Sunday 30 January 2011

School Day of Non-Violence and Peace

An eye for an eye makes the whole world blind
                                                                   Mahatma Gandhi


On 30th January every year, in schools of many countries is observed the School Day of Non-violence and Peace (DENIP), founded in Spain in 1964, on the anniversary of the death of Mahatma Gandhi. Its basic and permanent message is: "Universal love, non-violence and peace. Universal love is better than egoism, non-violence is better than violence, and peace is better than war".

Mahatma Gandhi had a philosophy founded upon the total nonviolence. He led nationwide campaigns to ease poverty, expand women's rights, build religious and ethnic amity and employed non-cooperation, non-violence and peaceful resistance as his only weapons. His principle was that all violence was evil and could not be justified.

Gandhi summarised his beliefs first when he said "God is Truth. The way to truth lies through ahimsa (non violence)”.

I would like to use a song to illustrate this message. I’ve chosen a very famous song which I’m sure you all know very well: “Give Peace a Chance” by John Lennon. It became the anthem of American anti-war movement during the 70’s and its message is very much alive today.