Let there be peace on earth…

For decades, the Israel/Palestine situation has been a “touchy subject” in our communities, between friends, and within families…with lines quickly drawn, judgments made, and the complexity of the situation and its history over simplified. Recent events have inflamed communication, sparked name-calling and violence…triggering emotions even further as the unfathomable tragedy unfolds in the region.

As we head into the holiday season in the US, how can we reach across divisions to stay in relationship and complexify our own perspectives?

A team member shared that one of her non-Jewish siblings participated in a peace rally where “Free Palestine” flags were flown. Her Jewish sibling was deeply offended, and fiery words were exchanged. But the two of them then followed up to explore their radically different viewpoints in a one-on-one conversation. They were able to offer each other the grace to listen with empathy, reinforce their unconditional love for each other, and acknowledge and honor the common grief they both felt.

Consider your own ability to navigate radically different perspectives from your own. Where do you go…to impatience and anger? to judgement? to entrenching deeper into your own opinion?

Or can you model the antidotes to hate, aggression and othering by listening with curiosity, humility, love, and respect for our unique differences?

We at Activate Inclusion invite you to identify what blocks you from opening your heart in those conversations and then do better at sitting in the discomfort of difference.

This is perhaps the most powerful way we can all contribute to justice and the beautiful invocation to repair the world.  

“I imagine one of the reasons people cling to their hates so stubbornly is because they sense,

once hate is gone, they will be forced to deal with pain.”

James Baldwin