WEBVTT 00:00:16.170 --> 00:00:19.050 Welcome to the Nonviolent Jesus Podcast. I'm 00:00:19.050 --> 00:00:22.129 John, Father John Deere, and today I'm speaking 00:00:22.129 --> 00:00:25.769 with my friend, author, longtime activist, and 00:00:25.769 --> 00:00:28.910 professor of nonviolence, Dr. Ken Budigan. This 00:00:28.910 --> 00:00:34.219 is a project of www .beatitudescenter .org. where 00:00:34.219 --> 00:00:36.240 you can find many other podcasts and regular 00:00:36.240 --> 00:00:39.600 Zoom programs on the nonviolence of Jesus and 00:00:39.600 --> 00:00:42.640 practicing active nonviolence and working for 00:00:42.640 --> 00:00:45.619 a more just, more peaceful, more nonviolent world. 00:00:46.140 --> 00:00:49.740 So let's begin with a little prayer. I just invite 00:00:49.740 --> 00:00:52.020 everyone, wherever you are, just to take a deep 00:00:52.020 --> 00:00:56.899 breath and to relax and recenter yourself and 00:00:56.899 --> 00:00:58.820 notice how you're feeling as we're going to begin 00:00:58.820 --> 00:01:02.140 our conversation. And I invite you to enter into 00:01:02.140 --> 00:01:05.640 the presence of the God of peace who loves you 00:01:05.640 --> 00:01:09.200 infinitely and personally and everyone everywhere. 00:01:10.200 --> 00:01:12.659 And let's welcome the risen nonviolent Jesus 00:01:12.659 --> 00:01:17.159 here with us now and ask for the grace to follow 00:01:17.159 --> 00:01:24.109 him more faithfully and to do God's will. God 00:01:24.109 --> 00:01:26.310 of peace, thank you for all the blessings of 00:01:26.310 --> 00:01:29.129 life, love, and peace that you give us. Be with 00:01:29.129 --> 00:01:32.370 us now as we reflect together on your call to 00:01:32.370 --> 00:01:35.390 follow the nonviolent Jesus and work for a more 00:01:35.390 --> 00:01:38.769 nonviolent, more just world. Bless us, inspire 00:01:38.769 --> 00:01:42.810 us, disarm us, strengthen us, and send us out 00:01:42.810 --> 00:01:46.379 to do your will. and to do our part to help end 00:01:46.379 --> 00:01:50.099 war and nuclear weapons and poverty and racism 00:01:50.099 --> 00:01:53.120 and greed and justice and environmental destruction, 00:01:53.299 --> 00:01:57.099 that we might be your holy peacemakers and welcome 00:01:57.099 --> 00:02:00.659 your reign of universal love, nonviolence, and 00:02:00.659 --> 00:02:05.620 peace on earth. In Jesus' name, amen. Well, friends, 00:02:05.700 --> 00:02:08.340 it's a pleasure to welcome my friend Ken Budigan. 00:02:09.180 --> 00:02:13.439 author, organizer, activist, speaker, nonviolence 00:02:13.439 --> 00:02:18.120 trainer, strategist of movements, leader of Pace 00:02:18.120 --> 00:02:21.620 Ibene, a longtime peace organization. Ken just 00:02:21.620 --> 00:02:24.439 retired as a professor of the practice of peace 00:02:24.439 --> 00:02:28.879 and justice and conflict studies at DePaul University 00:02:28.879 --> 00:02:32.860 in Chicago. He's worked on a whole series of 00:02:32.860 --> 00:02:36.419 movements for social change for decades, including 00:02:36.419 --> 00:02:40.580 campaigns to end nuclear weapons, homelessness, 00:02:41.039 --> 00:02:44.139 the U .S. wars in Iraq, freedom for East Timor, 00:02:44.240 --> 00:02:47.379 and ending the U .S. wars in Central America. 00:02:47.680 --> 00:02:50.919 In the 1980s, he was the founder and national 00:02:50.919 --> 00:02:53.659 coordinator for the Pledge of Resistance, which 00:02:53.659 --> 00:02:56.599 some old -timers like me may remember, which 00:02:56.599 --> 00:03:00.180 for a decade mobilized nonviolent action for 00:03:00.180 --> 00:03:03.099 peace in Central America. He has worked for over 00:03:03.099 --> 00:03:06.240 30 years with Pache Ibene, which has trained 00:03:06.240 --> 00:03:09.710 tens of thousands of people. in the practice 00:03:09.710 --> 00:03:12.289 of nonviolence and the strategies of nonviolent 00:03:12.289 --> 00:03:15.870 social change. And together we launched, when 00:03:15.870 --> 00:03:19.050 I worked with Ken at Pache Bene, Campaign Nonviolence, 00:03:19.050 --> 00:03:22.229 which is an annual week -long national grassroots 00:03:22.229 --> 00:03:26.770 movement. I always joke, Ken, against everything, 00:03:27.110 --> 00:03:29.930 poverty, war, racism, environmental destruction. 00:03:29.969 --> 00:03:33.490 Ken serves on the executive committee. of Pax 00:03:33.490 --> 00:03:35.710 Christi International's Catholic Nonviolence 00:03:35.710 --> 00:03:38.789 Initiative, and he's been a global leader working 00:03:38.789 --> 00:03:41.830 with the Vatican really regularly, right up till 00:03:41.830 --> 00:03:45.229 today, to promote gospel nonviolence literally 00:03:45.229 --> 00:03:48.430 around the world through the Catholic Church. 00:03:48.669 --> 00:03:51.849 Ken's the author of seven books, including Pilgrimage 00:03:51.849 --> 00:03:55.150 Through a Burning World, the story of the nonviolent 00:03:55.150 --> 00:03:58.370 protest movement at the Nevada test site, and 00:03:58.370 --> 00:04:04.219 what I consider the greatest practical program, 00:04:04.539 --> 00:04:08.199 like a how -to manual of nonviolence called From 00:04:08.199 --> 00:04:10.840 Violence to Wholeness, which you can get if you 00:04:10.840 --> 00:04:14.199 go to the campaignnonviolence .org website. He 00:04:14.199 --> 00:04:16.399 lives in Chicago with his wife, Cynthia, and 00:04:16.399 --> 00:04:18.839 daughter, Leah. Ken Buttigan, welcome to the 00:04:18.839 --> 00:04:22.439 Nonviolent Jesus podcast. Thank you so much, 00:04:22.639 --> 00:04:27.509 John. Thank you so much. My pleasure. to have 00:04:27.509 --> 00:04:29.910 you here. And there's so much I want to talk 00:04:29.910 --> 00:04:31.910 about. I want everyone to know your stories. 00:04:32.290 --> 00:04:36.209 So let's start from the beginning. And in our 00:04:36.209 --> 00:04:39.689 allotted time we have, I'd just like to ask you 00:04:39.689 --> 00:04:43.529 to walk through briefly really the great moments 00:04:43.529 --> 00:04:45.990 of your journey as a peacemaker in the United 00:04:45.990 --> 00:04:48.470 States over the course of your life as a follower 00:04:48.470 --> 00:04:51.410 of the nonviolent Jesus. And let's start with 00:04:51.410 --> 00:04:54.250 how it all began. You know, I've heard your stories 00:04:54.250 --> 00:04:55.810 so many times, but they're always interesting 00:04:55.810 --> 00:05:00.509 to me. from being a college student at San Diego 00:05:00.509 --> 00:05:04.170 USD to going to Oxford and finally going to, 00:05:04.209 --> 00:05:06.889 almost like a pilgrimage, Ken, to New York City 00:05:06.889 --> 00:05:09.750 and meeting Daniel Berrigan and asking for his 00:05:09.750 --> 00:05:12.389 advice. So how did you get started? Tell me your 00:05:12.389 --> 00:05:16.870 journey to nonviolence. Thank you so much, John, 00:05:17.009 --> 00:05:21.189 for having me aboard. It's really exciting to 00:05:21.189 --> 00:05:24.129 be in a conversation about the nonviolent Jesus. 