Pursuing harmony – a midweek Pause for Peace

The next verse in John O’Donohue’s For Presence seems particularly appropriate for our regular Wednesday Pause for Peace:

May your outer dignity mirror an inner dignity of soul.

During conflict—physical or verbal—our inner state leaks. We see what is really there in the extreme heat of the moment.

So this verse is an aspiration, an intention towards becoming. Because it certainly doesn’t happen overnight!

I recently listened to the BBC Prom concert from the Royal Albert Hall, which featured the West-Eastern Divan Orchestra under Daniel Barenboim's direction.

He is frail, and this is probably one of his last visits to the Proms, yet the fruit of his work in bringing young Israeli and Arab musicians together since 1999 was evident.

This isn’t a gathering together where differences are swept under the carpet but where there is honest space for dialogue in a venture that unites them in their love of music.

If you have a chance to listen on BBC Sounds, the whole concert, including conversations with Anne-Sophie Mutter, Daniel Barenboim, and his co-founder Edward Said’s widow, is a cause for hope.

#Pause4Peace

Pause. See differently. Re-story…

~ BBC Proms 2024. Prom 31: Anne-Sophie Mutter plays Brahms (the programme includes Brahms’ Violin Concerto and Schubert’s Symphony No. 9). For the whole poem, see Monday's post.