Welcome to the Nonviolent Jesus Podcast. I'm
John, Father John Deer, and today I'm speaking
with my friend Kazoo Haga, author and great teacher
of Kingian Nonviolence. This podcast is a project
of www .beattitudecenter .org, where you can
find many other podcasts and regular Zoom programs
on the nonviolence of Jesus and practicing nonviolence
and working for a more just, more nonviolent
world. So I always like to begin with a little
prayer. So I invite everyone just to take a deep
breath wherever you are and just to relax and
re -center yourself and enter into the presence
of the God of peace, the Holy Spirit of peace,
loves you infinitely. Let's welcome the nonviolent
Jesus here with us. Just take a moment to ask
for whatever graces of peace and mindfulness,
and justice that you need. Beloved God of peace,
thank you for all the blessings of life and love
and peace that you give us. Be with us now as
we reflect together on your call to Live out
and practice the vision of active, creative nonviolence
as Jesus did, as Dr. King did, as Gandhi did.
Bless us, inspire us, disarm us, strengthen us,
and send us out renewed to do your will that
we might help you to end poverty, war, injustice,
racism, greed, growing fascism, and the whole
culture of violence. that we might be your Beatitude
people of universal love, compassion, and peace.
We ask this blessing in Jesus' name. It's my
great pleasure to welcome and introduce everybody
to my friend, Kazu Haga. He's the founder of
East Point Peace Academy, a member of the Ahimsa
Collective and the Fierce Vulnerability Network,
and the author of a brilliant book called, Healing
Resistance, a Radically Different Response to
Harm, which I hope everyone will get. He's a
practitioner, trainer, and teacher of nonviolence,
as well as restorative justice and organizing
and mindfulness. And he works with incarcerated
youth and other youth activists around the country.
He's over 20 years experience teaching nonviolence
and social change work. And he resides in Oakland.
with his new baby at Canticle Farm, which is
an inner city community of nonviolence right
there. We're based around a garden. It's fantastic.
And Kazu has a brand new book out called Fierce
Vulnerability, Healing from Trauma, Emerging
Through Collapse. So just hot off the presses.
So welcome Kazu. I'm delighted you could be with
me today. So you've been teaching Kingian non
-violence for years, Kazoo, and we've spoken
in the past, and you bring a whole new fresh
perspective, and I'm sure you're still teaching
away. So I thought we could just start with the
basics of Kingian non -violence. What would you
like our listeners to know these days, 2025,
while we're going through, as the bottom line
fundamentals? of Kingian nonviolence? Yeah, I'd
say a couple of things. One is that in some ways
it's important to talk about what nonviolence
is not because there's so many misunderstandings
of what nonviolence is out in the world. You
know, one of the things that I always say is
that one of the biggest misunderstandings that
exists about nonviolence is that it's about simply
not being violent. And obviously, you know, it's
part of the picture. But I think the danger in
assuming that as long as we're not practicing
violence than we are practicing non -violence.
Because non -violence is not about what not to
do, as much as it's about what you're going to
do when you see violence, when you see injustice
in your own home, in your community, in your
own heart. What are we going to do to actively
transform that violence? I think it's easy to
see the violence and injustice that we see in
a world and kind of look the other way and say,
oh, it doesn't affect me. That's not my business.
And then think I'm a nonviolent person because
I'm not actively engaged in the violence. But
nonviolence really requires us to ask the question,
when you see violence, how am I going to intervene?
What am I going to do to play a role in transforming
the violence and the harm and the injustice?
And I think the other thing that I would add
to that is that The thing that Kingian nonviolence
and other modalities, philosophies of nonviolence
that are grounded in an ethical principled approach
to nonviolence is really commit to healing of
relationships, right? Like as we stand up and
say no to violence, as we stand up and resist
injustice, how do we do so in a way that reminds
us that all the goal of any conflict is the healing
and the reconciliation of relationships? One
of my friends and incarcerated non -violence
trainer, he's currently incarcerated in Soledad
State Prison, once taught me that resolving a
conflict is about fixing issues and reconciling
a conflict is about repairing relationships.
