Message of Peace

The Summit Council is pleased to present a Welcome Message from the new Co-Chair of our Board of Presidents, the Rt. Hon. Sir Lloyd Erskine Sandiford, former Prime Minister of Barbados (1987-94) and current Ambassador of Barbados to China:

Greetings to my brothers and sisters, associates and colleagues in the Summit Council for World Peace. This is my inaugural message of peace to you.

Without doubt, the vast majority of the world’s population of seven billion people hope and yearn for world peace. Statesmen have striven for it. Religious clerics have prayed for it. Philosophers and poets have written creatively about it. So it is, so it has been, and so it should be!

What though is peace that is so much hoped for, and yearned after? Peace is a state that is positive, engendering, enabling, and ennobling. It emanates from within an individual, and it disseminates to all without, characteristics that are beneficial, wholesome, nurturing, harmonious, benign, and salubrious. It is at one with those qualities a Creator God shows to his offspring, and that true parents exhibit towards their children.

And yet, world peace remains an elusive dream. Everyday there are tensions and conflicts between individuals, and between social groups. Crime, violence, and terrorism disrupt the even tenor of domestic life. Civil wars break out between governments and people. Regional and international wars erupt and upset the balance of peace among nations. Must this absurd and senseless state of affairs continue for ever and ever? Can’t homo sapiens arrive at a more prudent and acceptable mode of living? Or is world peace a utopian illusion?

I do not think that the pursuit of world peace is a senseless quest. I believe it is a goal that is noble and attainable. Homo sapiens has been able to understand DNA, to penetrate the ocean’s depth, and to explore outer space and the regions of the planets. I believe that humankind can build upon the lessons left by the sages of old, and create an environment in which swords can be turned into ploughshares, and there can be peace and understanding among people and nations.

This is a message of hope, optimism, and realism. It is riveted in belief in a Supreme Being, and in the attributes of love, justice, equity, altruism, human rights, non-discrimination, accountability, benevolence, and kindness. It is above all a message of peace, of inner serenity, of how we perceive ourselves, and of how we perceive others. If our perceptions are sound and infused with love, they will lead us to generous behaviour. The key to all of this is understanding, cooperation, and the development of just individuals, just families, just societies, and a just world. I extend my hand in cooperating with you to help build that world upon the principles of the Summit Council for World Peace.

Sir Lloyd Erskine Sandiford.
August 2011