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In this episode of the Proclaim Peace Podcast, hosts Jennifer Thomas and Patrick Mason are joined by Bellweather International founder Rachel Miner to tackle the difficult and sobering topic of genocide. They emphasize the importance of peace builders acknowledging and confronting the realities of evil and suffering in the world. Jennifer highlights that a key trait of peace builders is the ability to mourn and lament for those affected by atrocities. The discussion also connects to the Book of Mormon, which addresses the theme of genocide, particularly in its concluding narratives. Join them as they explore how awareness and understanding of these harsh realities can guide us towards fostering a more peaceful and just world.
Timestamps
[00:01:27] Genocide in the Book of Mormon.
[00:06:57] Peace as a lifestyle.
[00:08:09] Lifestyle of peace cultivation.
[00:11:21] Leadership and transparency for peace.
[00:15:44] Understanding the cycle of genocide.
[00:20:46] Genocide prevention in scriptures.
[00:23:06] Secret combinations in society.
[00:30:05] Teaching hate leads to genocide.
[00:33:16] Genocide prevention through education.
[00:36:06] Choosing love over hatred.
[00:41:24] Gender equality and genocide prevention.
[00:44:54] Hate speech and genocide prevention.
[00:48:50] Scapegoating in society.
[00:52:06] Economic suffering and perception.
[00:56:19] Unity in suffering and persecution.
[01:02:15] Mothers of genocide survivors' hope.
[01:04:08] Making peace in your life.
Transcript
(00:03-00:05) Jennifer Thomas: Welcome to the Proclaim Peace Podcast. I'm Jennifer Thomas.(00:06-00:16) Patrick Mason: And I'm Patrick Mason. And this is the podcast where we apply principles of the gospel and read the Book of Mormon to become better peacemakers. Jen, how's it going?
(00:16-00:37) Jennifer Thomas: It's going, okay, Patrick, I am a little hesitant about today's episode because we're gonna talk about some hard things. So there have been episodes of this podcast that have felt a lot more lighthearted to me and this one is not. But I am hopeful that we can get through a hard topic in a way that will be meaningful and relevant to our listeners.
(00:38-00:41) Patrick Mason: Just so everybody knows, we're gonna be talking about genocide today.
(00:41-00:43) Jennifer Thomas: Yay, genocide fun.
(00:44-01:57) Patrick Mason: I guess there's lots of hard topics in the world. We're talking about one of the hardest today. And I think part of it is because, well, I'd say for two reasons, and then let me know what you think. One is because I think peace builders cannot turn away from or ignore evil and great suffering in the world. That I actually think one of the character traits of a peace builder is a sense of mourning and lament, which means also attention or attentiveness to the pain and suffering of the world. And the fact is, even though it's ugly, it's heinous, it's not praiseworthy or lovely or of good report, right? But the fact is, there is great evil in the world. There is genocide in the world, not just in the past, but in the present. And so I think as peace builders, we have to pay attention to it if we want to address it, if we want to make the world a more peaceful and just place. So I think that's the first thing. The second thing is the Book of Mormon talks about it. The Book of Mormon ends with not one, but two genocides. And so I think the Book of Mormon is trying to call our attention to something, even if we don't really like going to that place.
(01:57-04:04) Jennifer Thomas: Well, and I think one of the things that's so relevant is that the causes of the genocide that the Book of Mormon ends in, we can step back through our reading and see the things that result in genocide started at the very beginning of the book. They were tensions in relationships and in families and then in communities that went unresolved, that went amplified over decades, and then ended very badly. And so I think one of the things that the Book of Mormon allows us to do is it allows us to condense that process into just a few hundred pages. And then that can hopefully allow us to see it with more clarity and in a way that also allows us to potentially see ourselves in it. Like, how am I making small decisions that could potentially accelerate into larger consequences? Or how am I contributing to a society in positive or negative ways that could create a really great society or create a really negative society? And so I think the Book of Mormon is an enormous tool to us, particularly because it situates all of this in amongst a group of at least ostensible believers, people who oriented towards Christ just a few generations before these genocides to great benefit. Like they oriented their whole beings towards Christ and lived in this extraordinary society that was the happiest that ever existed on the earth. And then as they turned away from Jesus and turned away from his teachings, what were the natural results? And so it just really is an important lesson for me to in, I guess, being honest about the way I'm contributing positively or negatively to my society and also being honest with myself about how committed I am to being a disciple, even in difficult times. And I just really am grateful that we're going to have this hard conversation. And I hope that we do it in a way with our guest that allows all of you to To not feel like this is a distant problem that has nothing to do with your lives, but that you can understand how it might have to do with your life and what role you might play.
(04:05-05:18) Patrick Mason: Yeah, exactly. And as we thought about how to handle this, and this kind of horrific violence, again, that's repeated twice at the end of the Book of Mormon, we, you know, there are different approaches we could take, we could really dive in and talk about, you know, dive into the, you know, the gory details of and the verses of what I was talking about. But I think, you know, we're, we're aware of those things. I think, The way we wanted to approach this was on the flip side, again, from a peace-building perspective of recognizing that there is genocide, there's genocide in the book, there's genocide in the world that we live in now. How do we avoid it? How do we prevent it? how do we as peace builders actually do something so that, you know, those words never again, which unfortunately too often has become an empty promise, but that actually we can be part of living that out in the world so that they're, you know, the Book of Mormon wants us, especially, you know, the Prophet Moroni at the end says, you know, I've told you all these things so that you can do better than us. The whole message of the book is, don't do like we did. Instead, they're trying to point us to a different way. So that's kind of the direction that we want to go today.
(05:19-05:33) Jennifer Thomas: Well, stick with us. We promise, actually, that this is going to be worth it, and hopefully will be a deeply affirming experience that will help you to re-commit to your relationship with Christ and the role that you can play as a peacemaker.
