David T Ives speaks on the National Mall

My name is David Taylor Ives. I am greatly honored to be one of the keynote speakers at this wonderful event. I have been asked to explore thoughts, and ideas, to help move this country--and indeed this world--toward peace, (beat) when we are so divided…in so many important ways.

I need to give you a word of warning. I am in the midst of a battle with Parkinson’s Disease that began 5 years ago resulting in the occasional Slurring of some words. I assure you (beat) I have not been drinking. (Laugh) Rather--in my passion for peace and understanding--my tongue does not always keep up with my brain. (beat) But I want to talk about some important thoughts and stories (beat) before I lose the ability to speak. (Laugh) And, hopefully, that will occur somewhere much farther down the road.

Albert Schweitzer was the 1952 Nobel Peace Prize Laureate. (beat) It has been my honor to promote his values and ideas, on a worldwide basis, for the past sixteen years, as Executive Director of the Albert Schweitzer Institute at Quinnipiac University in Hamden, Ct., and as an Adjunct Professor of Latin American Culture, political science, and international relations.

Schweitzer was regarded by most people (beat) around the world (beat) as one of the greatest persons of the twentieth century. He took an unusual path to fame, becoming world famous for his humanity (beat) by caring for…and about…others.

Dr. Schweitzer was one of the first--if not the first--Europeans to go to Africa, with the intent of alleviating suffering, (beat) not exploiting its vast resources or making slaves of its people.

Although he went under the auspices of a French society of missionaries, (beat) he did not go to proselytize or convert Africans to a Christian perspective. He went (beat) to ease the pain caused by the evils of colonialism . (beat) I find this very unusual for our times, and even more so (beat) for the times he lived in.

Dr. Schweitzer continued examining new ideas and philosophies throughout his life. (beat) He became interested in many different religions, and he wrote about the Eastern religions in a comparative fashion. (beat) He, nevertheless, maintained, throughout his life, a strong affinity for Christianity and its philosophy of love.

He also showed great concern for the environment, often writing on the interconnection between all living things. (beat) Indeed, the first book that took a really serious look at the degradation of the environment—Silent Spring, by Rachel Carson--was dedicated to Schweitzer a book which I highly recommend.

Nevertheless, Schweitzer felt that his greatest contribution to the world (beat) was not his work as a doctor, nor a theologian, a nor a humanitarian, nor a musician (beat) but his philosophy of “Erfuct fur das Leben” or “Reverence for Life”. He wrote: “The most immediate fact of man’s consciousness is the assertion ‘I am life that wills to live in the midst of life that wills to live.’

What he wrote included plant and animal life. He felt that all options should be carefully considered, before any life--of any kind--was taken.  (beat) If this philosophy were applied to the world today (beat) it would result in different decisions being made about how people and the environment are treated.

He was not however a complete Pacifist. He recognized there was such a thing as evil in the world and sometimes that evil had to be stopped and/or eliminated. He also knew that people had to eat and that involved plants and animals and their deaths.

I was on the Navajo reservation some years ago and a Medicine Woman invited me to her house for lunch. We went to her garden to get some lettuce for a salad. As she bent to cut each lettuce leaf, she prayed to the plant people and apologized for taking its life in order to sustain her own. It’s that kind of reverence and respect for life that I think Schweitzer is talking about.

I understand that the word Erfuct, in German, is translated as the word AWE in English. The word awesome is overused by many who speak in English, using awesome to talk about anything that they feel is the smallest bit remarkable. (beat) But I think Schweitzer meant for us to dig a little deeper, and to look at each other with a sense of awe AND wonder. (Beat) So that when we behold another person for the first time, we will have a feeling of amazement (beat) that this person standing in front of us actually (beat) exists.

Schweitzer wanted us to have a sensation towards another person (beat) that would be like the feeling of exhilaration we all get (beat) when we are on top of a mountain, contemplating and drinking in the incredible view (beat) in front of us.

Or (beat) the feeling of astonishment we get when we watch and listen to a powerful thunderstorm in the distance. (beat) with lightning flashing and Hearing the rolling thunder.

Schweitzer thought that each person you may interact with (beat) for any reason (beat) should be regarded as a miracle. (Beat) As one who deserves all the love and help you can give to this phenomenal being with whom you are interacting. (Beat)

To have this perspective, (beat) this sense of astonishment, (beat) should make it very hard to kill or hurt or hate anyone. (beat) It should make it very hard to separate children at our border (beat) from their parents. (beat) It should make it very hard to ignore the great poverty that people live in around the world and would help to stem the violence that always results when people lose hope for a better life. (beat) It should make it easy to understand (beat) that refugees do not leave their homes or their countries unless there is a threat to their existence (beat) that is dire.

