A Short Story...

Taken from The Art of Forgiveness, Lovingkindness,

and Peace by Jack Kornfield:

We can understand that each of us plays only a small part, and yet each contributes to the whole.

~ "Tell me the weight of a snowflake," a coal-mouse asked a wild dove.

"Nothing more than nothing," was the answer.

"In that case I must tell you a marvelous story," the coal mouse said. "I sat on a branch of fir, close to its trunk, when it began to snow, not heavily, not in a giant blizzard, no, just like in a dream, without any violence. Since I didn't have anything better to do, I counted the snowflakes settling on the twigs and needles of my branch. Their number was exactly 3,741,952. When the next snowflake dropped onto the branch - nothing more than nothing, as you say - the branch broke off."

Having said that, the coal-mouse flew away. The dove, since Noah's time an authority on change, thought about the story for a while and finally said to herself: "Perhaps there is only one person's voice lacking for peace to come about in the world."

~ Kurt Kauter

* * *

Do not be afraid to take a chance on peace,

to teach peace, to live peace . . .

Peace will be the last word of history.

~ John Paul II