First United Methodist Church in Orlando learned about Peace Poles through a Thursday morning Women’s Bible Study class. The pole’s prayerful message — “May Peace Prevail on Earth” — resonated with their congregation’s peace and justice values, as it has in more than 250,000 places around the world. They started a conversation with artist Joel Selmeier about carving a seven-foot Peace Pole out of limestone for the church and inscribing it with the “peace prayer” in seven of the languages found in their community: English, Spanish, Haitian Creole, Arabic, Chinese, Vietnamese and Creek.
Then, on June 12, 2016, a 29-year-old security guard killed 49 people and wounded 53 others in a mass shooting inside Pulse, a gay nightclub in Orlando, just a few blocks from the church. Their resolve and sense of urgency grew.
The church hired a landscape architect and added the “Pathway to Peace,” ten stepping stones engraves with the names of peacemakers: Jesus, Harriet Tubman, Mahatma Gandhi, Buddha, Dorothy Day, Nelson Mandela, Elie Wiesel, Muhammad, Martin Luther King, Jr. and Malala Yousafzai.
It was dedicated on the first anniversary of the Pulse shooting.
