St John`s College Peace Stone Print Page

The 'Peace Stone'  was a gift from the Japanese organization Shuyodan Hoseikai and is the the only Peace Stone in Australia. Each Peace Stone is a piece of natural rock about two metres high, engraved with Kanji characters. The Stone at St John's is inscribed with a poem of eight characters, which translates, "Four Seas are Brothers and Sisters. All nations are in peace". The poem was written by a famous calligrapher and Buddhist monk, Shunkai Bundo.

The stone dedicated at St John's is the fourth such monument erected outside Japan. It is the only example in Australia. Other stones are located in Sao Paolo, Berlin and San Francisco.

The stone is granite, about 305 million years old. It was given by Mr and Mrs Bernard Lenehan, on whose property at Georges Plains near Bathurst it was found, and whose family was involved in the foundation of St John's in 1858. Mr and Mrs Laurie Beaumont of Killara made possible its transportation to the College.

The Stone's erection owes much to the friendship between Father Paul Glynn SM, an Australian Marist Priest who has been involved for twenty years in reconciliation with Japan, and the families of John McVittie, one of the first Australian scholars invited to Japan after World War Two, and of Ryutaro Shidehara, his pupil and a member of Shuyodan Hoseikai.

Seitaro Idei, the founder of Shuyodan Hosekai, was born in 1899 in Sano, about 150 km north of Tokyo. He was strongly influenced by his parents and grew up to be a pacifist. He became convinced that war is the worst of human evils. In 1928 he took to the streets of Tokyo, campaigning for the withdrawal of the military from politics, and against intervention in Manchuria and Taiwan. He was imprisoned four times during World War Two. His ideals inspired him in 1941 to found Shuyodan Hoseikai, the Society for Promoting Devoted Service and Sincerity.

The members of the Society strive to live out the moral principles inherent in their belief. They work and pray for peace.

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