00:05:25.079 --> 00:05:27.480 As somebody who grew up in the Catholic Church, 00:05:27.740 --> 00:05:31.240 I don't think I ever heard the word nonviolence 00:05:31.240 --> 00:05:37.199 ever in grade school, in high school, or in college. 00:05:37.240 --> 00:05:40.540 All of these were Catholic institutions. And 00:05:40.540 --> 00:05:48.680 I distinctly remember wondering about that. Where 00:05:48.680 --> 00:05:53.740 is nonviolence in the Catholic Church? And in 00:05:53.740 --> 00:05:56.959 my senior year in college at the University of 00:05:56.959 --> 00:06:05.620 San Diego, I took a walk one morning and I suddenly 00:06:05.620 --> 00:06:10.079 was walking into the arms of God. It was not 00:06:10.079 --> 00:06:14.060 something I had expected, but every step I took 00:06:14.060 --> 00:06:19.399 was deeper and deeper into the loving arms of 00:06:19.399 --> 00:06:24.449 God. blew me away and it changed my life. That 00:06:24.449 --> 00:06:29.350 and taking the four required religious studies 00:06:29.350 --> 00:06:32.430 courses at the school that I had been putting 00:06:32.430 --> 00:06:37.810 off assiduously my four years at USD. I took 00:06:37.810 --> 00:06:39.889 them all at once and the combination of this 00:06:39.889 --> 00:06:43.769 religious experience and then the theology of 00:06:43.769 --> 00:06:50.540 God. changed me. And so I decided rather than 00:06:50.540 --> 00:06:54.620 perhaps becoming a professor of art history, 00:06:54.819 --> 00:06:57.620 I thought about that, the possibility of becoming 00:06:57.620 --> 00:07:03.019 a lawyer. I decided that I wanted to put God 00:07:03.019 --> 00:07:06.420 at the center of my life. And that meant going 00:07:06.420 --> 00:07:10.040 and studying more about God. And that brought 00:07:10.040 --> 00:07:12.839 me to the Jesuit School of Theology in Berkeley 00:07:12.839 --> 00:07:22.910 way back in 1977. And then I began to go on that 00:07:22.910 --> 00:07:26.949 journey. In preparing for this conversation, 00:07:27.389 --> 00:07:32.470 I went back to those days in my mind, and I realized 00:07:32.470 --> 00:07:37.829 that at one point, even though I wasn't particularly 00:07:37.829 --> 00:07:41.310 political, my family hadn't been political, I 00:07:41.310 --> 00:07:46.600 wasn't politicized, I did read in the paper that 00:07:46.600 --> 00:07:53.620 the University of California Board of Trustees 00:07:53.620 --> 00:07:58.060 was going to be meeting in San Francisco across 00:07:58.060 --> 00:08:01.680 the water from Berkeley, where I was, and deciding 00:08:01.680 --> 00:08:06.040 on continuing to manage the two top nuclear weapons 00:08:06.040 --> 00:08:10.180 laboratories in the United States, Los Alamos 00:08:10.180 --> 00:08:16.310 and Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory. And 00:08:16.310 --> 00:08:19.769 I read that there was going to be a little demonstration. 00:08:20.730 --> 00:08:24.990 I'm not sure what prompted me. I guess I would 00:08:24.990 --> 00:08:28.129 say it was the Holy Spirit to get on a bus to 00:08:28.129 --> 00:08:34.490 go over and to join this particular event. I 00:08:34.490 --> 00:08:36.590 arrived there thinking there'd be thousands of 00:08:36.590 --> 00:08:39.789 people. There were just a handful. I got there. 00:08:40.509 --> 00:08:43.929 And I said, I'm here for the demonstration. They 00:08:43.929 --> 00:08:46.750 said, oh, well, go in that room over there. So 00:08:46.750 --> 00:08:49.190 I did. And I said, what's going to happen there? 00:08:49.309 --> 00:08:50.990 They said, you're going to have a nonviolence 00:08:50.990 --> 00:08:53.490 training. And I said, what's that? They said, 00:08:53.529 --> 00:08:57.889 oh, that prepares you to to do this event. And 00:08:57.889 --> 00:09:01.070 I said, OK, that's what I'm here for. So I went 00:09:01.070 --> 00:09:04.809 in and I met for the first time in my life, Chad 00:09:04.809 --> 00:09:08.330 Myers, who is a friend of John Deere's as well. 00:09:09.460 --> 00:09:12.759 who is a scholar. But that day he was leading 00:09:12.759 --> 00:09:15.720 this nonviolence training. It was a down and 00:09:15.720 --> 00:09:18.159 dirty one hour nonviolence training preparing 00:09:18.159 --> 00:09:22.320 us to take this action. So we did that for an 00:09:22.320 --> 00:09:25.419 hour. And then I came out with my little toolbox 00:09:25.419 --> 00:09:28.299 on nonviolence. And they said, OK, what we're 00:09:28.299 --> 00:09:31.159 going to do is we're going to all lie down in 00:09:31.159 --> 00:09:34.980 front of the doors where the members of the board 00:09:34.980 --> 00:09:38.879 of trustees who are voting on this. have to come 00:09:38.879 --> 00:09:43.720 out and see you lying there as if you were, I 00:09:43.720 --> 00:09:46.899 guess, in a nuclear war. Like, I didn't know 00:09:46.899 --> 00:09:49.019 the term die -in in those days, but that's what 00:09:49.019 --> 00:09:52.480 it was. So I said, oh, okay. And they said, and, 00:09:52.539 --> 00:09:55.159 you know, you may be arrested. And I said, oh, 00:09:55.360 --> 00:09:59.740 okay. Well, I just got this training. So anyway, 00:09:59.980 --> 00:10:03.720 we laid down. Governor Jerry Brown was the first 00:10:03.720 --> 00:10:06.440 to walk out, and then a number of other of the 00:10:06.440 --> 00:10:10.029 board. members and they had to walk over us. 00:10:10.809 --> 00:10:15.769 We were not arrested. I got up and dusted myself 00:10:15.769 --> 00:10:20.070 off and won home. I really didn't do anything 00:10:20.070 --> 00:10:22.690 around these like this for a couple of years, 00:10:22.809 --> 00:10:26.129 but it got me thinking about nuclear weapons. 