And non -violence at its best does both. It figures
out, it gives us a way to fix issues and pass
legislation and pass new laws, change policies.
but also does the work of healing and mending
relationships. And I think in order to get to
beloved community, in order to move towards reconciliation,
we have to have an eye for both fixing issues
and repairing the relationships. That's so helpful,
Kazu. Thank you so much. Well, in your book,
Healing Resistance, you outline Dr. King's principles
of nonviolence from this perspective of healing
relationships. So tell me about some of your
key points in that book. Yeah, so one of my favorite
principles, you know, king and non -violence
is grounded in these six principles. And the
second principle says that the beloved community
is the framework for the future. And, you know,
I work with a lot of young people and people
of different generations, and the term beloved
community has become pretty popular over the
last 10 years or so, which is a really beautiful
thing. But I think when, you know, any sort of
framing goes mainstream, sometimes we lose some
of the essence and things get lost in translation.
And so, you know, I oftentimes talk to people
about, well, what do you think beloved community
is? Who's part of your beloved community? And
they say, oh, well, my family and my activist
community, my spiritual community. And I think
it's important to celebrate community wherever
we have it. We live in such an isolated world.
And at the same time, I always want to challenge
people to think a little bit deeper because when
Dr. King was talking about beloved community
and the theologian Josiah Royce coined the term
beloved community, they weren't talking about
loving the people that are easy to love and loving
the people that are already part of your close
tight -knit community. The work of building beloved
community is about learning to cultivate compassion
and understanding, or at the very least, curiosity.
in an acknowledgement of the dignity of the people
that we don't enjoy hanging out with, right?
The people on the other side of the political
aisle, the people who may even be causing us
harm. And I think that's, you know, one of the
things about nonviolence is like, people think
it's all about love and peace and it's easy and
beautiful and all that, but the work of purifying
our own heart of hatred and resentment And cultivating
that sort of universal goodwill for all life
is actually a really difficult, challenging thing
to do. And so I think nonviolence, when understood
in the proper context, is something that we really
need to grapple with. It's not an easy thing
to practice. It's so interesting, your title
of your book, you put together these Two words
which people often don't consider together, healing,
and you're talking about social healing, the
healing of peoples, but resistance, which is
standing up and saying no to structured injustice
and violence and trying to stop it and transform
it. Tell us about the combination of those words,
if you wouldn't mind. Yeah, I mean, you know,
I come from the lineage of one of the fiercest
resisters this country has ever known, right?
Dr. King was arrested almost 30 times throughout
his life, and he was not scared to say no. He
was not scared to resist and disrupt the kind
of easy pattern of the status quo. And I think
that's a really important part of the lineage
of nonviolence that we really, particularly in
these times, need to remember that nonviolence
is It is about this unwavering faith that we
are interdependent, that my liberation depends
on the liberation of all people. But also in
order to get to that place, that sometimes we
need the courage to stand up and to resist injustice,
to resist violence, that when people are acting
out in those ways, that they are not at their
best, right? So part of the work that we need
to do is to try to invite them to do better.
And oftentimes that has to start with doing whatever
we can to stop the immediate harm first. And
so I think that that that side of nonviolence,
the lineage that has the courage to say no to
injustice is a really important part of the history
of nonviolent movements. So here we are now with.
the Trump administration facing growing fascism,
white supremacy, authoritarianism, and really
the collapse of democracy. But this has been
decades, centuries in the making, and we've been
heading here a long time. And we need resistance
and healing resistance and nonviolent action.
And, you know, I'm thinking, I'm hearing other
longtime activists say they're expecting a lot
of people to rise up in the months and years
ahead. I'm not sure about that. But if they do,
if a lot of people start wanting to take public
action, you and I know it needs to be nonviolent
action. So can you tell us a little bit about
any thoughts you have about active nonviolent
resistance against the systemic injustice? Which
we're seeing in a kind of a new way under the
Trump administration or responses that you would
encourage people to take Well, you know, I love
the work of my friends Erica Chenoweth and Maria
Stefan who did research for dating back like
hundreds of years looking at social movements
throughout the world and They showed that nonviolent
movements are twice as effective as violent movements
So I think it is important even from that kind
of strategic lens to really value the importance
of nonviolent discipline But I think it's also,
you know, as someone who does a lot of work around
trauma, when I look at Donald Trump, I can so
easily see that he is a deeply, deeply traumatized
person who's operating less out of an ideology
and more out of this like brokenness in his heart.
