Mr Jones and me

moving

2009-04-08T14:41:00.003+10:00

Blogger is tired. I'm moving over to Wordpress. If anyone still reads this, you'll need to change your links and such to http://smoyle.wordpress.com.

An opportunity to work for peace

2009-03-04T22:02:00.000+11:00

How seriously do we take Jesus' call to be peacemakers?

Here is an opportunity to stand in the way of warmaking and say 'yes' with your life to the God of peace.

Operation Talisman Sabre is a series of joint military exercises taking place July 6-25 2009, involving almost 30,000 Australian and US troops across 8 areas in Australia engaged in live fire and invasion training. The highest concentration of troops is in Shoalwater Bay Training Area, a pristine wilderness area on the central Queensland coast. People from around Australia are coming together to say 'no' to this practicing for war, and yes to practicing for peace.

Here's how you can get involved at whatever level you feel comfortable (or challenged!):

* Come to planning meetings in your own state
No matter where you are, we can probably hook you up (especially in Melbourne or Brisbane) with the details of regular meetings. This is one way to see what's already happening and whether there's a role you'd like to take.

* Awareness raising around your capital city and solidarity actions
We need people who will be in the cities and towns during the exercises to raise awareness of what is happening in Shoalwater Bay. It may mean a vigil, a petition, or just talking to family and friends, but get together with a group and make it fun.

* Participate in nonviolence trainings
There will be at least two trainings (probably more) run in Melbourne in the lead-up to the games so that people can be as fully prepared as possible. It will also give you a chance to get to know some people who might be going up, and to test the waters of what kind of actions you might take around where you live or at Shoalwater Bay itself.

* Come up to Peace Convergence in Shoalwater Bay
Plan to take some annual leave or RDOs and join the peace convergence. The festivities kick off with the C2C (Committed to Change) Festival in nearby Byfield. The main gathering weekend will be July 10th-12th, but people will be present for the whole three weeks of the exercises (July 6-25). See the Peace Convergence website for more details.

* Consider taking direct action
It is likely that there will be groups of people who will take direct action to nonviolently stop the exercises or otherwise nonviolently resist them, some of whom will take actions risking arrest and some of whom won't risk arrest. Everyone will have the opportunity to be trained and fully prepared beforehand.

Such people also need the support of teams of people who are prepared to do all the necessary logistical work (picking up and dropping off, legals, prayer, personal support), so even if you don't want to risk arrest yourself you can still play a role in helping those who do. It would be helpful to start forming affinity groups (there's a good definition of affinity groups here) soon.

As my good friend Fr. John Dear says, "Nobody has to do everything for peace and justice but everybody's gotta do something!" So I encourage you to prayerfully discern what role you might take towards a more actively nonviolent life.

Please pass this on to your own networks and keep spreading the word!

Abundance is a state of mind

2009-03-04T14:00:00.003+11:00

Nice article here in a week when I'm finishing my chicken coop, made almost entirely out of materials I've found around the house or neighbourhood.

Prayer for Peace Tree and Ahmad-Shah Abed

2009-02-19T13:14:00.003+11:00

If anyone still reads this, I ask you to be in prayer for our good friends at Peace Tree and their friend Ahmad-Shah Abed who was murdered in Perth earlier this week. Details are still a bit sketchy but the news services are carrying the story.

Articles are here, here and here.

they can't be serious

2009-02-17T17:25:00.005+11:00

I wrote to a number of politicians and senior officials about Talisman Sabre 09, and got a reply today from the Defence Minister Joel Fitzgibbon...I noticed the paper is quite heavy gauge, and when I held it up to the light I noticed this watermark on the first page.

Opinion piece

2009-02-07T00:18:00.002+11:00

So like I said I have a new role at Urban Seed, so I've been thinking about articles I could write.

The other morning I was on my way to work when I saw my neighbour, and we stopped and talked. I asked how she coped in the heat last week - three 44 degree days in a row - and she said not so well. Then she started to talk about global warming, and how she thought that might be the cause because we've never had heat like that before that she can remember (and she's been in that house for more than 50 years). And then she threw up her hands and said, "What can you do? Nothing." And I immediately thought "no! that's terrible! we can't think like that!" but then I thought "but what can I suggest that would be useful to an elderly lady?" and basically said something feeble about having to do something. And then on the way to work I remembered the Wendell Berry quote and the article was born. Enjoy.

Fostering a dangerous climate of addiction

MY OLDER Italian neighbour was lamenting the recent hot weather. "I think it might be climate change," she said, and threw up her hands despairingly. "What can we do?" She sighed. "Nothing really." I could sympathise, of course. Despair about the future of our planet is in no short supply. But I couldn't help feeling that despair is a luxury we cannot afford.

As Wendell Berry, the Kentuckian agrarian poet and essayist says of the climate crisis, "The great obstacle is simply this: the conviction that we cannot change because we are dependent on what is wrong. But that is the addict's excuse, and we know that it will not do."

The science is overwhelming. Greenhouse gases, caused largely by our insatiable appetite for cheap, abundant energy, are heating the planet, melting ice caps and altering the climate, and we are nearing the dangerous tipping point towards catastrophic runaway climate change. Yet we continue to rely on unsustainable fossil fuels and our water use ignores the reality of this dry continent.

If this is the reality, why do we continue living as we do?

I work for Urban Seed, a community that has made a home in the heart of the city of Melbourne for about 15 years. We offer a free lunch, and often share it with the city's most marginalised, many of whom struggle with long-term drug, alcohol and gambling addictions. Over the years we've learned a thing or two about addiction — how insidious it can be, how destructive of wellbeing. But most of all, we've learned that addiction is not confined to someone shooting up heroin in a back laneway.

Often the executive on Collins Street buying the latest technological wizardry to "keep up" or the person shopping for this season's designer handbag are equally addicted — though some addictions are more socially acceptable than others.

Often I would sit with Luke as he slumped, defeated, over his lunch.

His addiction to the pokies had seen him blow his entire pension cheque at the casino — again. He would speak of how he had told himself just the night before that this time he wouldn't do it. But the human capacity for self-delusion is immense. His denial of the odds led him to believe that this time it would all be different.

Such is our problem with climate change. We are addicted to the very things that accelerate global warming. We know the problems but remain in denial about what it is going to require of us to fix them. Like an addict who thinks they can control their addiction or stop any time they like, we cling to the train as it hurtles towards the abyss.

Addictions often develop because of a need to escape a reality that is too difficult to face. Whether it's a heroin user escaping childhood abuse or an insatiable society escaping the reality of a world of finite resources, the same dynamic is involved.

Rudd's recent "consume our way out of recession" policies are a perfect example. Despite the fact that we know our overconsumption is accelerating global warming, this Government, which was elected on taking "real action on climate change", is encouraging us to buy more, consume more. The desalination plant is another exercise in contradiction — the logic of replacing one problem (lack of water) with another more destructive one (pollution, massive energy consumption). Yet without the Earth there is no human life and no economy.

Perhaps what we need is a 12-step program to rid ourselves of our addiction to destructive habits. Our experience at Urban Seed is that addictions are not cured by government policy or one-size-fits-all solutions. They are cured by slow, costly, patient, local, personal work. So it will be with climate change.

We need prophetic communities of imagination who can lead us to an alternative future — one that does not deny the realities of the ecologies in which we live but co-operates with their processes and yields to their limits.

But as any addict knows, the first step is admitting you have a problem — first to ourselves and then to each other.

So let me begin with this: My name is Simon and I am an addict.

Reverend Simon Moyle is public engagement co-ordinator for Urban Seed.

Washed up at 31

2009-02-04T11:39:00.002+11:00

So I've started a new role at Urban Seed doing public engagement and advocacy, and as I work on the ideas for a newly developed Seeds website I'm discovering that I'm about 3 years behind technology and social practice. And now I'm wondering if I can catch up.

Isn't 31 a little young to be too old?

He's really not the Messiah

2009-02-04T11:16:00.003+11:00

"I guess when Obama says this stuff...I don't think he really means it. And that gives me hope."
Jason Jones.

The Daily Show With Jon StewartM - Th 11p / 10c

Changefest '09 - Obama's Inaugural Speech

Daily Show Full Episodes
Funny Political Videos

Important Things With Demetri Martin
More Funny Videos

More on the vigil and NCYC

2009-02-02T16:28:00.002+11:00

Here's Shane Claiborne's take on what we did (sure he gets a few details wrong, but whatever).