00:10:26.490 --> 00:10:34.460 And that led me to a book project at a Center 00:10:34.460 --> 00:10:36.899 for Ethics and Social Policy, where I was doing 00:10:36.899 --> 00:10:43.340 some work study job. And I proposed that I edit 00:10:43.340 --> 00:10:47.120 a book on the environmental, political, psychological, 00:10:47.679 --> 00:10:52.639 social, financial consequences of the arms race. 00:10:53.320 --> 00:10:57.940 And so they agreed to this proposal. So I started 00:10:57.940 --> 00:11:00.759 working on that. Then after a while, I decided 00:11:00.759 --> 00:11:04.379 I needed to go get more research done. So that 00:11:04.379 --> 00:11:09.059 took me to the East Coast. And I went from university 00:11:09.059 --> 00:11:12.320 to university and think tank to think tank. And 00:11:12.320 --> 00:11:14.519 like I said, I wasn't particularly political 00:11:14.519 --> 00:11:17.639 in those days, but I was pretty distressed that 00:11:17.639 --> 00:11:21.500 nobody could see a way forward to nuclear disarmament. 00:11:21.580 --> 00:11:24.080 Everybody thought that was just the way it was 00:11:24.080 --> 00:11:27.419 going to be. And what we should do is not only 00:11:27.419 --> 00:11:29.679 increase nuclear weapons, but also conventional 00:11:29.679 --> 00:11:34.259 weapons. So finally, after being in Washington 00:11:34.259 --> 00:11:37.000 and then Philadelphia, I arrived in New York 00:11:37.000 --> 00:11:39.799 and I was pretty distressed by this whole thing. 00:11:40.320 --> 00:11:44.399 So before I left Berkeley, I was told, well, 00:11:44.440 --> 00:11:47.519 if you get to New York, go see Daniel Berrigan. 00:11:47.539 --> 00:11:49.460 I think he'll be interested in your project. 00:11:49.639 --> 00:11:52.120 So they gave me his phone number. I fished it 00:11:52.120 --> 00:11:57.659 out of my pocket and I called him up and I said, 00:11:57.840 --> 00:12:03.899 Father Berrigan, you don't know me. But I need 00:12:03.899 --> 00:12:07.019 some spiritual counseling on nuclear weapons. 00:12:07.240 --> 00:12:10.879 He happened to be in town. He invited me to his 00:12:10.879 --> 00:12:12.960 apartment up in the upper wilds of Manhattan. 00:12:14.080 --> 00:12:19.779 And I spent a life -changing three hours with 00:12:19.779 --> 00:12:23.509 him. It's rather like when somebody on their 00:12:23.509 --> 00:12:26.950 hands and knees go up to the top of the Himalayas 00:12:26.950 --> 00:12:31.029 to the cave and finds the guru there who transmits 00:12:31.029 --> 00:12:35.370 a whole culture and tradition in the space of 00:12:35.370 --> 00:12:40.230 three hours. I was totally blown away. Dan was 00:12:40.230 --> 00:12:44.620 facing 10 years in federal. prison. And I said 00:12:44.620 --> 00:12:48.220 to him, look, I'm going back to the West Coast. 00:12:48.320 --> 00:12:51.480 What can I do for you? And he looked me straight 00:12:51.480 --> 00:12:54.759 in the eyes and he said, don't do anything for 00:12:54.759 --> 00:12:59.000 me. Find some people you can pray with and march 00:12:59.000 --> 00:13:03.580 with. And in my mind, I said, Dan, you've got 00:13:03.580 --> 00:13:05.820 this all wrong. You're the activist. I'm the 00:13:05.820 --> 00:13:08.080 academic. You're the activist. I'm the academic. 00:13:08.840 --> 00:13:13.139 But, you know, for the next several. That phrase 00:13:13.139 --> 00:13:16.480 kept going through my right brain. Find some 00:13:16.480 --> 00:13:19.879 people you can pray with and march with. And 00:13:19.879 --> 00:13:22.659 you know what? I did. And I've been at it ever 00:13:22.659 --> 00:13:25.620 since. Oh, that's such a great story. I love 00:13:25.620 --> 00:13:30.259 hearing that. As many know, I did the same thing 00:13:30.259 --> 00:13:34.059 when I first met Dan. And I've been thinking 00:13:34.059 --> 00:13:37.340 about it with your story because I wanted to 00:13:37.340 --> 00:13:40.779 ask him the meaning of life. I finally was really 00:13:40.779 --> 00:13:43.600 scared, 21 -year -old, and I said, a young Jesuit 00:13:43.600 --> 00:13:47.139 novice, I'm sitting at his feet practically in 00:13:47.139 --> 00:13:49.620 his apartment. I said, Dan, what's the point 00:13:49.620 --> 00:13:53.139 of all this? What do I have to do? And he said, 00:13:53.279 --> 00:13:59.039 all you have to do is make your story fit into 00:13:59.039 --> 00:14:02.519 the story of Jesus. And it was life -changing 00:14:02.519 --> 00:14:06.370 for me, Ken. You know, it was getting... a word 00:14:06.370 --> 00:14:09.169 way better than anything I could have imagined 00:14:09.169 --> 00:14:13.850 from the guru. And when I think of your life 00:14:13.850 --> 00:14:18.269 journey, I think that's what you did. Maybe unconsciously, 00:14:18.269 --> 00:14:21.149 you know, we're all learning that to try to fit 00:14:21.149 --> 00:14:24.929 your story into the story of the nonviolent Jesus. 00:14:25.090 --> 00:14:29.649 And what you ended up doing in the 1980s is I 00:14:29.649 --> 00:14:31.450 was telling my friends here at the recording 00:14:31.450 --> 00:14:35.590 studio that It's hard to even grasp what you 00:14:35.590 --> 00:14:38.570 did, Ken, and people won't believe it now, given 00:14:38.570 --> 00:14:40.870 everything we've done. But if you can briefly 00:14:40.870 --> 00:14:43.190 walk us through the story of the Pledge of Resistance 00:14:43.190 --> 00:14:48.230 and how you helped, we now know, prevent the 00:14:48.230 --> 00:14:50.509 Reagan administration from a full -on invasion 00:14:50.509 --> 00:14:55.909 of Nicaragua. Thanks, John. Before I tell the 00:14:55.909 --> 00:15:00.289 story, I will just say to all of us, we are all 00:15:00.289 --> 00:15:05.519 capable of changing the world. All of us. All 00:15:05.519 --> 00:15:08.820 of us are, as John Deere sometimes says, we're 00:15:08.820 --> 00:15:12.879 all like little hobbits running around, but we 00:15:12.879 --> 00:15:16.279 all have this power. And so I just invite all 00:15:16.279 --> 00:15:21.379 of us, especially at this historical crisis that 00:15:21.379 --> 00:15:25.220 we're in, to realize we all have this power. 00:15:25.820 --> 00:15:31.200 But what happened with me was I did take Dan 00:15:31.200 --> 00:15:35.220 Berrigan's command his marching orders seriously. 00:15:35.580 --> 00:15:38.480 I found some people to march with and pray with. 00:15:38.679 --> 00:15:42.399 And that turned out to be this group of seminarians 00:15:42.399 --> 00:15:45.019 at the Graduate Theological Union. We formed 00:15:45.019 --> 00:15:48.639 a little group we called an affinity group. We 00:15:48.639 --> 00:15:52.279 had affinity because we were students, an affinity 00:15:52.279 --> 00:15:54.799 group called Spirit Affinity Group, which was 00:15:54.799 --> 00:16:01.440 based in gospel nonviolence. There we did for 00:16:01.440 --> 00:16:04.879 two years. I basically just put my graduate program 00:16:04.879 --> 00:16:09.860 on hold and just we did one wacky nonviolent 00:16:09.860 --> 00:16:12.820 action after another about nuclear weapons, but 00:16:12.820 --> 00:16:15.740 also what was going on in places like El Salvador. 