I got to talk with the host Basima. It was fun being on the radio! Click Here

Peace,
Colleen

If we could read the secret history of our enemies we should find in each man's life, sorrow and suffering enough to disarm all hostility.

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

Peace to You and Yours with Love
Jerry

The People Speak!

I have been invited to talk on the radio show The People Speak Tuesday, April 6th. This show will be archived. Go to the website: www.thepeoplespeakradio.net/.
to listen. It is very exciting to hear about public media with a focus on the issues that are important for us. I contacted the radio host, Basima Farhat, after reading the wonderful article Linda Chomin wrote about her in the Observer. The title of the article was "Livonia woman extends hand in peace"! She sure did! She invited me to talk on her show. Thank you Basima!
Peace, Colleen

Your task is not to seek for love, but merely to seek and find all the barriers within yourself that you have built against it

Rumi

Peace to You and Yours with Love
Jerry

CITIZENS FOR PEACE ESSAY CONTEST AWARDS CEREMONY!

Everyone is invited to the Peace Essay Contest Awards Ceremony on Tuesday, April 13th at Unity of Livonia, 28660 Five Mile Road, Livonia, 48154. Our winners are Polly Anna Burnette-Egan from Schoolcraft College, and Christa Mann and Rebekah Terry from Davenport University in Livonia; and Amany Killawi, Zeinab Bazzi, and Doaa Al-Howaishy from Star International Academy in Dearborn Heights.

We will all enjoy hearing the winning essays read by the authors. Kevin "Mr. Peace" Szawala will be our guest speaker. John Wilson will sing his song "Bridges". We will have a reception with our favorite cookies. Let's celebrate "The Season for Nonviolence" together!

Forgiveness will not be possible until compassion is born in your heart

Thich Nhat Hanh


Peace to You and Yours with Love
Jerry

I’ve learned that people will forget what you said, people will forget what you did, but people will never forget how you made them feel.
Maya Angelou

Peace to You and Yours with Love
Jerry

Love


We are members of one great body, planted by nature in a mutual love and fitted for social life. We must consider that we were born for the good of the whole.

Seneca

Peace to You and Yours with Love
Jerry

Panel Discussion on Active Nonviolence
We will have a panel presentation on the work of Gene Sharp, the authority on active nonviolence.
Join us for a powerful discussion on how we can commit to nonviolence as individuals and as a group. The meeting begins at 7 pm at Unity of Livonia. Bring a friend!

Diversity is a good thing
Prior to understanding evolutionary emergence our differences were looked as problems to be solved.
But from an evolutionary standpoint we can begin to see that our differences are the solutions to our problems.
It is almost like an ecosystem, the greater the bio diversity, the healthier the ecosystem can be.
The same is true in consciousness.
When we value our differences we can see there is a collective intelligence that is possible.
When we honor our differences we can find a conceptual common ground so that we can cooperate across ethnic and religious differences in service for a just, healthier and thriving future for the entire planet.

Reverend Michael Dowd

Peace to You andYours with Love
Jerry

A Weekend to Remember!!!
Midwest Regional Department of Peace Conference
Making Peace a Priority: Vision; Experience; Practice

Madonna University - May 14 - 16, 2010!

Conference Highlights:
Vision of Peace: The Peace Alliance Strategic Plan with Lynn McMullen
Peacebuilding Circles (Restorative Practices) with Rosemary Doyle & Jerry Mehler
Puzzles with a Purpose with Sue Belanger
Communicating Your Heart's Desire for Peace with Robert Koehler
Present Moment Meditation with Kathy Henning
Students Empowering Students with Kevin "Mr. Peace" Szawala
Report from the National SPA Conference with Polly Anna Burnette-Egan
Message of Peace with Bishop Thomas Gumbleton

The conference begins on Friday, May 14, at 7 pm. with a "Getting to Know You" reception.
We will view and discuss Azim Khamisa's short film "Garden of Life".
Saturday will start with a continental breakfast at 9 am. A buffet lunch will be included. The main conference will end at 5 pm. We will meet again at 7 pm for the "Reader's Theater" production of the original play "The Gift of Peace".
Sunday we are honored to have Bishop Thomas Gumbleton share his Message of Peace.

You can download the registration form in the Current Events section on the right.
The first 150 to register will receive a free Global Peace(s) Puzzle
Call Colleen for more information - 734-425-0079.
Also, go to www.dopeace.ning.com. to see the invitation to the conference on the national activism website.

Love Me


´Love me when I least deserve it, because that's when I really need it.”

A Swedish Proverb


Peace to You and Yours with Love
Jerry

Forgiveness entails the authentic acceptance of our own worthiness as human beings, the understanding that mistakes are opportunities for growth, awareness and the cultivation of compassion, and the realization that the extension of love to ourselves and others is the glue that holds the universe together. Forgiveness… is not a set of behaviors, but an attitude.

Joan Borysenko

Peace to You and Yours
Jerry

Peace: How Sweet it is!
Our February 9th meeting has the theme "Love & Peace"! For the third year, Kathy Henning will lead us in a meditation to connect with our inner peace. Reverend Dennis will talk about bringing that inner peace into the world to create more love & peace in our lives. We will have our business meeting following our two presentations. Happy Valentine's Day!
Peace, Colleen

The world is changing and the physical barriers are down now. It’s time for the emotional barriers to go down. And what better place to start than school?

