On Saturday, June 2nd Cambridge City Hall and the Cambridge Senior Center are opening their doors for Peace Day. From 1- 5 PM, there will be opportunities for all ages to recognize Cambridge as a City of Peace. Young and older poets will share their poems, Cambridge students and, performers will delight with ballads, hip-hop, percussion and instrumentals. Choruses from CRLS will join with the voices and instruments of Jeff Robinson and AfroDZak. Exhibitions of art will feature Jameel Parker and his students and a piece from Donald Shambroom.
Across the street from City Hall at the Senior Center, there will be more activities for joining discussions, making peace flags and folding cranes, and workshops for “healing the body”. Dancers of Universal Peace will lead dances. True Story Theater will engage with stories of peacemaking. Peace Games will incite joyful cooperation and winners all around. And military families and veterans from Iraq working for peace will lead a conversation on talking with families about peacebuilding in the midst of war.
Outside on the sidewalk, peace groups, community organizations and justice workers will share their wares and resources. Neighborhood anti-violence projects will offer resources along with Mass Peace Action and Cambridge United for Peace with Justice.
The program will open on City Hall steps at 1 PM with trumpets, words and invocation. The Raging Grannies will share their tunes of protest and peace along with drummers for justice. Underground Railroad Theater’s Debra Wise will provoke and entertain and the Emperor Norton's Stationary Marching Band will delight with their 11 piece circus band and group of traveling performers.
Peace Day is a time to participate, be with friends and neighbors, learn about the many expressions of peace making in the city, be in conversations about and celebrate 25 years of peace initiatives in Cambridge.
At 4:30, everyone is invited to make a human peace sign in front of City Hall.
“Even for those who cannot be at City Hall on the 2nd, we are inviting people to work for peace on that day offering an alternative to the sea of injustice and war which engulf us.” According to Peace Commission director Cathy Hoffman “ It is a small piece of trying to build a world and community in which every day will become peace day. While Cambridge is not yet a city of peace, this is the vision and the future we are holding out.”
"Peace Day" is one of the 2007 events in the city commemorating the 25th Anniversary of the Cambridge Peace Commission. In 1982 the Cambridge City council voted to create the Cambridge Commission on Nuclear Disarmament and Peace Education to promote awareness about the dangers of living in a nuclear age for a municipality and peace education. Over the past 25 years, the Peace commission has shortened its name and expanded its mission to challenge all forms of the roots of violence, affirm diversity and build community within our city. Dedicated to the concept of thinking globally and acting locally, the Commission links the municipal government with neighborhoods, city youth, peace and justice efforts and anti-violence coalitions. It has fostered international relationships through the Sister City Program both sending and receiving delegations.
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