Estimated read time: 4-5 minutes
- Rev. Lawrence Carter urged a BYU audience to join his peace mission Thursday.
- He emphasized Christians should act as peacemakers, quoting Jesus and John 3:16.
- Carter proposed a department of peace, highlighting racism as a barrier to progress.
PROVO — The Rev. Lawrence Edward Carter Sr., a dean at Morehouse College in Atlanta, called on students and faculty at Brigham Young University to join him "on a mission of peace" during an address at BYU's Wheatley Institute on Thursday.
The Rev. Carter is the founding dean of the Martin Luther King, Jr. International Chapel at Morehouse, the same historically Black college where the Rev. Dr. King received his degree.
The Rev. Carter congratulated BYU for its adherence to Christian principles and for the quality of its education, before focusing his message on how Christians can be peacemakers in an address titled "Peace, Non-Violence and Human Rights."
Justified by faith, mandated by God
The Rev. Carter has had a long friendship with The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints — including when Rev. Carter conferred its inaugural Gandhi-King-Mandela Peace Prize to President Russell M. Nelson. The Rev. Carter also has plans to place a framed portrait of Joseph Smith in the halls of the Martin Luther King, Jr. International Chapel.
The Rev. Carter spoke about the need for Christians to act as peacemakers.
"It's Jesus who is the lure of your faith," he told students at a lunch ahead of his address. "You are in a very special, magical place, a university founded by The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. ... How did Jesus choose to show up in the world?"
He pointed to a specific scripture where Jesus said that he came "to do the will of God."
"He said, 'if you've seen me ... if you've seen me, you've seen the Father, for the Father and I are one.'
"Can you say that?" he asked the students directly. "Jesus said, 'I thought it not robbery to be like God.'"
The Rev. Carter exhorted his listeners to act as the hands and feet of Jesus Christ. He also explained what he thought that might look like.
'For God so loved the world' — how does that mean a Christian must act?
The Rev. Carter said that Jesus pursued peace not just for his own community, but for all.
"It is clear to me in the Gospels that the consciousness of Christ was much bigger than Palestine. He identified with his Father's world, his Father's universe," the Rev. Carter said.
He recited John 3:16 to his students, pausing for emphasis.
"'That God so loved the world' — stop," he ordered. "You don't need to go any further. There it is right there. There's your moral imperative. That God so loved the world."
The Rev. Carter explained the two paths to peace, including an individual approach where people approach politics with love and grace and without attributing malicious intent to actions or statements.
He spent more time, however, on institutional and political avenues toward peace.
"We need to start understanding that moral worth is determined less by individual, isolated, ethical acts, than by long-term, committed relationships," he told the crowd of students, faculty, administrators and leaders of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints gathered in Hinckley Hall at BYU.
He then leaned forward and tapped the microphone, as if to make sure that everyone in the audience was tuned in for the next point he was about to make.
"You cannot have what you are not willing to be," he said. "You can't preach and lecture about peace and be effective unless you show up as peace. Hence, we need a department of peace. We need a secretary of peace. Not a department of defense. Not a secretary of defense."
The day we have peace, he said, would be beautiful.
"That will be a day not of the white man, not of the Black man — that will be the day of humans as humans. if we are going to give peace a chance, with our neighbors, our cities, states, the nation, the world, we need an inner revolution of values."
According to the Rev. Carter, America is not making progress toward that point.
"One of the reasons the United States does not enjoy a greater degree of peace is that discrimination, and the racism that motivates it, still haunts America," he said.
"Today I call on you to join me on a mission of peace ... to be visible and vocal supporters of people, groups and institutions that work for justice and peace around the globe," the Rev. Carter said.
He closed by hearkening back to the life and work of Jesus Christ. He asked all his listeners to be a "nonviolent peace ambassador for human rights" — a "new generation of Christians."
