Читать книгу Blessed Peacemakers - Robin Jarrell - Страница 35

31 January 1903—22 December 1998

Tree of Justice, Fruit of Peace

Like so many British youth of his generation, Donald Soper grew up believing that he was a “member of the greatest empire the world had ever known.” Still a boy when World War I erupted, the “possibility that the power conducting mass violence did not necessarily confer moral approval on the practice” never occurred to him. He was confident in a totally uncritical way that might makes right.

That all changed in 1921, when he matriculated at Cambridge to study history. An excellent athlete, Soper was devoted to the game of cricket. He had been relatively unmoved by the sight of older Cambridge students who had returned from the war maimed. But the horror and senselessness of violent death was brought home to him when a fast pitch of his accidentally killed a batman during a cricket match.

Soper never got over the spiritual and moral ramifications of this tragedy. Wrestling with bouts of depression and guilt, he reexamined his earlier patriotism and experienced a religious conversion. His study of the gospels led him to the conclusion that nonviolence was a requirement for a Christian. Pacifism and social reform, which improved the quality of life for those living in want, were, in his estimation, undeniably bonded with Christ’s radical message.

Licensed as a Methodist minister in 1926, Soper soon became a respected preacher and debater. His fame spread nationally in 1942 when he began open-air preaching at Hyde Park’s “soap-box parliament.” He continued using his weekly open-air forums for the next sixty-five years to argue for peace, socialism, nuclear disarmament, and racial equality. Known affectionately as “Soapie” and “Dr. Soapbox,” Soper was known for not sparing hecklers who interrupted his addresses. He was still climbing onto the soapbox at Hyde Park even in his ninetieth year.

Soper joined Dick Sheppard’s Peace Pledge Union in 1937. His public arguments for pacifism were so fervent and persuasive that the government banned him from speaking on the BBC during World War II. After the war, he remained one of England’s most recognized spokespersons for peace with justice. “Peace is the fruit of justice,” he insisted, “and can grow on no other tree. It is impossible to graft it on a society which is unjust. The rejection of war must go hand in hand with the rejection of the systems which have required war as a continuation of politics by other means.”

Soper was a regular columnist for the socialist weekly Tribune for over twenty years. He also published numerous books on Christianity, social reform, and pacifism. Awarded a life peerage by the Labor Party in 1965, he wryly remarked that the honor was “proof of the reality of life after death.” A controversialist until the end, he remarked shortly before his death that because capitalism is based on institutional theft, shoplifting at a supermarket by an impoverished and hungry person isn’t necessarily a crime.