North Korean Missiles & a Call for Peace

 

God of wonder,

Comfort those who have been suffering from the division by foreign powers for over 70 years.
We ask you to restore the broken Korean Peninsula.

—from Prayer for the End to the Korean War and Peace on the Korean Peninsula(opens in a new tab) by Dr. Un Sunn Lee

Kim Jong -Un, the reckless tyrant of North Korea, has been at it again, launching missiles like holiday fireworks in the vicinity of neighbours South Korea and Japan. While this isn't new, the volume of missile launches over the past few days is unprecedented. If Donald Trump, the former reckless tyrant wannabe, was still in power he would likely be issuing fatuous counter-threats but he's either on the golf course or in court. 

This has me thinking about a United Church initiative which hasn't gained much traction, an appeal for 10.000 signatures on a petition to officially conclude the Korean War of the early 1950s with a peace treaty.  More than 26,000 Canadians served in this conflict and 516 of them died. This has been described as the forgotten war in Canadian history and those of us of a certain age probably know more about it from the hit American TV series MASH than anything we learned in school.  

There are fewer than 3,000 signatures from United Church members to date and only about 125,000 world-wide, a far cry from the 100 million hoped for. To be honest I hadn't signed myself because the cause seemed rather quixotic, but I have now, simply because I'd rather be a prayerful peacemaker( isn't this what Jesus asks us to be?) than indifferent to the folly of perpetual war. 

Here is a description of the project and the United Church link: 

The Korean War began in 1950. While open clashes ceased in 1953 with the signing of an armistice, a peace treaty has not yet been established and the war is not over. For more than 70 years the Korean people have endured a constant state of hostility and war, which has solidified the division of the peninsula.

The Korea Peace Appeal(opens in a new tab) is a global campaign that seeks to collect 100 million signatures by 2023, the 70th anniversary of the armistice. The National Council of Churches in Korea has challenged The United Church of Canada to add Ten Thousand Signatures by the summer of 2022.

Join with Korean partners and all who seek peace on the Korean Peninsula, the region, and the world. In adding your signature to the petition, you are saying:

• End the Korean War and establish a peace agreement.
• Create a Korean Peninsula and a world free from nuclear weapons and nuclear threat.
• Resolve the conflict with dialogue and cooperation instead of sanctions and pressure.
• Break from the vicious cycle of the arms race and invest in human security and environmental sustainability.

• Background

  The United Church of Canada is responding to an urgent invitation of the National Council of Churches in Korea (NCCK), a long-time Mission & Service partner, to join them in the Korea Peace Appeal(opens in a new tab). This campaign has been initiated by more than 370 South Korean civil society organizations, religious groups, and international partner organizations with the goal of ending the Korean War and concluding a Korea peace agreement.

  Both North and South Korea have used the conflict as an excuse to perpetuate violations of human rights to maintain power, countless resources have been focused on military spending rather than on people’s health and welfare, and millions of Korean families remain separated from each other on opposite sides of the border sealed in 1953.

  The people of Korea have not lost hope. Their call to the world is “Peace First―End the War Now.”

• https://united-church.ca/social-action/act-now/korea-peace-appeal

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