{"id":24,"date":"2011-03-29T21:04:55","date_gmt":"2011-03-30T01:04:55","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/abfifer.com\/blog\/?p=24"},"modified":"2021-04-19T16:01:08","modified_gmt":"2021-04-19T20:01:08","slug":"colorful-peacemaking","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/abfifer.com\/blog\/2011\/03\/colorful-peacemaking\/","title":{"rendered":"Colorful Peacemaking"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a>Did you know that this is the time of the year when people of Indian descent celebrate an ancient festival of spring called “Holi” or “Phagwah”, that includes peacemaking? Everyone gets what can best be described as colored baby powder \u2013 red, green, blue, etc. \u2013 and they sprinkle it on people with whom they\u2019ve had a conflict. Here\u2019s how Karna Singh, with the Rakjumari Cultural Center in Queens, NY,\u00a0 describes it to Pulse of the Planet:<\/p>\n

“It’s a time when people try to heal any difference or disagreement or conflict that existed from the past on this day. And the fun about it is that the way you do it is, not by even discussing the problem, but just marching straight up to your brother who you quarreled with, or mother who you were angry with, and take that colored powder and spray them, or rub it onto them, and hug them and kiss them.”<\/p>\n

Will this really make peace? It won\u2019t help with deep sins like adultery or abuse, but it just might have its place. Perhaps you realize you said something to someone that came across as more critical or angry than you intended; or you belatedly discovered that you missed a friend\u2019s birthday or special occasion; or you neglected to return a phonecall. Rather than go through the awkward steps of apologizing, you can just walk up to them and throw some colored powder on them. They\u2019ll presumably know what you mean. It\u2019s a way to make peace without making peace. It\u2019s better than nothing! Of course it\u2019s not as beneficial as going through the true confession-forgiveness process\u2014but for those conflicts where we were probably not going to do that anyway, this at least puts a peaceful veneer on the relationship.<\/p>\n

Do some people throw colored powder on each other, year after year?<\/p>\n

It strikes me that our Western Christian culture lacks a peacemaking ritual. Jews have their High Holy Days, and the Amish have their annual pre-communion time, but mainstream Christianity lacks an annual reminder of the need for peacemaking. Columnist Ann Landers has tried to fill this void with \u201cReconciliation Day\u201d on April 2: \u201cSince 1989, I have suggested that April 2 be set aside to write that letter or make that phone call and mend a broken relationship. Life is too short to hold grudges. To forgive can be enormously life-enhancing. . . .\u201d A Catholic group is promoting October 4, the feast day of St. Francis of Assisi, as Reconciliation Day: \u201c<\/strong>Reconciliation Day’s large purpose is to contribute to the resolution of conflicts and to promote reconciliation and peaceful, even joyful, coexistence.\u201d (<\/strong>http:\/\/reconciliationday.net\/RECONCILIATION_DAY_STORY.html<\/a>)<\/strong><\/p>\n

From a New Testament perspective, every<\/em> day should be \u201cReconciliation Day.\u201d Jesus taught that, if while you are worshiping you remember that someone is upset with you, you should leave worship and go reconcile with that person (Matthew 5:7). We don\u2019t get to postpone it. But the reality is that we do keep postponing it, and an annual cultural ritual might be just what we need to initiate peacemaking. Where can I get some of that baby powder?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Did you know that this is the time of the year when people of Indian descent celebrate an ancient festival of spring called “Holi” or “Phagwah”, that includes peacemaking? Everyone gets what can best be described as colored baby powder \u2013 red, green, blue, etc. \u2013 and they sprinkle it on people with whom they\u2019ve […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-24","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/abfifer.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/24","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/abfifer.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/abfifer.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/abfifer.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/abfifer.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=24"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/abfifer.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/24\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":840,"href":"https:\/\/abfifer.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/24\/revisions\/840"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/abfifer.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=24"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/abfifer.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=24"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/abfifer.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=24"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}