00:16:16.059 --> 00:16:22.120 And we also had a had a really powerful action 00:16:22.120 --> 00:16:25.159 at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory where 00:16:25.159 --> 00:16:28.730 some of my friends had decided to. entered the 00:16:28.730 --> 00:16:31.110 Catholic Church, so they were going to be confirmed, 00:16:31.250 --> 00:16:34.289 and we did that by carrying the nuclear cross 00:16:34.289 --> 00:16:39.470 from one part of the area to one of the gates, 00:16:39.570 --> 00:16:47.389 which was this 400 -pound MX missile, and then 00:16:47.389 --> 00:16:53.029 we chained ourselves to it, and we were arrested. 00:16:54.639 --> 00:16:57.759 Cross was taken off to the city dump, which we 00:16:57.759 --> 00:17:03.740 took as a symbolism of disarmament. One day, 00:17:03.740 --> 00:17:09.920 I had an experience where I got a letter from 00:17:09.920 --> 00:17:13.900 somebody in Nicaragua. Now, for those who were 00:17:13.900 --> 00:17:17.339 alive then, you knew that the Reagan administration 00:17:17.339 --> 00:17:20.660 every day. said it was going to invade Nicaragua. 00:17:20.759 --> 00:17:23.900 It was going to take over Nicaragua because it 00:17:23.900 --> 00:17:26.319 had had a revolution there. It wasn't on the 00:17:26.319 --> 00:17:29.960 same page with the United States and was also 00:17:29.960 --> 00:17:33.799 carrying out attacks and raids on the people 00:17:33.799 --> 00:17:38.799 there. And so I got a letter and I don't know 00:17:38.799 --> 00:17:42.160 how this person ever got my name or address. 00:17:42.460 --> 00:17:45.240 It was addressed to me. I opened the letter. 00:17:45.400 --> 00:17:50.150 It was telling me about the carnage that my government 00:17:50.150 --> 00:17:54.250 was inflicting on the people of Nicaragua. And 00:17:54.250 --> 00:18:00.049 I had read about this. I'd gone to lectures about 00:18:00.049 --> 00:18:02.549 this. I had gone to demonstrations about this. 00:18:02.670 --> 00:18:05.170 I knew something about that. It didn't seem to 00:18:05.170 --> 00:18:07.809 be telling me anything I didn't know. But then 00:18:07.809 --> 00:18:11.150 about three quarters of the way down the letter, 00:18:11.230 --> 00:18:15.250 it said, We're telling you now, so 10 years from 00:18:15.250 --> 00:18:19.589 now, you cannot say you did not know. Do everything 00:18:19.589 --> 00:18:27.230 in your power to stop this catastrophe. And that 00:18:27.230 --> 00:18:30.890 shook me. Then I looked up and I literally had 00:18:30.890 --> 00:18:35.769 a vision of this man holding a dying child in 00:18:35.769 --> 00:18:42.740 front of me. And then that vision faded. I said 00:18:42.740 --> 00:18:46.259 to myself, but I'm only one person. What can 00:18:46.259 --> 00:18:50.740 I do? And then I remembered reading a story in 00:18:50.740 --> 00:18:53.259 a magazine called Sojourners about a group of 00:18:53.259 --> 00:18:56.140 50 people who had committed themselves to engage 00:18:56.140 --> 00:18:59.759 in nonviolent civil disobedience or legal protest 00:18:59.759 --> 00:19:03.099 if the U .S. invaded Nicaragua. And that they 00:19:03.099 --> 00:19:06.180 were going to go to the border between Honduras 00:19:06.180 --> 00:19:09.180 and Nicaragua and try to get in the way of the... 00:19:10.190 --> 00:19:12.470 Of the invasion, if they were prevented from 00:19:12.470 --> 00:19:14.089 doing that, they would go to federal buildings 00:19:14.089 --> 00:19:16.710 in the United States and engage in that action. 00:19:17.109 --> 00:19:22.650 And I said to myself, oh, well, why just 50 people? 00:19:22.750 --> 00:19:27.069 Why not 500 people or 5 ,000 people or 5 million 00:19:27.069 --> 00:19:31.029 people? And so I sat down for myself. I wrote 00:19:31.029 --> 00:19:35.630 a little pledge that committed me to engage in 00:19:35.630 --> 00:19:39.970 nonviolent civil disobedience of the U .S. invaded 00:19:39.970 --> 00:19:42.289 Nicaragua or escalated its military intervention 00:19:42.289 --> 00:19:47.829 across the region. And then I began sharing it 00:19:47.829 --> 00:19:54.670 with people. And just to cut to the chase, I 00:19:54.670 --> 00:19:58.890 joined with people in California and then with 00:19:58.890 --> 00:20:04.069 folks at Sojourners and other places to build 00:20:04.069 --> 00:20:06.369 a movement. called the Pledge of Resistance. 00:20:06.750 --> 00:20:10.210 Eventually, about 100 ,000 people took that pledge. 00:20:10.329 --> 00:20:12.410 This was the days, of course, before the internet. 00:20:13.569 --> 00:20:17.309 And we organized ourselves into 400 local groups 00:20:17.309 --> 00:20:20.750 across the United States. We had a signal group 00:20:20.750 --> 00:20:26.089 that would call us out if there was an escalation 00:20:26.089 --> 00:20:29.769 of military intervention or, God forbid, an invasion. 00:20:30.289 --> 00:20:33.930 And as John said, for the next decade or so, 00:20:34.730 --> 00:20:40.170 Some of us spent our lives engaged in that organizing. 00:20:40.430 --> 00:20:42.710 And I will just tell you what I learned from 00:20:42.710 --> 00:20:47.549 that experience, besides so much from my fellow 00:20:47.549 --> 00:20:51.710 activists about what it means to be nonviolent, 00:20:51.809 --> 00:20:56.130 but also the power of nonviolence. Because we 00:20:56.130 --> 00:20:59.890 learned at one point from people within the administration 00:20:59.890 --> 00:21:03.819 that, in fact, because of the actions we were 00:21:03.819 --> 00:21:06.519 doing, hundreds and then thousands of people 00:21:06.519 --> 00:21:08.859 engaging in civil disobedience, withdrawing their 00:21:08.859 --> 00:21:12.180 consent from this policy, that the Reagan administration 00:21:12.180 --> 00:21:16.200 had definitively decided not to invade Nicaragua. 