{"id":7140,"date":"2015-07-28T13:35:23","date_gmt":"2015-07-28T17:35:23","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/emu.edu\/now\/peacebuilder\/?p=7140"},"modified":"2015-07-28T13:35:23","modified_gmt":"2015-07-28T17:35:23","slug":"is-spi-still-needed-two-africans-respond","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/emu.edu\/now\/peacebuilder\/2015\/07\/is-spi-still-needed-two-africans-respond\/","title":{"rendered":"Is SPI Still Needed? Two Africans Respond"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Babu<\/a>
Babu Ayindo, MA ’98, has taught at seven SPI-type institutions all over the world, in addition to his frequent stints at SPI.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

The spring\/summer 2014 issue of <\/em>Peacebuilder focused<\/em> on EMU\u2019s Summer Peacebuilding Institute at its 20th anniversary year. With the proliferation of peacebuilding<\/em> institutes and workshops in Africa and elsewhere, is SPI still needed? In separate interviews, two Africans \u2013 one from Kenya and the other from Mozambique \u2013 answered \u201cyes.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n

In 1996, Babu Ayindo traveled from Kenya to be among the earliest students pursuing a master\u2019s degree in conflict transformation at EMU. He had always been a \u201cdoer\u201d and credits EMU\u2019s Center for Justice and Peacebuilding (within which SPI is nested) for valuing that.<\/p>\n

\u201cCJP has done a good job of identifying those practitioners who ordinarily would not have the time, patience or typical academic qualifications to enter an academic program,\u201d he says, \u201cIt\u2019s given them a great opportunity to study in the field and get credentials.\u201d<\/p>\n

Babu\u2019s major take-away from CJP? \u201cMeeting instructors and professors who believed in me and my interest in the role of storytelling, dramatization, and other arts in peacebuilding. Howard [Zehr]<\/strong>, Ron [Kraybill]<\/strong>, Vernon [Jantzi]<\/strong>, Lisa [Schirch] <\/strong>and John Paul [Lederach] <\/strong>were very supportive \u2013 they believed in me. This is such an important thing \u2013 to be believed in, and to be given the room to make mistakes and to learn for yourself.\u201d<\/p>\n

Babu was impressed that though his professors were Mennonite-style Christians, \u201cthey respected those of us with different beliefs, including the spirituality of indigenous peoples.\u201d<\/p>\n

Babu was raised Roman Catholic, but like many Africans his religiousness is deeply rooted in his indigenous connections to his ancestors and the natural world. \u201cIn moments of crisis, I draw from that.\u201d<\/p>\n

He earned his MA in conflict transformation in 1998 and today, 17 years later, is pursuing a PhD in the field at the University of Otago in New Zealand.<\/p>\n

Babu is one of the most sought-after teachers of peacebuilding in the world. He has returned to teach at SPI repeatedly and at SPI-like peacebuilding initiatives in seven other locations: Washington D.C.; Fiji; Mindolo, Zambia; Nairobi, Kenya; Winnipeg, Canada; Davao, Philippines; and Caux, Switzerland. He is scheduled to teach at the Northeast Asia Regional Peacebuilding Institute in Mongolia in August 2015.<\/p>\n

In Babu\u2019s view, the basic courses taught at most of these institutions are not substantively different from those at CJP. But each institution needs a strategic vision for its own area of the world, he says. Those in the Global South need to work more at decolonization, including decolonizing the meaning of peace and justice and tapping their own indigenous paradigms for peace. In the Global North, CJP should focus on shifting the United States toward a more just, peaceful path, Babu says.<\/p>\n

Methodist Bishop Dinis Matsolo <\/strong>of Mozambique agrees with that view. He credits Mennonites for spreading the theology of peace into churches around the world. Yet he asks, \u201cAre Mennonites doing enough about U.S. policies, when I see the U.S. disregard the UN, start wars, and manufacture and use weapons widely?\u201d<\/p>\n

Nevertheless, Matsolo greatly values his month-long sojourn at SPI in 2005: \u201cTo taste the heavenly banquet of studying with people from all the different countries \u2013 even those who were almost at war with each other \u2013 inspired me to think it is possible to solve the world\u2019s problems. We lived together and shared with each other and learned from each other.\u201d<\/p>\n

Matsolo has done coursework at two other peacebuilding institutes \u2013 one in his own country and the other in Zambia but he feels SPI represented the ultimate experience. \u201cSPI is like a fire at which embers get started and re-heated if they start to go out from being isolated. Once you\u2019ve been at SPI, you can go out and start your own fires.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The spring\/summer 2014 issue of Peacebuilder focused on EMU\u2019s Summer Peacebuilding Institute at its 20th anniversary year. With the proliferation of peacebuilding institutes and workshops… Read more about Is SPI Still Needed? Two Africans Respond<\/span><\/a><\/p>","protected":false},"author":196,"featured_media":7141,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1073],"tags":[77,1337,625],"issues":[1275],"class_list":["post-7140","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-magazine","tag-babu-ayindo","tag-dinis-matsolo","tag-summer-peacebuilding-institute","issues-2014-15"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/emu.edu\/now\/peacebuilder\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7140","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/emu.edu\/now\/peacebuilder\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/emu.edu\/now\/peacebuilder\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/emu.edu\/now\/peacebuilder\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/196"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/emu.edu\/now\/peacebuilder\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=7140"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/emu.edu\/now\/peacebuilder\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7140\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":7196,"href":"https:\/\/emu.edu\/now\/peacebuilder\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7140\/revisions\/7196"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/emu.edu\/now\/peacebuilder\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/7141"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/emu.edu\/now\/peacebuilder\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=7140"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/emu.edu\/now\/peacebuilder\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=7140"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/emu.edu\/now\/peacebuilder\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=7140"},{"taxonomy":"issues","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/emu.edu\/now\/peacebuilder\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/issues?post=7140"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}