A Call to Prayer for Peace on the Korean Peninsula

United Methodists and all others who strive for peace at home and around the world,

I hope you will join me, the Rev. Dr. Susan Henry-Crowe, and many others in praying for peace on the Korean Peninsula this Sunday, August 13th. You’ll find Rev. Dr. Henry-Crowe’s invitation copied below.

Wars and rumors of wars trouble these days with threats of nuclear attack. Seventy two years after the United States dropped the atomic bomb on Nagasaki, Japan, I’d like to invite you to meditate anew on these words found at the Nagasaki Peace Park, a memorial to that fearsome day.

Bishop Elaine JW Stanovsky | Greater Northwest Area

After experiencing that nightmarish war,
that blood-curdling carnage,
that unendurable horror,
Who could walk away without praying for peace?
This statue was created as a signpost in the struggle for global harmony.
Standing ten meters tall,
it conveys the profundity of knowledge and
the beauty of health and virility.
The right hand points to the atomic bomb,
the left hand points to peace,
and the face prays deeply for the victims of war.
Transcending the barriers of race
and evoking the qualities of both Buddha and God,
it is a symbol of the greatest determination
ever known in the history of Nagasaki
and of the highest hope of all mankind.

— Seibo Kitamura (Spring 1995) – “Words from the Sculptor” of Peace Statue. Photo by Jimmy G, CC BY 2.0

A Call to Prayer for a Just Peace

Rev. Dr. Susan Henry-Crowe

On this day, 72 years ago, the United States dropped an atomic bomb on the Japanese city of Nagasaki – just three days after dropping one on the city of Hiroshima. It is estimated that over 150,000 people were killed over those three days.&

Fast forward to present day, the last few months have been met with anxiety and tension around threats of nuclear weapons and warfare. Leaders in North Korea continue to isolate their country as they threaten Creation with nuclear missiles. Leaders in the United States agitate and provoke with threats of destruction. It is during times like these when we must join together in a call for the exhaustion of all diplomatic efforts before turning to military action.

The United Methodist Church believes war to be “incompatible with the teachings and example of Christ.” The Church “insists that the first moral duty of all nations is to work together to resolve by peaceful means every dispute that arises between or among them” (2016 Book of Discipline, Social Principles ¶165.C). The United Methodist Church also “supports the abolition of nuclear weapons…We call all nations that possess nuclear weapons to renounce these vile instruments of mass destruction and to move expeditiously to dismantle all nuclear warheads and delivery vehicles” (2016 Book of Resolutions, #6129).

In the Council of Bishops’ 1985 foundation document “In Defense of Creation: the Nuclear Crisis and a Just Peace,” the bishops assert that one of the “most important purposes of Christian peacemaking is the exercise of their God-given power in the political arena.” They affirm two essential means of fulfilling this purpose:

1. personal involvement of United Methodist leaders, lay and clergy, at every level in nurturing political action as an imperative of shalom, and
2. direct and regular personal engagement of our church members with policy makers in foreign and defense policy.

The bishops also make clear that peacemaking is “ultimately a spiritual issue,” and “without conversion of minds and hearts, the political systems of this world will remain estranged from shalom.”

Because of this need for spiritual and political peace, the World Council of Churches has designated this Sunday, August 13th 2017, as the Sunday of Prayer for the Peaceful Reunification of the Korean Peninsula. The National Council of Churches in Korea (NCCK) and the Korean Christian Federation (KCF) have prepared a prayer for churches to use on Sunday.

So I call upon all United Methodists to join in prayer this Sunday: for peace on the Korean Peninsula, for peace in the hearts of our leaders, and for peace among all peoples.

May we continue to faithfully follow the Prince of Peace, and find comfort in the words of the Apostle Paul:

“For he is our peace; in his flesh he has made both groups into one and has broken down the dividing wall, that is, the hostility between us.” (Ephesians 2:14)