A Natural Peace: Evidence for the Abnormality of Violence

Last updated on: June 4, 2015 at 10:00 am by Suzanne Ross

A Natural Peace: Evidence for the Abnormality of Violence 2015-06-02T16:29:22-05:00 Suzanne Ross

LOGO Patheos Explore the world's faith through different perspectives on religion and spirituality! Patheos has the views of the prevalent religions and spiritualities of the world.

Is war an inevitable part of human existence? Is violence woven into the strands of our DNA? Or is it possible that human nature is loving, compassionate, and altruistic? Much ink has been spilled on the question and you can read social science and psychology studies that support the view that civilization is only a thin veneer over a violent natures or that altruism has an evolutionary advantage and is coded into our DNA. Unfortunately, nothing definitive on the question yet, not from the experimental sciences anyway. But I don’t think a definitive answer is all that elusive: If you want to know if humans are violent by nature, look at the face of a child who has been impacted by violence.

I know that mimetic theory (MT), my life’s work, has taken a beating on the subject of human violence. It has been accused of forging an indissoluble link between humanity and violence, though nothing could be further from the truth. Mimetic theory explains how violence became embedded in human culture, indeed how human culture as it is currently constructed relies on a foundation of violence. But MT also clearly illuminates the contingency of our current predicament. In other words, though violence is the beating heart of human culture today, it doesn’t have to be.

The faces of children show us just how foreign to human nature violence actually is. Children shrink from violence. They withdraw inside of themselves and the face they turn outward to the world is one stripped of their personalities. They lose their affect, are unable to smile or respond to overtures from others. I suppose if you think that joyless, lifeless, blank stares are “normal”, then violence can be thought of as essential to normal human functioning. But if you think that children like this are abnormal, in other words, if you think that violence as prevented them from developing normally, then it’s fair to conclude that violence is anathema to human life and therefore cannot be part of our DNA. Violent behavior must be contingent, just one possibility among others in the vast repertoire of human behaviors. One we can opt for or opt out of as we choose. A choice that a careful study of mimetic theory forces us to face.

In her observational studies of young children, Dr. Maria Montessori concluded that normal childhood development was surprisingly peaceful. What she called “normalized” children – children freed from the oppression of adult ideas of what children should be and do – were calm, capable of intense and prolonged periods of concentration, filled with wonder and joy, and overflowed with creativity. They were not violent, angry, anxious or mean. On the contrary, Dr. Montessori explained that “We might say that if love appears, we are within the range of the normal, and if it does not, within the range of the abnormal.”

In fact, I can allow her to interpret the images of children afflicted by violence for us. She called for a “revolution [in childhood education], one in which everything we know today will be transformed. I think of this as the final revolution,” she explained. “Not a revolution of violence, still less of bloodshed, but one from which violence is wholly excluded – for the little child’s psychic productivity is stricken to death by the barest shadow of violence.” Dr. Montessori insists that a child “stricken to death” by violence is not evidence of the normal human condition. Quite the contrary.

If war is inevitable, as some believe, then human development will forever be abnormal. We will never truly flourish and discover our way into new cultural forms that do not rely on constant infusions of violence to sustain them. We have been too long slogging through what Dr. Montessori called the “adult period” of human evolution, one that is “characterized by constant outbreak of war.” With her revolution in education, she hoped to usher in “the age of the child… the period in which we will begin to build peace.” Mobilizing ourselves to support the normal development of children is what “organizing humanity for peace” looks like. Social peace and harmony have too long relied on winner takes all wars of domination and defeat. True peace must be grounded in its only true foundation: the natural peace of a normalized humanity.

What does this have to do with a new atonement theology, one in which we acknowledge that God’s work of reconciliation is utterly nonviolent and undeniably human? Perhaps we can discover another, deeper layer of meaning in this familiar verse, 1 John 4:9: “God’s love was revealed to us in this way: God sent his only Son into the world so that we might live through him.” It might do us well to remember that God sent his Son into the world as a human child. It’s possible that the life we are promised “through him” did not need to await his death, but was present at his birth. The resurrection affirms that life leads to life, not death. Not even a violent death could overcome the promise of life. Is the promise renewed with each new birth of a child? We will only discover the answer if we pay heed to our children; we will only live into the promise of peace if we allow the child to lead us.

Previous Post

June 1, 2015

My Baccalaureate Address: A Life Worth Living: On Tragedy, Revenge, and Love

Next Post

June 5, 2015 A Transgender God: Reflections on God and Caitlyn Jenner

Browse Our Archives

Select a Category Atonement and Current Events Curriculum Faith and Families Interviews Jesus the Forgiving Victim Lent Montessori politics Reviews The Bible Explained Uncategorized Valentine's Day Wednesday Sermon Who is God?

Select a Month July 2020 November 2019 October 2019 September 2019 August 2019 July 2019 June 2019 May 2019 April 2019 March 2019 February 2019 January 2019 December 2018 November 2018 October 2018 September 2018 August 2018 July 2018 June 2018 May 2018 April 2018 March 2018 February 2018 January 2018 December 2017 November 2017 October 2017 September 2017 August 2017 July 2017 June 2017 May 2017 April 2017 March 2017 February 2017 January 2017 December 2016 November 2016 October 2016 September 2016 August 2016 June 2016 May 2016 April 2016 March 2016 February 2016 January 2016 December 2015 November 2015 October 2015 September 2015 August 2015 July 2015 June 2015 May 2015 April 2015 March 2015 February 2015 January 2015 December 2014 November 2014 October 2014 September 2014 August 2014 July 2014 June 2014 May 2014 April 2014 March 2014 January 2014 December 2013 September 2013 August 2013 July 2013

TAKE THE

Religious Wisdom Quiz