Several months ago, I was driving in the car with my eight-year-old grandson through Belfast, when he pointed: “There’s a tricolour!”, The Reverend Jim Rea writes in the News Letter.
I paused and said: “Well, it has a good meaning, that green, white and orange really represents peace between the orange and the green traditions”. Later as we came closer to home, I pointed to a Union Jack: “It too has a good meaning, because on it are the three crosses representing the loyalty of St Patrick, St George and St Andrew to Jesus Christ more than anyone else.”
He listened intently but said nothing.
Some weeks later, he and I were settling down with a bag of sweets to watch the Irish Cup Final between Glentoran and Cliftonville on television. “There it is again, the tricolour. I remember. It means, peace between the green and orange, but it will never happen.” Oh, I thought, I haven’t made much progress.
“We must work to make it happen so that you will have a better future for your generation,” I said.
“No, it will not happen,” he replied, “Eve ate the apple!”
The mind of my eight-year-old grandson had already discovered how prone to failure and sin the human race is. His thoughts were more profound than my initial reaction. How often are the good efforts we make thwarted by the evil deed, or malevolent thought?
A friend once remarked to me that no matter how much you try to make peace in this country there’s always somebody out to wreck it.
But Granda is not giving up. Not putting aside for the right of people in this community to have strong political allegiances or aspirations, I wonder if we gave first place in our lives to the One whose cross appears on the Union Jack and whose peace appears on the flag of the Irish Republic, would it make a difference?
The first century Christians were Greeks, Jews, Romans and an assortment of others. They may have disagreed on many issues, but they put Jesus Christ first in their lives and it changed the world.
http://www.newsletter.co.uk/thought-for-the-week-flying-the-flag-of-peace-1-5328535