‘Let me hear the words of the Lord:
are they not words of peace,
peace to his people and his loyal servants
and to all who turn and trust in him?’

Peace is your blessing, Lord, on the human heart and on the face of the earth. Man and woman at peace with themselves, with their fellow humans, with the whole of creation, and with you, their Master and Lord. Peace that is health in the mind and wholeness in the body, unity in the family and prosperity in society. Peace that unites, reconciles, heals and gives joy. Peace that is the greeting of men and women to each other in all languages of the world, the motto of their organisations and the slogan of their public meetings. Peace that is easy to invoke and hard to achieve. Peace that, in spite of an announcement by angels on the first Christmas night, has never quite arrived on earth, never quite settled in my heart.

‘Love and fidelity have come together;
 justice and peace join hands.’

The condition of peace is justice. Justice that gives each one their due between persons and institutions; and justice that justifies the failings of man and woman with the forgiving mercy of God. If I want peace in my soul, I must learn to be fair to all those with whom I live and about whom I speak; and if I want peace in society I must strive for social justice in the structures of society and in the relationships between classes and between people. It is only justice that will bring abiding peace to our troubled earth.

The Biblical word for the good man is ‘just’. In justice I fulfil my duty to God, to myself and to all men and women. The sensitivity to recognise all men and women as brothers and sisters and to give each one their due with joyful readiness and open generosity. Justice even in my words which tend to be unfair and disparaging when I speak of others, and justice even in my thoughts which only too easily condemn the behaviour of others in the private court of my own mind. Then will justice emerge in my conduct and my dealings with all, and I will be ‘just’ as I desire to be.

Justice in my own life will then give me the right to proclaim justice for others in the public forum where injustices are fraught and oppression rears its head. Equality, openness, fairness for everybody and in everything. Awareness of the deep cleft between classes and peoples, with the awakening, both emotional and practical, to the urgency of the cause of justice for the very survival of humankind.

Justice then will bring peace. Peace in my soul to balance my emotions, my feelings, my joys and my sorrows in the equanimity of the heavenly perspective of things; and peace in the world to make reality the divine gift God brought with himself when he came to dwell among men. Justice and peace are the blessing that accompany the Lord wherever he goes.

‘The Lord will add prosperity,
and our land shall yield its harvest.
Justice shall go in front of him,
and the path before his feet shall be peace.’