I don't think I'm yet peaceful because I have to struggle every

Hear the cry of Betty Williams, Nobel laureate of peace, who confessed with unflinching honesty: “I don’t think I’m yet peaceful because I have to struggle every day within myself when I see the suffering of the people of the world, the women and the children. And fury sets in. But I have to transform that and take it out and do something positive with it — but I have to do that sometimes minute to minute.” In this saying is the eternal battle between fury and peace, between the storm that rises within the heart and the labor to turn it into light for the sake of others.

She does not speak as one who has attained a serene mountaintop far above the pain of the world. Rather, she reveals that struggle is constant, that to be awake to the world’s wounds is to feel the fire of anger at cruelty and injustice. This anger is not weakness, nor is it sin. It is the fire of the spirit, the divine protest against what should never be. Yet if left unshaped, it consumes and destroys. Betty’s wisdom teaches that the true warrior of peace is not one without fury, but one who learns the sacred art of transformation, turning that fire into action that heals, restores, and rebuilds.

Consider her own life, forged in the bloodied streets of Belfast during the Troubles, when violence between neighbors tore Ireland apart. Betty, once an ordinary woman, became extraordinary when tragedy struck—when children, innocent and small, were killed in the conflict. Fury set in, yet she refused to let it calcify into hatred. Instead, she gathered mothers, fathers, neighbors, and strangers, and together they raised the banner of peace. From her inner tempest was born the Community of Peace People, and through it, the world saw that even in a land drenched in vengeance, reconciliation could be dared.

History is filled with others who have walked this same narrow road. Think of Mahatma Gandhi, who beheld the cruelty of empire and felt the fire of indignation. He did not let that fire turn him into another wielder of violence; instead, he transformed his fury into nonviolent resistance, shaking the mightiest empire with the frail body of the poor and the oppressed. Or recall Nelson Mandela, who, after decades in prison, emerged not consumed by rage but refined by it, wielding forgiveness as a sword sharper than steel. Both he and Betty remind us that true peace is not passive—it is a storm calmed and then directed toward justice.

The teaching here is profound: one must not flee from anger, for it is part of the soul’s language. To feel nothing when confronted with the world’s suffering would be to be hollow and dead. But anger left untended becomes poison; anger cultivated into action becomes power. Betty Williams shows us that minute by minute, the choice is ours: to lash out in bitterness, or to labor, breath by breath, to make of our fury something fertile.

What then shall the seeker do? First, do not despise the fire within. When you see injustice, let it stir you. But before you speak, pause. Before you act, ask: “What good can come of this fire? How can I pour it into deeds that build, rather than destroy?” Second, look for the smallest ways to shape anger into positive action—whether it is a kind word in the face of cruelty, a protest against injustice, or the patient labor of service to those in need. Third, accept that this is not a battle won once, but a struggle of every hour, perhaps every minute, as Betty herself confessed.

Thus, the lesson is clear: peace is not the absence of struggle, but the mastery of struggle. It is the ceaseless transmutation of fury into compassion, of fire into light. Those who follow this path become not only seekers of peace but its very instruments, bearing forward the torch that others may walk a brighter road. Let each of us, then, vow to rise with courage: when fury comes, may it be forged into action; when despair whispers, may it be answered with hope. For in this way, we join the company of those who, though not yet peaceful, are building peace with every breath.