(05:36-06:43) Patrick Mason: Well, to have this conversation, I'm really excited about the guests that we have on Proclaimed Peace today. Our special guest is Rachel Miner. Rachel is the founder and CEO of Bellwether International, which is a nonprofit organization committed to disrupting the cycle of genocide and building genocide-resistant societies. She holds a bachelor's degree from Brigham Young University, a master's in public administration from the London School of Economics and Political Science, and a second master's in economic and political development from Columbia University. That's a pretty good CV. In 2021, she was honored to be named as a U.S. Truman Scholar. Rachel has presented her research on genocide prevention to prestigious forums, such as the United Nations Commission on the Status of Women, the Global Women's Summit, and the International Religious Freedom Summit, among others. She's published her work. She does lots of media. And most of all, she does work all around the world to understand the causes and most of all, to prevent genocide all around the globe. So Rachel, we're so thrilled to have you with us. Thanks for being here.
(06:44-06:46) Jennifer Thomas: Happy to be here. Thanks for joining us.
(06:47-06:56) Patrick Mason: So we start always by asking our guests the same question that they answer always from their own perspectives. How do you personally define peace?
(06:57-07:40) Rachel Miner: Peace is a lifestyle. that requires the cultivation of love over hate. So a lot of people talk about kind of peaceful conditions in the development world, maybe a lack of conflict as the definition of peace, but it's not an event. It's a lifestyle. And if we don't develop the lifestyle of peace, we will either, one, take for granted what peace is and never truly know when we have it, Or B, we will fail to protect it because we won't know in what lifestyle or in what resources we have to actually defend that ultimate ideal that's in the mind of those who seek peace.
(07:41-08:09) Jennifer Thomas: So I actually really appreciate this definition. You would think after doing so many podcasts on this topic that people would have repetitive answers, but this was a new one and I really appreciate it. Would you maybe start out by sharing with us, we're gonna get into some heavy things in this episode, but I'm wondering if maybe to start us out, you'd share with us some of the positive affirmative things of that lifestyle you see that if we cultivate can lead us to a position of peace.
(08:09-11:55) Rachel Miner: Yeah, absolutely. Part of my work at Bellwether International is really thinking about what it means to be a bellwether. So maybe I'll start there. The word bellwether is to be a leader, to be out in the front. And its original term was used to describe folds of sheep. There's always a bellwether sheep that has a special relationship to the master shepherd. And in a lot of cases, this sheep would have an actual bell tied around its neck so that other sheep would hear the bell in the absence of seeing the shepherd or knowing where the shepherd was and would be able to follow the bellwether into safety and along guided routes. So that term has been adopted in lots of different fields. It's most often used now in financial context, economic context, to describe bellwether stocks or bellwether trends, to be an indicator of trends. But ultimately, our mission at Bellwether International is to create a culture where everyone is empowered to be a bellwether, a bellwether for peace and a bellwether for genocide prevention and resistance. So when we think about the lifestyle of peace, we have to think about what it means to be upstream from conflict, from mass atrocity, and what it means to be a bellwether. So some of those cultivating characteristics and lifestyle choices is, I think, first and foremost, a real awareness of what leadership requires. A lot of people think of leadership as speaking out, speaking up, providing that path, leading the way. I think that there is lots of different kinds of leadership, particularly in the context of peace. But I'm learning more and more that, actually, leadership is not just the first. It's the first and second. And what do I mean by that? Well, you could have a bellwether sheep, someone who's paving the way, but it's actually the second sheep. It's the sheep that follows the bellwether that's providing the path of leadership. So in the context of peace, when someone stands up and says, you know, this is not OK, Who supports that message? Who steps in and supports a movement of peace, a cultivation of peace, a lifestyle of peace? So I'm always thinking about in my own work, in my own diplomatic efforts, even in the political context in the United States right now, there's not a lot of people speaking up generally, but where there are people speaking up, is there a second voice? Is there that affirmative voice of peace that's saying, we stand with so-and-so. We stand with the message of peace. We won't tolerate this, or we need to see this, or we'd like to see changes here. So that's a real core component, is learning how to be the first and second leader in the bellwether mindset. I think another ingredient in the cultivation of peace has to do with transparency and truth. I think we'll get a little bit into this when we talk about some of the scriptural context, but no good deed is done in secrecy or darkness in the same way that evil deeds are done. So being a bellwether for peace requires transparency requires a different kind of communication that says, this is what we're trying to achieve. This is what peace is for. This is how you can be a part of it. These are your incentives to be a part of it. and really learning that transparency. So I could share a lot more characteristics, but I just think we've undervalued both leadership and honesty, and we've kind of lost sight of how the first and second leader and a culture of transparency, honesty, and communication, in my opinion, are the foundation for all peace in the world.
(11:57-12:59) Patrick Mason: I love that. And that's such a striking image. Certainly one I'll carry with me is the bellwether sheep. I don't think I knew that that's where the word came from. So I definitely learned something in the last five minutes. But also that idea that actually that second sheep is really important, right? I think there's a lot of people who think they're leading, but nobody's following. And so what is it like to actually bring people along with you on the way to do good in the world? So that's amazing. Before we dive in, and I know we have a lot to talk about here, but Rachel, I wonder if you talk about just a little bit about your own background. I've read your degrees and some of your achievements and accomplishments, but tell us a little bit about your path of how you decided to do the work that you're doing. What struck you? What inspired you? What led you to work on genocide prevention and resilience? And just talk about your own personal path as a peace builder.
