On Pilgrimage

I was quite intrigued by the steps delineated in the idea of nonviolence as a pilgrimage. I think that the process that was outlined in the personal transformation that can occur in a pilgrimage is a very powerful one…and one of particular importance for the conversion from violence to nonviolence. This is just a combination reflection/analysis of that journey from my own experiences (though limited), readings, and teachings of prophets and guides of nonviolence.

In all of us, although all too often hidden deep inside of us, there is a longing for something more. Many mystics and theologians speak of a loneliness or an intense longing for God or peace. Dorothy Day referred to it as the “long loneliness” and Thomas Merton wrote of it as a desire for contemplation or solitude. While these images or experiences certainly carry denotations of being alone, that is certainly not the case with the references made by those experiencing a longing for a fulfillment of some sort. The longing that embarks on the pilgrimage is often undertaken in community. It is at this point that the transformative power of the nonviolent pilgrimage awakens. It seems to me that only through others, through a community, can we embrace a calling to nonviolence. For it is in the calling to nonviolence that we are also called to resist the dominance of violence, which can be very lonely and difficult, if not impossible, to do alone.

Thus far, the spiritual pilgrimage to a nonviolent faith is embodied by a longing for something more, perhaps an alternative to the way we understand our lives, our society, or the world at large. It is an experience that often emerges out of a deep spiritual moment or practice (such as Merton’s practice of solitude) or other moving experience. From this longing emerges a call. This call is significant because it requires a commitment to embark on the journey, to answer the invitation to be changed in someway yet to be determined.

The next stage is preparation. The journey to nonviolence requires a number of things before the self can begin to be transformed. To me, the most important element of this personal transformation is that it includes the support of a community. When we resist the story of violence, the myth that violence is what protects us from the unknown, we need something to help us to understand what replaces that myth. A community of fellow pilgrims can fill that void. Some pilgrims may have taken this path before and are helping to serve as guides while others are also sharing in this journey for the first time. Nonetheless, a community of nonviolent believers helps to shape and support the individual pilgrim.

Once the community has gathered to leave, a larger community gathers as well to see off their friends and family. Sometimes this larger community does not understand the pilgrimage this smaller community is about to begin. Perhaps, though, through love and compassion for a pilgrim, they understand the personal call that must be answered in this way. I am thinking of many friends and family of those who offer prayer and support for the sacrifices of others in the name of nonviolence, whether it be parents and siblings of jailed war-resisters or participatory communities on the other side of the fence offering prayers for arrestees. But it could be much simpler than that. For some, the ritual of leaving is signified by a journeying out of the world for an intense spiritual transformation to nonviolence, such as the story shared with us of Dr. King spending the night in the room Gandhi slept in.

The journey, although necessarily taken together, is experienced alone as well. I have found that shared reflection of each others’ personal transformation can offer much insight and understanding into our answering our own callings. The most difficult part of the journey though is to allow it unfold at the level you need it to happen at. Often, that is different for each pilgrim and we need to give the space to allow that individual to develop their own experience. This is not to say it is to be easy. On pilgrimage, we can challenge each other to take varying degrees of risk to allow ourselves to be transformed, but ultimately, we need to recognize the Holy Spirit working among us as that source of transformation and not force what our experience on another.

Many would describe the arrival of the pilgrimage as the culminating experience in this journey to nonviolence. Some of these arrivals, for me, have been a deep conviction that nonviolence is my calling or a confrontation of a new form of violence previously unseen in my life. For others it could be the release from prison after a direct action or the dismantling of a certain system of violence. However, while there is a sense of peace and gratitude, the arrival is not the end of the journey, there is still the return.

The return to the world can be as exhilarating and life-affirming as it can be spiritually dangerous and lonely. While the current pilgrimage has ended, one must face the new reality of life alone. A discipline of prayer and commitment to integration are essential for a healthy transition to a new life. Often, because the powers of violence are so pervasive, nonviolent resistance (particularly that of transformative act of nonviolence) is met with a menacing violence that feels threatened. It is at this point that our experiences and transformations take us back to the beginning for a new pilgrimage, as a new longing has emerged. For once we have a taste of the peace and transformative power of the nonviolent pilgrimage that is embodied in solitude and community, in contemplation and action, in social change and personal change, there is a renewed desire to partake in that journey of faith again.

