Peace for Peace

      "Peace is in a hurry" announces Virgínia Garcez, the national coordinator of the program People who Make Peace and educator for Peace. According to Virgínia, who is as well an expert in electronics following up the First World Spiritual Forum, "the more people practice peace the stronger its roots and the more humankind will have peace".

      The program People who Make Peace is an initiative of the International University for Peace (UNIPAZ), with the support of eight other institutions, among them PNUD, UNESCO and the NGO Viva Rio. Virgínia's challenge is not a small one: she must disseminate the culture of peace among some of the most violent regions in seven states of Brazil.

      "Consciousness, sensitization, education for a culture of peace" – this is the recipe followed by more than one thousand peace agents trained by the initiative, according to the coordinator Virgínia Garcez. A Franciscan by conviction, she finds in the teachings of the great masters the inspiration to carry on…"Buddha, Gandhi, Martin Luther King; in Brazil, sister Dulce", according to her some people who "managed conflicts in a wise manner".

      "The most important thing is to practice peace", says Virgínia. To her what minimizes violence and negative feelings "is to know how to control one's emotions when they occur".

      "Dialogue and a peaceful conflict resolution are some of the many paths of the culture of peace" we read in the site www.gentequefazapaz.org.br on the Internet. Virgínia explains that educators are the roots, the agents the branches and the friends of peace, the fruit.

      "When you are taken over by a negative emotion observe the feeling, breathe it, perceive it. You don't need to vent it on others. Watch it and let it go" concludes the educator for Peace.

Valério Azevedo
Communications Assistant for the First World Spiritual Forum