(12:59-19:28) Rachel Miner: Thanks for the chance to talk about that. I think There are some real clear career paths in life and you kind of know ahead of time and you go out and you chase that and you follow the CV of others and the building blocks that are laid out in our capitalist society. I'm going to say up front that my path was not that. I had no idea when I started studying economics and actually even before that when I started at BYU as a studio art major. that I was going to be dedicating my life, committing my life to understanding and preventing genocide. But a lot of things came together, as they do for all good people who want to consecrate their life and their gifts to God. And that has certainly always been at the core of my path. is just knowing that our heavenly parents value and center human rights in their work more than anyone on the earth. And they want peace to prevail and they want conflict resolution and transformation. They want a world that's free from atrocity. That fundamental belief is where my path starts. And then early on, as I was finishing up degrees and studying in different areas, I had exposure to contemporary genocide. I volunteered with a charity in London that was responding to the 2014 Yazidi genocide. And this was perpetrated at the hands of a terrorist group known as Daesh in the conflict transformation community or ISIS. And I was so deeply disturbed for so many reasons. First, that as a woman of education and privilege, I was very well informed in politics. I'd worked on the Hill for a time. I had never heard of the Yazidis. I had never even heard of them. I had no idea what they believed, what was important to them, why they were being targeted, how this could happen. And I had no idea that among other contemporary genocides, Yazidis are not the only group that have suffered. There is wide-scale mass atrocity in the world today. And I think one of the most interesting deceptions of our society that we've told ourselves and allowed political leaders to kind of persuade us to believe is that the only genocide that happened was the Holocaust. And, and so there's kind of this mentality that genocide has happened in the past and it won't happen again, or that could never happen to us what happened in the Nazi regime in Germany to the Jews could never happen today and we've we've developed a real complacency a real apathy for. understanding how genocide is formed. So all these ingredients kind of came together, and when the opportunity presented itself, and we actually approached a group of funders to say, you know, we're not doing serious research on this, but all the economic trends and all the economic statistical predictors are saying a few things. First, genocide is pervasive, widespread, and on the rise. The global trend towards genocide is increasing in our world. The second, genocide is not like other kinds of conflict. We tend to conflate conflict with genocide. We tend to actually use genocide in very loose terms, which is harmful for what we're trying to achieve in the world and say, oh, this is conflict, it's genocide. That's not true. Genocide is very clear in its definition. It's the deliberate intent to destroy a group of people based on identity traits, it's outlined extensively in the United Nations, you could even argue really that the United Nations was formed as a body in the context of genocide prevention. Exactly. So that's kind of the second thing we have to clear up is that genocide isn't spontaneous. It doesn't erupt like other forms of conflict, like maybe civil wars or coup d'etat or things of that nature. It's always premeditated. It is always planned years, years in advance. And Then another principle that I came across both working with the Yazidis and researchers and funders was that it's cyclical. So in the early days of my advocacy working for this charity, and then right when I started Bellwether, I approached a lot of policymakers to understand, what do you think genocide is? Why is it happening? What are your beliefs about this kind of conflict? And they'd say, well, we just don't really know, do we? We don't have any data. It's too complex. And I didn't buy that six years ago when I started Bellwether, and I certainly don't buy that now. As it turns out, genocide is happening on average every two and a half, three years. So we actually, quite unfortunately, have more data than we've ever had. We know exactly why genocide happens. We know where it happens. We know where it could happen next. And I don't really subscribe to that myth that something is so complex. I don't think genocide is more complex than climate change. I don't think it's more complex than many of the issues we're facing in the world. And my training in economics, my spiritual beliefs, and then looking at some of these core assumptions and realizing, you know, we could do something about this. We could absolutely construct a movement to resist genocide, to come upstream to understand the cycle of genocide, to disrupt that cycle, and empower society writ large, we can empower huge groups of people to actually understand the dangers of genocide, how to avoid them, and how to actively resist them. And that's really where my career started with understanding this, this early exposure, and then just not really feeling content to accept these myths, if you will, these these rhetorical claims that have just been cycled at every never again ceremony you've ever heard. Oh, if we only knew. Well, actually, we do know. And I felt like it was a calling from God, a divine assignment to do something about it.
(19:30-21:37) Jennifer Thomas: So I actually live in a town in Massachusetts that there are two towns right next to each other that have a quite significant population of people who are Armenian and who came to the United States after the Armenian genocide. And I had this very similar experience that I thought I was fairly well informed. In fact, I was probably above average informed around the genocide that had taken place in World War II of various peoples, right? But I had never heard of the Armenian genocide. And then coming into this culture that these towns that were very small, had really significant Armenian populations. And seeing how this reverberated through this culture, even decades later, the price that these families had paid and the way that even a generation or two out, this still was such an important part of of their sense of identity and absence to some degree of security. And so I just couldn't agree more with you that this happens more often than we want to be aware of, and that it has lasting, real lasting effects on generations of those who come after. One of the things I would really be interested in, maybe this is something you want to do in the context of the Book of Mormon, is I think you've talked about the fact that there are steps, that this doesn't just blindside us, and that pretending that it blindsides us is probably a little bit of a sin on our part, that we have an obligation to see these steps as they're happening, the stages of genocide as they unfold. And so maybe you can help some of our listeners to see something they might not have seen before, put it into their view, and help them see it in a spiritual context that will I think what we'd like people to take away from this is not just genocide is bad, it happens, but we want people to see, I mean, everyone agrees, right? But we want them to see that there are places that they can be these bellwether sheep, right? They can do exactly what Patrick and you have just talked about. They can be the people that stand up and sort of signal to others that they're hearing the signs and seeing the signs and want to engage against them.