Prophetic Nonviolence

I have been following the Planned Parenthood demonstrations going on in Aurora and the drama that is unfolding around there in defense of life. I was reflecting on the many “pieces of truth” that are undoubtedly being brought into the controversy all in the name of life. Even the women and men who claim to be pro-choice are exhibiting a concern for a life ethic, at least in some ways. Many pro-choice advocates are not pro-abortion, but are looking at one solution that is supposed to bring better “life” to pregnant mothers and their children. What gets lost in this battle of personal ethics and interests over whose “right” it is to choose life are the very lives themselves – and the solutions we end up tend to be exclusive, dominating, not life-affirming and violent.

A consistent ethic of life falls in line with creative nonviolence and what the dialogues regarding abortion are overwhelmingly missing is the avenue to “acknowledge, repair, and transform the infinite relatedness and unity of all life.” While we need to withdraw our support from non-life giving practices such as abortion, we also need to confirm and redeem the life of those seeking abortions and provide viable alternatives to prevent, remedy, and support expectant mothers and fathers, but particularly mothers as so often they tend to be the vulnerable and marginalized in out society. Both sides of this life-ethic issue have some truth to offer the other and the solutions proposed thus far do not appreciate the complexity of the issue nor the very real effects such systemized violence can have on all people.

In the newspaper articles I have read and people I have talked to, the proponents and opponents of the Planned Parenthood facility fall into one of two extremes: the clinic has a right to stay or get rid of the clinic altogether. The violence that is at the heart of this debate stays hidden among these simple, easy, and far-sweeping solutions. It does not even come close to touching the violent realities an expectant mother may face and drive her to such action as an abortion. A nonviolent approach necessarily considers her reality to compassionately react and find a solution that projects a consistent ethic of life for mother, child, and society. But, as we have all too often seen, creative nonviolence demands sacrifice and challenge to confront truths that may force you to reconsider your own truths.

In my mind, a nonviolent solution is a facility or institution that provides the relief and support (emotional, physical, financial, etc.) that affirms the life of the mother and encourages to birth her child…and not forger her once that child has been born. While many abortion seekers are unwed mothers, they (and their children) remain, in a sense, the widows and orphans Christ instructed us to love and care for the most.

This illustration or case study, which is all too real, demonstrates how a creative nonviolent approach and imagine or envision alternatives. The trouble is, both in communicating with those not open to discussion and the “pragmatist,” convincing them that such dreams can be a reality. While I do not claim to know the first thing about ministry for mothers to be, I can imagine a world where they are loved and supported and not drawn to violent solutions such as abortion. Yet communicating and inspiring others to buy into that reality is a challenge that can overwhelmingly cast you aside as an unrealistic dreamer, as an idealist who does not know the slightest thing about the “real” world. I find this especially depressing when trying to communicate about a world founded in the nonviolence of Christ with faithful Christians and still meet their resistance and faith in violence.

I am constantly drawn back to some of the great teachers of nonviolence not for their practical approach to social change or personal commitment to conversion, but to the language that they employed in their teachings or writings. The most interesting thing to me about how nonviolence played out in the lives of Dorothy Day, Dr. King, Cesar Chavez, Gandhi, the Berrigans, etc. is not how they were telling the world or society how they should change and transform, but the way in which they did it: as prophets. The image of prophetic nonviolence makes more sense to me than any other scriptural reference because it falls into line with all the other “crazy” prophets of Old and New Testament stories that painted the world in an ideal. The prophets encouraged a transformation to a higher ideal, to a higher, more consistent ethic of life but did not tell them exactly how to do it. Thomas Merton never spoke of how to initiate the social change needed to reflect an ethic of life and rejection of violence. Yet his prophetic call and invitation to embrace nonviolence as the way encouraged others to explore such an initiation. Perhaps through dialogue and faith in this creative nonviolent approach there is another soul who possessed the vision of how to inspire this change in society – in how to do the ministry of Planned Parenthood in a more consistent, nonviolent way.

Turmoil of a Troubled Cubs Fan

Thomas Merton, in a collection of essays called Disputed Questions, includes a reflection of some sort on solitude. In the essay “Notes for a Philosophy of Solitude” Merton offers a critique of the many fictions men believe in order to mask their loneliness or their solitude. One of the examples he gives is how the solitary recognizes the loneliness one has that is often explained away by others’ beliefs that they are part of something much larger, such as when a nation wins a war, they celebrate collectively in that fact, or the massive cheering at sporting events and the intensity that it may entail.