Vigil at BAe

2009-02-01T15:20:00.003+11:00

Spent early January hanging out at the National Christian Youth Convention where they asked Jess and I to provide one of 32 practical activities for the young people to try (called 'Submersion Day'). It was a day of social action, so other groups planted trees, helped out in people's gardens, made slums on the steps of Parliament House, did flash mobbing for Stop the Traffik etc etc. We decided to stage a vigil outside the Melbourne offices of BAe Systems (formerly British Aerospace), the third largest weapons manufacturer in the world (after Lockheed Martin and Boeing).

We ended up with about 120 young people (!), most of whom had never so much as participated in a march or protest before. They were pretty apprehensive (that would be an understatement) but we offered a range of options for them to take up or they could do whatever they wanted so no one was forced to do something they weren't comfortable doing.

BAe helped us out by parking elsewhere for the day so we had the entire carpark to ourselves (they barricaded themselves inside with the shutters drawn...scary Christian peace people). So we spent about 3 1/2 hours there, starting with a liturgy (attached) then encouraging people
to do their own thing...we covered the carpark with chalked messages, made banners, some went over the road to the shopping centre and leafletted people, wrote letters to the PM, chalked the bike path behind the building, held silent vigils outside the door, staged a die-in, and then finished by marching around the building seven times to the sounds of chanting and a conch shell being blown by the Pacific Islanders. Highlights included people in the office building next door putting up a sign in their window saying, "Make Love Not War", a tourist from Queensland who was so inspired walking past that she stayed and vigilled with us for an hour, and an Islander elder who belted out the Beatitudes like I've never heard them before.

The joy and freedom was palpable - we were just gobsmacked by how the fear and apprehension of the day before gave way to excitement and exuberance (despite the three squad cars waiting for us outside the building). Going in I'd been concerned about tokenism and 'protest tourism' but I reckon all of that was blown away by the breaking down of barriers and the inspiration it provided for a really diverse and generally conservative crew. Jess used the parable of the sower to describe how it had affected people - probably some not at all, others it might take a while to sink in or bear fruit, and others who were just instantly changed and into it.

And having established relationships with BAe security, it might have good potential for a regular vigil, especially as they're building a huge new office/factory over the road from their current one (Victoria St Abbotsford).

Who's the clown up the tree?

Chalking the carpark

Speaks for itself

Finished the day with a big rally at Fed Square where all 1500 NCYCers (plus extras) gathered for music, etc. Here's a couple of our crew on stage belting out one of our chants.

Newborn beginning...after Caesar

2008-12-18T12:59:00.002+11:00

We live in the midst of empire,
awaiting the birth of the baby the angel foretold.

Caesar decreed a census, everyone counted;
Caesar intended to have up-to-date data for the tax rolls;
Caesar intended to have current lists of draft eligibility;
Caesar intended taxes to support armies,
because the emperor, in whatever era,
is always about money and power,
about power and force,
about force and control,
and eventually violence.

And while we wait for the Christ Child,
we are enthralled by the things of Caesar –
money…power…control,
and all the well-being that comes from
such control, even if it requires a little violence.

But in the midst of the decree
will come this long-expected Jesus,
innocent, vulnerable, full of grace and truth,
grace and not power, truth and not money,
mercy and not control.

We also dwell in the land of Caesar;
we pray for the gift of your spirit,
that we may loosen our grip on the things of Caesar,
that we may turn our eyes toward the baby,
our ears toward the newness,
our hearts toward the gentleness,
our power and money and control
toward your new governance.

We crave the newness.
And while the decree of the emperor
rings in our ears with such authority,
give us newness that we may start again
at the beginning,
that the innocence of the baby may
intrude upon our ambiguity,
that the vulnerability of the child may
veto our lust for control,
that we may be filled with wonder
and so less of anxiety,
in the blessed name of the baby we pray.

(Walter Brueggemann, Prayers For A Privileged People)

The 08/09 veg season

2008-12-18T10:14:00.008+11:00

Back in late September I dug over and planted out my veggie patch. It's been a year in the making, having removed two huge stumps, composted, and pulled out three buckets full of little river pebbles. So these were the before and after pictures:

Before:

After:
Before:

After:
I now have zucchini, tomato, strawberries, onions, pumpkins, beans, basil, cucumber, and various kinds of lettuce in there. Then there's the pots with capsicum, carrots, roquette, and lemon, lime and orange trees. And all of this companion planted with nasturtiums and marigolds.

meanwhile, outside the world trade centre

2008-12-17T16:46:00.005+11:00

I went to the World Trade Centre today, because that's where Thales is*, and I'm leading a group of NCYCers on a peace experience (we were thinking about vigiling outside Thales, but probably won't now). Anyway, just over the road, on the steps that lead to the train station, was this lovely piece of graffiti.

* Thales in Australia is ADI Limited, the largest supplier of weapons and military equipment to the Australian Defence Forces.

quote of the day indeed

2008-11-06T23:03:00.001+11:00

Most days I wonder why I keep that quotes of the day feed...then occasionally I chuckle at one like this and leave it intact.

"I can picture in my mind a world without war, a world without hate. And I can picture us attacking that world, because they'd never expect it."
Jack Handey, Deep Thoughts

Article: Between Sojourners and the Simple Way

2008-10-22T21:49:00.002+11:00

Highly recommend this long but very impressive article, take the time to read it if you can. He's basically arguing for a Christian way of living that finds a path between the pragmatism of Sojourners and the idealism of Simple Way...can't say I agree with absolutely everything he's said here, particularly with regard to Yoder (who doesn't speak with one voice any more than the next person), but it outlines the tensions really well and proposes some excellent ways forward.

There will always be tensions between the local practices of the faith community and wider movements for social change, prophetic actions and pragmatic policy-pushing, the primacy of faith language and the necessity of public language. The challenge is to avoid setting up false alternatives for ourselves, to avoid thinking that our particular piece of the puzzle is the only one that matters. Instead of dismissing either prophetic signs and alternative experiments or advocacy and civic participation, we need to find ways to deepen the connections between them, because the possibilities for authentic cultural transformation just might lie at their intersection.

(thanks to AAANZ for the heads up)

2008-10-16T11:59:00.002+11:00

A couple of articles in the Age today reveal once again what many of us already knew: that police have been routinely posing as activists to covertly infiltrate campaigns to gather intelligence. Even the Palm Sunday peace march for crying out loud. Maybe that means the government finally gets the seditious nature of Palm Sunday?

Police spying on activists revealed

* Richard Baker and Nick McKenzie
* October 16, 2008

VICTORIA Police's secret intelligence unit has infiltrated Melbourne's activist and community groups for two years to gather information on protests against the Iraq War, Japanese whaling and a weapons exhibition.

Reigniting civil liberties concerns about police spying, an officer from the police Security Intelligence Group has infiltrated groups such as Animal Liberation Victoria, Stop the War Coalition, Unity for Peace and Socialist Alternative.

The officer, who posed as a vegan, left-wing activist, has also had close contact with representatives of church and student groups involved in anti-war demonstrations. So successful was his operation that the organising committee for this year's Palm Sunday peace march in Melbourne appointed him its minute-taker at meetings.

And this:

The spying game

* RIchard Baker and Nick McKenzie
* October 16, 2008

IT WAS a simple mistake. The quiet, polite young activist who had been working every Tuesday as a volunteer in Animal Liberation Victoria's Melbourne office did not shut down his computer properly before leaving.

Andrew* had left his personal email account open. For those in the group who had nagging doubts about the bona fides of the eager young man who had turned up out of nowhere in February 2007, it was an opportunity too good to resist.

But the scan of Andrew's email account raised more questions than answers. He had very few email contacts; no friends, family or work colleagues. It appeared the only email addresses he had belonged to the people sneaking a look at his email account - the animal rights folk - plus maybe a few others in Melbourne's activist community.

Who was this guy who wanted the crappy job of taking notes at meetings? Why was he always so keen to know when the next animal rescue or protest was on? How come this vegan appeared to have no knowledge of Melbourne's vegetarian restaurants?

The empire is alive and well.

People sometimes think I'm paranoid, but I always assume there's at least one member of the police force at any meeting or phone hookup or email network...rarely is there any need for secrecy anyway. But this shows the immoral lengths government is willing to go to to minimise dissent under the pretense of 'public safety'. If you're a concerned police officer, go to the meetings in uniform and explain why you're there. Who knows, we might even get along.

