Over the past three months, I had the opportunity to be part of a local project called “Safe and Strong – Women Shaping Communities,” through which I led Kintsugi workshops in different towns across Bosnia and Herzegovina. Kintsugi, the Japanese art of repairing broken pottery with gold, symbolizes the idea that our scars do not have to be hidden, but can instead become part of our strength and beauty. In many ways, that philosophy reflected the women I met throughout this journey.

The good guys. The bad guys. I grew up believing there were good guys and bad guys. Indeed, many movies and stories supported the idea. But who were these ‘bad’ people? Why were they ‘bad’? What motivated them? And where did those motivating desires come from?

This is now the fourth war I have lived through in Lebanon. Each time violence returns, it carries old memories with it. Old fears. Old grief. In moments like these, I often find myself asking again: How do we hold on to peace in the midst of darkness? How do we continue believing that God is good and that Jesus truly is the Prince of Peace when societies keep tearing themselves apart?

The Islamic Center of San Diego has long been more than a mosque to me, many of us at Peace Catalyst and the whole community. It has been a place of friendship, learning, hospitality, and our shared work for peace. Imam Taha and the community there have welcomed us for years as partners in interfaith dialogue, justice, and care for our city. For me personally, it is a place tied to close relationships and memories that have shaped my understanding of love, faith, and neighborliness.

Peace Catalyst Team Members Nick and Laura Armstrong live and work in Boise, Idaho, welcoming and developing friendships of mutuality with people who have come to the Boise area as refugees. Continue reading to find out more about their impact and the importance of the Armstrongs and their work in PCI.

One way to reframe our thinking about hope (and everything else we’re not sure we believe in anymore) is to focus more on asking better questions and less on finding the “right” answers. While questions themselves offer less security and control than answers, questions are also more powerful than answers, and more compelling.

In the gospels, Jesus is asked 183 questions. In all but four cases, he replies either with another question, a story, or an “answer” that’s a paradox. Not only that, but Jesus himself asks 307 questions throughout the gospels. So he is far more often found with the questions than found answering them. Why might this be? I can think of a few possible reasons…

For peacebuilders, for activists, for social changemakers, burnout is often accompanied by guilt and shame—I don’t have time to feel this way when others’ lives are at stake—and so we attempt to push through, putting all our energies into the fight until we hit the proverbial wall. But this cycle can actually do real harm. So how do we be changemakers while avoiding burnout?

My name is Dougle. I’ve lived and served in Russia, Ukraine, China, and now Lithuania, where I serve as a lecturer in Peace and Conflict Studies at LCC International University, helping students from over 60 countries wrestle with the realities of violence, injustice, reconciliation, and peacebuilding.

Peace Catalyst team member Phil Gazley started his peacebuilding journey in India, asking forgiveness on behalf of his nation for English colonisation and the harms it did, and he now works in Norwich to develop church unity, interfaith relationships, and safety in vulnerable communities. Read more about his work and about Peace Catalyst in Norwich, UK.