Ultimately, we have just one moral duty: to reclaim large areas of peace in ourselves, more and more peace, and to reflect it towards others. And the more peace there is in us, the more peace there will also be in our troubled world.
Etty Hillesum
An Interrupted Life
"Sadako Sasaki was two when a United States bomber dropped an atomic bomb on Hiroshima. She died ten years later of radiation-induced leukemia. In the hospital, she began folding a thousand paper cranes (the white crane is the sacred bird of Japan, and 100 origami cranes traditionally mean the granting of a wish). Her friends asked children in Japan and 13 other countries to make a contribution to a memorial in Hiroshima's Peace Park, which was set up in 1958 with the words:
'This is our cry, this is our prayer, to build peace in the world'
inscribed on its base. In the 1980s students of the International School, looking for a way to keep this message of peace alive, set up the 1000 Crane Club; they produced a booklet and asked groups of children world-wide to become members by sending 1000 paper cranes for Sadako's memorial. The first response came from an American school in 1986. Children, almost entirely unaided, had started a movement and established a globally recognised symbol of hope for peace." copied and pasted from www.ppu.org (peace pledge union)This year we made peace cranes for friends and family to hang on their tree with instructions and paper for them to make one and pass it on. Find instructions on how to here: http://www.pacificfriend.ca/html/how_to_fold_a_paper_crane.html
Amidst the hustle & bustle, packages & bows, tinsel & trimmings take a moment to find a little peace.....then be sure to pass it on!
Wishing everyone a Joy-full Christmas and a Peace-full New Year!