And that's something that I can have compassion
for. And it's also important to know that Me
having compassion for Donald Trump will probably
never change Donald Trump like Donald Trump is
never gonna be aware that I sit and try to cultivate
Understanding and compassion and empathy for
him. It's never gonna change him But it does
change me right like the work that I do To try
to have universal goodwill for all human beings
because I believe that all life is sacred does
change and reorient the way that I walk through
the world. And so I think it's one of the important
things to keep in mind about building nonviolent
movements is, yes, we need to move in a way that
acknowledges the dignity of all people and has
compassion for all people. But sometimes that
work, that specific piece of cultivating compassion
for all people is work that we do for ourselves
as much as we do it for the people that we're
cultivating compassion for. And I think if we
look at it that way, then we can build powerful
movements because the more we do work to acknowledge
the sanctity of all people, then we're also reminding
ourselves that we ourselves are sacred, right?
That we ourselves matter, that we will never
be outside of the interwoven web of humanity.
And if even someone who is causing as much harm
as Donald Trump is causing, if even he is part
of beloved community, then I must also be part
of beloved community. And I think the importance
of us grounding ourselves in that truth that
I belong is really important, especially in these
times when there's so much violence and harm
and injustice and isolation, to really ground
ourselves in that universal truth I think is
really important. Wow, that's beautiful. Well,
that brings us to your great new book, Fierce
Vulnerability. And it seems to me that your main
point there is what we're talking about here
is that the real issue behind humanity's systemic
violence and justice, and I think just global
insanity, if you look at... world hunger and
nuclear weapons and catastrophic climate change
the real issue you're presenting is trauma even
social or global trauma and that movement work
and our goal is healing and I Interpreted as
social healing or global healing. That's why
you could see dr. King as a social healer So
tell us about the book and what are the points
you're trying to make? Yeah You know, one of
the key things that I'm exploring with fierce
vulnerability is the idea that injustice is not
a political issue. Like when I think about political
issues, it makes me think about like partisan
debates and intellectual debates and power games
and to see which side can gain more power than
the other side so we can pass this new piece
of legislation. But to me, injustice is less
a political issue. and much more a manifestation
of collective trauma. I've worked with so many
incarcerated people in other communities who
have experienced, witnessed, and perpetrated
a lot of violence. And every time I slow down
enough to understand that individual person's
story, everything they do begins to make sense.
It doesn't condone what they do or what they
did, but it begins to make sense. And so much
of that is understanding how trauma impacts our
ability to create healing for individuals as
well as for the world, and how trauma is at the
source of so much of the violence that we cause
each other in our society. And so, you know,
a lot of fierce vulnerability is about learning
the lessons from the last 50 years of trauma
healing work and neuroscience and really understanding
why we inflict violence on each other because
we've experienced violence and how that impacts
our brains and it impacts our ability to even
think about things like interdependence and taking
those lessons and kind of scaling them up and
infusing nonviolent movements with an understanding
of how trauma works, both as individuals, but
also as nation states and as a species. And really
understanding, you know, another concept that
we play with in the book is that when you're
working with traumatized people, you know that
you can't just go to groups of traumatized people
and point our fingers and say, stop. Like that's
not, that's never going to be effective in helping
them heal through their trauma. And I think in
social movements, that's kind of how we oftentimes
tend to try to create change is to go to people
who are quote unquote being unjust and point
our fingers and say, you need to stop doing that.
Like movements oftentimes kind of move with this
energy of we're here to shut things down. And
I think if we can understand injustice as manifestations
of trauma, then can we move with Energy not over
here to shut things down but we're actually here
to open things up. I tactically we may need to
shut down highways and government meetings and
whatever it might be but can we move with the
spirit of we're actually here to open up important
conversations about why this violence is happening
we're here to open up possibilities for healing
and possibilities for connection. That's so powerful.
