{"id":17428,"date":"2013-06-24T14:44:36","date_gmt":"2013-06-24T18:44:36","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/emu.edu\/now\/news\/?p=17428"},"modified":"2013-07-26T15:59:51","modified_gmt":"2013-07-26T19:59:51","slug":"where-there-was-despair-they-saw-hope-summer-peacebuilding-institute-2013-wraps-up","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/emu.edu\/now\/news\/2013\/where-there-was-despair-they-saw-hope-summer-peacebuilding-institute-2013-wraps-up\/","title":{"rendered":"\u201cWhere There Was Despair, They Saw Hope\u201d \u2013 Summer Peacebuilding Institute 2013 Wraps Up"},"content":{"rendered":"

Many of the 196 attendees at this year\u2019s Summer Peacebuilding Institute (SPI)<\/a> had survived devastating loss and trauma. Yet the final week of that gathering at Eastern Mennonite University began with an evening of infectious joy.<\/p>\n

SPI learners \u2013 representing 43 nations over six weeks of sessions, May 6-June 14 \u2013 did line and contra dancing, joined an exuberant Syrian circle dance, clapped hands to a spirited maranga, watched a graceful performance by colorfully garbed South Pacific colleagues, and eased into a Virginia Reel.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s a nourishment for my soul,\u201d Lilian Burlando said of her near-annual trip to SPI, on the Harrisonburg, Va. campus, from Tierra del Fuego, Argentina. Burlando, who operates a counseling and interfaith dialogue center, said she felt uplifted by the course \u201cNarrative, Theory and Practice,\u201d which highlighted “the importance of stories in everyday life.\u201d<\/p>\n

By listening attentively to each other\u2019s narratives, students \u201clearn to be the experts\u201d and not leave understanding to professionals, explained therapist Vanessa Jackson of Atlanta, who taught the narrative course with David Anderson Hooker.<\/p>\n

Burlando smiled as she watched granddaughter Mercedes Echazu dance. Echazu \u2013 a recent social-work graduate and one of five grandchildren, plus a daughter, who have accompanied Burlando to various SPI sessions \u2013 completed \u201cMonitoring and Evaluation,\u201d a course relevant to her profession.<\/p>\n

In Nigeria, after 15 years\u2019 employment at a bank, Helen Kwuelum decided to work in peacebuilding and women\u2019s empowerment. She attended SPI\u2019s four sessions, joining husband Charles, who has completed a year\u2019s study in the EMU Center for Justice and Peacebuilding<\/a> master\u2019s program.<\/p>\n

Near their home in northern Nigeria, the couple had fled bombings by the militant Islamist Boko Haram movement. \u201cSo many people were killed, displaced, traumatized,\u201d said Charles. Recent news, in turn, reports thousands of families fleeing the region following a government crackdown on Boko Haram, which recruits unemployed youth to fight.<\/p>\n

Charles and a colleague hope to befriend young Nigerian Muslims through their organization, Transforming Systems Initiatives. Helen regrets that during the bombings, \u201cI thought all Muslims taught violence.\u201d Discovering \u201cfaith in peacebuilding\u201d at SPI, she no longer attributes violence to any faith. Conflict, she said she now understands, \u201cis all about ourselves, not about the religions.\u201d<\/p>\n

Clarinda Molia of the Solomon Islands sang \u201cFrom a Distance\u201d at the dance. When that ballad of peace became popular during the first Persian Gulf War, Molia was just a baby.<\/p>\n

Ana-Latu Dickson of Papua New Guinea studied restorative justice at SPI. Although her nation\u2019s courts employ the concept, Dickson \u2013 who helps rehabilitate perpetrators of violence against women \u2013 said, \u201cI\u2019m learning more about it here.\u201d She and Molia were among 16 South Pacific and five East African participants in the Women\u2019s Peacebuilding Leadership Program.<\/p>\n

This year\u2019s overseas SPI applicants encountered \u201cvisa problems – as usual,\u201d co-director Bill Goldberg<\/a> reported. Approval of applications from Pakistan, Afghanistan and Iran \u201ctook so long for \u2018administrative processing\u2019 that almost no one got a visa in time to come.\u201d<\/p>\n

In addition to the narratives course, new offerings were \u201cDesigning Peacebuilding Programs,\u201d taught by Lisa Schirch, and \u201cNurturing Resilience,\u201d by Bill Lowrey and Ali Petersen.<\/p>\n

Bruce Stambaugh, a retired educator and weekly columnist for The Holmes Bargain Hunter <\/em>in a heavily Amish region of Ohio, was one of only three North Americans of 16 participants in his class. On his blog, he wrote: “The others came from places like Azerbaijan, Thailand, Iraq, Kurdistan, Belgium, Ghana, Nigeria, Syria and Haiti….<\/p>\n

“The students ranged from young adults to grandparents like me. … They were pastors, government leaders, workers for non-governmental aid agencies, interpreters and teachers.”<\/p>\n

The worries of a Haitian classmate for his family\u2019s safety at home helped Stambaugh appreciate both his own rural Ohio community and SPI classmates\u2019 resilience.<\/p>\n

\u201dInstead of focusing on how bad it was in their country or blaming other governments, these men and women were glad for the opportunity to learn how to dissect and resolve conflict,” he wrote on his blog. “They would take what they had learned and apply it as best they could.<\/p>\n

“Their goal was to improve the world around them, even if it was one person at a time. Where there was despair, they saw hope.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Many of the 196 attendees at this year\u2019s Summer Peacebuilding Institute (SPI) had survived devastating loss and trauma. Yet the final week of that gathering at Eastern Mennonite University began ... read more about \u201cWhere There Was Despair, They Saw Hope\u201d \u2013 Summer Peacebuilding Institute 2013 Wraps Up<\/span><\/a><\/p>","protected":false},"author":112,"featured_media":17493,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[12499],"tags":[14969,5798,15004,15006,14414,8407],"feature":[],"class_list":["post-17428","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-spi","tag-ana-latu-dickson","tag-bill-goldberg","tag-david-anderson-hooker","tag-helen-kwuelum","tag-lilian-burlando","tag-lisa-schirch"],"yoast_head":"\n\u201cWhere There Was Despair, They Saw Hope\u201d \u2013 Summer Peacebuilding Institute 2013 Wraps Up - EMU News<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/emu.edu\/now\/news\/2013\/where-there-was-despair-they-saw-hope-summer-peacebuilding-institute-2013-wraps-up\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"\u201cWhere There Was Despair, They Saw Hope\u201d \u2013 Summer Peacebuilding Institute 2013 Wraps Up - EMU News\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Many of the 196 attendees at this year\u2019s Summer Peacebuilding Institute (SPI) had survived devastating loss and trauma. 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