On a very concrete level, I agree with Merton’s assertion that we as people have theses fictions that enable us to explain away our loneliness. I think it allows for one to see clearly the many myths and false truths society has to justify things such as violence. This is not only useful but necessary if one is to try and live nonviolently. However on another level, part of me is made very uncomfortable by Merton’s very distinct assertions of man’s loneliness and the folly of collective celebration or mourning. While I certainly have not grasped all of Merton’s deep and rich philosophical understandings of solitude, I have been able to internalize it in some way and what I have found is a very disturbing participation in society’s fictions. For me, it is with the Chicago Cubs.

Some friends observed very intense responses to the Cubs playoff games. Yelling, anger, symbolic and violent body movement are all representative of the frustrations and heartbreak of a hope-filled Cubs fan. For me, I very seldom become so intense about a sporting event anymore. Part of my process or pilgrimage in nonviolence has been to filter out the aggressive competitive nature that was unhealthy and violent from my past as an athlete. It still remains something I think about often – what does nonviolent competition look like? Are certain sports by nature violent and should not be practiced (boxing, rugby, etc.)? But at a deeper level, I still love to engage in athletic competition and enjoy watching others do it, but when my reactions become rooted in such seemingly violent frustrations and reactions when a bad call is made or “my team” loses, I am participating in Merton’s fiction.

So I am faced with a very troubling situation: I love baseball and the Chicago Cubs but I easily become sucked into the pseudo-mob mentality and experience sadness and gladness for something of which I do not, in all reality, participate in at all. So to clear myself of tendencies for violent reaction, do I stop watching the Cubs? I do not want to do that at all. Intellectually, I know it is just a baseball game, but the emotions and experiences I have are very real. Where do they come from – Merton’s fiction perhaps? Do I prepare myself and watch out for the tendencies in that I know may cause me to be sucked into the game too much – who I watch it with, whether I am drinking beer or not, have thought about possible outcomes ahead of time?

While to many people, the question of are intense responses (which can be coded as violence) to situations such as a baseball game merely a fiction and participation in an unreality may seem ridiculous, to me it has become an essential stage in my development in nonviolence. It is troubling because the uncomfortable nature of facing my own tendencies and leanings toward a violence that is responsive and reactive to a mere socialized love for the Chicago Cubs might be a sign of even a more hidden conditioned response or participation in violence. It also reveals the capacity for people to be violent in so many aspects of their lives that it can be overwhelming and intimidating to even think or reflect about it.

I think in many ways Merton is on to something when he speaks of loneliness and the relationship that has to violence and nonviolence. Merton says that “the loneliness of man is God’s loneliness.” I think that this loneliness that we seek to eradicate from our lives through such fictions as being part of some collective, participatory group such as Chicago Cubs fans allows a space for a capacity of violence to grow. Historically, many radical and reactionary groups have advocated for atrocious acts of violence, genocide, poverty in the name of belonging to a group. So it seems that violence flourishes most in this fictional understanding of finding one’s self or identity in a group. But when we realize that our loneliness is not something to hide from or to explain away because it is of God, our capacity for nonviolence grows as well. And then we can participate in groups, in society, as Cubs fans because our identity is not determined by whether the Cubs win or lose or how fans react to a bad call because who I am is already made known to me in my loneliness that is God.

But to live this, to experience the loneliness that nonviolence and God conjure is an entirely different thing. It is something that I am not ready to fully dive into out of fear that I may lose who I am, but perhaps that is joy of losing one’s life to save it. The fear is very real of not knowing who I might become when my loneliness and nonviolence is embraced. Will I not like baseball anymore? Will I not watch the Cubs? How will my relationships change? All of these questions are very real to me but perhaps they are just one more social fiction intended to keep us violent and out of the nonviolent loneliness of God. I do not know, I hope to one day know, and will try to cheer for the Cubs but not allow the violence of the group to dictate who I am!

A teacher offered this to me:

DEEPLY SYMBOLIC OF AN ENTIRE PARADIGM.

IS THERE A THIRD WAY? IS IT POSSIBLE TO RECLAIM THE FUNDAMENTAL “DIVINE LONELINESS,” THE BELONGING THAT DOES NOT DEPEND ON THE FICTIONS OF WHAT MERTON ELSEWHERE CALLS THE “SOCIAL WOMB” (IN “RAIN AND THE RHINOCEROS” AND “THE TIME OF THE END IS THE TIME OF NO ROOM,” BOTH IN RAIDS ON THE UNSPEAKABLE).

