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Quotes,
speeches and texts by Betty Williams und Mairead Corrigan
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Inspired by Mahatma
Gandhi and Martin Luther King
Jr., both of these Nobel Prize winners carry a simple message of love,
mutual understanding and non-violence into the world. This page contains quotes
by Mairead Corrigan and quotes
by Betty Williams which make this message clear. In addition to this, the
following material is also available on subsequent pages:
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Extracts
from the speech made by Betty Williams at the 1976/77 Nobel Peace Prize
award ceremony in which she also spoke about the Declaration of the
Peace People" [to the
speech]. |
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A
letter from
Mairead Corrigan Maguire to her son Luke [to
the Luke's letter]. |
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A
speech entitled "The
Field" about the necessity of change in Northern Ireland, delivered
by
Mairead Corrigan Maguire in 1999 [to
the speech]. |
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An
in-depth interview with Betty Williams about herself, developments and
the work towards peace [to
the interview]. |
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EA in-depth interview
with Betty Williams about herself, developments and the work towards
peace [to
the interview]. |
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Mairead
Corrigan on love, mutual understanding and non-violence
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Nonviolence is
not just for an elite few, it is for everyone. It is a way of life based
on respect for each human person and for the environment. It is also a
means of bringing about social and political change and resisting evil
without entering into evil. It is a whole new way of thinking. |
Surely, it is
time that our identity as human beings becomes the most important thing
to us: that we recognize our common humanity as our first identity; that
we are first and foremost men and women in the world today, born to love
and be loved - we are interconnected and we need each other. |
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We as
individuals have got to find our spiritual path. We have got to come
into our own truth - and as a young person, that was my struggle - what
is life about? And it took me a long time to come to realize that there
aren't too many things that are important, but what is important is that
we respect each other, uphold our humanity and put our common humanity
above the flags, the religions and all of those other things. |
In trying to
choose what to do, when faced with such enormous problems, sometimes we
can feel powerless and imagine that we personally cannot do anything
that will really make a difference. However, I passionately believe that
nonviolence is a powerful force that each of us can cultivate in our
daily lives and that through the power of love and truth we can each
make a difference. |
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Pure loving
service to each other, not only helps bring us inner peace and happiness
- it helps build a world of peace and happiness. |
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Betty
Williams on love,
mutual understanding and non-violence
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Compassion is more
important than intellect in calling forth the love that the work of
peace needs, and intuition can often be a more powerful searchlight than
cold reason. |
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We have to
create a world in which there are no unknown,
hostile aliens at the other end of any missiles, and that is going to
take a tremendous amount of sheer hard work. The only force which can
break down those barriers is the force of love, the force
of truth, soul-force... |
You don't have
to win the Nobel Peace Prize to work for
peace. The simple premise of unconditional love and nonviolence so
beautifully brought to life by Gandhi and Martin Luther King can be
practiced by all people. Teach only this to your children. If you'll do
just this one simple thing, together, we can heal the world. |
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