(21:38-27:02) Rachel Miner: Yeah, let's dive into that. There are so many scriptures that help us understand the doctrine of genocide prevention. That's what I'm calling it. There's a lot we could discuss here. I really tried to narrow down a lot of my studies into some of the core points that I think we need to discuss. And I know that you've been discussing on the podcast the end of the Book of Mormon, and so that's really where I want to start. I think 4th Nephi, 3rd Nephi, 4th Nephi, through the end of the Book of Mormon, lays it out in such clear terms. And so I want to just touch on some of these core principles. So first, 4th Nephi, as a whole book, really outlines a cycle that leads into conflict. And again, I want to be really clear, not all conflicts in the Book of Mormon are genocide. And genocide is identity based. So in fourth Nephi chapter one, and I know you've had other episodes that have really dive into this principle, so I'm not gonna spend too much time on it, but it talks about all manner of ites. So that's kind of the first ingredient when we're thinking about genocide prevention is first understanding where are the cleavages in society? Where are their ites? Where are their groups that are breaking down or coming together in the case of genocide prevention. And we get that in 4th Nephi chapter 1 verse 17. But I want to point to actually an earlier reference to where this kind of breakdown in identity in society is revealed in the Book of Mormon. So actually if we turn to 3rd Nephi chapter 7, we get a really interesting look, starting in verse six. This, I think, these scriptures actually tend to be a little bit misunderstood, so we can walk through them and kind of talk through them together. So, we're looking at the beginning of breakdown of society and in verse 35 chapter 7 verse 6 it says the regulations of government were destroyed because of the secret combination of the friends and kindreds of those who murdered the prophets so what I want to do first is understand this word secret combination this phrase because it's going to come up everywhere in the precursors to conflict. And of course, we see secret combination, we immediately think of the Gadianton robbers, and we think of some of these organized groups. In a contemporary context, there would be all kinds of political science discussion around what this group was. Was it domestic terrorism? Was it a non-state armed group? Was it XYZ? But I want to be a little more simplistic in our definition of secret combination because I think it's incredibly enlightening. So first, the word secret. Second Nephi 28.9 is really helpful in understanding the context of the word secret. So we get clear direction from Nephi when he's talking about darkness and he tells us very simply that God does not work in darkness. So secret should be connected to this idea of concealing, but not just from society at whole, but really concealing from God. So that is the secret that's happening. In 2 Nephi 28 9, it says, there shall be many which shall teach after this manner false, vain, foolish doctrines. They shall be puffed up in their hearts and shall seek deep to hide their counsels from the Lord. So again, it's not just a secrecy to each other, it's a secrecy from God. It's thinking that, as it says at the end of the verse, their works shall be in the dark. God won't know what we're doing. We can hold up our sin and God won't know. So that's the first component of this, secret. I'm gonna hide, not just from my fellow men, but I'm gonna hide from God. There will be no ultimate accountability. I'm gonna take on a mindset that justice is not real, that I'm above the law, and that God cannot hold me responsible. Then let's look at the second word, combination. So if you go back to the etymology or the history of the word combination, it comes directly from the word conspiracy. And the definition of conspiracy is, and I quote, a combination of persons for an evil purpose. a combination of evil persons. So it's the deliberate gathering of minds and people to do something evil. And in that expansive definition, which I want to go even one step further, the earliest known use of the word conspiracy, which is really crazy, comes from the word conspire, which means to breathe. So it meant to literally breathe together in an unlawful alliance. So there's this kind of intimacy that happens in secret combinations where people are coming together for evil purposes, and they're gonna do it in the dark, and they're gonna do it in a way where they think they're above the law and they're above God.
(27:03-28:18) Patrick Mason: So can I jump in real quick? Yeah, please. So this is actually really fascinating. I love these connections that you're making. I admit, I'm a little bit allergic to the word conspiracy because I don't want to be like a conspiracy thinker. or a conspiracy theorist. And to me, as I think about it, conspiracies are always what other people do. Although there are some people who would, some in my extended family, who would say they're not conspiracies, they're facts. Right. So how do we know and how do we judge? Because we all know that in our political climate right now, everybody is always pointing at the other side and saying there's conspiracies on the other side. Right. So so as we think about genocide prevention, as we think about something like this, how do we know that the that we're talking about what you're talking about, right? A real conspiracy towards evil and not just politics as usual, where people disagree about things, sometimes things that really matter.
(28:19-31:09) Rachel Miner: This is a core question. So let's go to two scriptures now that we understand what secret combination means. And yeah, there's this, wait a sec, do we know what conspiracy is? We're throwing that word around, kind of like we throw around the word genocide. We can politicize any word we want to get gain and leverage over people. So let's get a little more clear about the context. I'm gonna start with two different scriptures. First in fourth Nephi, so, What is the secret combination motivating people to do? That is the first question you have to answer to understand where conspiracy is motivated. It's the doctrine, by their fruits you shall know them. So if we go to fourth Nephi, back to fourth Nephi, chapter one, verse 39. that we're gonna be taught this distinction. And it's really clear here, but I'm also gonna reference an earlier scripture, which is in the footnote. So in verse 39, it was because of the wickedness and abomination of their fathers, even as it was in the beginning. So we're getting a reference back to where the Lamanite hatred comes from. And this is the key distinction. This is the motivation right here. And they were taught to hate. They were taught to hate the children of God. So conspiracy can take many forms, but if your conspiracy is teaching you to hate someone, teaching you to hate a group because of their identity, their political identity, their national identity, their ethnic identity, their religious identity, now we're talking about genocide ideology, which, as we discussed at the very beginning, genocide's premeditated, it's planned. You have to be taught to hate in a way that genocide can prevail. So if you look at the footnote, which I think is even more instructive, it goes back to Mosiah chapter 10, 17. We get again this principle in Mosiah 10, 17. Thus they have taught their children they should hate them, and that they should murder them, and that they should rob and plunder them, and do all they could to destroy them. That is the definition of genocide. It is taught by parent to children. And I think every member of the church and every member of society should take pause at this. I mean, your soul should be a little bit shaken and say, wait a second, have I inadvertently taught my children to hate any group of people? Have I modeled in anything that I say, what I post, what I do, what I comment on, that it's okay to hate someone because of who they are? That is where all of us need to be so aware, so critical of our own teaching in our own homes, in our own churches, in our own societies, because that is the root of genocide ideology.
