Become lifelong learners in the school of peace

By Klysha Best

With war and political turmoil being the hot topic in recent days, one priest is calling on the faithful to view peace as not just a distant hope, but a skill to be learned, practised, and lived.

Speaking at the 13th Annual Tortuga Parish Lenten Prayer Breakfast at the Omardeen Auditorium on February 28, Fr Matthew d’Hereaux delivered a strong talk that linked Jesus’ Beatitudes with the urgent need for personal transformation.

“Blessed are the peacemakers,” Fr d’Hereaux declared, echoing the words of Christ from the Sermon on the Mount. “Not blessed are the peace-talkers. Not blessed are the peace-wishers. Blessed are the peacemakers. Those who do the work. Those who learn the craft. Those who persist when peace seems impossible.”

He challenged the gathering to look deeper and reconsider how they think about peace, not as absence of conflict, but as an active, demanding practice.

Fr d’Hereaux pointed to the Epistle of James, which teaches that conflicts arise from the passions at war within us.

“Before there is war between nations, there is war within us. Our unchecked anger, our refusal to forgive, our addiction to being right, these are the seeds from which every global conflict grows,” he said. “And if we want to be peacemakers in the world, we must first make peace in our own hearts.”

“Peacemaking is not something you achieve once and are done with,” he said. “It is something you must learn, and relearn, and learn again. Every relationship, every conflict, every moment of tension is a classroom.”

Fr d’Hereaux framed the Lenten season as a divine training ground where God refashions us in a 40-day intensive in the school of the Spirit.

He pointed to the traditional Lenten practices as the core curriculum:

“Prayer teaches us to listen, not to demand, not to insist, but to be still and hear. Fasting teaches us to recognise what we truly hunger for beneath the noise of our cravings. Almsgiving trains our hearts to see the other, to make room, to share not just our resources but ourselves.”

Fr d’Hereaux asked the congregation to consider where peacemaking begins in their own lives.

He urged parents to model peacemaking for their children, spouses to practise forgiveness, and neighbours to choose reconciliation over resentment.

“The world is watching us,” he said. “And the world is desperate to know: Is peace possible? Can humans actually live together without destroying each other? The answer, my friends, is ‘yes’, but only if we are willing to learn.…Humility is the first classroom of the soul.”