Celebrate 8 for Global Peace in Kelowna Canada!

By Pam Kemp with Kelowna Linked & Synced in Kelowna, B.C.

On September 18 about 45 participants met at The Sails in downtown Kelowna, B.C., Canada for Celebrate 8, a peace walk to celebrate Canada’s #8 position on The Global Peace Index.  In keeping with the theme, celebrants, about half of them children, processed to seven additional peace stops, where at each a participant read a Positive Peace Pillar description and quoted a famous peace-maker, such as Jesus, Jean Vanier, St. Teresa of Kolkuta, Martin Luther King, Jr., Dorothy Day, etc.  A quartet sang at two peace stops, a children’s chorus sang at two, and a pianist played at a  Piano in the Park while we all sang “Make Me a Channel of Your Peace.”  At The Wharf ten children were invited, one by one, to throw a peace pebble into Okanagan Lake for each of the ten lowest countries on The Global Peace Index (Syria being last at #163).  We silently prayed for those countries as we watched the peace pebble ripples radiate from the centre.  Blue scarves and bracelets, peace flags made my Syrian refugee children new to Kelowna, peace pinwheels and peace flags provided take-home reminders to continue to be peacemakers.

Readers and singers represented a Catholic parish, the United Church of Canada, the Islamic mosque and Unitarian Church.  Together we affirmed our commitment to the Non-violent Peace Pledge and to continue to work for peace.