00:21:17.119 --> 00:21:20.119 They changed tactics, they went underground with 00:21:20.119 --> 00:21:23.680 it, and that tactic also blew up in their face 00:21:23.680 --> 00:21:26.039 because there was a movement across this country 00:21:26.039 --> 00:21:29.849 calling them out in a different way. I learned 00:21:29.849 --> 00:21:33.150 that we have more power than we think. And in 00:21:33.150 --> 00:21:37.509 fact, not only did that prove true in terms of 00:21:37.509 --> 00:21:41.690 stopping an invasion of Nicaragua, you will know, 00:21:41.710 --> 00:21:45.029 of course, that the U .S. invaded Panama, Iraq 00:21:45.029 --> 00:21:48.509 twice, Afghanistan, other places. but did not 00:21:48.509 --> 00:21:51.630 invade Nicaragua. And we learned from Reagan's 00:21:51.630 --> 00:21:54.589 people themselves saying it was because of ordinary 00:21:54.589 --> 00:21:57.809 people power. So I learned that we have this 00:21:57.809 --> 00:22:00.829 power and we can pull that. And we do that with 00:22:00.829 --> 00:22:05.069 that sense of love for all, including those we're 00:22:05.069 --> 00:22:09.490 resisting. Thank you so much for telling the 00:22:09.490 --> 00:22:12.529 story. And I wanted you to do that because it's 00:22:12.529 --> 00:22:17.099 so empowering. I remember those days very well. 00:22:17.180 --> 00:22:20.680 I had lived in El Salvador in 85. I went to Nicaragua 00:22:20.680 --> 00:22:23.839 with the Jesuits, went up on the border. We were 00:22:23.839 --> 00:22:28.900 literally shot at. I got dengue fever. And all 00:22:28.900 --> 00:22:32.420 the while, Ken, I had signed a pledge of resistance 00:22:32.420 --> 00:22:36.140 and the Jesuits were going to expel me if I got 00:22:36.140 --> 00:22:39.880 arrested. But I thought that was, you know, the 00:22:39.880 --> 00:22:45.140 cost of peace. Somewhere along the way, we met. 00:22:45.299 --> 00:22:47.539 And I want to ask you, if you could, because 00:22:47.539 --> 00:22:50.519 our time is short, just to walk through a couple 00:22:50.519 --> 00:22:53.160 of the other great campaigns you were part of 00:22:53.160 --> 00:22:57.180 as leader. First, the Nevada test site, where 00:22:57.180 --> 00:22:59.440 they were blowing up nuclear weapons, 1 ,500 00:22:59.440 --> 00:23:01.640 of them in the 50s, and then the underground 00:23:01.640 --> 00:23:04.259 testing. And you and Father Louis Vitale and 00:23:04.259 --> 00:23:06.960 the Nevada Desert Experience and I ended up working 00:23:06.960 --> 00:23:10.519 on the board with you there for many years. led 00:23:10.519 --> 00:23:14.099 waves of civil disobedience. Tell us about that. 00:23:15.859 --> 00:23:19.880 This is a really important campaign, and it's 00:23:19.880 --> 00:23:21.900 really important for people to know about it. 00:23:22.319 --> 00:23:26.920 So in the early 1980s, as the U .S. involvement 00:23:26.920 --> 00:23:32.079 in Vietnam had begun to wane, our good friend 00:23:32.079 --> 00:23:36.339 Father Louis Vitale, who was working, had been 00:23:36.339 --> 00:23:39.000 exiled basically by the Archdiocese of Los Angeles 00:23:39.000 --> 00:23:46.339 to through Nevada, learned directly that nuclear 00:23:46.339 --> 00:23:50.019 testing was going on. On average, once every 00:23:50.019 --> 00:23:54.920 18 days from 1951 forward, there was a nuclear 00:23:54.920 --> 00:24:00.200 bomb going off just north of Las Vegas. And it 00:24:00.200 --> 00:24:03.660 was, as Daniel Ellsberg said, it was the most 00:24:03.660 --> 00:24:09.039 bombed place on the planet. And so Louis, on 00:24:09.039 --> 00:24:12.019 the 800th anniversary of St. Francis's birth 00:24:12.019 --> 00:24:18.119 in 1981 and 82, just decided to go out there 00:24:18.119 --> 00:24:22.380 and pray. And so a few Franciscans, laypeople, 00:24:22.660 --> 00:24:26.059 priests, sisters, went out and began praying. 00:24:26.259 --> 00:24:29.980 And then eventually they started a 40 -day event. 00:24:31.680 --> 00:24:34.200 called the Lenten Desert Experience. And then 00:24:34.200 --> 00:24:37.460 that morphed into an ongoing campaign with the 00:24:37.460 --> 00:24:42.720 audacious idea of ending nuclear testing, not 00:24:42.720 --> 00:24:46.799 just in Nevada, but worldwide. And that went 00:24:46.799 --> 00:24:51.480 on for a decade. And in fact, just to make it 00:24:51.480 --> 00:24:55.619 clear, that movement brought people from around 00:24:55.619 --> 00:24:57.779 the world, around the country, and around the 00:24:57.779 --> 00:25:00.440 world. And then those people would go home and 00:25:00.440 --> 00:25:04.039 work on their own test sites. So that by 1993, 00:25:04.279 --> 00:25:08.200 there was enough people power generated to get 00:25:08.200 --> 00:25:13.019 an international comprehensive test ban treaty 00:25:13.019 --> 00:25:18.680 promulgated and signed by 154 nations. The United 00:25:18.680 --> 00:25:21.279 States actually signed it, didn't ratify it, 00:25:21.319 --> 00:25:24.400 still hasn't ratified it, but has lived according 00:25:24.400 --> 00:25:27.960 to it. even under the first and now the second 00:25:27.960 --> 00:25:33.200 Bush administration, has gone with a moratorium 00:25:33.200 --> 00:25:39.619 on nuclear testing. And this is huge. And I just 00:25:39.619 --> 00:25:44.519 think we have more power than we think. And we 00:25:44.519 --> 00:25:50.400 see this in the case of this really, really important 00:25:50.400 --> 00:25:54.480 campaign that we need to celebrate and build 00:25:54.480 --> 00:25:57.910 on. You know, it's like ancient history now, 00:25:58.049 --> 00:26:01.150 but it was really quite brilliant, Ken, because 00:26:01.150 --> 00:26:05.029 it was a Lenten program. And what happened was 00:26:05.029 --> 00:26:09.269 parishes, ordinary church people would plan every 00:26:09.269 --> 00:26:12.269 year, okay, so next Lent, I'm going to go out 00:26:12.269 --> 00:26:15.730 to Las Vegas for the weekend retreat. And then 00:26:15.730 --> 00:26:19.339 it just became this. I called it Civilist Obedience 00:26:19.339 --> 00:26:22.619 101, basic choreography. You'd have a wonderful 00:26:22.619 --> 00:26:26.059 retreat, meet hundreds of people from all over 00:26:26.059 --> 00:26:29.259 the country. And then on Sunday morning, we'd 00:26:29.259 --> 00:26:32.400 all drive two hours north into the desert. And 00:26:32.400 --> 00:26:36.200 I mean the wild open desert. The Nevada test 00:26:36.200 --> 00:26:39.660 site is larger than Rhode Island, as I recall. 00:26:39.799 --> 00:26:42.960 And we'd literally cross a line in the little... 00:26:43.240 --> 00:26:46.279 County police people had painted a little, I 00:26:46.279 --> 00:26:50.740 mean, a little yellow line. And 25 ,000 people 00:26:50.740 --> 00:26:53.559 were arrested over the years there. And it became, 00:26:53.779 --> 00:26:59.039 I think, a Gandhian -level Satyagraha campaign. 