(31:09-31:42) Jennifer Thomas: Well, and my guess is that a lot of people would say, well, I'm not expressly saying hate. But I think if you are saying these people are the enemy, or these people are out to destroy us, or these people are going to hurt us, then you are teaching hate, right? You're defining people, you're setting up enmity. And I think to me, enmity and hate in this situation are very analogous, right? You can use them interchangeably because it's not just how you feel about someone, it's you feel that way about them because you see them as your enemy, someone who's going to destroy you.
(31:43-32:22) Patrick Mason: And it's not just their ideas that are bad, but they are bad. Right? Like their very existence somehow corrupts society, pollutes society, and they can't be reasoned with, right? In fact, including them in the body politic makes it worse because they're a cancer, right? I mean, there's all these words that we use, all of which are dehumanizing, and they're no longer children of God. pollution, corruption, cancer, insects, bugs, you know, the enemy, all these other things other than human.
(32:23-34:48) Rachel Miner: Precisely. And I think it's, I mean, it's really clear in these scriptures, even if we take a broader context. So this is quoted in Mosiah, King Benjamin and the sermons following that, but it goes back to the beginning. We have insights as early as Nephi, that there was hatred being taught between two groups of people. So when people say, well, how did, you know, In the end, after all the wars and conflicts in Alma, there was genocide at the end of the Book of Mormon. There was deliberate effort to destroy certain ites, right? And this was planned, premeditated. We know in 4th Nephi, it's because they had been taught, this didn't happen in a year or days or weeks, they had been taught from the beginning to hate. So if it is truly something that's taught, It can be untaught. It can be retaught. It can be relearned. This is where the hope of genocide resistance lies. And people always ask me, you know, you're working in these serious, serious conditions in the serious context. Yes, it is the most depressing, most heinous human rights violation in the world. There is nothing worse than genocide. There is nothing worse in the world than genocide. But it is deliberate, and one of my most favorite quotes that I reference all the time is from a couple of economists who have helped really create a body of work around the economics of genocide prevention. They say this, in the rationality of genocide, there lies hope. The fact that it's deliberate, the fact that it's rational, the fact that it's planned is our greatest source of hope. We can find where it's taught and replace it. And this goes hand in hand with a second quote, which I frequently reference from the Nuremberg trials. You cannot kill an idea with a gun. You can only replace it with a better idea. And those two principles coming together with these scriptures help us to understand, okay, genocide starts with hot hatred, but it also ends with learning to not hate. It ends with teaching the doctrine of Christ who said explicitly, love your enemies. Do good to them that hate you.
(34:48-35:33) Jennifer Thomas: I was just going to say that I love that the answer to this cold rationality, this deliberate theoretical argument of why you should destroy someone, is this deeply irrational sermon that says, hey, you have to feel differently about people. You have to respond differently to aggression. And it's this thing, it's the deep irrationality of this message from Christ that is our saving grace, that we don't, it's just how we feel. It's tuning in to the message that come to us from on high and saying, wait, what is my heart telling me truly? And it should be orienting me towards other people, not away from them.
(35:34-36:28) Rachel Miner: Exactly. And a combination, if we're thinking about how to break down secret combinations, what is the antonym to that? It would be transparent cooperation. The opposite of secret combination is bringing together not evil people. but bringing together good people for a good purpose, breathing. And doing it out in the open and saying, yeah. Breathing out into the open. We are united for a good cause. We are united for peace. We are united for this. So I mean, this is just the crazy power of understanding words, doctrines, and principles. If we know what we're up against, it's actually very clear and has been clear from the beginning of the teachings of Christ. that we can combat genocide ideology by living a lifestyle where we choose love over hatred.
(36:29-37:04) Jennifer Thomas: And I love this message that you've shared about doing that not only transparently, but courageously, overtly. Like saying, not just like I'm quietly living a gospel-centered life, which is important, right? I don't want to diminish that. But in times where hatred is ascendant, it's requisite of us to live very openly and to express very openly that we are choosing a path of peace and that we are choosing a path of love, to speak out so that others, I think, can align with us and have hope.
(37:05-40:57) Rachel Miner: Absolutely. And this is where I want to share the next doctrine of genocide prevention, genocide resistance. So we could talk a lot about the warning signs. I would encourage those who are interested to look at a few other scriptures, like in Helaman chapter 6, where the secret combinations are first formed. There's a lot of insights there. You could also look at Mormon chapter one and see how cleavages, identity-based cleavages in society broke down by tribe. It wasn't actually the breakdown of tribe that caused the breakdown of society. It was the fact that the tribes chose not to abide by the laws of the land. It was the deregulation of government, and it was the breakdown of laws that caused the ultimate conflict, not necessarily tribes. So that's kind of an interesting insight. But let's go to genocide resistance. Let's go to what this looks like. If genocide ideology, then, is a taut hatred around specific identity groups, genocide resistance comes right from 2 Nephi 26, verse 33. where God, through the words of Nephi, models genocide resistance. So let's break this down. Nephi writes, none of these iniquities come of the Lord. He doeth that which is good among the children of men, and he doeth nothing save it be plain unto the children of men. and he inviteth them all, he inviteth them all to come unto him and partake of his goodness. He denieth none that come unto him, black and white, bond and free, male and female. He remembereth the heathen, and all are alike unto God, both Jew and Gentile. In one scripture, In one scripture, we get the breakdown of what genocide resistance looks like. As it turns out, when you look at the definition, the formal definition of genocide, which comes from the 1948 UN Convention on the Prevention of Genocide, it deliberately describes that genocide is based in racial, national, ethnic and religious-based hate. Look at the scripture again with those words in your mind. Black and white, bond and free, male and female, heathen, Jew and Gentile. We have the same categories in the scripture as we do in the formal definition of genocide. So we know there's something here. I think it's also important to notice the order of these terms. Race is first for whatever reason. That racial discrimination, harassment, and persecution that has plagued our world, our scriptures, and our understanding of the history of humankind from the beginning is listed first. We know that the Book of Mormon was written for our day and age. Black and white is listed first. There's a lesson here. We need to be thinking about racial equality. Second to that, bond and free. I think this has to do, I mean, in the context of the Book of Mormon, we're thinking about maybe formally slavery or things of that nature, but it's more than that. In the context of the Book of Mormon, bond and free has to do with your economic freedom.
