"If men really wanted peace they would sincerely ask God for it and He would give it to them.
But why should He give the world a peace which it does not really want? The peace the world pretends to desire is really no peace at all.
To some men peace merely means the liberty to exploit other people without fear of retaliation or interference.
To others peace means the freedom to rob others without interruption.
To still others it means the leisure to devour the goods of the earth without being compelled to interrupt their pleasures to feed those whom their greed is starving.
And to practically everybody else peace simply means the absence of any physical violence that might cast a shadow over lives devoted to the satisfaction of their animal appetites for comfort and pleasure."
~ Thomas Merton