If these people are viewed as miracles, (beat) then the first thing to do is to hug them, (beat) and to tell them (beat) they are safe now. (Beat) And to ask them (beat) “How can I help you?”

Young people in this country are also hurting (beat) because too many of them have not been treated as if they were a miracle, either. Witness our opioid epidemic.

So (beat) steps one, two and three for resolving todays many conflicts: (beat) To treat everyone as if they are a miracle.

Thirty years ago (beat) I had the honor (beat) of serving in the United States Peace Corps (beat) as a community gardens promoter in a then isolated part of Costa Rica called the Osa Peninsula. The Osa Peninsula was accessible only by a boat that left at 4 a.m. for Golfito, across the bay where the doctor’s office was located. (Beat) Part of my job (beat) was to find families with babies, and to measure their height and weight. (Beat) If I judged that a child needed to see a doctor because of low weight, I would encourage the family to get proper medical care, (beat) and would take them to the doctor (beat) if that is what they needed.

I ran into a family one afternoon. (Beat) I found out they had a baby girl (beat) approximately eleven months old. (Beat) I helped them plant some seeds. I built a makeshift fence to keep the pigs there from eating all of the vegetables I had planted, with the help of the father. (Beat) Inside their dirt floor house was the baby. (Beat) She was having trouble breathing. (Beat) She would take these long sighs, (beat) and not quite catch her breath. (Beat) She tried several times until she finally did catch her breath. (Beat) Then the pattern repeated. (Beat)

I checked on whether or not her mother could breast feed, (beat) but she couldn’t. (Beat) She was malnourished as well.

I offered to meet them at the boat for Golfito the next morning. I told them I would pay the fare for the entire family. (Beat) They had another son (beat) about 3 three years old.

It turned out that the mother of the family had gotten some formula from somewhere (beat) and was trying to feed this to her two kids, (beat) often mixing this with polluted water from their well and which also diluted its effectiveness .

The next morning, I arrived at the rendezvous point on the beach (beat) and waited for the family to get there. Finally, (beat) they came running down the embankment, screaming to me: “She cannot breathe! She cannot breathe! Ella no puede respirar!” (Beat)

They put the little girl into my arms. We shoved off. I tried to revive the little girl with artificial respiration…. It was to no avail. I felt her die in my arms. (Beat) I am sure that I felt her soul leave her body. (Beat) There, in the middle of the bay, I cried. (Beat)

We took her to the clinic. The doctor was there. (beat) He pronounced her dead, probably from worms that had filled up her lungs from drinking polluted water.

I will never get over this. (Beat) I feel her presence with me even now (beat) sitting on my shoulder. (Beat) At the time, it would have cost around fifty dollars to have a new well dug. (Beat) Fifty dollars would have brought about another miracle for a whole family. (Beat) Why is that too much to ask?

According to UN sources, kids under the age of 5 die of preventable diseases around 15,000 times a day. I find this unacceptable in this day and age when there are enough calories to make everyone fat.

In my own country, I am embarrassed by the wall that is slowly being built along our border with Mexico (beat), the wall from San Diego, in the west, to Brownsville, Texas. (Beat) In order to make certain that our neighbors in the south will remain in their place. (Beat) And (laughs), by the way, (beat) Mexico is not going to finance any part of the wall. (Beat)

We should take one-third of this money to build schools and medical clinics. (Beat) And to train teachers and doctors and nurses! (Beat) Then we should use the ideas of Nobel Peace Prize Laureate Mohammad Yunus, and of the Grameen Bank, to fund small business loans, and to fund them most specifically to women, since they are often more responsible in using their money wisely and benefitting their families.

Several years ago, I made two visits to Central America. One trip was to Guatemala, during the summer, to work with the Rigoberta Menchu Foundation. We went to build classrooms for her Mayan people. Then we went to Nicaragua, to work on building classrooms there, as well.

This incredibly stupid fence the U.S. is building (beat) will keep out many of the people that we met in both countries. (beat) Think of it. These people who are working for a dollar a day, if that. (Beat) Some of them are reduced to making hamburgers out of a combination of clay and soil to eat in their tortillas. (Beat)

One of the teachers we worked with asked me, plaintively, if I could help her find a job in the United States, (beat) as she only made $4 a day, even with her university degree. (Beat) This meant that she had to choose, whether to buy black plastic to cover the holes in her walls and roof (beat) or (beat) to feed her children. (Beat)

The laborers in our country right now are often exploited and disposable. Partly because they are poor. But, even more so, because they are viewed as different (beat) or as the dangerous other. (Beat)

A strong belief in Schweitzer’s system of ethics would prevent people from being perceived as disposable. (Beat) Instead, they would be welcomed into the United States. Or (beat) they would be helped to live in their own country with dignity. (Beat) Instead of building the wall along our border, we should tear down that wall!

