“Ezra. My name is Ezra. I’m 18,” said a young man. 

“You have a whole book of the Bible with your name,” I said introducing myself. 

“I know,” he says, “my grandmother says that all the time.” 

The boy is chatty. 

“My dad made me play sports. He always checked my homework.”

“Sounds like you and your dad are close.”

“He’s dead. Murdered. A year ago. It’s ok. I am used to it. I cried once about it – on the day, but never again. No one talks about him.”

“Ezra, it is not ok,” I said, “listen to yourself.”

“What do you mean?”

“You tell me about your dad and sports and then that your dad was murdered — as if you’re talking about the weather. Ezra, it is not ok. You may be ‘used’ to your dad being dead but it is not ok. You have suffered great loss. I’m really really sorry this has happened to you and your family.”

“It’s ok. You know so far I have been offered scholarships to about 5 universities. I am not sure which one to choose. I wish my dad was here to help.”

Suggestions for discussion among your immediate family, friends, fellow faith seekers, and co-workers: 

What’s important? What do people really want and need in order to establish a healthy sense of peace. Please, add your insights: 

• A safe place to make and call home. A healthy and diverse diet. Regular exercise. Outdoor time.
• Fulfilling and growing relationships. Someone to listen. Someone to hear. The trust of others and people to trust.
• Meaningful work. Measurable goals. Long term ambitions. Short term successes. A community of like-minded colleagues.
• On-going and life-giving connections with blood family and family of choice. Opportunity to enjoy long-established friendships, even friends from early childhood. 
• A meaningful role in a faith or service community. Engagement in a beautiful vision.

What do people really not need? What undermines peace? 

• Threats, real or imagined, to safety and security. Growing financial stresses.
• Ambiguous relationships, those that are conditional, a trade, tight-rope, unpredictable relationships. Come-here, go-away “friendships.”
• Responsibility without authority. Shifting goal-posts. Being blamed.
• Working under fragile or sensitive leadership — a threatened boss. Leaders or bosses who have favorites, Leaders who bring fragile domestic circumstances to work.
• A faith community with controlling leadership, rigid rules, operating from gross or subtle platforms of manipulation and blame.