More John Dear gold

2008-10-08T11:37:00.003+11:00

John's been on a roll lately in his NCR column as he does his book tour around the US...here's just a couple of selections...click the links for the whole article.

I've encountered many activists over the years, and a good many seething with anger. And who would blame them? But I've learned that in the end, anger consumes our heart's energies and can lead us to abandon our work for justice and peace. We saw this in the 1960s when many young people railed against the Vietnam War and their anger erupted in violent protests. Because they did not go beyond their anger into the spiritual roots of peacemaking, I think many gave up the journey to peace.

My own experience seems to bear that out. The more you learn about injustice, war and poverty, the more overwhelmed you can get. Things are far worse, you discover, than you first realized. Anger is often the first emotion on the scene. But anger doesn't sustain you for the long haul work of lifelong peacemaking and nonviolent resistance.

And this:

Everywhere I go, someone asks, "Are you saying we cannot use violence any more?" Yes, I answer. "How then do we defend ourselves from someone who intends to do us harm? How do we defend ourselves from terrorists who want to hurt us? How do we defend ourselves from other nations?" "Nonviolently!" I answer.

It sounds foolish, of course, but I point folks back to the nonviolent Jesus and suggest that he teaches a whole new way of life..

We're so used to violence. We easily believe the myth of redemptive violence, the lie of war, the false spirituality of violence, the misguided notion that might makes right, that war is justified, that our weapons protect us, that violence works. I suspect we don't trust God, don't think God can protect us, don't take Jesus seriously. In the end, such questions reveal our lack of faith. Do we believe in the God of peace or not?

the temptation of the Sadducees

2008-10-08T11:35:00.001+11:00

"There has been a degree of success in avoiding the temptations of the Pharisees… But one cannot be so sure that there has been equal success in discerning and avoiding the temptation of the Sadducees, which is also a form of servitude to the Powers. By this we mean the assumption that the forces which really determine the march of history are in the hands of the leaders of the armies and the markets, in such measure that if Christians are to contribute to the renewal of society they will need to seek, like everyone else – in fact in competition with everyone else – to become in their turn the lords of the state and the economy, so as to use that power toward the ends they consider desirable." -- John Howard Yoder, The Politics of Jesus, p. 156.

the inspiral Defence White Paper contribution

2008-09-18T19:44:00.001+10:00

This was inspiral's contribution to the White Paper consultations, written and read by Anthony.

My name is Anthony Nicholas. I am speaking on behalf of Inspiral, a faith community in the inner north of Melbourne, Australia, who are exploring together the way of life demonstrated by Jesus Christ. We have been asked to address three questions:

1) What role should our armed forces play?
2) What kind of armed forces should we develop?
3) Can we afford such forces?

I would like to answer these questions by way of a short concrete example.
On October 26, 2003, police raided the Sydney home of a Pakistani-Australian man called Faheem Khalid Lodhi. They found terrorist manuals showing how to make detonators, explosive devices and poisons. They also found maps of the Sydney electricity supply system and 38 aerial photos of Australian military installations. Justice Anthony Whealy determined that Lodhi’s intent was to pursue “violent jihad” to “instil terror into members of the public so that they could never again feel free from the threat of bombing in Australia.” Lodhi is now serving 20 years in prison classified as a high security ‘AA’ prisoner.

Lodhi was sent by a Pakistani Muslim Group called Lashkar-e-Taiba historically based in Pakistani Punjab. Lashkar-e-Taiba has always wanted India out of Kashmir. After September 11, they starting fighting in Afghanistan. Lodhi was sent here with orders to bomb because Lashkar did not like Australian troops fighting in Afghanistan. This example shows the kind of threats Australia is facing – they are real and have the potential to do great harm.

Our tanks, missiles and planes are not going to stop Lashkar-e-Taiba’s next bomber. To rely on the police is a bad idea – they will not stop these bombers every time, in every place. No - the soldier Australia needs to win this war is not Australian – he or she is a Pakistani Muslim. They are going to stop that bomber because they are going to say “Hey everybody, I don’t agree with this suicide bombing against Australia. Australians aren’t anti-muslim. Maybe we disagree on some things, but this is too much.” That is the soldier we need. They question is, how do we recruit them?

That is a hard question. But, you know what - we’ve done it before. Over 35 years, 40,000 people from Asia came to study in Australian institutions under the Colombo Plan. That’s a 40,000 strong army of people through Asia willing to give us a chance and a fair go to speak up on our behalf. What about now in Pakistan and Afghanistan? Have we got people on the ground? We need an army there, local people, muslims, who understand us, who will speak up on our behalf. We will have those people on the ground speaking up for us only if we act with love towards them. We must ensure that we do not act in a way that threatens their security, and instead chose a path that positively promotes their well-being. The Colombo plan is just one example showing our ability to do that when we set our minds to it.

Can we afford to reach out with love to our neighbours? Can we afford to bring them here on scholarships, to spend money learning their languages and reconciling our views of what is just? Yes we can. We far prefer our money spent on building happiness, justice (both here and overseas) and security rather than in buying more bullets, guns and insecurity.

Defence White Paper public consultations

2008-09-17T14:07:00.004+10:00

Eight of us from inspiral went to the Defence White Paper public consultations last night. Submissions were overwhelmingly for more peaceful means of defence and security. This is the verbal submission I made on behalf of Urban Seed.

Thankyou for this opportunity to voice some of what I believe about defence and security. As someone who has committed his life to pursuing peace and justice through the method and lifestyle of nonviolence, it is all the more important that we hear alternative voices to the increasing reliance on violence, alienation and threat power that characterises most foreign policy these days. Once again we must listen to the voices of Mohandas Gandhi, Martin Luther King Jr., Abdul Ghaffar Khan and Thich Nhat Hanh, voices for creative nonviolence.

I know a bit about defence, security, and safety, from working for an organisation called Urban Seed. Much of our work takes place just around the corner from here, in Baptist Place, which Urban Seed has called home for about 15 years. Every day we welcome some of the city’s most marginalised people into our homes and lives, mostly through sitting around a lunch table enjoying good food together. We call it Credo Café because it expresses something of what we believe about the world. Those who come for lunch at Credo are largely people whom the average citizen feels threatened by – the homeless, the mentally ill, those with drug and gambling addictions, people who have often led violent lives. In such a place, security becomes particularly important, especially when it is not merely a workplace, but a home. But what we’ve discovered is that safety based in threatening or excluding or hurting others is not safety at all. If security is to be real, it must be mutual.

And so we’ve been experimenting with nonviolence – not a mere refusal to act violently, but a creative, active power that sometimes aggressively and provocatively, but always lovingly, confronts situations of violence or oppression. Nonviolence is transformative of conflict because it does not seek to dominate or threaten the other, but to win them over by confronting them with the injustice of their actions. It is this kind of creative, self-giving love that characterises the safety of Credo, and it’s a safety that extends out into the surrounding neighbourhood. By welcoming people rather than shunning them, by extending active love rather than threats or violence, people are invited to respond in kind. Often we have people over for lunch who might ordinarily feel they have nothing in common, such as lawyers and homeless people, and as they sit around a table together, understanding is fostered, and friendships are formed. Sometimes when they leave Credo, potential enemies have become friends.

What happens on this local level can and should happen on a global level. Unless we extend active love to those we believe threaten us, the cycle of violence will continue.

And so I call on this committee to reject the logic of violence, which yields only bitterness and hatred and further violence, for the creative, powerful force of nonviolence. I call on you to equip our brave defence forces not with more weapons to kill, maim and destroy, but weapons of love that will build our nation into something we can be even more proud of, that will be of benefit to even our enemies. I call on you to transform our army, navy and air force from a domestic defence force to an earth defence force, which takes seriously the greatest threat to our existence, which is not terrorism but global warming. I urge you to stop buying weapons of mass destruction and instead use those billions of dollars to lift those in our own country and overseas out of poverty, to feed, clothe, heal and educate. By demonstrating such love we will have no enemies, no need for defence, and the only real security that exists.

Just when you think it doesn't get any better...

2008-09-07T14:32:00.002+10:00

The APDSE (Asia Pacific Defence and Security Expo aka "buy the latest-and-greatest killing machines here" expo) has been cancelled.

News report here (note: the paper was a strong supporter of the arms expo).

OzPeace (key organisers of the planned nonviolent protests) press release here.

