wfn.org | Declaration for Peace from Anglican Church, Kyoto, Japan

[Worldwide Faith News <wfn@wfn.org>]

ACNS 2761 - JAPAN - 13 November 2001

Declaration for Peace

St Stephen's Church, Kyoto, Japan

Sunday 21, October 2001

We are a community wishing to follow Jesus Christ, who gives us new lives.

Jesus always lived with the least and oppressed, but never resorted to force
to liberate them. Jesus has shown us love instead of power, sympathy with
pain and wail instead of pity, and sharing instead of charity.

Indeed, Jesus lived for justice and peace of God. We see the peace of the
Lord through the life of Jesus. We express our sincere condolences to the
victims of the violence, which hit the United States on September 11. We
believe that respecting the dignity of the hurt life means never hurting any
other lives and creation of God again, as well as remembering a large number
of people who have been killed and forgotten in this unfair world without
any chance to be cared for. Following Jesus means denying all kinds of
violence. We believe that denying violence will never cause division but
will rather pave the way to reconciliation shown by the risen Jesus.

We reject armed retaliation by the USA and the UK as well as Japan's
dispatch of the Self Defense Forces abroad to cooperate with them. We
reconfirm that no war will ever bring about true peace in the end; the
violence will become a hotbed of another violence; and true peace will never
come unless we listen to the cries of the trampled people living in this
unfair world. Kyoto St. Stephen's Church will do oppose all kinds of war and
act for peace by trying to find a solution without armed force.

Kyoto St Stephen's Church, Kyoto Diocese, Anglican Church in Japan

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