With the war in Iraq and other instabilities flooding the news, one wonders if we as Catholics have anything to contribute towards efforts to seek peace worldwide. Certainly, individual Catholic organizations such as Catholic Relief Services and the Sant’ Egidio Community have done much to promote peace over the years. Is there any peace-building effort that’s more comprehensive and also Catholic?
In 2002, the Catholic Peace Network (CPN) was founded. Based at the University of Notre Dame’s Kroc Institute for International Peace Studies, collaborating organizers included Catholic Relief Services, the Sant’ Egidio Community in the US, the US Conference of Catholic Bishops, the Maryknolls, and Catholic University.
The network consists of practitioners, academics, clergy and laity from around the world. They seek to “enhance the study and practice of Catholic peacebuilding, especially at the local level.” The organization also seeks to “deepen bonds of solidarity among Catholic peacebuilders, share and analyze ‘best practices’, expand the peacebuilding capacity of the Church in areas of conflict, and encourage the further development of a theology of a just peace.”
Membership is open to anyone who would like to contribute to a better understanding and a more effective practice of Catholic peacebuilding.
Annual conferences have been held in places as far as Colombia, Burundi and the Philippines. The next conference on April 13-15, 2008, titled “Conference on the Future of Catholic Peacebuilding” will come back to the Notre Dame campus.
Books on the topic of Peace from a Catholic perspective are available on the ActiveParishioner website.