A FRIEND OF MINE, JANET WEIL, LOVES BASEBALL (THE SF GIANTS VARIETY). SHE HAS A WHOLE MEDITATION ON ITS CENTRAL PREOCCUPATION WITH “COMING HOME SAFE.” MAYBE THAT’S WHERE WE START WITH THIS…!

HERES HER VIDEO:

http://www.rainonline.org/video/comingHome.mov

Subtle Differences?

Ruminating on the meaning of resistance, I find a troubling element that seems to be inherent to the nature of resistance. When one resists another, is there an act of recognition in that resistance? For example, when one participates in a direct action, arrested, tried, sentenced, and serves time in prison, is there not an apparent willingness to allow or recognize the oppressor's authority? Does that act then participate in the systems of domination we seek to change and reinforce the power-holders position?

It seems to me that in order to understand such an act of resistance as subversive requires a very vocal submission of one's own will to the powers that be. That one is effectively saying: "You are not doing this to me because you have power, but I am allowing you to do it to me because I have power." While there are certainly many Christian theological justifications for this in the model of Christ's sacrifice, many critics can turn to a Nietzchean argument that this giving of the will is a delusion - that one would rather will nothing than not will at all. To this end, does it serve to reaffirm the status quo's consolidation of power?

How does one effectively resist another without giving credence to the illegitimacy of their power?

Volatile Relationships: ROTC and Universities; Violence and Nonviolence

This is a letter to the editor I wrote in response to the articles in Loyola's Phoenix newspaper.

Read the articles here:

ROTC Rights
Should Ignatius wield a sword? Delving into ROTC presence on a Jesuit Campus

___________

The volatile relationship between Jesuit education and formation and ROTC is not a new one. All but a few of the twenty-eight Jesuit universities in the U.S. participate in ROTC in some way. In many of the universities the issues are raised in terms of financial responsibility, accessible education, or discrimination. Yet there are critics and supporters on both sides who remain unwilling to dialogue or consider the heart of the issue when talking about this contentious relationship: violence.

The Phoenix ran two opposing sides of the ROTC/Jesuit argument. Pat Leahy’s article, “ROTC Rights,” fervently supported ROTC presence for namely two reasons: 1) The “military is the only entity capable of the difficult task of preserving order on this planet”; 2) Jesuit education can better the military – “By introducing officers to different perspectives and ideological stances, Loyola can push American foreign policy – and the manner in which it is carried – toward Jesuit principles.”

Conversely, in their letter to the editor, “Should Ignatius wield a sword? Delving into ROTC presence on a Jesuit Campus,” Dugan Meyer and Danny Gibboney focus on the militarization of the university through the Solomon Amendment, ROTC discriminatory policies that are inconsistent as a department within Loyola, and the inconsistency of ROTC with Jesuit values such as social justice. While the arguments Meyer and Gibboney present require considerable thought and are worthy of discussion, they do not dive deep enough into the issue of ROTC and violence when they claim “we are […] asserting that this institution cannot simultaneously promote military ROTC programs and the principles of nonviolence and respect for all people.”

What this very important and moral debate on ROTC’s role in higher education may be reduced to is a conversation between violence and nonviolence. Leahy asserts very effectively that the military and the ROTC believe in violence as the only means of preserving peace. Meyer and Gibboney briefly recognize the inherent contradictions of a university being, at the very least, complicit with violence, and permitting and teaching nonviolence.

Perhaps the most illuminating advocate to look to for guidance is St. Ignatius himself. All are quite familiar with his conversion from being an officer in the Spanish military to lay down his sword and follow Christ. At a time when Church teachings of the “War on Terror” are most clearly delineated unjust and immoral, any compliance with the war is to be regarded as unjust and immoral as well. Many veterans are returning from the war with horrific stories and experiences there and committing themselves to helping other soldiers and aspiring soldiers learn the realities of war and to lay down their swords.

The ROTC seeks recruitment for violence, and while in the classroom there may be opportunity for discussion and opinion, there is certainly no room for that on active-duty. The moral formation a Jesuit education seeks to embody would certainly be punished if one questions the ethics of military’s hierarchical command. One will be called upon to, in the very least, train and learn to kill. This sort of violence is contrary to Christian values and Christ’s teachings.

As for Leahy’s faith in violence, a real and honest historical look at social change and “preserving order” reveals that the changes that come out of violence are never lasting or permanent. Aside from this nation’s beatification of violence as salvation, in which Loyola, and most other Jesuit or Catholic institutions, are proponents of in someway, either through word, deed, or silence, violence has also clouded our minds from truly considering nonviolence as a viable and proper Christian alternative.