00:26:59.339 --> 00:27:02.099 Don't you, Ken? And that's, I mean, it's hard 00:27:02.099 --> 00:27:05.619 to replicate anything, but it was just one of 00:27:05.619 --> 00:27:07.539 the great experiences of our lives. So thank 00:27:07.539 --> 00:27:11.640 you for sharing that. Yeah. If people are interested, 00:27:11.960 --> 00:27:15.420 I did. I wrote a study about this called Pilgrimage 00:27:15.420 --> 00:27:20.779 to a Burning World, published by New York University 00:27:20.779 --> 00:27:25.880 Press, because it was a deeply spiritual and 00:27:25.880 --> 00:27:28.880 sacred experience across many different traditions, 00:27:28.960 --> 00:27:34.640 as well as a very savvy, strategic campaign, 00:27:34.740 --> 00:27:38.599 and tried to capture that in that book. Yeah, 00:27:38.619 --> 00:27:41.599 great book. So all this time, we're now in the 00:27:41.599 --> 00:27:46.039 90s and the 2000s, and you're getting a PhD and 00:27:46.039 --> 00:27:48.220 you eventually settle into teaching at DePaul 00:27:48.220 --> 00:27:52.099 in Chicago. But we had the first Iraq War that 00:27:52.099 --> 00:27:54.779 you and I were organizing. It seemed to me like 00:27:54.779 --> 00:27:57.640 a demonstration every day in January, February, 00:27:57.660 --> 00:28:02.900 March 1991. And then the second Iraq War in March 00:28:02.900 --> 00:28:09.559 2003. which we have no idea how many people died. 00:28:09.700 --> 00:28:12.740 But the number I've settled on is that we killed 00:28:12.740 --> 00:28:17.559 1 .4 million Iraqis over all those years. And 00:28:17.559 --> 00:28:20.819 it's hard for people to imagine now. Again, it 00:28:20.819 --> 00:28:22.900 seems like ancient history. And this is, again, 00:28:22.960 --> 00:28:25.059 asking you to briefly talk about the Declaration 00:28:25.059 --> 00:28:28.380 of Peace campaign. We were doing nonstop action, 00:28:28.500 --> 00:28:30.539 folks. Ken and I were in and out of jail and 00:28:30.539 --> 00:28:32.420 all. But Ken is always going, well, I got to 00:28:32.420 --> 00:28:34.779 change the country. I'm going, uh -huh. Well, 00:28:34.859 --> 00:28:41.220 good luck with that. And then you. So 2003, George 00:28:41.220 --> 00:28:44.099 W. Bush, there's weapons of mass destruction 00:28:44.099 --> 00:28:47.720 in Iraq and we got to go there. And he's following 00:28:47.720 --> 00:28:51.460 up on 9 -11 while bombing Afghanistan. And then 00:28:51.460 --> 00:28:55.240 Kerry ran against George W. Bush and the whole 00:28:55.240 --> 00:28:58.859 country is supporting Bush and the war. The polls 00:28:58.859 --> 00:29:03.160 were like 80 percent. And Ken says. We're going 00:29:03.160 --> 00:29:05.299 to call for the whole country, the movement, 00:29:05.359 --> 00:29:08.980 to go to every local congressional district and 00:29:08.980 --> 00:29:13.980 sit in and say, stop the war on Iraq. And you 00:29:13.980 --> 00:29:16.740 called it Declaration of Peace. And it practically 00:29:16.740 --> 00:29:20.119 changed my life because I organized a civil disobedience 00:29:20.119 --> 00:29:24.200 action in New Mexico and faced a hard year in 00:29:24.200 --> 00:29:27.660 prison for that. You really had a huge effect 00:29:27.660 --> 00:29:29.819 on the whole country, Ken. Tell us about the 00:29:29.819 --> 00:29:35.589 Declaration of Peace. So we had heard that the 00:29:35.589 --> 00:29:40.690 midterm elections were coming up and those running 00:29:40.690 --> 00:29:43.910 those campaigns said there is going to be no 00:29:43.910 --> 00:29:47.869 discussion by the Democrats about the war in 00:29:47.869 --> 00:29:50.930 Iraq. That is a non -starter. We're not going 00:29:50.930 --> 00:29:54.630 to win on that. So people like Rahm Emanuel and 00:29:54.630 --> 00:29:59.509 Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid decided there's not 00:29:59.509 --> 00:30:03.069 going to be any discussion about that. We had 00:30:03.069 --> 00:30:08.950 decided that there should be a discussion, but 00:30:08.950 --> 00:30:15.569 also action. And so we, inspired by our friend 00:30:15.569 --> 00:30:17.869 Michael Nagler, who sent me an email on Christmas 00:30:17.869 --> 00:30:23.589 Day 2005, the idea set a deadline for the U .S. 00:30:23.589 --> 00:30:26.230 to be out of Iraq. It had already been three 00:30:26.230 --> 00:30:30.680 years. And if that's not met, The whole country 00:30:30.680 --> 00:30:34.680 goes and engages in nonviolent action, civil 00:30:34.680 --> 00:30:38.119 disobedience and so forth. And so we love that 00:30:38.119 --> 00:30:41.339 idea. And my spouse, Cynthia Okayama -Dopke, 00:30:41.460 --> 00:30:46.420 and I just plunged into organizing this from 00:30:46.420 --> 00:30:52.039 a back room in our house. And we, without getting 00:30:52.039 --> 00:30:57.460 into all the details, one thing that we wanted 00:30:57.460 --> 00:31:02.269 to say. was how do we frame it differently? Because 00:31:02.269 --> 00:31:06.150 George Bush was saying the two options are cutting 00:31:06.150 --> 00:31:09.849 and running or staying the course. And we got 00:31:09.849 --> 00:31:12.369 with somebody who thinks about these things and 00:31:12.369 --> 00:31:15.950 said, how about a third way, which is a new course 00:31:15.950 --> 00:31:20.500 for Iraq or a new course on Iraq? And we thought, 00:31:20.599 --> 00:31:24.299 huh, that's a third way to think about this, 00:31:24.400 --> 00:31:27.400 because the new course should be peace and ending 00:31:27.400 --> 00:31:30.119 the war and all of that. But it was a really 00:31:30.119 --> 00:31:33.359 interesting framing. So we started, we invited 00:31:33.359 --> 00:31:36.859 people all across the country to go into congressional 00:31:36.859 --> 00:31:39.759 offices, and they did. And they brought this 00:31:39.759 --> 00:31:43.099 pledge, this declaration. Will you sign this 00:31:43.099 --> 00:31:49.329 declaration that unless the war ends by... September 00:31:49.329 --> 00:31:53.309 21st, the International Day of Peace, 2006, we're 00:31:53.309 --> 00:31:58.089 going to oppose the war and we're going to cut 00:31:58.089 --> 00:32:01.130 off funding and so forth. So anyway, to make 00:32:01.130 --> 00:32:05.309 a long story longer, as those delegations went 00:32:05.309 --> 00:32:08.829 into these offices and saying, look, we're going 00:32:08.829 --> 00:32:11.829 to be back and doing civil disobedience if September 00:32:11.829 --> 00:32:14.849 21st comes and we don't have a plan to end the 00:32:14.849 --> 00:32:19.839 war. Then it was interesting. They managed to 00:32:19.839 --> 00:32:23.579 get 12 members of Congress to actually sign the 00:32:23.579 --> 00:32:26.640 Declaration of Peace, which was great. But the 00:32:26.640 --> 00:32:30.319 most important thing was