(Beat) Let us use the money, instead, to work together----with our Latin American brothers and sisters----to provide roads, schools, clinics (beat) and anything else that can provide everyone with a way of life full of pride and honor in oneself. This would eliminate the refugee so-called problem and leave many businesses needing help.

In Guatemala, I came, face to face, with the second-class citizenship that has violated so much of their indigenous communities. (Beat) As my students and I entered the village where we were to build a classroom for their school, (beat) we first had to go to a town meeting (beat) to which every resident was invited. We had to assure them, with the help of representatives from the Rigoberta Menchu Foundation, that we were not there to kidnap their children, (beat) nor were we there to take minerals from their sacred mountains. (Beat) Only then were we allowed to live and work in their community.

The Mayan people had had too much deep unhappiness with other white people, especially with those men who looked like me (beat), and who had taken advantage of them, to the detriment of their way of life, their pride, and their self-esteem.

Our students lived with Mayan families, many of whom had never before had that intimate contact with North Americans. At first, (beat) my students were treated with suspicion. But, within a day, both the Mayan families and my students--some of whom are in this audience--were sharing with each other as equals! The Mayans taught my students their language, and my students taught them English, using rudimentary Spanish. (Beat) There was a celebration occurring in a dimly lit, mud brick home that transcended boundaries and enabled us to connect as equals, through some magic of shared experiences and the wonder of a different culture…. (Beat) One way to heal that which divides (beat) is to take it seriously. (Beat) To spend time living in the Mayan villages. (Beat) Not to---on a big, tourist bus---drive by people in their shacks.

What I have learned (beat) is that most people do not give a damn (beat) about the poverty in the world. (Beat) How can they make a difference (beat) and help poor people if they do not care. (Beat) It is a lack of political will to change that causes the poverty I have seen throughout my life. (Beat) There was and is no excuse for it.

Do any of you remember any candidate for public office, anywhere in this country, who spoke about the needs of poor people anywhere in the world, in the last elections. I cannot think of any example.(Beat) I do not care whether the poverty to combat is here or abroad. (Beat) Poor people need our attention.

And (beat) we should become activists (beat) and keep on keeping on, (beat) bringing these conditions to the attention of governments, churches and synagogues, not for profit organizations, and many more. (Beat) One can argue that it is hard to tear down these walls between cultures, religions, and ethnic groups. (Beat) Many times, it is. (Beat) But often, if one can learn to celebrate differences instead of letting our differences divide us, these walls can melt away. (Beat) If we have reverence and awe for one another--as Schweitzer suggested--perhaps some of these walls can be torn down.

I also would like us to apply the Declaration of Independence outside our borders. Jefferson writes that quote all men are endowed by our creator with certain inalienable rights that among these are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness unquote. Jefferson included all men(and I add women) not just americans in his vision. The only thing I would change is to add the word women.

I have been lucky enough to have met and worked with severaI Nobel Peace Prize Laureates. If you are looking for people who are performing miracles with limited resources, (beat) take a look at the female Nobel Peace Prize Laureates.

One is from Iran. Her name is Shirin Ebadi. She was the first female judge in Iran. She co-founded the Iranian Human Rights Defense Center in 2001. (Beat) She has defended journalists who have been arrested and imprisoned for what they wrote. (Beat) She has also been a leader in promoting gender issues. (Beat) She lives under death threat. (Beat) Helping her would help a lot of women to survive.

Another female Laureate is from Yemen. Her name is Tawakkol Karman. She is a journalist. (Beat) She won the Nobel Peace Prize for her non-violent struggle for the safety of women, (beat) for women’s rights (beat) for democracy in her country, (beat) and in peace building work. (Beat) She founded Women Journalists Without Chains, which reports on violations of freedom of the press. (Beat) She is another very engaged female laureate.

Yet another dynamic Peace Laureate is Leymah Gbowee from Liberia. (Beat) She, and a group of Christian and Muslim women, were instrumental in overthrowing a brutal dictator named Charles Taylor. (Beat. Laughs) You should check her out on Ted talks. (Beat) She is a dynamic leader and one that we all should recognize as a very talented person. (Beat) She runs a camp every summer in which she invites young people from different ethnic groups in Liberia--most with a history of enmity between them--and teaches them to live in peace. (Beat) The camp costs between $40 and $50,000 to run annually. (Beat) Each year Leymah struggles to raise the money to open it. (Beat) Investing in this camp could help save a country. (Beat) It is a model to be used throughout the world, to support diversity (beat) and to heal our wounds. She also. Has given some fabulous TED talks.

