Humans, our ancestors, and all sentient beings on earth have been living in a state of harmony, a natural balance for millions of years undisturbed. It is the primal human condition, our natural state. John F. Kennedy in 1963 called it "the most important topic on earth: peace." In his university commencement address, he was referring to what he called genuine peace, "not merely peace in our time but peace in all time." In as much as the freedom of conscience is mankind's inalienable right, peace for all the peoples of the earth is a sacred right that has to be respected and honored by every human individual and every human institution.
The United Nations has made a historic realization and reaffirmation of this principle in its General Assembly on the 12th of November 1984: the "Declaration on the Right of Peoples to Peace" recognizes that the promotion of peace is vital for the full enjoyment of all other human rights. The right to peace is a key and a precondition to all other freedoms that humans can possibly enjoy, because unless humanity enjoys peace, it cannot exercise its civil, political, economic, social and cultural rights. There is no freedom without peace; there will only be violence, coercion and chaos.
But peace cannot come to us naturally, we should make a clear and conscious effort to come together and establish peace in all nations. Just as war, violence, coercion and chaos were brought about by successive generations of destructive human minds bent to disturb our natural peace, we will need to deliberately counter these efforts by generations of caring and looking out for each other to restore or recreate the peace that was destroyed in its natural state possibly thousands of years ago. JFK also concluded that: "Our problems are manmade; therefore, they can be solved by man." Together, we must agree on a humane and human vision of a world not divided by mutually exclusive interests but united by common goal of developing the human potential unhindered by violence or threat of force.
All religions of the world, and all moral codes abhor war, exploitation, violence, and uphold peace and harmony, cooperation and taking care of one another. We are our brother's keeper. It is easy to let our primitive impulses to reign, so we can dominate our neighbors and subject them under our authority. But it is hard to keep our watch and ensure that everyone gets their fair share. Morality persuades us to always strive higher and be the best human we can be, it guides us to be our better selves each and every day. The death of peace is not something that we cannot prevent. Yet peace is not achieved easily. It is the fruit of our conscious effort and careful vigilance. It requires great skill and cooperation of humans on a global scale that we have never seen before. Therefore, it is not only “the most important topic on earth” but it is also the most ambitious and most noble project that humanity can conceive of: PEACE.
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John F. Kennedy in 1963 called it "the most important topic on earth: peace." He was referring in a university commencement address to what he called genuine peace, "not merely peace in our time but peace in all time." JFK also concluded that: "Our problems are manmade; therefore, they can be solved by man."
Humans and all have been living for millions of years undisturbed In as much as the freedom of conscience is mankind's inalienable right, peace for all the peoples of the earth is a sacred
But peace cannot come to us naturally, we should make a clear and conscious effort to come together and establish peace in all nations. Just as war, violence, coercion and chaos were brought about by successive generations of destructive human minds bent to disturb our natural peace, we will need to deliberately counter these efforts by generations of caring and looking out for each other to restore or recreate the peace that was destroyed in its natural state possibly thousands of years ago.
The United Nations' "Declaration on the Right of Peoples to Peace" recognizes that the promotion of peace is vital for the full enjoyment of all other human rights.
- unless humanity enjoys peace, it cannot exercise its first and second generation rights, namely its civil, political, economic, social and cultural rights.
This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License.
To view a copy of this license, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/
or send a letter to Creative Commons, PO Box 1866, Mountain View, CA 94042, USA.