The Pope goes on in his Peace Prayer to say “help us to speak about others as our brothers and sisters.” Here my late sister Patsy has a tender moment with our grandfather on his farm. He was one of seven kids, my grandmother and I one of four. Everything is not smooth sailing with siblings, but we rarely continue to call them names once we are grown. Instead we recognize that we have different opinions, outlooks, faiths even. We learn to negotiate these differences without demonizing each other.

In some churches I have attended, all refer to one another as Brother and Sister. In the Catholic Church, these words are set aside for people in religious orders. The churches where are all seen as siblings seems friendlier. There is an acknowledgement that we are in one family and need to respect one another.

Regardless of one’s religious affiliation or lack of one, we could all benefit by seeing one another as siblings under the same sun. Perhaps we would hesitate to call each other names. Perhaps we might remember our mother saying something like “we don’t talk like that to one another in this family!”