And a wonderful analysis provided by one protestor:

Us violent feral low life people armed with our deadly heat seeking loudspeakers must use the night to celebrate.

That all those peace loving people with their toys missiles , cannons, guns, bombers, tanks, frigates etc are not bringing their toys here.

Pace e Bene Oz was involved in the resistance to this expo and was planning a nonviolence expo. I was going to be involved in all of this (I'd planned a nonviolence stall) until we realised we were having a baby about then. Incredible news.

More on the Garrett/Shoalwater Bay decision

2008-09-06T20:58:00.006+10:00

More articles on the decision...apparently it's just the third time the EPBC Act has been successfully used to stop a development...

Here's Peter Garrett's original press release.

Here's the transcript of a Stateline interview about it.

Here's the Brisbane Times' article.

A Courier Mail article which emphasizes how unusual a step this is.

Much of course has been made of the fact that Garrett was one of those involved in stopping the sand mining proposals for Shoalwater Bay.

Could be that Waratah Coal's done us a huge favour here...they've drawn national attention to Shoalwater Bay and its environmental significance, and made the government make clear statements to that effect. Now to capitalise on it!

More info at shoalwaterbay.org.

Nice to have a win once in a while

2008-09-05T22:44:00.001+10:00

I spent a day and a bit researching and writing a submission to Peter Garrett under the Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act against this coal port proposal...

Gotta love a man with a bald head.

Now we just have to get the Army, Navy and Air Force to stop bombing it and everything will be hunky dory.

Peace,
Simon

Get on board for 09

2008-08-28T15:30:00.001+10:00

About Talisman Sabre 09

In June 2007, 30,000 Australian and US troops descended on Shoalwater Bay on the central Queensland coast for a series of live-fire exercises including bombings and invasion tactics. They're planning to do it all again in July 2009. At the same time, a new coal port has been proposed for an area inside the the Shoalwater Bay Training Area.

This is an invitation for you to be involved in planning to stop the Talisman Sabre military exercises in July 2009.

The Melbourne Peace Convergence Collective met recently to talk about what needs to be done between now and July 09 in order to make these exercises less likely to happen. We established two groups:

1. Movement building: This group decided to focus their attention and energy on getting as many people involved in protesting the military exercises as possible. This will primarily be done through education, public meetings, research and organisation. It would also involve liasing and networking with other peace groups to build a national movement to stop the Talisman Sabre exercises which fuel further wars of aggression, align us with US foreign policy, and are destructive to Australia's ecology and national interest.

2. Strategic Direct Action: The direct action group decided to focus on training and equipping as many people as possible to be as disruptive as possible for as long as possible should all other attempts to stop the exercises fail. This will require both those who are willing risk arrest for nonviolent direct action, and significant support crew (people who can do media, legals, driving, logistics, etc). Ideally we would like this to be a nationally co-ordinated effort with people from every state.

We would therefore like YOU to join us on:
Friday September 5th at 6pm (bring some food to share) at 116 Little Bourke Street (Urban Seed), where both groups will meet to make further plans.

These are likely to be monthly meetings so if you can't make this one, plan to be at the next one. Please forward this invitation on to anyone you think might be interested.

Even if you're not planning to go to Shoalwater Bay in July 09, you're welcome to be part of the planning and organisation process. We will need people in Melbourne involved as well.

For more information on the Talisman Sabre military exercises, go to http://www.peaceconvergence.com.

For questions etc email Kristy at kmhen7@gmail.com or Simon at smoyle@gmail.com, or just come along and find out more on the night.

The Duty of Hospitality

2008-08-27T13:59:00.003+10:00

Here's one of Peter Maurin's Easy Essays I've been thinking about a lot recently. Lots more can be found on the Catholic Worker website which is a fantastic resource for all things Dorothy and Peter.

The Duty of Hospitality

People who are in need
and are not afraid to beg
give to people not in need
the occasion to do good
for goodness' sake.
Modern society calls the beggar
bum and panhandler
and gives him the bum's rush.
But the Greeks used to say
that people in need
are the ambassadors of the gods.
Although you may be called
bums and panhandlers
you are in fact the Ambassadors of God.
As God's Ambassadors
you should be given food,
clothing and shelter
by those who are able to give it.
Mahometan teachers tell us
that God commands hospitality,
and hospitality is still practiced
in Mahometan countries.
But the duty of hospitality
is neither taught nor practiced
in Christian countries.

the terrifying cost of feeling safer

2008-08-27T13:56:00.002+10:00

Cracker of an article here by Ross Gittins in the SMH - on the high cost of so-called defence against terrorism. Great to see this stuff getting a run in the mainstream media which so often panders to the status quo.

ever felt like you've been nailed to a wall?

2008-08-04T23:14:00.003+10:00

When Sean O'Reilly was out here he brought a bunch of copies of 'Route Irish', a feature-length essay film on the campaign(s) against Irish facilitation of the US/UK invasion of Iraq, with a focus on Shannon Airport. Towards the end it begins to name where the so-called 'peace movement' went wrong:

I couldn't help but feel sometimes that the millions that had marched in opposition to the war in Iraq in the weeks before the 'shock and awe' bombing of Baghdad had got exactly what they had wanted and then disappeared. The papers in the runup to February 15th seemed for once to help with the plans - happy to help them to blow off some steam - then back to their cheerleading. Part of a generation showed itself on the street everywhere and then went straight back to work, never to reappear. What they had wanted, I surmised, was to create a beautiful, uncomplicated, pleasurable image of themselves as the good ones, the moral ones, the caring ones, the innocent ones. They wanted an image which would either change the world or let them off the hook. An image that would, once and for all, absolve them of further responsibility for a darkening future, an image to wash their hands with.

Were we any different? "Not in my name" was the slogan I remember most from the time. Looking back it sounds for all the world like a get-out clause. It came out of millions of mouth, an each-way bet. I heard it come out of my own mouth, and it did make me feel good at the time. It seemed enough. But how does it compare to, for instance, "over my dead body" or "if you want to get to them you'll have to come through us"? In retrospect it feels like an abdication of responsibility. Our names were surplus to requirements. (bold emphasis mine)

Ouch. Colour me convicted...seems to me that's so often the case for protest movements, that in a country where our names are surplus to requirements we resort to tokenism in order to feel better about ourselves. How can we be serious about peace - saying 'peace, peace,' when there is no peace - if we don't resist war with our very lives? May the rest of my life be closer to "if you want to get to them you'll have to come through us" rather than merely "not in my name"...which reminds me of one of Fr. Dan Berrigan SJ's (many) pearlers:

We have assumed the name of peacemakers, but we have been, by and large, unwilling to pay any significant price. And because we want the peace with half a heart and half a life and will, the war, of course, continues, because the waging of war, by its nature, is total–but the waging of peace, by our own cowardice, is partial.

evangelical nonviolence

2008-06-24T11:47:00.002+10:00

Great article (from 1976) by Ron Sider....to think we haven't moved any further in 32 years.

"Since Jesus atoned for our sins by carrying love for enemy to the ultimate degree, a refusal to follow his example at this point not only involves a denial of scriptural authority; it also constitutes a questionable doctrine of the atonement. God chose to reconcile his enemies and accomplish the atonement by nonviolent, suffering love. If we reject the biblical imperative to follow Jesus at this point, we in effect express disbelief about the validity of God’s way of reconciling enemies. But to do that is to express disbelief about the atonement itself."

Scott Parkin again

2008-06-20T16:37:00.004+10:00

All the way back in 2005 I wrote a couple of posts (here's one and here's the other) about Scott Parkin, a nonviolent activist deported from Australia for allegedly being a threat to Australia's security. It's one of the most blatant abuses of power our country has seen in recent years (leaving him dubbed Australia's first political prisoner). There's a new video out that tells the story - I highly recommend you take the 15 minutes to hear what happened, and begin to question your assumptions about the just, free society we're supposed to be a part of. Visit here for more information.

A Persistent Peace

2008-06-13T15:46:00.002+10:00

When John Dear was over here, he specifically asked us to pray for a book he had recently written, but was having difficulty getting published...his autobiography. So I'm more than delighted to say that not only did the publishing come through, but it is due out August 1. Read all about it, including advanced chapters, here.

There is also a possible film in the works over it, so continue to pray that all of that will come through.

