STATEMENT: Statement from Pax Christi Massachusetts on the Marathon bombings

from Pax Christi Massachusetts

Chaos, destruction and death visited Boston on Marathon Monday, bearing witness to the perverse power of violence to shatter families, annihilate hope, end dreams, and engender great fear in our hearts.

We members of Pax Christi Massachusetts, the Catholic peace organization built on the foundation of gospel nonviolence, and deeply committed to the Way of Peace of Jesus, wish to express our profound sorrow at what has come to pass in our beloved city of Boston. We mourn with the victims and families, and claim kinship with all who will carry their suffering far into the future. We pray for the healing of bodies and spirit and cling to the hope that in this city of great diversity, we remain united in a spirit of compassion and clear thinking.

In this time of enormous stress and sadness, when we are tempted to despair of meaning, Pax Christi recommits itself to merciful love which dissolves enmity and draws forth creative and transformative ways of building human community. We disavow the use of violence as an acceptable means of achieving goals, and decry its use in responding to evil. We profess that the spark of the Divine resides in everyone, waiting in patience to be called forth. We therefore pray for the grace to hold in our hearts both victims and perpetrators, that we may eventually find ways to reconcile one to the other.

In our yearnings for peace, we remember, too, all those others in our finite global community whose lives have been destroyed in irrational and unconscionable ways at the hands of terrorists, and through the war-making of governments. We humbly pray that as we seek to understand the root causes of extreme violence, our capacity to become bearers of God’s unconditional love increases.