Thank you. So where did you get this phrase?
And what does it mean to you? Fierce vulnerability.
And you're not just talking about individually,
right, but movements acting through what you're
calling fierce vulnerability. And you're talking
about that, I presume, through Kingian nonviolence.
Yeah, so the word's fierce vulnerability. Ironically,
we don't remember who the first person was that
said it, but I have a friend, Chris Moore Backman,
and he was involved in action years ago. Yeah,
the author of The Gandhian Iceberg. Yeah, great
book. He was involved in an action years ago
in North Carolina where they were protesting
the construction of the Atlantic coast pipeline
and a group of his friends shut down the governor's
mansion. And during the planning of that action,
the words fierce vulnerability, kind of someone
spoke it into the air and then it kind of took
on a life of its own. And at that action, they
asked themselves the night before the action,
what are the qualities that we long to see in
these action spaces? And so they talked about
how they want to see connection and healing and
love and all of these things. And so out of that
conversation, they decided during the action
that they weren't going to hold any signs. They
weren't going to do any chance. And it's kind
of like, well, if you're on a protest and you're
not holding signs and you're not chanting, what
do you do? And so what they did was they took
over the governor's mansion. They sat in a circle
in the lobby. And then when the governor who
was out of town sent his staff down to go talk
to these protesters, instead of yelling at them,
instead of giving them a list of demands, the
protesters went around and each one talked very
vulnerably about why they were there. and about
the fears that they have about the future of
their children and the climate and what the pipeline
would mean for their communities, some of them
coming to tears expressing why they were there.
And Chris said that you could see tears welling
up in the eyes of the staff of the governor and
also even some of the police officers. And so,
you know, we got that idea that, you know, when
I do trauma healing work, I know that when one
person can model vulnerability, it just opens
up possibilities for transformation that wasn't
available before that. And so part of what we're
playing with is that when we go into these demonstrations
and protests and engage in non -violent direct
action, instead of leading with here's what we
demand, or instead of leading with we are here
because you're wrong, what if we led with the
message of we are scared? our hearts are breaking,
our communities are being destroyed, we don't
know what to do. Like, if we led with that kind
of vulnerability, then could it open up possibilities
that might not be present otherwise? We might
still be shutting down the highway, but the message
and the spirit that we are bringing to that space
is different. Wow, that's so beautiful. So, are
there strategies or key attitudes that you recommend
that people cultivate if we're going to be organizing
around a model of fierce vulnerability? Does
that make sense in your book? And what do you
mean by, in the subtitle, emerging through collapse?
Yeah, two very important questions. One is, yeah,
so a lot of fierce vulnerability, not just the
book, but, you know, we've been building this
thing called the Fierce Vulnerability Network,
and we do workshops around it, is if we imagine
ourselves modeling our own vulnerability as a
way to touch into the vulnerability of other
people to create transformation, what is the
work that we need to do to prepare ourselves
to play that kind of role? A lot of it is doing
our own internal grief work so that when we're
out in these actions, we can touch into that
grief, but also we've processed that enough internally
so we're not opening up like wide open wounds.
A lot of the work that we do is encouraging our
colleagues and our movement allies to do our
own shadow work and our own trauma healing work
so that when we're out there engaging in such
a traumatizing world, it doesn't unconsciously
trigger our own traumas. Because what happens
when our trauma is triggered is that our ability
to practice nonviolence, our ability to have
empathy and curiosity and think about concepts
like interdependence, the part of our brain that
is capable of doing those things is cut off.
So the more we can do our own healing, the more
we can be in these escalated moments of the history
of our species in a more grounded way. And so
in addition to learning how to shut down highways
and form blockades, learning how to breathe deeply,
learning how to meditate or pray, learning how
to sing songs together, these are all things
that help us prepare to model vulnerability in
a fierce way. And emerging through collapse is
just it was an acknowledgement of two things.