it lodged the framing 00:32:30.319 --> 00:32:34.220 right in there to the point where Rahm Emanuel, 00:32:34.519 --> 00:32:37.400 Nancy Pelosi, and Harry Reid, the senator from 00:32:37.400 --> 00:32:41.670 Nevada who was the head of the Senate. shifted 00:32:41.670 --> 00:32:44.230 course themselves, put out a press release third 00:32:44.230 --> 00:32:49.690 week of July saying a new course on Iraq and 00:32:49.690 --> 00:32:53.509 basically called for the end of the war. And 00:32:53.509 --> 00:32:59.109 350 events took place across the country, civil 00:32:59.109 --> 00:33:01.750 disobedience and other legal protests. Some of 00:33:01.750 --> 00:33:04.430 us got arrested. the White House, the Senate, 00:33:04.569 --> 00:33:08.609 and the House in Washington. John, you got arrested 00:33:08.609 --> 00:33:14.809 in a really great way in Santa Fe. But that happened 00:33:14.809 --> 00:33:19.869 across the country. The impacts, the day after 00:33:19.869 --> 00:33:24.470 the midterms, the Democrats won handily. Not 00:33:24.470 --> 00:33:28.190 that we're working for the Democrats, but the... 00:33:28.960 --> 00:33:33.519 there was a landslide victory in the House, and 00:33:33.519 --> 00:33:37.359 Bush fired the Secretary of Defense, Donald Rumsfeld, 00:33:37.420 --> 00:33:44.019 the next day. So, you know, I'm saying this over 00:33:44.019 --> 00:33:46.380 and over again. You know, John and I can talk 00:33:46.380 --> 00:33:49.279 about this, but every one of us listening, we 00:33:49.279 --> 00:33:53.259 have this power. And so if something, if an idea 00:33:53.259 --> 00:33:56.859 occurs to you that's nonviolent and powerful 00:33:56.859 --> 00:34:01.299 and creative, I highly encourage you to put it 00:34:01.299 --> 00:34:05.359 out there and get with others and organize. It's 00:34:05.359 --> 00:34:10.579 an amazing story, Ken, because you say, OK, we 00:34:10.579 --> 00:34:14.599 had 350 events. Well, those events with hundreds 00:34:14.599 --> 00:34:17.579 of people going and shutting down the local congressional 00:34:17.579 --> 00:34:21.239 representative's office, not in D .C., but all 00:34:21.239 --> 00:34:24.780 over the country. And that hadn't happened about 00:34:24.780 --> 00:34:29.719 Iraq. There was that really big protest in 2003 00:34:29.719 --> 00:34:33.719 just before the war started. But then people 00:34:33.719 --> 00:34:36.900 just gave up. And you said, no, we're going to 00:34:36.900 --> 00:34:40.900 do this. Here's a tactic. And so we, 10 of us, 00:34:40.900 --> 00:34:45.860 went into the post office building in Santa Fe. 00:34:45.960 --> 00:34:49.000 We're going to go to the third floor to the senator's 00:34:49.000 --> 00:34:54.000 office. And the SWAT team showed up, 50 armed 00:34:54.000 --> 00:34:57.760 soldiers. Out of the movies, out of the Terminator 00:34:57.760 --> 00:35:00.619 or something. We hadn't done anything. We walked 00:35:00.619 --> 00:35:02.179 under the elevator and they said, you're all 00:35:02.179 --> 00:35:05.760 under arrest. And we said, we're just going upstairs 00:35:05.760 --> 00:35:08.860 to see our senator. And they said, well, you're 00:35:08.860 --> 00:35:11.019 going to do something notorious because they 00:35:11.019 --> 00:35:15.400 were pointing at me. So we had brought the names 00:35:15.400 --> 00:35:19.079 of all those killed in Iraq that we knew. We 00:35:19.079 --> 00:35:23.190 had 10 ,000 names. And we actually had been carrying 00:35:23.190 --> 00:35:25.789 them around for months and we stayed in the elevator 00:35:25.789 --> 00:35:29.909 for eight hours and we read those names out loud 00:35:29.909 --> 00:35:34.869 all day to the 50 armed soldiers, you know, with 00:35:34.869 --> 00:35:37.969 machine guns aimed at us. And the media there, 00:35:38.110 --> 00:35:41.449 and it was front page news for months and months 00:35:41.449 --> 00:35:46.929 in New Mexico. And it was amazing, really kind 00:35:46.929 --> 00:35:50.590 of life changing. And it put Iraq on the... front 00:35:50.590 --> 00:35:53.610 pages of New Mexico, but that's what happened 00:35:53.610 --> 00:35:57.190 everywhere. And I think, Ken, when you say we 00:35:57.190 --> 00:36:00.610 have power, you know, by just calling upon ordinary 00:36:00.610 --> 00:36:04.309 people to do what you can, and together we're 00:36:04.309 --> 00:36:07.090 going to build a people power movement, shifted 00:36:07.090 --> 00:36:12.289 the support of the war, and the war did end. 00:36:13.909 --> 00:36:17.070 It's an amazing story, and you're amazing that 00:36:17.070 --> 00:36:19.889 you keep insisting we can do this. And meanwhile, 00:36:20.030 --> 00:36:23.349 our time is kind of coming up to an end. I would 00:36:23.349 --> 00:36:25.329 love to have asked you about Campaign Nonviolence. 00:36:25.329 --> 00:36:28.730 Folks can look it up. And about your work with 00:36:28.730 --> 00:36:30.769 the Catholic Nonviolence Initiative. We had Marie 00:36:30.769 --> 00:36:33.389 Dennis on, so people can listen to her. But let 00:36:33.389 --> 00:36:37.210 me close by asking you to talk about today. And 00:36:37.210 --> 00:36:41.010 you've been telling us we have power. And your 00:36:41.010 --> 00:36:43.929 own journey. as a follower of the nonviolent 00:36:43.929 --> 00:36:47.230 Jesus and a peacemaker. Here we're now, as you 00:36:47.230 --> 00:36:49.130 said to me on the phone last week, we're in this 00:36:49.130 --> 00:36:53.690 liminal space of just unprecedented global crisis 00:36:53.690 --> 00:36:57.269 and national collapse, but it's also an opportunity. 00:36:58.750 --> 00:37:03.130 So what advice or suggestions do you have for 00:37:03.130 --> 00:37:06.230 your listeners here about going forward on their 00:37:06.230 --> 00:37:10.909 own journey as peacemakers? We are at a crossroads. 00:37:12.350 --> 00:37:16.389 And we have the choice, as Dr. King said, between 00:37:16.389 --> 00:37:21.610 nonviolence or nonexistence. And we're at that 00:37:21.610 --> 00:37:24.989 crossroads. And as Pope Francis said when he 00:37:24.989 --> 00:37:28.250 quoted King, he said, now the choice is up to 00:37:28.250 --> 00:37:35.489 us. This is a critical, hellacious moment. I 00:37:35.489 --> 00:37:41.199 want to think of it the way. In this way, I would 00:37:41.199 --> 00:37:43.920 say we've been getting our training for this 00:37:43.920 --> 00:37:46.900 moment. All these things we've talked about on 00:37:46.900 --> 00:37:49.960 this call or all the things you've done, John, 00:37:50.139 --> 00:37:54.800 in your life, which has been amazing and so varied 00:37:54.800 --> 00:37:58.280 and so powerful. I want to submit that those 00:37:58.280 --> 00:38:01.179 are all have been our training for this moment. 