(40:57-41:02) Jennifer Thomas: I was gonna say, I read that as much economically rather than like physical enslavement, right?
(41:03-41:39) Rachel Miner: It is economic freedom. You were bond in ancient times if you didn't own your own land, if you didn't own your own home. if you didn't own your own right to labor. So we have an economic distinction here. Then we get, of course, gender. And I'm going to drive this home till I'm blue in the face, because International Women's Day just passed. And also, this is crucial to the doctrine of Christ. Male and female, we need to identify this in our own faith. We need to identify these differences in our society and understand that gender equality is so core to what it means to be a bellwether in genocide prevention.
(41:40-41:44) Patrick Mason: Well, and oftentimes because genocide has a disproportionate effect on women.
(41:45-42:45) Rachel Miner: Not often, always. Always. In every case, in every study that I've done, it is the women and children who are stuck in the middle, and it is the women who bear a disproportionate physical price of surviving genocide. And then this last component, heathen. Who are we talking about here? Who did the Nephites consider heathen? It was people who weren't members of the church, formally. It was people who didn't take the covenant of Christ. So there's a whole other layer to this, which is, no, no, you can't just discriminate based on race or gender or any of these other things. You also can't discriminate just because someone doesn't belong to your faith. And lastly, Jew and Gentile. Even more, he's expanding that interfaith definition even further. Not just people who aren't of the faith or who have left the faith, like the heathen, but Jew and Gentile, people who don't even have faith.
(42:45-42:50) Jennifer Thomas: Or aren't of the covenant, right? You don't see as being God's chosen people, right?
(42:51-42:53) Patrick Mason: Well, just straight out like unbelievers.
(42:54-43:40) Rachel Miner: People who don't even believe in God. are not justifiable to discriminate against. That, I think, is very clear instruction. I think every Latter-day Saint who professes to follow Jesus Christ should really do some deep soul searching to make sure that they understand what this means in practice and not just as theology. And I think every person who has an investment in the future of peace, should take pause to understand, am I teaching hatred? Or am I teaching my children, myself, and the people in my sphere of influence to love across these differences? That is how you become a Bellwether.
(43:42-43:58) Jennifer Thomas: So let me ask you a question. We've got thousands of people listening to us, and they are going to probably not self-identify as people who would start or participate in a genocide. They're going to say, hey, I don't really know why this conversation is super relevant.
(43:58-43:59) Patrick Mason: We have so much faith in our listeners.
(43:59-45:14) Jennifer Thomas: Yeah, we have a lot of faith in them, because I think they don't think they would, right? And so I'm really interested to have you share with us, what does this translate to? In the sense of, there are a lot of intermediary steps between just, you've talked about the most important one at the very beginning up front. How do I think about my neighbors? What do I, what am I teaching the people around me? How am I orienting towards God? Putting him in my life, you know, loving God and then my neighbor like, and to myself. But I guess my question for you is, there are these intermediate steps that we, have a responsibility as followers of Christ, as true peacemakers, there are moments in which we can change our behavior or we can stand up or we can kind of stop these events in process, right? And my guess is there are a lot of those times when we can engage that happened before. I'm not really articulating this very well, but I think we see things like genocide in retrospect, the mirror, and say it was so obvious when people could have and should have done something. But I don't think it is when you're living in the moment, particularly if you're disconnecting and don't want to have anything to do with it. So what would you counsel our listeners? How can they engage? What can they do to make a difference?
(45:15-45:32) Rachel Miner: Absolutely. I'm going to share a story to teach the principle and then I'll expound on the principles. I was in Rwanda last year for the 30th commemoration of the genocide there. And you had a spectacular episode about this with Empower the People Rwanda, a great group.
(45:32-45:33) Patrick Mason: Empower the Future, yeah.