One is that we are in a poly crisis, right? We
are in the midst of climate catastrophe and pandemics
and the erosion of the democratic process and
rising fascism. All of these things are happening
around us. We are not crazy for feeling like
the world is burning all around us. The world
is literally burning all around us. And I think
part of the work of fierce vulnerability is the
vulnerability to accept that reality as scary
as it might feel that we are on the precipice
of one of the biggest transition moments in the
history of our species, perhaps, and having the
fierceness not to collapse under the weight of
the gravity of that situation. And then, you
know, kind of playing on the concept of emergence,
like emerging through this collapse, because
the changes that are happening in our world are
so big that we are no longer the driving forces
for change. The earth is the driving force for
change. And there's no way for us to map out
a work plan from here to liberation. Like we
have to rely on emergence, which is about centering
ourselves enough so that we can hear the subtle
voices of emergence of spirit of inspiration
and just sense and respond along the way. You
know, as an activist, I've always been taught
that we have to have this grand strategy that
figures out every contingency to get us from
here to victory. But I don't think we're at that
place anymore. And so how can we really have
faith that If we slow down enough and listen
to our hearts, we will be guided into the actions
that we need to take. That's lovely. I hear a
lot of Buddhism in your approach to this Kingian
nonviolence and your new framework of fierce
vulnerability, and that's just so helpful and
fresh. And it's taking us, as you write a lot
about, and I want to ask you to speak even more
to it, beyond us versus them, or right versus
wrong. I guess it's this phrase non -duality
as movement people, which would then lead to
social healing, that we're all one, we're all
in the same boat, that we got to get beyond judging.
And that's the beauty of that story of North
Carolina. I was learning that in Los Alamos,
New Mexico, where we had a vigil for 20 years
at the birthplace of the bomb, where every nuclear
bomb is built. And we were grappling with that
because Gandhi said, you need a symbol. So we
took up the book of Jonah, and every year hundreds
of us went through the whole town and poured
ashes on the ground and sat in sackcloth. The
message was, we're not pointing figures. We're
taking responsibility. We're all in this boat
together. And of course, ashes and stuff. And
we felt changed. But the whole state knew what
we were saying. But it was trying to get beyond
pointing fingers at the people, the millionaires
and incredible, rich, powerful people who build
nuclear weapons. and judging them because we
need them. They're the only ones who can dismantle
these darn things. That's one of the truths that
I came to. So say more about, you know, what
I hear you talking or about inviting us to is
experimenting in ways to get over that hump,
to plumb the depths of Dr. King's teaching about
the interrelated connection between all of us,
all things, and Mother Earth, and that we have
to in effect, getting so much more serious about
nonviolence. Yeah, definitely. So, you know,
I'll start by sharing that, as some people may
know, like I'm deeply grounded in Buddhist teachings.
A Japanese Buddhist oracle, Nipponzami Ohoji,
was my introduction to social change work when
I was 17 years old, spent a year and a half living
in their monasteries. And the first book on Buddhism
I ever read, was a book by Thich Nhat Hanh called
Living Buddha, Living Christ, who was essentially
saying that if you get down to the essence of
the teachings of the Buddha and Jesus, I was
also taught at a meditation retreat years ago
that the Buddha didn't teach Buddhism. The Buddha
taught universal truths that emerged in all the
world's traditions. And so as a Buddhist, when
I read Dr. King, I'm like, oh, Dr. King was a
Buddhist because he was also always talking about
interdependence. and this idea that we depend
on each other, that my liberation is deeply interwoven
with the liberation of all people. And so I think
that is one of the essential teachings of nonviolence
is this unwavering faith in interdependence.
And one of the teachings that does come from
the Buddhist tradition that is really helpful
is the doctrine of two truths that teaches us
that in our world, we're always living in two
different levels of reality. One is what's called
the relative level, which is the much more linear
level. That's the things that we can see and
touch and feel with our hands. But there's also
this ultimate reality, which is much more mystical,
magical. Both realities exist at the same time.
