Browse Topics
Nonviolence
What Jesus Would Do
John Dear On Nonviolence, Civil Disobedience, And Doing Time
For the record, I don’t believe you can be a Christian and support war in any form — or, for that matter, support greed that leads to global poverty or any form of injustice, racism, or sexism. Christians are supposed to be peacemakers. The only thing you can say for sure about Jesus is that he was nonviolent. That was his whole message. Martin Luther King Jr. said that this is actually the most exciting era for a Christian to be alive, because we’re at the brink of destruction, and our only choice is to lead humanity back to the nonviolence of Jesus. Gandhi said that Jesus was the most active practitioner of nonviolence in the history of the world, and the only people who don’t see that are Christians. It’s incredible!
June 2009
Martyr’s Mirror
Two shotgun-wielding sheriff’s deputies barred our entry through the gates of the naval transmitter station, but our group of twenty-one protesters radiated the assurance of the overly prepared. We had trained a whole month for this moment. Though the deputies couldn’t tell from looking at us, we were skilled in the art of moral jujitsu.
June 2009
excerpted from
Beyond Vietnam
A Time To Break Silence
A nation that continues year after year to spend more money on military defense than on programs of social uplift is approaching spiritual death.
June 2009And A Time For Peace
Kathy Kelly Puts Herself In Harm’s Way To Oppose War
This war was waged, ostensibly, over weapons of mass destruction. I always say that if you want to find evidence of weapons of mass destruction in Iraq, all you have to do is go to the pediatric wards and see the children whose lives have been ruined by depleted-uranium ammunition left in the soil after the Gulf War. The U.S. has developed, sold, and used more weapons of mass destruction than any other nation in history.
February 2006Why I Am Not President
On January 19, 2004, the day of the Iowa caucus, I decided to run for president. Perhaps, in my tiny way, I reasoned, I can prevent America from becoming a Jesus-flavored neofascist empire. So I announced to the world (or, at least, to the portion of it that is on my e-mail address list) my candidacy for the Republican nomination. My campaign had begun.
January 2006
No Such Thing As A True Story
In Taoism there’s a famous saying that goes, “The Tao that can be spoken is not the ultimate Tao.” Another way you could say that, although I’ve never seen it translated this way, is “As soon as you begin to believe in something, you can no longer see anything else.”
January 2005
Sunbeams
November 2004I am not quite sure what the advantage is in having a few more dollars to spend if the air is too dirty to breathe, the water is too polluted to drink, the commuters are losing out in the struggle to get in and out of the city, the streets are filthy, the schools are so bad that the young perhaps wisely stay away, and the hoodlums roll citizens for some of the dollars they saved in the tax cut.
At Hell’s Gate
A Soldier’s Journey From War To Peace
I remember the day I left for my military service. My father drove me to the bus station in Erie, Pennsylvania. I had a Boy Scout suitcase with my name written on it in black Magic Marker. My father bought me a ticket and left me there to wait for the bus. No goodbye hug, no handshake, no parting words.
October 2004
Sunbeams
October 2004The illegal we do immediately. The unconstitutional takes a little longer.
A Brief History Of My Money-Back Guarantee
Last November I published the following poem in The Sun: If you are / dissatisfied / with / this poem / IN ANY WAY, / return it to: / Sparrow, P.O. / Box 63, / Phoenicia, / NY 12464.
May 2004
