The Pathway to World Peace Can Begin in the Lehigh Valley

Turn on the television or open your phone, and it can sometimes feel as though the world is moving from one crisis to another. Wars continue, communities are divided, political disagreements become personal, and people increasingly struggle to trust those who see the world differently.

It is easy to feel powerless in the face of problems so large.

But peace has never been created by governments alone. It begins with people.

Peace requires more than the absence of war. It requires justice, compassion, respect and the willingness to see the humanity of people with whom we disagree. When we stop listening to one another, suspicion grows. When we refuse to understand another person's perspective, division becomes easier than cooperation.

This is where local communities have an important role to play.

Here in the Lehigh Valley, people from many religious, cultural and ethnic backgrounds live alongside one another. We may worship differently, speak different languages or come from different parts of the world, but we share the same neighborhoods, schools, workplaces and public spaces.

That gives us an opportunity.

We can choose to build relationships before disagreements arise. We can invite our neighbors to learn about our traditions rather than relying on assumptions. We can volunteer together, help someone facing hardship, attend one another's community events and simply take the time to know the person next to us.

These may seem like small things compared with international conflicts, but they matter. A peaceful society is built from countless everyday interactions in which people choose respect over suspicion and service over division.

My faith teaches me that peace must be accompanied by justice. We cannot ask for peace only when it benefits us. We must want fairness and dignity for everyone, including people with whom we may strongly disagree.

The world certainly needs better diplomacy, responsible leadership and an end to violence. But ordinary people also have a responsibility. We cannot control every decision made in a distant capital, but we can control how we treat the person standing beside us.

Perhaps the pathway to world peace begins closer to home than we think.

It begins when we choose to listen instead of label, understand instead of assume, serve instead of divide, and recognize that our differences do not have to prevent us from working together.

The world may be facing enormous challenges. But every community has the ability to become a small example of what a more peaceful world could look like.

The Lehigh Valley can be one of those examples.

Farid Ahmad is an Easton resident, a U.S. Postal Service letter carrier, and General Secretary of the Ahmadiyya Muslim Community's Lehigh Valley chapter. He is active in interfaith outreach and community service and writes about faith, civic engagement and building stronger communities.