And so in the relative reality, there is a left
and a right and an up and a down. But in space,
there's no such thing as left or right or up
and down. And both things are true. And so I
think You know, in the relative reality, Donald
Trump has power and he is causing a lot of harm
and that needs to stop. But in the ultimate reality,
which is also true, if people like Donald Trump
and all of the people who support him are not
liberated, then we will always be at odds and
there will always be war and there will always
be division. And so how can we continue to move
in a way that acknowledges that, yeah, some people
have power that they're wielding in abusive ways.
But we actually need to free them from the delusion
of their own sense of superiority and supremacy
in order for all of us to heal. That's so beautiful.
So the power of active nonviolent love. I'm thinking
of Philip Berrigan, who used to say, he was a
longtime activist and a friend of mine, and he
used to say, towards the people at the Pentagon
where we would go and vigil, we pray for them
and we resist them. And no, that was his language
from there, that talking about love, that we're
really praying for folks, for their change of
heart. Romero was huge about that. He was always
talking positively about the Hunter and the Death
Squad people. It's amazing to me if you really
study him and saying we're praying for you and
you need to be converted We call you to put the
guns down and that's what Phil was saying and
I don't know that we do that enough here that
we are publicly loving and praying for conversion
and disarmament and transformation among all
people including ourselves you're saying and
and then that takes a public form of resistance
That's right. Do you agree with that? Yeah, a
hundred percent, a hundred percent. And you know,
Dr. King, there's a famous story from the civil
rights era where they were protesting in Selma,
Alabama. And the sheriff in Selma at the time,
who was one of the more violent sheriffs in the
South that they had to face, there was a time
when he got sick with the flu or something, I'm
not sure. And one of the lead organizers at the
time, James Bevel, took all of the movement activists
and they held a prayer vigil outside of his house.
praying for his wellness, you know, and doing
things like that, that like, yes, we are going
to resist you in every way we can, and we heard
you're sick and we hope you're feeling better
because you are still our brother, you are still
a member of this beloved community. I think that
sort of non -dual truth, again, is really important
for us to hold. That's beautiful. Tell me about
your work in prisons. What have you been doing
there, teaching nonviolence? Yeah. Are you still
doing that? Teaching nonviolence and being taught
nonviolence. These people, incarcerated people
are some of the most dedicated peace activists
I have ever met in my entire life because they
know violence. They understand the dynamic of
violence. They know where violence has brought
them. And they know, so many of them come from
very violent neighborhoods and they know what
their communities need more than anything else.
And I always say that I didn't know what words
like accountability meant until I met these incarcerated
people who have been doing so much incredible
healing and incredible work trying to hold themselves
accountable and trying to be an agent of change
and to try to create more of a culture of peace
both in their own hearts and the prisons, reaching
out to communities that they have harmed. Yeah,
so I consider the incarcerated people that I
work with to be some of my greatest teachers.
That's wonderful. Well, we're about out of time.
I wonder where can people get in touch with you
or get your new book, Fierce Vulnerability? Yeah.
So, folks can find out about my work on my website,
kazuhaga .com. It's K -A -Z -U -H -A -G -A. And
you can buy the book there. It's linked to my
publisher, Parallax Press, which is a non -profit
Buddhist publisher founded by Thich Nhat Hanh.
So, definitely encourage people. to buy straight
from them as opposed to some of the other large
online retailers that I will not name. Before
we end, is there any last thing that you'd like
to share with our listeners? Yeah, you know,
there's a lot of crises happening in our world
today, particularly around climate. It's probably
the biggest existential threat that we have faced
as a species. And I continue to think that as
the earth is going through these massive transformations,
that it's also opening up huge opportunities
for us to make transformative change. Every time
there's a crisis, there's a huge opportunity.
And so to look at the Earth as our ally, the
Earth is giving us so many opportunities to create
transformative change at a level that may not
have been unimaginable before. You know, there's
a lot of opportunities for us coming up to widen
the window what we think is politically feasible.
So, you know, listen to the earth and be with
the earth and to take advantage of everything
that it's offering us. Well, thank you so much,
Kazu Haga, for speaking with me today. It's been
a blessing. Thank you, friends, for listening
to the Nonviolent Jesus Podcast. You can hear
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everyone and keep on following the nonviolent
Jesus and see you next time. Thanks so much,
everyone.