Greetings!

This week, we have two training offerings, updates from trusted friends on what is happening in Gaza, and the official Press Release on our Teachers of Peace Award! The importance of our work continually becomes more evident, and we are so grateful to all of you who make it possible. Please see this week's updates, below.

With warmth and a shared commitment to nonviolence,

Mary Hanna on behalf of Meta Peace Team

MPT Recognized with

National Award:

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Pax Christi USA, the national Catholic peace movement, has recognized Meta Peace Team (MPT) as the 2025 recipient of the Pax Christi USA Teacher of Peace award, its highest honor. The award was presented at the Pax Christi USA national conference, held July 25-27 in Detroit.

MPT provides a civilian-based, community-focused nonviolent presence in areas of conflict. It educates and trains on the efficacy, vision, power, and practice of active nonviolence, particularly as it relates to nonviolent conflict intervention, and places peace teams both domestically and internationally where invited.

“Meta Peace Team richly deserves the honor of being chosen as the recipient for the 2025 Pax Christi USA Teacher of Peace Award,” said Sherry Simon, chair of the Pax Christi USA national council. “I have been a part of the education and skills training that they provide and can personally vouch for the value and professionalism of their program. Their bravery and consistent efforts to model and teach nonviolence is inspirational.”

In nominating Meta Peace Team for the Teacher of Peace award, Pax Christi USA Young Adult Caucus leader Jessica Sun wrote, “Fearlessly and prophetically training and deploying unarmed civilian protection teams around the country and the world, especially in Palestine, Meta Peace Team is a shining star to Christians everywhere of what discipleship of the nonviolent Jesus looks like. … They train and educate in the knowledge of violence, its structural roots, and the actions necessary to combat it in an intersectional manner including race, wealth, geography, and access. Mastering the skills of nonviolence is much easier said than done — Meta Peace Team is walking that walk in deep faith and overflowing hearts.”

Founded by Rev. Peter Dougherty and Jasiu Milanowski, in collaboration with several others, MPT began as Michigan Faith and Resistance in the 1980s and evolved into Michigan Peace Team in 1993. In 2013, the name changed to Meta Peace Team, with “Meta” connoting movement and transformation, which fits the aspirations of MPT’s mission.

“We at MPT are deeply honored to receive this award,” said Fr. Dougherty, who received the Teacher of Peace award as an individual in 2002. “We cherish our intimate working relationship through the years with Pax Christi at both the state and national levels. Together we are striving to replace violence and alienation by empowering people with tools of nonviolence to create a world of love grounded in justice.”

MPT’s first international team was placed in 1993 in Bosnia. Since then, teams have been placed in Haiti, Israel, the West Bank, Gaza, Mexico, Iraq, Egypt, Panama, the sovereign nations of the Keweenaw Bay Indian Community and the Western Shoshone Indians, and at the US/Mexico border. In 1996, in response to requests for local peace teams to prevent violence, MPT placed its first domestic Peace Team at the Detroit Free Press Strike and, by 1998, was regularly fielding Peace Teams to prevent violence after big sporting events, at national and state conferences, KKK rallies, Gay Pride parades, cultural events, executions, political gatherings, social protests, and potentially controversial events. MPT has also offered protective accompaniment for threatened school children, activists, and even reporters from the Southern Poverty Law Center.

In addition to its peace team training and placement, MPT is also currently partnering with communities within the US (for instance, in Detroit, MI and Roanoke, VA), to empower ordinary citizens with violence prevention and de-escalation skills.

Use this link to watch an introductory video on MPT.

Use this link to download a PDF of history of MPT.

“This recognition is so deeply appreciated, and all of us are truly humbled,” said Mary Hanna, MPT’s Operations Manager and Training Coordinator. “We find ourselves in the company of saints and prophets when we look at the list of previous recipients. There are no words to express our gratitude. Those of us working with MPT have been given the tangible opportunity of working to make the world a better, less violent, and more just place. Who could ask for more than that? And as for me specifically, I feel I’ve been blessed to be able to work with both MPT and Pax Christi, because I never have to choose between my faith and my job: They have become the same thing.”



