In the new year, we must seek pathways to the light

by Joseph Nangle, OFM
Pax Christi USA 2023 Teacher of Peace

These several days the greeting “Happy New Year” will be on the lips of people everywhere. It is the annual wish, hope and prayer that the new calendar year will see better times. But for so many of us “Happy New Year” 2024 is being spoken with another sentiment alongside: that the next 12 months will continue to present equally or increasingly the dark realities of the last 12.

Symptomatic of these somber but inevitable misgivings is clearly the indescribable tragedy of Benjamin Netanyahu’s unending cruelty towards the Palestinian people in Gaza. That crime is a metaphor for equally horrific events in virtually all parts of the world: Ukraine, Syria, the DR Congo, the southern border of the United States, to mention just the obvious. Pope Francis describes these sorrowful realities as “the Third World War – being carried on piecemeal.”

In addition, humanity faces a mortal danger to our common home; we are dealing with Artificial Intelligence and all of its disturbing unknowns; nuclear armaments are expanding and being “upgraded”; democracy in the United States is teetering on the brink of total disarray; a dangerously irrational man is positioning himself to win the 2024 presidential election. And Christ’s message being hijacked by Christian Nationalism.

All these existential threats to “life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness” for every person result in one way of another from violence. But a further tragedy is that virtually all those in positions of international and national leadership fail to understand this fact and therefore cannot imagine solutions based on nonviolence.

In the midst of these global, political and moral threats, we can find in Pope Francis a genuine world leader/pastor with intelligent social analyses and plausible pathways toward epochal conversion from the irrational ways in which so much of the world is operating to one that is sane.

Some outstanding examples: Regarding war, the pope says: “Wage peace each day to overcome the seeming invincible monster of war… We can try in daily life to face conflicts, avoiding any form of violence and oppression, even verbal, because at times it takes just a word to hurt or kill a brother or a sister.” This suggests that at every level of life, personal and communal, attitudes and acts of nonviolence will lead to just peace.

Facing the destructive results of climate change/global warming, Francis prays that God “touch
the hearts of those who look only for gain at the expense of the poor and the earth. That God
teach us to discover the worth of each thing, to be filled with awe and contemplation, to
recognize that we are profoundly united with every creature…”

Regarding Artificial Intelligence in his 2024 World Day of Peace message, the pope holds out a caution and a vision: “… [M]ay the rapid development of forms of artificial intelligence not increase cases of inequality and injustice all too present in today’s world… but will help put an end to wars and conflicts, and alleviate many forms of suffering that afflict the human family.”

In his recent Christmas greeting to the Vatican Curia, Pope Francis called for a spirit of discernment, defined as the ability to perceive, understand and judge things clearly. This practice may seem far from solving the overwhelming crises facing the world of 2024. However, the Holy Father cites this time-tested Jesuit practice as a framework for seeking pathways to “the light.”

“Discernment,” he says, “is necessary for our … journey as it cautions against the rigid application of rules without a deep understanding of God’s will …

“It frees us from the illusion of omnipotence and challenges the temptation to perpetuated familiar patterns … It is a burst of love that distinguishes between good and better, between what is helpful in itself and what is helpful here and now, between what may be good in general and what needs to be done now.”

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Joe Nangle OFM is a Pax Christi USA Ambassador of Peace and the 2023 Pax Christi USA Teacher of Peace. As a member of the Assisi Community in Washington, D.C., he is dedicated to simple living and social change. Joe also serves as the Pastoral Associate for the Latino community at Our Lady Queen of Peace, Arlington, Virginia.