Photo: Ted & Co. co-founder Ted Swartz and Tim Ruebke perform “I’d Like to Buy an Enemy” at Bluffton (Ohio) University on Jan. 19. The performance explores America’s highly militarized presence and its impact around the world. Photo provided. 

“Peace, Pies & Prophets,” brought together students, faculty and community members at Bluffton (Ohio) University for an evening of laughter, pies and awareness of peacemaking efforts on Jan. 19.

“If people come together in a group and laugh, and hear something that challenges them, that’s the most important thing I can contribute,” said Ted Swartz of Ted & Co. “When you throw in the pie auctions, it adds some really fun comedy pieces. This was a great audience for that, with a lot of great energy.”

Ted & Co. co-founder Swartz and Tim Ruebke presented the 60-minute satire that allowed the audience to laugh at themselves, while presenting the influence of America’s highly militarized presence in the world, and suggesting ways of working for peace and justice in the United States and globally. Interspersed was a pie auction, started at random times by the performers blowing a horn and donning cowboy hats.

More than 30 “peace pies” were donated by local community members, with names such as “Raisin Awareness” and “Pea-can Work It Out.” The total amount from the auctioned pies and the goodwill offering taken on pie tins was $6,618, and donations continued to come in after the show. One pie alone sold for $600. All proceeds go directly to Christian Peacemaker Teams (CPT), whose executive director, Sarah Thompson, was in attendance.

The event was sponsored by Bluffton University’s Campus Ministries, PEACE Club, and the Damascus Road Anti-Racism Team, as well as First Mennonite Church in Bluffton and Lima Mennonite Church.

Since 2012, Ted & Co. has been partnering with CPT, a nonprofit that builds partnerships with local peacemakers to transform violence and oppression, to bring the show to peace-minded communities.

“I’d Like to Buy an Enemy” was written in 2009 and has been performed in partnership with CPT to bring “Peace, Pies & Prophets” to communities across the US and Canada dozens of times since its debut in 2012.