Bishop John Stowe, OFM Conv., bishop president of Pax Christi USA, said, “Meta Peace Team demonstrates the best form of teaching peace, that is by placing their own lives on the line and committing to nonviolent action. Their work in Gaza is truly heroic and it is an honor for us to recognize their good work with the Teacher of Peace award. With many ties to Michigan, it is especially opportune that MPT can be celebrated as we gather in Detroit. I encourage all Pax Christi members to learn about their work for peace.”

(L→R) Mary Hanna, Fr. Peter Dougherty, and Melody Arnst accepting the Teacher of Peace Award

on behalf of Meta Peace Team

Some of the many MPT members present.

Israeli Organizations Conclude Israel Committing Genocide Against Palestinians in Gaza

The following message is from a trusted source - a physician from the U.S. volunteering in Gaza:

"We went to the north per request of the WHO for extreme need. Landed at Shifa hospital in the part of Gaza known as Gaza city. Driving up that street in the current context is like driving between heaven and hell… to the left, the beach and the serene ocean… waves lapping against the sand, the sun glistening off the water, absolutely majestic… and to our right (east) is the absolute devastationscape… crumbled buildings, residual walls riddled with bullet holes, twisted metal half buried in the dirt… lives that once were… entire apartment complexes leaning on one another like exhausted brothers… hollow, empty, and quiet. But if you pay attention carefully, you’ll see that the inhabitants of paradise reside on both sides (of this street). On one side the kids still splash at the waters edge even though they’ve been told they cannot swim at risk of attack by the IDF warships… on the other side, within the rubble, between spaces made by rocket blasts, these same heavenly inhabitants have re-established homes upon/within the ruin… somehow. As you watch the videos, you’ll may hear our guide explain what the buildings used to be… how some of those building were used as checkpoints by the IDF… and now what’s left… almost nothing.

K, one of the sweet men I have met since being here for just a few hours… stood next to me as we toured the area… we bumped into the ICU doctor I’ll be working with for the next little while and they recognized each other: K. reminded the doctor that (they had) met earlier this year when K.’s sister presented to the EGH (European hospital now destroyed) after a bomb had fell on her house and killed her three children… they hugged again… “she ‘istashad’” (in English, 'was martyred') he said… then nodded at each other… semblances of warm grimaces on their faces, trying to smile in kindness. Smiles in Gaza are resistance. To speak of the dead in this manner is to honor them and to resist (those) that try to wipe them out.

They first took us to meet the director of the hospital… a tall, bald man who has a presence about him when he walks in the room. Everyone obviously respects him dearly. He sat at the head of the table and briefed us on what Shifa (which means healing for both the body and mind) was and what it is now. One of the other admin members jumped in to explain the ongoing onslaught… He then paused for a moment… almost catching his breath… the director of his hospital had just learned in the last 2 days that his daughter, her husband and all of their children that were displaced were killed in an airstrike. He turned his laptop around and the background of his screen was a collage of all those who died.. he named them all… his voice broke… but he adjusted himself, made a prayer for them and then got back to business.

One day, when this is over… the grounds of Shifa will be a memorial to the genocide. The mass grave in the courtyard… the destroyed NICU where premature babies were left to die under forced evacuation orders… where thousands of souls were lost and a large portion of the healthcare workers of Gaza were murdered. This place will also be the memorial that represents the rebirth of Gaza from under this tyranny. We saw workers rebuilding AT THE SAME TIME we could hear bombs dropping in the distance. You cannot defeat a people who think this way. May God have it so that the persistence and bravery that these people display discourages the IDF from continuing their onslaught with the knowledge that their plot (to eliminate all Palestinians) will never be fulfilled."

• At the end of this short video clip, the narrator says they will try to visit another hospital, "Inshallah". Inshallah is the Arabic word for "If God wills it". Because their lives are so utterly unpredictable, Palestinians use this phrase all the time.

"End unfolding genocide or watch it end life in Gaza:

UN experts say States face defining choice"

This weekend via Zoom

This weekend in Person:

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