Do you advocate for those struggling, suffering, oppressed? Fantastic! Do you then go home and murder someone innocent and then take their suffering into your body - into the temple of the Holy Spirit? Not fantastic!

It is easy to get upset about Gaza (I have shared these feelings). It is easy to have “righteous indignation” about wars far away - but what about the suffering in your home, in your own body?

It doesn’t require any change on your part - except to go on an occassional march - to be an advocate for things far away. It takes another part of yourself to be an advocate for things and others when you are directly responsible.

Take responsibility for your own acts of oppression, your own acts of murder, your own aggression. You are part of the problem and only by changing yourself can you truly be part of the solution.

Let’s create a better world, starting with ourselves!

May all beings know peace!

Aroha nui,

Tūruapō

01 Aug 2025, 11.14 (GMT +13)

The Peaceable Kingdom

We are not of this world, but are redeemed out of it. Its ways, its customs, its worships, its weapons, we cannot follow. For we are come into the peaceable kingdom of Christ, where swords are beaten into ploughshares and spears into pruning hooks, and none shall hurt nor destroy. — George Fox, Epistle 203 (1659)