00:38:02.739 --> 00:38:07.409 And we do not know. how this moment is going 00:38:07.409 --> 00:38:10.949 to go. I do know we have more power than we think. 00:38:11.289 --> 00:38:17.050 So one initiative that I'm engaged with, there 00:38:17.050 --> 00:38:19.730 are two things. One at Pachibene, our good friend 00:38:19.730 --> 00:38:24.289 Rivera's son is organizing Rise and Shine, which 00:38:24.289 --> 00:38:28.590 every week puts out resources for all of us for 00:38:28.590 --> 00:38:31.769 dealing with the tsunami that's emanating from 00:38:31.769 --> 00:38:37.039 the Oval Office. So please go get those every 00:38:37.039 --> 00:38:43.179 week from Rivera on the Pache Bene campaign nonviolence 00:38:43.179 --> 00:38:48.480 website. A significant campaign right now is 00:38:48.480 --> 00:38:52.440 One Million Rising. And this is an initiative 00:38:52.440 --> 00:38:55.119 that emerged out of the No Kings demonstrations 00:38:55.119 --> 00:38:58.559 June 14th. Some of us had the privilege to be 00:38:58.559 --> 00:39:02.239 part of. Huge, huge march in Chicago, but all 00:39:02.239 --> 00:39:07.130 over the country. And also indivisible. And they've 00:39:07.130 --> 00:39:12.090 kind of put their power together and invited 00:39:12.090 --> 00:39:15.369 people to imagine one million people rising up 00:39:15.369 --> 00:39:24.110 in non -cooperation with what I call the movement 00:39:24.110 --> 00:39:28.150 of movements, the sector of sectors, the campaign 00:39:28.150 --> 00:39:33.559 of campaigns, to say, We withdraw our consent 00:39:33.559 --> 00:39:37.840 nonviolently in all sorts of ways. Now, what 00:39:37.840 --> 00:39:41.659 they're doing, they had 130 ,000 people two weeks 00:39:41.659 --> 00:39:46.739 ago attend or listen after the fact to a webinar 00:39:46.739 --> 00:39:49.360 that our good friends Maria Stephan and Daniel 00:39:49.360 --> 00:39:52.960 Hunter and others organized. I highly recommend 00:39:52.960 --> 00:39:57.199 go find One Million Rising. Watch that video. 00:39:57.949 --> 00:40:02.530 The second installment of this is happening on 00:40:02.530 --> 00:40:07.630 July 30th, Wednesday, July 30th. Depending on 00:40:07.630 --> 00:40:09.389 when you're hearing this, it may have already 00:40:09.389 --> 00:40:11.690 happened. I highly recommend you go watch that. 00:40:12.289 --> 00:40:16.090 What they're asking people to do is, unlike what 00:40:16.090 --> 00:40:18.869 we did in COVID, we get together in our living 00:40:18.869 --> 00:40:24.110 rooms and form groups of non -cooperators. Sharing 00:40:24.110 --> 00:40:26.579 your concerns about the moment and then... how 00:40:26.579 --> 00:40:29.300 we're going to take action in lots of ways to 00:40:29.300 --> 00:40:32.360 say I'm withdrawing my consent. And they have 00:40:32.360 --> 00:40:35.659 a really great, powerful message that says, as 00:40:35.659 --> 00:40:38.039 I've been saying ad nauseum on this call, we 00:40:38.039 --> 00:40:40.460 have more power than we think. And we can pool 00:40:40.460 --> 00:40:43.940 that power to withdraw what's called the pillars 00:40:43.940 --> 00:40:47.539 of support that keep the current outrages going. 00:40:48.039 --> 00:40:50.800 We can all be part of that. I think that's going 00:40:50.800 --> 00:40:54.940 to be very, very important. So we need each other. 00:40:55.860 --> 00:41:00.960 We need to be rooted in prayer. We need to follow 00:41:00.960 --> 00:41:03.679 the nonviolent Jesus even through this moment. 00:41:03.960 --> 00:41:07.340 We need to read the books of John Deere. We need 00:41:07.340 --> 00:41:14.639 to be arm in arm as we create the conditions 00:41:14.639 --> 00:41:17.980 for the shift. And what is that condition? It's 00:41:17.980 --> 00:41:20.340 really a conversation that we're going to have 00:41:20.340 --> 00:41:24.860 with our society. Do we want a society? that 00:41:24.860 --> 00:41:30.300 is dehumanizing, disinheriting, dispiriting, 00:41:30.539 --> 00:41:34.480 dominating, and destructive. That's what we've 00:41:34.480 --> 00:41:36.679 got at the moment. We don't have to have that. 00:41:36.820 --> 00:41:41.420 But that means we have to convey that. And we 00:41:41.420 --> 00:41:44.500 can do that. I'd like to close by just quoting 00:41:44.500 --> 00:41:48.099 one of the great figures of the 20th century, 00:41:48.420 --> 00:41:52.699 Allen Ginsberg, who said, while I'm here, I'll 00:41:52.699 --> 00:41:56.739 do the work. And what's the work? To ease the 00:41:56.739 --> 00:42:00.199 pain of living. Everything else is a drunken 00:42:00.199 --> 00:42:03.679 dumb show. While we're here, we'll do the work. 00:42:03.760 --> 00:42:05.699 What's the work? To ease the pain of living, 00:42:05.860 --> 00:42:09.239 to celebrate the joy of living, to bring the 00:42:09.239 --> 00:42:12.900 fullness of life that Jesus calls us to, and 00:42:12.900 --> 00:42:18.969 go forward. And the big secret is... All the 00:42:18.969 --> 00:42:21.630 way through, we're going to be called to do this. 00:42:21.869 --> 00:42:25.710 And let's do it with joy and even some kind of 00:42:25.710 --> 00:42:28.530 happiness. That's how I want to kind of leave 00:42:28.530 --> 00:42:32.329 this, John. Amen, Ken. Thank you so much, Ken 00:42:32.329 --> 00:42:34.389 Budigan, for speaking with me today. And thank 00:42:34.389 --> 00:42:36.329 you, dear friends, for listening to Ken and me 00:42:36.329 --> 00:42:40.070 here at the Nonviolent Jesus podcast. You can 00:42:40.070 --> 00:42:42.610 hear more podcasts and find other upcoming Zoom 00:42:42.610 --> 00:42:47.070 programs at BeatitudesCenter .org. Please consider 00:42:47.070 --> 00:42:49.630 offering a donation to support this free work. 00:42:49.829 --> 00:42:52.409 And if you can, please leave some positive feedback 00:42:52.409 --> 00:42:56.530 or review at NCR or Apple or Spotify or whatever 00:42:56.530 --> 00:42:59.800 platform you use. And most of all, Please help 00:42:59.800 --> 00:43:02.860 spread the word by telling your friends and colleagues 00:43:02.860 --> 00:43:05.860 everywhere about these podcasts and these great 00:43:05.860 --> 00:43:08.800 conversations with visionaries like Ken Budigan. 00:43:09.119 --> 00:43:12.480 May the God of peace bless you all. Keep on following 00:43:12.480 --> 00:43:15.159 the nonviolent Jesus and see you next time.