Receiving hope from Buddhist monk’s walk in SC, an artist offers gift of thanks

Dana Hawthorne of Pinopolis, S.C., has been following the Walk for Peace online and came to Saluda this week to be with them.

After seeing on Instagram that someone had presented Aloka the Peace Dog with a pin with a dove on it, she became inspired to use her talents as a stained-glass artist to make a stained-glass dove with an olive branch for the monks. The dove is an international sign of peace and is prominent in the Walk for Peace logo.

“I didn’t have time to put it in a beautiful box like I wish I could have.,” Hawthorne said. “But that isn’t the point. The point is that it came from my heart.”

Wanting to be sure she’d have an opportunity to give the gift, wrapped in bubble wrap as it was, Hawthorne drove past the crowded Saluda County Courthouse square where hundreds were gathering for the monk’s afternoon lunch break, to a vacant stretch of the road a few miles down U.S. 378 where the monks were still walking.

“I just held it out, and the first monk that saw it came up to me and said, thank you very much. So I bowed and said, thank you to every man who walked, thank you for coming,” Hawthorne said.

“Things touch me easily, happy, sad or whatever. So I’m so grateful that I’m here and I got to see them on their journey.”

Noting that she’s astounded at their sacrifice of walking thousands of miles, with nothing in it for themselves but just to promote love and peace in the world.

“I’m so grateful that they are here,” she added, while choking back tears. “We need hope in the world. And every day it keeps getting worse. So seeing them makes me feel like there’s hope for humanity. You know, a hope for our future, because we desperately need it.”