Laura San Giacomo

Peace to You and Yours with Love
Jerry

Our greatest wounds are caused by separation, isolation, and loneliness. But there is not a lack of love on our planet; there is simply a lack of courage to show it.

author unknown

Peace to You and Yours with Love
Jerry

People are often unreasonable, irrational, and self-centered. Forgive them anyway.
If you are kind, people may accuse you of selfish, ulterior motives. Be kind anyway.
If you are successful, you will win some unfaithful friends and some genuine enemies. Succeed anyway.
If you are honest and sincere people may deceive you. Be honest and sincere anyway.
What you spend years creating, others could destroy overnight. Create anyway.
If you find serenity and happiness, some may be jealous. Be happy anyway.
The good you do today, will often be forgotten. Do good anyway.
Give the best you have, and it will never be enough. Give your best anyway.
In the final analysis, it is between you and God. It was never between you and them anyway.
-this version is credited to Mother Teresa

Peace to You and Yours with Love
Jerry

2010 Citizens For Peace Meeting Topic Calendar

Click Here

Activities and Accomplishments

There are many dedicated members working for the creation of a cabinet level Department of Peace as well as for the creation of a culture of peace. Through a variety of activities, we are able to offer opportunities that appeal to those with many different interests, talents, and know-how.

Click here to read "Citizens For Peace Activities and Accomplishments 2009".

Love

Love is what we are born with. Fear is what we learn. The spiritual journey is the unlearning of fear and prejudices and the acceptance of love back in our hearts. Love is the essential reality and our purpose on earth. To be consciously aware of it, to experience love in ourselves and others, is the meaning of life. Meaning does not lie in things. Meaning lies in us.”

Marianne Williamson

Peace to You and Yours with Love
Jerry

What shames us, what we most fear to tell, does not set us apart from others; it binds us together if only we can take the risk to speak it.

Starhawk

Peace to You and Yours with Love
Jerry

Forgiveness

What we need to forgive in others may be something in ourselves that we have hidden from our awareness. Forgiveness is the most powerful healer of all.

Gerald Jampolsky

Peace to You and Yours with Love
Jerry

Congratulations Rosemary!
Rosemary Doyle was honored at the American Association of University Women's "Salute to Women" Luncheon on Saturday, Dec. 12th. Several members of the Citizens for Peace attended the luncheon to support Rosemary & hear her acceptance speech. Colleen Mills nominated Rosemary because of her work as the Education Director of the Citizens for Peace. The AAUW selection committee was impressed with the accomplishments spearheaded by Rosemary.

When you meet anyone, remember it is a holy encounter. As you see him, you will see yourself. As you treat him, you will treat yourself. As you think of him, you will think of yourself. Never forget this, for in him you will find yourself or lose yourself

A Course In Miracles

Peace to You and Yours with Love
Jerry

Education or War?

Nations have recently been led to borrow billions for war; no nation has ever borrowed largely for education. Probably, no nation is rich enough to pay for both war and civilization. We must make our choice; we cannot have both. -Abraham Flexner, educator (1866-1959)

Poverty & Plenty: Reflections on Haiti

Join us for the December 8th Meeting. Kim Redigan and Therese Terns will give their personal account of their trip to Haiti where they attended the graduation of the first rural university in Haiti. It will be informative & inspirational. Bring your friends!

PEACE

Peace is more than the absence of war, violence, or conflict. Peace is a presence – the presence of connection.
-Louise Diamond

Only when peace lives in each of us, will it live outside of us.
-Deng Ming Dao

For it isn't enough to talk about peace. One must believe in it. And it isn't enough to believe in it. One must work at it.
-Eleanor Roosevelt

All works of love are works of peace.
-Mother Teresa


Peace to You and Yours with Love
Jerry

“A human being is part of a whole, called by us the Universe, a part limited in time and space. He experiences himself, his thoughts and feelings, as something separated from the rest, a kind of delusion of his consciousness. This delusion is a kind of prison for us, restricting us to our personal desires and to affection for a few persons nearest us. Our task must be to free ourselves from this prison by widening our circles of compassion to embrace all living creatures and the whole of nature in its beauty.”

Albert Einstein

Peace to You and Yours with Love
Jerry

Celebrate!!

Join the celebration of the 6th Anniversary of the Citizens for Peace on Tuesday, November 10th at Unity of Livonia at 6:30 pm. We will have a potluck, a silent auction, games, and music by Kriya! We will be celebrating six years of incredible work to create a culture of peace. Bring your friends & family to celebrate with us.

TEARS

There is sacredness in tears. They are not a mark of weakness, but of power. They speak more eloquently than ten thousand tongues. They are the messengers of overwhelming grief, of deep contrition, and unspeakable love.

Washington Irving

Peace to You and Yours with Love
Jerry

If you judge people, you have no time to love them.

Mother Teresa


Peace to You and Yours with Love
Jerry

LOVE

It is easy to love someone you love, but to love your enemy is to know true love

Mahatma Gandhi.


Peace to You and Yours with Love
Jerry

Men and Women

The ultimate measure of a man is not where he stands in the moments of comfort and convenience, but where he stands at times of challenge and controversy.
Dr. Martin Luther King , Jr.

The woman’s mission is not to enhance the masculine spirit, but to express the feminine; hers is not to preserve a man-made world, but to create a human world by the infusion of the feminine element into all its activities.
Margaret Thatcher

Peace to You and Yours with Love
Jerry

The best and most beautiful things in the world can not be seen, nor touched...... but are felt in the heart.
Helen Keller

Peace to You and Yours with Love
Jerry