There is Betty Williams (beat) who won the Nobel Peace Prize in 1977, along with Mauread McGuire. (Beat) Betty has a special place in her heart (beat) for children. (Beat) She has been working in Italy, to build homes for all those refugees--and their families—who are coming across the Mediterranean Sea to escape death at home in the Middle East and in Africa. (Beat) She could use some help to create apartments so the refugees can live in dignity, so they can live without fear of reprisal from death squads, and so that they can have an education.

And Jody Williams. (Beat, laughs) She is as dynamic as they come. (Beat) She won the Nobel Peace Prize for her work to eliminate land mines. She founded a group called the Nobel Women’s Initiative. The group coordinates efforts among the laureates to increase the visibility of women working for peace. (Beat) Why, in the current negotiations between North Korea and the United States, are women not included in the negotiating team? (Beat) They certainly should be.

Oscar Arias, the two-time former President of Costa Rica, and a Nobel Prize Laureate, wants to build a museum. (Beat) A museum filled with the people who worked timelessly, without stopping, for peace. (Beat) Too often, our museums are about who wins a war. Our museums chronicle something awful that happened, like the atomic bomb explosions in Hiroshima and Nagasaki, or places like Auschwitz, battlefields like Verdun. (Beat) Why can we not have at least one museum that emphasizes efforts towards peace?

Rigoberta Menchu has run for President of Guatemala twice, and has founded her own political party. She runs (beat) in order to encourage her Mayan people to do the same and that they do not have to be second class citizens in their own country . (Beat) The first step is to have the Mayan peoples celebrate their heritage and be proud of from whence they came. (Beat) And when they do, more Mayans will run for political positions and they will win. And, when they are in the majority, they will take back their country.

I am inspired by The Dalai Lama. (Beat) He feels that his most important concern is to meet often with the public because his primary commitment, his major interest, is the promotion of human value, human affection, compassion and religious harmony. (Beat) (Laughs) As he says so often, (beat) his philosophy is kindness to all!

Michelle Obama has said that right now, when we're hearing so much disturbing and hateful rhetoric, it is so important to remember that (beat) our diversity has been - and always will be - our greatest source of strength and pride here in the United States.

There are many other women who are long=suffering leaders for social equality and justice like the famed primatologist Jane Goodall, the former President of Liberia Ellen Sirleaf, and of course that Gutsiest of women, Malala, who took a bullet in her head for her beliefs in the importance of educating girls and women!

However, Any discussion of poverty and Schweitzer has to mention the threat of nuclear weapons which was very important to Schweitzer and will take a major miracle to solve. The USA is actually thinking about modernizing our nuclear bombs so they explode better. (repeat) We already have enough to destroy the world ..why do we need more. The money for this expenditure will come directly from the poor from global warming efforts, from education, and from health care.

With the inflammatory rhetoric that characterizes the current impasse over the possible development and/or deployment of nuclear weapons in Iran, most people seem to have forgotten the lessons of Dr. Schweitzer or, for that matter, Schweitzer’s friend and contemporary Albert Einstein, the father of the atomic bomb. Both men thought that an explosion of nuclear weapons anywhere in the world would be an unmitigated physical and moral catastrophe.

It would therefore be of immense importance if the United States in this hour of destiny could decide in favor of renouncing atomic weapons to remove the possibility of an eventual outbreak of atomic war. The theory of peace through terrifying an opponent by a greater armament can only heighten the danger of war.”

Although written in the 1950’s, Schweitzer’s words still resonate. “The awareness that we are all human beings together has become lost in war and through politics. We have reached the point of regarding each other only as members of people either allied with us or against us and our approach: prejudice, sympathy, or antipathy are all conditioned by that. Now we must rediscover the fact that we- all together- are human beings, and that we must strive to concede to each other what moral capacity we have. Only in this way can we begin to believe that in other peoples as well as in ourselves there will arise the need for a new spirit which can be the beginning of a feeling of mutual trustworthiness toward each other.” I think that John McCain Is an example of working In this manner. I will miss him although I had my differences with him, politically!

For the men and women who hold the fate of nations in their hands, (beat) and avoid, with anxious care, all that may worsen the situation in which we find ourselves, and by so doing make it even more dangerous, we should tell them this: (Beat) Please, may they take to heart the words of the Apostle Paul: "So far as it lies in your power, be at peace with all men."

And I will close with the words of Martin Luther King, Jr.

“Our lives begin to end the day we become silent about things that matter!

So let us not be silent, let us believe and make miracles large and small, and may we be in awe of all people, may we forgive each other, and may we truly celebrate the richness of difference.”