Pace e Bene National Gathering

2008-06-13T15:34:00.002+10:00

Very disappointed to be missing this, but our baby will be due about a week before, so I'll have to miss it...but get there if you possibly can, it'll be absolutely fantastic.

PACE E BENE Australia GATHERING 2008

‘Engaging Nonviolence – Deep Listening to the Spirit’

Adelaide: Thursday November 6^th – Sunday November 9^th

An Invitation

To join with others and listen to the spirit as we share the journey of ‘exploring nonviolence’ and how it takes shape in our lives.

Right now we are seeking indications of interest in attending and invite responses via email, post, fax or phone

Phone and fax (03) 5562 3277

Mob: 0408 541 152

Email: bobmyers@aapt.net.au

Who else could you invite?

Who else do you know who shares the passion for this possibility? Who would wish to journey with the spirituality of active nonviolence? Who could you invite to enrich the gathering with their presence? For more details of the program, see below.

Accommodation venue details

The Monastery Conference and Function Centre

15 Cross Road, Glen Osmond SA 5064 Tel: 08 8379 3681 FAX 08 8379 8751 www.stpauls.mx.com.au

Set in tranquil, picturesque grounds in the Adelaide foothills "The Monastery" is only 10 minutes [5km] from the city centre and 20 minutes from the airport. Car parking is available on site.

Money matters of various kinds

Accommodation: is in single rooms with shared facilities…cost includes all meals from Friday breakfast – Sunday lunch (linen $10 extra).

Single (waged) $290 Single (unwaged) $240

Couple (waged) $550 Couple (unwaged) $420

If you wish to come a day early or stay later, please contact the Monastery direct).

Other conference fees – invitation to contribute

Our commitment is to have the conference accessible to everyone, and our invitation to ourselves is to equalize the costs as much as possible. We suggest an ‘access contribution’ (of what you can afford) from those living in or near Adelaide which would be used to balance out the higher costs of those participants who have to travel further, or who have other financial challenges.

We don’t want anyone to miss out through lack of funding. Remember the possibilities of resources from within your own community or network. Perhaps a parish, workplace or institution would help fundraise to assist with your costs.

There are some funds available to subsidise participation by people who might otherwise be unable to take part. Please let us know your needs.

Draft Programme - Thurs Nov 6^th – Sunday Nov 9^th

‘Engaging Nonviolence – Deep Listening to the Spirit’

Program outline (so far… do send your ideas, needs and requests!)

Phase 1 Engage with the spirit of the gathering place and with each other
Phase II Engage with deep spirit within self
Phase III Engage with the spirit of our wider communities – going beyond ourselves

THURSDAY 6^TH NOV

Evening

Gathering (from 6pm), welcome, settle in, introductions and grounding in place

Dinner informal pizza, nibbles, drinks

Sharing ideas and offers for daily morning prayer ….e.g. meditation, Tai Chi, yoga, other - whatever skills/gifts the group may offer

FRIDAY 7^TH NOV

Morning

Morning Prayer – as per last night’s suggestions/offers

Breakfast

Welcome to country
Welcome to each other and sharing the stories of our individual journeys to here

Lunch

Afternoon

Sharing Our Community Stories and Gifts

(Focus: how have we got to 'here' and what’s going on in our world now...)

· The Pace e Bene story – locally, nationally and internationally

· From Violence to Wholeness, Engage, Travelling With the Turtles….

· Recent stories…among which are: the Solomon Islands; Mainstreaming Nonviolence; Samuel Hill 5; FVTW in Scotland….

· Sharing our Gifts (What are the gifts you wish to offer this gathering given your journey to here?) - sharing skills, knowledge, wisdom, experiences...gathered along the way

· Other possible dicussion areas might include: gender and nonviolence training, rising militarisation in the region, refusal to pay war tax…..plus the contributions you bring of course….?

· Dinner

Evening

Discernment: invitation to one hour of 'noble silence' between 7-8pm

(after dinner) to discern movements within self from the day....

followed by

Sharing the insights between 8-9pm

SATURDAY 8^TH NOV

Morning

Morning prayer - as Friday
Breakfast

Sharing our Gifts continues (What are the gifts you wish to offer this gathering

given your journey to here?)
Sharing skills, knowledge, wisdom, experiences...gathered along the way

Lunch

Afternoon

Discernment: Invitation to one hour of 'noble silence [after lunch] 2-3pm discern movements within self from the day....followed by

Gathering to share insights/further skills and other discernment

Evening

Dinner

“Celebration….”

SUNDAY 9^TH NOV

Morning

Morning prayer – as Friday..

Breakfast

Where do we go from here- Open space

2 sessions before Lunch

Sunday Lunch

Afternoon:

Closing Circle, Ritual and Departure (3pm)

MONDAY 10^th Nov – optional - Pace e Bene Australia AGM

TUESDAY 11^th – THURSDAY 13^th Nov - optional – APDS – Arms Expo NV Action

Pace e Bene Australia intends to provide an alternative ‘nonviolent marketplace’ in Adelaide during this weapons bazaar. We will keep you informed about how this initiative develops and invite active participation by our friends and supporters around the country. There will be a variety of ways to be involved, whether by being present in Adelaide or by creating solidarity activities in your own community.

Raytheon 9 acquitted!

2008-06-13T14:33:00.001+10:00

On 11 June 2008, by a unanimous verdict of the jury, the Raytheon 9 were found not guilty of three counts of criminal damage at the Raytheon offices, Derry Northern Ireland on 9 August 2006.

Immediately afterwards, the defendants addressed supporters and press outside Belfast’s Laganside Court. Colm Bryce began:

The Raytheon 9 have been aquitted today in Belfast for their action in decommissioning the Raytheon offices in Derry in August 2006. The prosecution could produce not a shred of evidence to counter our case that we had acted to prevent the commission of war crimes during the Lebanon war by the Israeli armed forces using weapons supplied by Raytheon.

We remain proud of the action we took and only wish that we could have done more to disrupt the ‘kill chain’ that Raytheon controls.

This victory is welcome, for ourselves and our families, but we wish to dedicate it to the Shaloub and Hasheem families of Qana in Lebanon, who lost 28 of their closest relatives on the 30 July 2006 due to a Raytheon ‘bunker buster’ bomb.

Their unimaginable loss was foremost in our minds when we took the action we did on 9 August, and the injustice that they and the many thousands of victims of war crimes in Lebanon, Palestine, Iraq and Afghanistan have suffered, will spur us on to continue to campaign against war and the arms trade that profits from it.

We said from the beginning that we came to this court not as the accused but as the accusers of Raytheon. This court case proved that Raytheon in Derry is an integral part of the global Raytheon company and its military production. This is no longer a secret or in doubt. Raytheon have treated the truth, peaceful protest, local democracy and this court with complete contempt. The most senior executive who appeared said that the charge that Raytheon had ‘aided and abetted’ the commission of crimes against humanity was “not an issue” for him. Raytheon should have that contempt repaid in full and be driven out of Derry and every other place they have settled. They are war criminals, plain and simple. They have no place in our society and shame on all those in positions of power or influence who would hand them public funds, turn a blind eye to their crimes, cover their tracks or make excuses for them.

These crimes continue daily and hourly in the Middle East. It is up to those of us who oppose those wars of domination and occupation to build a movement that matches the enormity of what is being done by Western governments. We hope that this victory gives courage and heart to all those involved in that movement and the many more who need to be for us to achieve our aim of stopping these wars. Until then, the very least we can do, to show solidarity with our brothers and sisters in the Middle East is to dissociate ourselves from the corrupt governments of the US and Britain. That means opposing the visit to Belfast of the world’s biggest war criminal, George W Bush on 16 June.

We feel totally vindicated by this decision and wish to extend our heartfelt thanks to all of those who gave us support, especially to our families and friends, to the members of the Derry Anti War Coalition and the Irish Anti-War Movement , to our excellent legal teams. Of course, we particularly want to thank the jury who listened intently through three weeks of evidence before ensuring that justice was done today.

hope, despair and Lions For Lambs

2008-05-23T14:33:00.000+10:00

Here’s a letter I penned soon after our recent court appearance for disrupting the Talisman Sabre military exercises last year (reflections here), but never sent.

Dear friends,

I’m sitting here having just finished watching Meryl Streep, Tom Cruise, and Robert Redford in Lions For Lambs, and thinking about the despair that pervades the US and so many of us about the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. And as I think about this in light of events in my own life in the past year, I thought it might be worth sharing these reflections with you about hope, resistance and Christian discipleship in the midst of despair.

