Just as flower seeds and bulbs multiply each year, the seeds of peace multiply and blow around the world. The angels and gods of peace nurture these seeds and whisper encouragement to any person or group that shows an interest in working with them. Among these were Bertha von Suttner, the Austrian author who published the novel, Lay Down Your Arms! in 1889 and founded an Austrian pacifist organization in 1891, and Alfred Nobel, who was encouraged by Bertha, the angels, and Pax, Roman god of peace, to provide for the Nobel Peace Prize in his will.
Another person who was greatly influenced by the escalating desire for peace in the late 19th century was Leo Tolstoy, Russian author of the classic novel, War and Peace, who also wrote a nonfiction book: The Kingdom of God is Within You, in defense of pacifism. Tolstoy was one of those rare people who possessed a clear vision into the truth of things. Love had melted the shell around his soul and torn the veil from his eyes, enabling him to understand the true meaning of Jesus’s teachings: that to turn the other cheek means just that – to resist not evil. He asserted that the Church itself committed heresy against God by supporting war and capital punishment. Tolstoy wrote: “How can you kill people, when it is written in God’s commandment: ‘Thou shalt not murder’?”
Seeds of peace burst forth from the pages of Tolstoy’s book. The angels then carried them around the world where they could germinate in the minds and hearts of readers such as the Indian lawyer, Mohandas Gandhi. When Gandhi read Tolstoy’s treatise on pacifism he was yet a young man, protesting the treatment of Indians by the British in South Africa.
Being a Hindu, Gandhi first received his vision of a peaceful world from Vishnu, the peace-loving deity of the Hindu Trinity. But Gandhi was a thin-shelled man, who felt a oneness with other cultures and other religions, so his desire for peace continued to grow as he studied the words of Tolstoy and of Jesus. In 1908, Gandhi read Tolstoy’s “Letter to a Hindu” which was published in the Indian newspaper Free Hindustan. Gandhi was inspired by Tolstoy’s suggestion that love was the only weapon that could free the native Indians from the tyranny of the colonial British Empire. Once Gandhi decided to put Tolstoy’s theory to the test, all the Company of Heaven stood behind his efforts to organize the non-violent strikes and protests that would liberate India from colonial rule without a revolutionary war.
The 1900s composed the most violent century in human history. Over 100 million people were killed in two world wars. Hundreds of thousands of people died in other conflicts, and an estimated 170 million civilians were murdered by their own governments. But, while violence and hateful acts erupted throughout creation, Love never despaired. During the darkest hours of war, genocide, and terrorism, Love’s angels fanned the flames of desire for peace, and planted the seeds that would blossom into those pacifist organizations and anti-war movements that made world peace a realistic goal in the hearts and minds of many.
Some of the organizations that the angels helped form during World War I were the International Committee of Women for Permanent Peace, the American Union Against Militarism, Fellowship of Reconciliation, and the American Friends Service Committee. And it was during World War I that the angels emboldened the German and British soldiers to venture out of the trenches to celebrate Christmas together. They sang carols, played soccer, and shared their Christmas goodies. Even though the generals and politicians dragged them back to battle after the Season of Peace had ended, the brief holiday from war brought hope to those human souls that longed for the day when all people would live as one.
When World War I finally ended, the desire for peace was so great that the angels and gods of peace found much joyful work to do, assisting the formation of War Resisters' International and the Women's International League for Peace and Freedom in the United States, and the No More War Movement and Peace Pledge Union in Great Britain. The Paris Peace Conference that negotiated the peace terms after the war gave birth to the League of Nations which was the first permanent international organization ever established for the purpose of maintaining world peace. And even though members of the League had to admit failure with the onset of World War II, peace lovers on both sides of the veil were heartened by the fact that large portions of the human population had begun to set the goal of lasting peace for all nations.
The horrors of World War II, ending with the nuclear destruction of Hiroshima and Nagasaki in Japan, resulted in an even stronger yearning for peace, which opened the way for the Company of Heaven to bring together representatives from 51 countries to found the United Nations. The angels of peace are the invisible force behind the UN ambassadors who strive to maintain peace and security throughout the world, to promote better living standards for all, and to advocate for human rights.
The United Nations could not prevent the Korean War, the Vietnam War, the Persian Gulf War, or any of the other little wars that have exploded from humanity’s inability to see beyond the veil of separation, or to break through the shells that prevent human souls from blending as one. But each war and each violent conflict is accompanied by a peace movement, anti-war songs, art for peace, peace prayers, and a burgeoning number of pacifists.
The post-World War II generation has given birth to a new kind of human being: one that is born with a cracked shell from which the soul’s light can expand and merge with the light of creation. These human light-bearers are born with no understanding of war. They can’t imagine how their brothers and sisters can even think about destroying one another and the earth on which we live. Some of these children, growing up in the 1960’s, watched on television as the flag-draped coffins of Vietnam soldiers were carried off the planes, one after another after another. Amazed and uncomprehending, they said to their parents: “I thought war was something that happened a long time ago, before people grew up. I thought we knew better now.” These children would cry and feel very much alone when they spoke out against the war in school, and their teachers told them how foolish they were. But as they spoke out, the light-bearers found each other, and the movement toward peace continued to spread.
Modern technology has allowed warfare to grow increasingly horrific, giving nations the opportunity to destroy the lives of their enemy in grander and more malevolent ways than ever before. The hunger for power and wealth that leads to war has become more difficult to conceal behind the deception of a just cause. As war grows uglier, and its insidious reason for being waged more transparent, the numbers of people awakening to the necessity of replacing fear with love grows, too. For every army of soldiers that marches against an enemy, a larger army of light-bearers, angels, and soldiers of Love, marches with them, each one carrying the sword of truth. When the sword of truth pierces the shell that encases a human soul, light shines through the crack, and all is revealed. The warrior sees the soul of his enemy shining with the same light as his own, and he wonders how he could have feared him?
The shell of fear that separates one soul from another is not easily cracked or dissolved, but Love knows it can and will be done, because fear is an illusion, while Love is eternal. Love sees the tragedy and mayhem of war, and Love says: “Have patience, as I am patient, knowing that everything in creation is a reflection of the inner. As more and more enlightened ones experience inner peace and spiritual unity, changes will occur in the outer world as well. For now, I remind you of the words given by the teacher, Jesus: “Peace I leave with you; my peace I give you. I do not give to you as the world gives. Do not let your hearts be troubled and do not be afraid” (John 14:27).
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