MAY PEACE PREVAIL ON EARTH. Port Dover, September 8, 2024.
Font row, left to right: Janet Ternes, Bishop Barry Clarke, Bobbi Ann Brady, Adam Veri, Rev. Lynn Thackwray, Hleb Koleiko, Mark Liota.
Back row, left to right: James Hopkins, Alan Hayes, Gail Nutley, Toby Barrett, John Bird, M.J. Perry. (Photo: James Cation)
By Gail Nutley
On Sunday, September 8, a Peace Pole was dedicated at St. Paul’s Anglican Church in Port Dover.
The Pole was dedicated by Rt. Rev. Barry Clarke, Bishop-in-Charge at St. Paul’s, and Reverend Canon Lynne Thackwray, guest minister, after the Sunday service with many parishioners in attendance.
The Peace Pole is posted on the right side of the church entrance, in its own garden space, and it has quite a history that makes our parishioners honoured and proud.
This Peace Pole was presented to All Saints’ Anglican Church, Hagersville, on Peace Sunday in November 1998. A member of All Saints’, Anna Berwick (Mitchell), a teacher at Northview School (Hagersville) and Six Nations, designed and guided four students to paint the pole in four languages – English, French, Ojibwa and Cayuga. (Anna later became an Anglican minister, serving at St. Peter’s Tyrconnell (Wallacetown), until her sudden death in 2007.)
Traditionally, students from Northview rang the bells at All Saints’ on International Peace Day. A Peace Garden was designed as a place for the Peace Pole to reside. It was placed there in the spring of 2000, blessed by Reverend Canon Lynne Thackwray, dedicating it to past, present and future members of All Saints’ Church.
With the closure of All Saints’ Church, Hagersville, in September of 2020, the Peace Pole needed a new home. Various former members of All Saints’ agreed that St. Paul’s Anglican Church in Port Dover is the appropriate church to receive the gift of this Peace Pole.
A PEACE POLE is a monument that displays the message “May Peace Prevail on Earth” in the language of the country where it is placed, usually with additional translations.
It was created by philosopher Masahisa Goi in Japan in 1955 as a peace prayer, after World War 11. He then formed the World Peace Prayer Society. Since that time over 200,000 poles have been placed in 180+ countries. Peace Poles are made in varying sizes and materials, from tall granite poles to small wooden ones. The text may be carved, etched or painted.
Many religious leaders have planted Peace Poles including Pope John Paul II, Mother Teresa and the Dalai Lama. Peace Poles have been placed in such locations as the North Magnetic Pole, the Hiroshima Peace Memorial, the Egyptian Pyramids site in Giza, as well as numerous community parks. Frequently they are placed near the entrances of churches or schools.
Perhaps the world’s largest Peace Pole, at 52 feet, is located in Janesville, Wisconsin at the site of a KKK rally. Another of the largest Peace Poles, measured in tons, is the granite Peace Pole in Beech Acres Park near Cincinnati, Ohio, posted there to warn against hate literature left in the driveways of Jewish residents.