Despair is far too easy; more than that, it’s a luxury for those of us in the First World, sitting comfortably in our homes lit by energy saving bulbs watching the horrors unfold in front of us. We can pontificate as to whether we believe this war is about oil, or about democracy; about ridding the world of an evil dictator, or weapons of mass destruction, or about establishing US bases in the Middle East…or maybe all of the above. Conversations about the arrogance of America, or about its greed, or even Australia’s complicity become nauseating. Putting our faith in democracy, or in policy, or in the law to be able to work it all out is futile; worse, it’s idolatry. In the end it all adds up to empire. And really it doesn’t matter which empire – it could be Rome, it could be the United States of America, or (who knows?) in a few years maybe China. It really doesn’t matter. What matters, for those of us who put our faith in Christ, is where we sit in such moments of time. How do we follow Jesus? Where was he found?

Hanging from a cross, it would seem, in the midst of empire, damned by all for the sake of maintaining the status quo. As happens so often in history, having sat with the victims of empire, he became one. And he calls us to do the same; to deny ourselves – our privilege, our position, our power – take up our cross, and follow him.

And so it comes down to this: discipleship is about where we sit. Or as Phil Berrigan once put it, somewhat more crudely (but I think more accurately), “Hope is where your ass is.” Do we sit with the victims of empire, or with its powerbrokers? Do we sit in the prisons, the courtrooms, the homeless shelters, amongst others whom our society have marginalised or rejected? Or do we sit in the imperial courtyards of power, and, like Peter, deny the suffering and tortured Christ because of our presence there?

I am left from our time in court last week with one question; not was this the right thing to do, but (like my good friend and co-defendant Sarah) why not more? How can I go about my daily business with the occasional nod to war resistance when people are being murdered in my name while I sleep? As Dan Berrigan says, “We have assumed the name of peacemakers, but we have been, by and large, unwilling to pay any significant price. And because we want the peace with half a heart and half a life and will, the war, of course, continues, because the waging of war, by its nature, is total–but the waging of peace, by our own cowardice, is partial.” If despair is cheap, resistance in the West is an absolute bargain. Six months’ good behaviour bond is an encouragement to go back for more.

I particularly want to thank those of you who supported us – whether you wrote letters or references, prayed, planted trees or played frisbee with a friend, stranger or enemy; your solidarity made this easier for us, particularly because as Wink says, “history belongs to the intercessors”. May those of us tempted by despair feel ourselves drawn to the invitation to audacious hope that is the good news of Jesus Christ.

Blessings of peace,
Simon

The Samuel Hill 5 experiment (or, Reflections of a Newbie)

2008-05-23T10:43:00.000+10:00

I find Gandhi’s reference to nonviolent action as “experiments with truth” very useful. This has been very much an experiment for me, one that has undoubtedly confirmed my inklings towards nonviolence as the way of discipleship of Jesus, and also as a powerful force for love and truth in the world. What follows are some reflections on the Samuel Hill 5 action as an experiment. It is not a critique of nor reflections on the Peace Convergence as a whole, nor on overall strategy for resistance to Operation Talisman Sabre 07, but are focussed particularly on our action itself. I trust they will be useful in the ongoing conversation in nonviolence and faith circles.

* Choosing stories and storying choices: Perhaps the first and most important point to come out of this action is (to borrow Ched Myers’ phrase) the importance of choosing our stories and storying our choices. We in the West suffer from a crippling lack of imagination, mostly as a result of a dearth of alternative stories to that of the empire in whose shadow we sit. Those who sit in the dominant story mostly find themselves with little room within it to make changes, little room to act or be empowered or see alternatives. I, however, have chosen the Christian gospel as my formative story (or perhaps more accurately it has chosen me) and as a result I will spend the rest of my life immersing myself in it and being shaped by it. It is a story that is deeply subversive and antithetical to the story of empire, despite the ways it has been abused throughout history, and as such it forms the perfect counter to it.

At all stages it was the gospel story that gave us the overarching metanarrative from which to make sense of our actions and others’ reactions to them. This gave us an energy, a courage and a stability that would not have otherwise been possible. Stories such as the temple cleansing and the Gerasene demoniac suddenly leapt off the page and into animated real life. No longer were they mere stories; they were our stories, not merely in some modernist abstract sense of being factual, but in the sense that we had known them, and they had known us, in the biblical sense.

There often seems to be an uncanny connection between current events and the lectionary readings, and the time of our trial was no different. With John 14:16 declaring, “And I will ask the Father, and he will give you another Advocate [defence counsel] to be with you forever…” and 1 Peter 3:11’s “seek peace and pursue it,” it was clear that we were in the right place. In fact, the whole 1 Peter 3 section was appropriate – from “do not repay evil for evil, but on the contrary, repay evil with a blessing” [the heart of the Sermon on the Mount] to verses 13-17: “Now who will harm you if you are eager to do what is good? But even if you do suffer for doing what is right, you are blessed. Do not fear what they fear, and do not be intimidated, but in your hearts sanctify Christ as Lord. Always be ready to make your defense to anyone who demands from you an accounting for the hope that is in you; yet do it with gentleness and reverence. Keep your conscience clear, so that, when you are maligned, those who abuse you for your good conduct in Christ may be put to shame. For it is better to suffer for doing good, if suffering should be God's will, than to suffer for doing evil.”

As we prayed the Lord’s Prayer together, phrases like “your Kingdom come” took on new meaning. “Forgive us our trespasses,” also took on a new and amusing meaning.

At the same time, the gospel equipped us to tell our story, particularly as an alternative to the dominant story, in a way that engaged people, made sense of what happened, and extended an invitation to join in.

* Humour as subversion: Our action has also highlighted for me the importance of fun and humour in gaining wider public understanding and bridging the gap between the mainstream punter and the hardened activist. While at no stage did we want to be flippant or deny the seriousness of that which we were resisting, there was something undeniably engaging about playing frisbee with military personnel. The ridiculousness of the image seemed to crack wide open the stereotype of the overearnest, angry, dour faced protestor that pervades much of society. There is something both safely harmless and engaging and yet simultaneously deeply and dangerously subversive about humour (as frequently demonstrated by The Chaser team and Jesus Christ).

* Strategy:
What we did was successful on several levels:

a. We stopped the war games, albeit temporarily, as evidenced by tanks and other equipment at a standstill, the total shutdown of Samuel Hill Air Base, and the signage indicating the deliberate cessation of live firing (rather than its absence).
b. We gained entry to the base with minimal effort, minimal risk of danger to ourselves or others, and using minimal resources. In fact, it was ridiculously easy.
c. We engaged the troops in respectful face-to-face dialogue on a personal level, had some significant conversations and gained valuable insights.
d. Our action strategically bolstered that of other groups, specifically by drawing attention to the presence of civilians on the base in a way that could no longer be denied by defence personnel.

What we could have done better:

a. Primarily I think research in general would have helped – knowing the terrain is important, more orienteering training would help, know more about the exercises, the equipment used, etc.
b. Strategic legals: Next time I would give much more strategic thought to the legal aspects of the action to maximise the ongoing effects. While I think we did the best we could with what we had (namely a very very inexperienced and naïve bunch of self-represented young people!), had we thought more strategically about the laws around it we may have been able to further our impact on the system. In this case our original intention was to do the action the way we wanted and then plead guilty; we changed our minds on a guilty plea only sometimes afterwards when we realised there was no way we could conscienably call ourselves guilty for what we did (under any definition, legal or otherwise). We were then able to subequently put together a pretty solid case. However in future, where possible, I would ideally tailor the action to suit legals in a similar way to the Pine Gap 4. Priority should still always go towards faithful action over legal issues, but where possible maximising strategic impact in the court process should be important, particularly to ensuring integrity when pleading not guilty.

* Empowerment: As a privileged, educated, middle class person (a group who generally have the most to lose from civil disobedience, and therefore rarely engage in it) this has given me a sense of empowerment beyond my expectations. Crossing the line unafraid and without any real consequences has opened a whole new realm of possibilities for creative action that is both effective and affective. It’s a signal to those who attempt to hold power over me that I will not comply, I will not remain silent even when others do. Phil Berrigan has said of voting, “If it made any difference, it’d be illegal,” and I’d have to agree – voting is at the very least a blunt instrument for social change. It also indicates, I think, that actions that do make a difference tend to be illegal because that’s the way empire stacks the deck (as Ciaron O’Reilly often says, “Good lawmaking comes from good lawbreaking”). Which is not to say that an action’s being illegal is sufficient for it to change anything (let alone for the positive), but it’s potentially indicative.