(45:33-51:53) Rachel Miner: Empower the Future, thanks. So I was in Rwanda with a group of women from all over the world. I was there with the UN Special Advisor on the Prevention of Genocide. And most of the women in the room had either directly survived genocides. We had Rwandan survivors, women who had survived Bosnia, women who had just come from the front lines of the genocide in Sudan. And somehow I found myself in this room and it was deeply humbling, one of the most humbling experiences of my professional career thus far. And I had someone ask me to my face, you know, Is there gonna be genocide in the United States? And I said, no. No, there's not gonna be genocide in the United States. We don't have enough of the early warning signs. They said, are you sure? Because it sure sounds like it. And I thought, oh wow, okay, let's go back to what we know. What do we know? Genocide's premeditated and planned years in advance. It starts with hate speech. Genocide ideology, the reason I keep using that phrase, the ideas behind genocide start as hate speech. So that's the doctrine we just unpacked. That hate speech, if left in a society for long enough, it changes people. We'll start to have change in the way people act. And when that hate speech becomes, we're going to scapegoat X group. We need to hate X group because they're responsible for, normally the way that this hate speech starts to sound is something like this. Our economy is suffering because of X group. Every genocide that I've studied has hate speech combined with a period of prolonged economic suffering. So it wasn't that in the time of the Holocaust, pre-Holocaust in Germany, it wasn't that we should hate the Jews. It was very clear language. Our economy is suffering because of the Jews. They're dishonest, don't buy from them, don't work with them. So any time there's economic stability in a country, everyone should be on the lookout to say, who's gonna get blamed? In the United States right now, we're economically prosperous, but we're in a period of economic volatility, I'd say, since COVID, since COVID-19. Actually, the whole world is in a period of economic instability since COVID. Who are we blaming in our societies? Is there a clear scapegoat? Is there a scapegoat coming from government? Is there a scapegoat coming from religious groups? Is there a scapegoat coming from political groups? Again, all of this is to help us take pause and realize, oh, maybe I'm not hating deliberately, but I'm scapegoating. I'm saying my economic suffering is because of this identity group. I think there's a lot of scapegoats in the United States right now. There's not one clear group that's being blamed. Everybody's kind of blaming everybody. But one thing we could all do is ask ourselves, who do I blame? And whoever you answer in response to that question is the group that Christ is now admonishing you to love and serve. That is the group that you could now challenge yourself to get to know. to interact with directly, person to person and not through a screen. This is the group that you should try to understand, respect, serve, pray for in the words of Christ, pray for them, pray for your, quote, enemies. and start to build bridges across those divides. Once you see hate speech, economic suffering, and a clear scapegoat, things get really scary really fast. But most genocides are then preceded by years. I just want to drive this home again. This doesn't happen over a year, month, weeks. This is years. For years, you then see a scape group that's targeted. There's normally violence against this group, and there's large impunity. So if ever we get to a place where these scapegoats are now physically targeted, where they are being killed, where there are disappearances, and there's impunity, meaning we don't hold people accountable for crime, then we should start becoming really concerned. We're not there yet. But the real challenge in places of enormous prosperity such as the United States. And I know you have a global audience, but I'm going to speak as an American, because that is my background and my sphere of influence. What we need to be especially cautious of in the United States is that the way we talk about scapegoats in our country, the way we talk about who we should blame for economic suffering, has immediate consequences, physical consequences for people overseas. Because everyone is watching our country. I just got back from a trip to Liberia. There was not a single meeting I walked into with the highest levels of government where they didn't ask me about what's happening in the United States, about my government, about my democracy and what's going on there. Not a single meeting. The world is watching us. And when we casually use language, genocide ideology, hate speech, when we casually throw words around like genocide, when we're casual about any of these very serious topics, it has immediate consequences. So I hope that points to a few ways. Ultimately, and again, man-in-the-mirror moment for all those Michael Jackson listeners out there, if you are answering the question, who do I blame, honestly, to yourself, and you can identify a group, pretty much all of us can. I can even think, I've done this exercise myself, who do I blame for the economic suffering? That is the person I now need to build a bridge with. That is the group of people I now need to try and understand, or a group of followers, or a group of political believers I now need to try to understand, love, and serve.
(51:54-53:48) Jennifer Thomas: So I'm going to add one other tiny thing in that I want our listeners to think about. We have lived in the richest country in the world. Most of our listeners are in the United States. Most of us listening to this, by definition, have enjoyed the highest standard of living that most human beings have ever joined or enjoyed on the face of the earth. And I think one of the things that I've been thinking about recently in relation to this is we think of economic suffering as being like a floor. We think of genocides having started when people were really just starving or hungry, like around World War, you know, after World War One. I actually think for a bunch of people who are spoiled and who are used to really, really high standard of living, I don't think if money is our object and is what we love and if it's our source of comfort and it's our source of peace, I actually don't think it takes too much of a reduction in a standard of living for people to see themselves as deeply aggrieved. In other words, I don't think it actually relates to their actual economic suffering. I don't think they're starving necessarily. And I know some people are. But I guess I'm just saying I would ask all of our listeners to be cautious about that relativism around suffering before they say, hey, I am truly suffering, and it's because of this group of people. Are you suffering, or do you just have $3,000 less than you did last year? Because there's a big difference, right? And I'm not saying that we, I don't, I want you to have those $3,000. I want you to be happy. But, but I guess it's really easy when you've had a life of abundance to classify pain as something that really isn't pain. I don't know if I'm making sense here, but I do think that that is one way that I worry about us as a nation. falling into these patterns earlier than other people would have thought because we are so used to being comfortable, fat and happy that as soon as we are not comfortable, fat and happy, we equate that with deep suffering and we will act accordingly.
(53:49-57:20) Rachel Miner: Well, let's just tie it back to the doctrine when you look at, you choose your breakdown of society in the Book of Mormon, to Jennifer's point. We're not God. No one on this call is. We have no relative ability to judge a person suffering against another. Justice is God's. Vengeance is God's. We can't participate in those exercise and be honest with ourselves and our conscience. We can't. We don't know. We don't understand relative suffering in the mortal mind. But to your point, Jennifer, I can list a number of scriptures. Take any one of these that you'd like. Look at 3rd Nephi chapter 7. Look at 4th Nephi chapter 1. Look at Ether chapter 8. What words are used to describe the manifestation of the pride of the people. I'm going to turn to Ether Chapter 8 as my example. What's first described in all of these cases is not how they acted, but what they were wearing In every doctrinal explanation of pride, the breakdown of society, all of these things, we start to get these really interesting descriptions of people's clothing, of their costly apparel, of their… the fact that, for whatever reason, they have this extra money to wear their pride, to wear their social status symbols. And that is the description that all the prophets and apostles choose to describe the breakdown, starting with pride. So let me be even more clear than maybe, Jennifer, you're saying here, or just to add clarity to what you're saying here. It is not a race to the bottom. It is not a race to the most persecuted church. It is not a race to say, we suffer more than. Because pretty soon you're gonna be building towers to heaven to describe other things that you're more than. It's not a race to the bottom. Never has been, never will be as long as you're a follower of Christ. It's a race to the top. And Christ was very clear in his parables. How about the parable of the 11th hour? that actually it doesn't matter when you join the fold. It doesn't matter what you're wearing. It doesn't matter what your background is. He doesn't care how long you've labored out in the vineyard. He doesn't care how far you've been persecuted or what your grievance is. He's asking you. to put aside that difference and come into the body of Christ and be one and be unified. So there is so much language everywhere in the world. Every group has a compelling case right now, particularly right now in our political climate, about why they're the most persecuted. Whose narrative does that help? Does it help the followers of Christ or does it help the followers of evil? I do not want to minimize the suffering. I honor all suffering and I stand in solidarity with every person who says I've been persecuted. We have legal standards to know that there's different levels of persecution and there's different levels of atrocity. But let me reiterate again, why would we race to the bottom when we are trying to elevate society to the top? That needs to be the mindset flip.