ROTC has no place in a Jesuit, let alone Catholic institution when it actively seeks to subvert the truth, the immorality, and the injustice of the violence in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Finally, to return to the arguments of what is a university, Meyer and Gibboney rightly conceive of a university as a sacred space – “cathedrals of free inquiry and intellectual growth where all students have the opportunity to pursuer their academic, social, and professional interests as they see fit.” While Leahy’s understanding of this invokes then a justification of ROTC on campus to provide another education, it remains an education rooted in salvific violence. And as Ignacio Ellacuría, SJ, writes in Toward a Society That Serves its People, “It is often said that a university should be impartial. We do not agree. A university should strive to be free and objective, but objectivity and freedom may demand taking sides” (p. 175). See violence, the ROTC, the war on terror for what it really is and who it is really affecting. Then, consider our own faith in violence and ask why…and why not nonviolence. This is the objectivity and freedom Ellacuría advocates for in a university, because impartiality is all too often complicity.

_________________

Unfortunately, the views cited in Leahy's article are all to representative of the "powers that be" and "redemptive violence" (to use the understanding of Walter Wink). William Cavanaugh further contends that the "myth of redemptive violence" has not only entered our consciousness as a means of saving us or protecting us from our enemies, but that our salvation lies in it as well. This soteriology of the state and the state-sponsored or state-endorsed violence has become so pervasive in our souls that we cannot conceive of our faith in any other terms as well. So nonviolence is doubly threatened, or rather, the state and the individual is threatened by nonviolence because a whole new soteriology needs to be understood.

Jena 6 Demonstrations

The rallies and demonstrations that emerged in response to the highly contested charges of Mychal Bell as an adult were largely successful in bringing their demands for accountability and truth to the justice system. While the Jena 6 events and court proceedings have been, and remain, a hot bed of racial tensions, the tens of thousands of demonstrators who converged on Jena, LA in September were participating in a nonviolent demonstration that was reminiscent of the Civil Rights Marches of the 1960s.

Unfortunately, the marches then and the marches now have still been unable to produce the kind of systemic change needed to equalize treacherously unfair racial attitudes and practices in many of the U.S.'s social institutions, particularly the justice system. Perhaps the racist attitudes and assumptions of the justice system as it pertains to Black Americans is best illustrated by Reed Walters, District Attorney, speaking about the nonviolent rallies of thousands of primarily Black American activists: "I firmly believe and am confident of the fact that had it not been for the direct intervention of the Lord Jesus Christ last Thursday, a disaster would have happened. You can quote me on that."

In response to Reed Walter's racist and "religious" comments, Jena minister Rev. Donald Sibley: "I think it's a shame for you to say only Jesus Christ caused what happened there last Thursday. I think it was behavior of 30,000 people." Sibley told CNN, "I can't diminish Christ at all, but for [Walters] to use it in the sense that because his Christ, his Jesus, because he prayed, because of his police, that everything was peaceful and was decent and in order—that's just not the truth."

Walters defended himself: "What I'm saying is, the Lord Jesus Christ put his influence on those people, and they responded accordingly."

The assumption that Walters holds is that Black people are violent. This racist understanding and expectation of a primarily Black demonstration to turn violent reveals Walter's own racialized tendencies based on past stereotypes of Blacks being "uncontrollable" or "animals."

When the demonstrators consciously choose to act in a nonviolent manner, Walter's own worldview is confronted with a new reality. Walter's justifies it to himself as "divine intervention" as being the only thing that stopped the otherwise imminent violence.

This is precisely what nonviolence strives to do...challenge the realities of injustice and force those in the position of power to act in a new way. While Walter's comments still reflect his racist attitudes, had the demonstration turned violent, Walter's attitudes would have been further solidified. And then Walters's police could have responded through the customary violence typical in enforcing the law. At least in this way, the nonviolent nature of the demonstration brought about a disconnect that Walters's had to force himself to explain away - through religious beliefs. Yet once those religious beliefs are forced to be explained away, then there exists one less explanation for why, according to Walters, Blacks are violent.

Nonviolence exposes the realities of people attitudes by forcing the aggressor to recognize the dignity and humanity of the oppressed or the other. Walters may still be a racist with power in an unfair racialized justice structure, but through nonviolent action the demands of the people were heard, Bell's charges were dropped to that of a juvenile and released on bail, and the irrational nature of Walters's and the justice system's racism was exposed .


sourced from the AP News Report, see it here for more information:
Jena 6 Defendant Released on Bail