* Importance of small, independent affinity groups
The action has confirmed for me the strength of small affinity groups, particularly when they are supported by strong intentional communities or solidarity networks. The ability to organise quickly and independently, with minimal resources and to do so sustainably with the long haul in mind, has clearly given us a strength of resolve that would not have been possible in its absence. The Christian Activist Network has functioned effectively in this regard for solidarity, training, and support, as have our respective faith communities.

* Stepping stone
Finally, after court proceedings have finished, I am left with a sense of humility and proportion, particularly in the sense that these particular actions didn’t risk very much. Probably for our first action, particularly as people who have emerged from Australia’s middle class and are (in Simon Reeves’ words, I think borrowed from Jarrod McKenna) “in rehab from consumerism” we needed to begin at this level. I remain, however, acutely aware that, as Sarah said to the judge in her closing statements, “I won’t regret having done this, but rather I regret that am not doing more to resist war and oppression.” In that sense, I think we can see this as a stepping stone to further action.

More info can be found at http://samuelhill5.blogspot.com.

Raytheon 9 and other nonviolence news

2008-05-15T10:09:00.003+10:00

Send these guys a note of encouragement if you can as they face court next Monday over their actions from almost 2 years ago (9th August 2006) in interfering with Raytheon's death-dealing. Anzac Day this year saw some more local action at the Raytheon offices in Brisbane also as Jim Dowling, Lisa Bridle and Sean O'Reilly staged a sit-in.

And in related nonviolence news (it's all happening at the moment), there's been another ANZAC ploughshares action in New Zealand while we were away in Yeppoon. More info here.

hey monkey where you been?

2008-05-15T10:06:00.001+10:00

I've been rather busy the last month or so. Check here and here for why.

for your (or my?) reference

2008-04-14T13:00:00.003+10:00

So I'm not sure if anyone still reads this, but I thought I'd put a general request out to anyone to write a letter in support of me and the Samuel Hill 5's actions as I front the Yeppoon Magistrates Court in a week and a bit.

We'd ideally like to plonk a whole bunch of letters down in front of the judge, from a wide cross section of the community, saying that they support us and the action we took to stop these games.

This is one way you can have a say to the court system and the government about your opposition to war and violence.

Send it to samuelhill4@gmail.com by Friday 18th April and we'll make sure it reaches the trial judge. Many thanks.

Nelson

2008-04-12T17:41:00.003+10:00

I love ambiguous statements by politicians. Especially this one by Opposition Leader Brendan Nelson, who is on a single digit approval rating at present.

Today's Age headline: "Nelson: I'm going nowhere"

I think what he meant to say is "I'm not leaving the leadership of the party" but what he actually said is much more accurate.

With frank honesty like that, it's no wonder he's not doing so well.

the new beast

2008-04-02T16:52:00.002+11:00

Huzzah for insurance!

"sea of pink" - nonviolent solidarity

2008-03-28T19:39:00.002+11:00

Got the link to this story today in my inbox - an impressive little story about how a simple act of solidarity can be so powerful and transformative.

my bike was stolen :(

2008-03-16T20:51:00.002+11:00

and before you ask, yes, it was locked up. I was inside a shop helping a friend renovate for an hour and a half, and when I returned, it was gone. including my helmet and everything.

I hope they enjoy it...it was a great (new) bike.

just another reason to love the peace tree crew

2008-02-22T17:09:00.002+11:00

Vines and fig trees.

Micah 4
1. In days to come
the mountain of the Lord's house
shall be established as the highest of the mountains,
and shall be raised up above the hills.
Peoples shall stream to it,
2. and many nations shall come and say:
"Come, let us go up to the mountain of the Lord,
to the house of the God of Jacob;
that he may teach us his ways
and that we may walk in his paths."
For out of Zion shall go forth instruction,
and the word of the Lord from Jerusalem.
3. He shall judge between many peoples,
and shall arbitrate between strong nations far away;
they shall beat their swords into plowshares,
and their spears into pruning hooks;
nation shall not lift up sword against nation,
neither shall they learn war any more;
4. but they shall all sit under their own vines and under their own fig trees,
and no one shall make them afraid;
for the mouth of the Lord of hosts has spoken.
5. For all the peoples walk,
each in the name of its god,
but we will walk in the name of the Lord our God
forever and ever.

oh. my. goodness.

2008-02-22T14:45:00.002+11:00

Un. be. lievable.

Pine gap protesters' conviction quashed

Four anti-war protesters who broke into the Pine Gap spy base have had their convictions quashed by a Northern Territory court.

Donna Mulhearn, 39, Tim Dowling, 52, Adele Goldie, 31, and Bryan Law, 52, were the first Australians to be charged under the 1952 Defence (Special Undertaking) Act (DSU Act).

The four protesters - from the Group Christians Against All Terrorism - were found guilty of using bolt cutters on a high security fence and entering the secret spy base near Alice Springs in 2005.

They were convicted last June and together were fined more than $3,000. They had faced a maximum prison sentence of seven years each.

The Commonwealth DPP applied against what it said was the leniency of the sentence while the defendants appealed their convictions.

In the NT court of Criminal Appeal in Darwin on Friday, the full bench unanimously acquitted all four defendants of their conviction under the DSU Act.

Chief Justice Brian Martin said the full bench also declined to order a retrial.

The court will publish its reasons at a later date.

The four are still convicted of minor charges under the criminal code including damaging commonwealth property.

Outside the court, Mr Law said he had been entitled to call evidence during his trial about the role of the defence facility.

He said the commonwealth had tried to punish the protesters for a peaceful "expression of conscience".

"This court has found that is unjust, a miscarriage of justice and we are within our rights to challenge the existence of Pine Gap," he told reporters.

"We are completely vindicated and very happy.

"Pine Gap is not a base for the defence of Australia, Pine Gap is an instrument of international aggression."

Ms Mulhearn said there had been a misuse of the DSU Act.

"It's a draconian act and it was an extremist move that the act be used against us," she said.

"It means the federal government will have to look at the Defence (special undertakings) Act and the application it has now for any other activists who want to participate in non-violent civil disobedience at Pine Gap."

(I must admit I giggled at the 'Tim Dowling' bit...)

wendell berry on industrial sex

2008-02-15T11:15:00.004+11:00

After seeing this article in today's Age, my mind immediately went to this quote of Wendell Berry from Feminism, The Body And The Machine. I suspect when he wrote it (1989), it was intended as more wry overstatement than prediction, but there it is.

It is odd that simply because of its "sexual freedom" our time should be considered extraordinarily physical. In fact, our "sexual revolution" is mostly an industrial phenomenon, in which the body is used as a idea of pleasure or a pleasure machine with the aim of "freeing" natural pleasure from natural consequence.

Like any other industrial enterprise, industrial sexuality seeks to conquer nature by exploiting it and ignoring the consequences, by denying any connection between nature and spirit or body and soul, and by evading social responsibility. The spiritual, physical, and economic costs of this "freedom" are immense, and are characteristically belittled or ignored. The diseases of sexual irresponsibility are regarded as a technological problem and an affront to liberty.

Industrial sex, characteristically, establishes its freeness and goodness by an industrial accounting, dutifully toting up numbers of sexual partners, orgasms, and so on, with the inevitable industrial implication that the body is somehow a limit on the idea of sex, which will be a great deal more abundant as soon as it can be done by robots.

st francis I ain't

2008-02-12T19:34:00.001+11:00

I ran over a bird today. no, not in the car. on my bike. you heard right.

so I'm riding to work along Lygon St in peak hour traffic and as I try to avoid the mirrors of the cars that are crawling along, I see this myna (like the one pictured above) hop out of the path of one car. unfortunately, it hopped into my path. I had nowhere to go - parked cars to my left and traffic to my right, and only a couple of feet in between. I assume it sees me - birds always move when there's something coming at them, right? so I watch it as I approach. and I watch. thinking it will move I wait until the last moment before I swerve out of its way, only to have it try to jump out of my way...

but we both moved the same way.

