During the summer of 2004, a group of thirteen students and three InterVarsity staff members from the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, Carroll College, and a number of other schools in Wisconsin traveled to Ireland to learn about the struggle for peace in Belfast.
While in Ireland the students worked with a variety of peace organizations. Joe, a Protestant, and Kendra, a Catholic, volunteered at East Belfast Mission, a Methodist ministry that helps bridge the Protestant/Catholic divide. Joe and Kendra planned to paint, on the Catholic side of the wall, a mural depicting the houses and lanes of the Protestant side. While Kendra mixed paints, Joe played noisy games with the Catholic children who had come to watch. Through the barricade at the end of the street, Protestant children shouted insults at the Catholic boys and girls playing on the pavement. Soon, instead of shouts, the Protestant boys were throwing stones, and Joe and Kendra found themselves being pelted with rocks from the Protestant side of the wall. Joe and Kendra moved the Catholic children away from the falling rocks and discouraged them from retaliating.
A small gesture, but one that Joe and Kendra hope will point the children toward an understanding of peace. InterVarsity is committed to declaring the love and reconciliation of God to those who live in hatred.
For more information on InterVarsity summer activities go to Global Projects
The photo of the Belfast mural “Rights of the Child” is Copyright Jonathan McCormick and used by permission.