(57:20-57:37) Jennifer Thomas: I hope that no one thinks I'm minimizing economic suffering either, because there are people who truly are. But I know that there are a lot of people in our society who are making decisions who are not, in fact, suffering, but just maybe want more than they've got. And that's a little bit of a different thing.
(57:37-58:37) Rachel Miner: And we may never know. But the point is, like, let's let's not use that language. If you've suffered or not. Let's not use that language. Let's use a language that elevates everyone instead of elbowing each other to be at the bottom and and promoting a language where actually It's glamorous or competitive to be persecuted or to suffer. That is not, that's not the world we want to create. That's not the manifestation we want to put into the world. So I second that. And of course we stand with those who suffered. Was that not Christ's defining feature? that no matter if you had suffered an issue of blood, or paralysis, or sin, or measles, or leprosy, it didn't matter how you suffered, he lowered himself to lift you up, to lift up and say, I see you, I validate you, and now we can be one together in the healing power of the atonement. That is the only message that we should promote in a context of global suffering.
(58:39-59:51) Patrick Mason: I love that. Well, that's actually a great place to wrap up, I think. And Rachel, I'm so grateful for everything that you've taught us, especially just really powerful teaching out of the scriptures throughout the Book of Mormon to show. It's one of the things we've tried to show throughout the podcast is that this book has a lot of lessons and practicality and application, of course, to our individual spiritual lives. but also to the world that we find ourselves in, a world with lots of pain and suffering and evil all the way up to, as you say, really the greatest evil that we do to one another, which is intentional mass murder, you know, around identity lines, which we call genocide. So we always close, hopefully, on a positive note. And I'm sure, Rachel, you spend your life focusing, again, on trying to prevent the most evil things that humans do to one another. And so you've got to have some kind of grounding. You've got to have something that sustains you and preserves you in the midst of that really hard work. So where is it or how is it that you personally find peace in your life?
(59:53-01:03:26) Rachel Miner: I find peace in Jesus Christ. First and foremost, I am an admirer of many global religions and many faiths. And as a follower of Christ, I do not condemn those who follow other teachings that promote peace. I invite them. I invite them. And I have found, as a follower of Christ, that those teachings which I hold dear are actually held dear, writ large, in many faiths across the globe. every global world religious leader that I've encountered and people of faith and no faith, we talk about faith as our unifying word, and let me explain why. Very, very critical in the work of genocide prevention, which is that really what unites us as humans is our faith in the future. So there is a kind of faith beyond God, and certainly He's part of that for me, and certainly Jesus Christ is part of that for me, but even if I weren't a Latter-day Saint, there is a faith for the future that unites most of the people in this world. The challenge is that the evil people of the world are always louder, and they try to convince good people of two things. First, that you're outnumbered, which is statistically improbable. Most of the most horrible heinous crimes that have been committed in the world have been committed by less than 1% of the population. You can count a couple hundred people who are committing the very worst crimes in our world right now. We're not outnumbered. Second, the evil loud voices of this world convince you that not only are you outnumbered, but you're alone. There's no one who's sympathetic to what you're trying to do. There's no one who will stand up. There are no bellwethers. There is no resistance. There is no movement to do good. And I'm here to tell you, from my travel to over 50 countries, that is completely untrue. We are not alone. We are not alone in any country. We are not alone in our faith. We are not alone in our vision, in our hopes. And the people who have taught me this more than anyone else, are women who have survived genocide. I have started to collectively refer to them as my many mothers, very much like mothers of the Book of Mormon who have taught me that if you keep your faith in the future, however that manifests, evil cannot win. And the mothers of Srebrenica have taught me this. The mothers of Rwanda have taught me this. The mothers of the Yazidis have taught me this. It is the mothers who have survived genocide in every country that know and hold in their hearts and every day choose to fight the evil and dark powers of this world that stand up and say, we are not outnumbered, We are not alone. And I echo that message from the rooftops. All of us have a mother who has shared this lesson with us, and boy, would the global landscape look different if we all listened to our mothers and the message of peace they share. So I do have enormous hope. So do the survivors of genocide. And if they have hope, we must all carry the banner of their hope into the world that we live in.
(01:03:27-01:03:31) Patrick Mason: Excellent. Thank you so much. Thank you, Rachel, for coming on and sharing all of that wisdom.
(01:03:32-01:03:40) Jennifer Thomas: We really, really appreciate it. And I think we'll just move forward, not doubting that the mothers knew it. The mothers knew it. Yeah. Thanks so much.
(01:03:40-01:03:40) Rachel Miner: Thank you.
(01:03:43-01:04:02) Patrick Mason: Thanks everybody for listening today. We really appreciate it. We just want to invite you to subscribe to the podcast and also to rate and review it. We love hearing feedback from listeners, so please email us at podcast at mweg.org. We also want to invite you to think about ways that you can make peace in your life this week. Thanks for listening and we'll see you next time.
(01:04:08-01:04:23) Jennifer Thomas: Thank you for listening to Proclaim Peace, a proud member of the Faith Matters Podcast Network. Faith Matters holds expansive conversations about the restored gospel to accompany individuals on their journey of faith. You can learn more about Faith Matters and check out our other shows at faithmatters.org.