I can still feel the sensation of it getting caught in the grip of my front tyre and getting pulled under.

it was all over in a split second, of course. and it survived the incident - or I assume it did. after one wheel went over it, it flew away - toward the cemetary admittedly, but it did fly away from the scene, and without so much as exchanging phone numbers.

that's more like it

2008-02-10T13:18:00.000+11:00

My new zuccini harvest. No more trick photography needed.

finally...some good news for JD

2008-02-01T15:41:00.000+11:00

Received this from John Dear...absolutely delighted for him, especially in the week he was called a "renegade priest and a renegade citizen" and a "phoney" by the judge at his sentencing. It's almost a year since we hung out here in Melbourne, and what a year. John's been really supportive of me personally through that time. Continue to pray for him.

Dear friends, I'm sharing with you this amazing letter I just received which Archbishop Tutu sent to Norway!

Keep me in your prayers! Peace, John

* * * * * *

In support of The Reverend Father John Dear, S.J. : Nobel Peace Prize 2008

Dr Leo Rebello, World Peace Envoy from Bombay, India and Dr Charles Mercieca, President of International Association of Educators for World Peace, USA have nominated the Reverend Father John Dear, SJ for the 2008 Nobel Peace Prize. I commend Father Dear to you and support his nomination.

Fr John Dear is a Jesuit priest who has been in the forefront of the religious peace movement in the United States. He is the embodiment of a peacemaker. He has led by example through his actions and in his writings and in numerous sermons, speeches and demonstrations. He believes that peace is not something static, but rather to make peace is to be engaged, mind, body and spirit. His teaching is to love yourself, to love your neighbor, your enemy, and to love the world and to understand the profound responsibility in doing all of these.

He is a man who has the courage of his convictions and who speaks out and acts against war, the manufacture of weapons and any situation where a human being might be at risk through violence. Fr John Dear has studied and follows the teachings of non-violence as espoused by Mahatma Gandhi and Martin Luther King, Jr., he serves the homeless and the marginalized and sees each person as being of infinite worth. I would hope that were he to receive this honor his teachings and activities might become more widely accepted and adopted. The world would undoubtedly become a better and more peaceful place if this were to happen.

For evil to prevail requires only that good people sit on the sidelines and do nothing. Fr John Dear is compelling all of us to stand up and take responsibility for the suffering of humanity so often caused through selfishness and greed. I hope you will consider his nomination favorably.

God bless you
Archbishop Desmond Tutu

enneagram

2008-01-31T23:31:00.001+11:00

For those who understand this whole thing, I recently discovered that I'm a type 4 with a strong 5 wing. Ah yes, it all makes sense now.

Not that it can explain me at all of course, because I'm special and unique and can't be understood by anyone...;)

defining irony

2008-01-31T17:03:00.000+11:00

I've been doing a lot of clearing lately, making space for a veggie patch. First I needed to cut back the massive hedge which had grown over the top, blocking all sunlight. Then I had to clear the garden.

What resulted was a great piece of land to do some growing in. After having worked hard for weeks creating this space, I was finally able to add the piece de resistance - my pumpkin plant, which had been struggling in a pot.

The day after was 35 degrees in the height of summer.

Needless to say the plant was burnt beyond recognition, prompting me now to set up a temporary shade over it. So having removed all the shade from that area in order for it to grow, I've now had to create shade in order for it to not die completely.

My veggie patch (or, how I learned about the birds and the bees)

2008-01-31T16:16:00.001+11:00

As I mentioned here, I was having some problems with my zucchinis.

Since then I transplanted them from the kiddie pool they were in to a garden bed that I've attempted to revitalise. Alas, the zucchinis were growing no larger there - until I discovered what everyone else probably already knows about zucchinis; that there are two types of flowers, males and females, and the female flowers have to be pollinated by the male flowers. The ones I'd picked before hadn't been pollinated, so never grew beyond that size. So obviously, with no bees in my garden, I was going to have to do it myself. So I've been out there at 7am some mornings handpollinating them just to make sure it happens.

Hence, we are finally growing some decent sized zucchinis, now that I know what I'm doing.

Passionfruits have a rather amusing history in my family, but here's the one I planted in just December, and has grown from half a foot to this in late January. It's already flowering, so I may even squeeze out a fruit or two before autumn hits.

We were given this strawberry plant for Christmas. It was tiny then, just a little seedling, so we may just get some strawberries out of it this season.

We needed a climber for the side of the garage that doesn't need too much sunlight. These pepinos are doing nicely there.

Then there's the capsicums. For a while they were too crowded in, so didn't do much, but recently they've gone mad and we're doing quite well out of it.

And the beans are now taking over. They look fantastic up against the bare fence. Particularly since I cleared the fence to actually give them some room to grow.

And finally, my lettuces are doing great - using our old used coffee grounds we've had no problems with snails or slugs.

The saddest thing was that almost the entire worm farm died on a particularly hot day (drowned in their own urine - what a way to go) and the same happened when I transplanted my pumpkin from a pot to the garden (it just got obliterated by the sun). I've since got more worms, so the farm is back up and running, though my pumpkin still needs a lot of healing before it'll even look like fruiting. Of course by then it'll probably be too late.

Still, I'm pretty happy overall. More to come on my gardening adventures.

Whatever doesn't kill you...

2008-01-11T11:12:00.001+11:00

...only makes you stronger. In which case, I must be mighty strong after finishing this sucker, 'cos it was a close-run thing.

I just had a thought...

2008-01-11T11:08:00.001+11:00

Does Microsoft really recycle the stuff you put into the so-called 'recycle bin', or is the name just greenwash?

All those pixels...what a waste.

Musings on Brueggemann's 19 theses

2008-01-09T12:42:00.000+11:00

I sent them to a friend, and replied by saying, amongst other things, that he found them "deliberately and negatively provocative". So what follows is my reply to him.

First, I'm completely fascinated that you found them "deliberately and negatively provocative". It just sounded like reality to me! And hopeful reality at that. There IS a counter-narrative! What could be more hopeful?

Perhaps it's some of the experiences I've had in the last year or two, but it certainly reflected much of my (very hopeful, deeply meaningful!) reality. Like you, I'm particularly interested in the script/counterscript idea. Much of my theological upbringing lacked such an idea. In fact, mostly it went along with the dominant script, diverging only at the point of after death. That is, we are saved now so we can go to heaven when we die; in the meantime we wait around a bit, maybe doing some good deeds here and there but because we can't be perfect we might as well not strive to be, and if we do we're in danger of thinking we're saved by works! So you might as well just wait around to die, and spend your time trying to get as many individual souls 'saved' as possible. There is no challenge to the dominant script there; no politicisation or even socialisation.

So what I like about the theses is firstly the focus on narrative, or scripting, itself. What we are invited into is not abstract, disembodied concepts but a living story, here and now. We are, in fact, invited to live Jesus' story - as Daniel Berrigan puts it, "To make your life fit into Jesus' life."

Secondly, we're invited to a particular counter-narrative - one that has been building since the creation of the world, and features such luminaries as Abraham, Moses, Joshua, Isaiah, and was ultimately revealed and embodied in Jesus. Describing the dominant script as "technological , therapeutic consumer militarism" gives some shape to our counter-narrative, but also helps us to see what we are socialised into. So, for example, we're socialised into might makes right - redemptive violence (including the use of coercive power over). We're socialised into technology = good. We're socialised into consuming = good.

And so my experience of trying to live the counter-script is precisely as Brueggemann describes - that I frequently find myself profoundly ambiguous about it. I see Jesus clearly saying "this way to true, abundant life" ("blessed are the poor, the meek, the peacemakers", etc) and yet I am so socialised into the dominant script it makes it incredibly difficult to believe. It's only by living the alternative script that I recognise its truth, and the lie of the dominant script. It's only by consuming (profoundly) less, and living the counter-script of abundance that I understand its truth. It's only by trusting in the God of peace in the face of militarism that I understand that peace does not come through war. It's only by singing in a police holding cell that I understand that power has nothing to do with governments, police, or the 'legal system'.

Four of my Christian friends are going to prison soon for their nonviolent citizen's inspection of the Pine Gap military facility. The dominant script says they should be afraid, that this will deter them from acting in such a way again. Yet they live by a different script. They are not afraid: they are rejoicing to be worthy of suffering for acting in the name of Christ. And by doing so they demonstrate that it's possible not to go along with the dominant script. I may well follow them to prison later this year. And my prayer is that I will be able, by the grace of God, to do the same.

But many of my colleagues, no less faithful servants of God, will disagree with such a characterisation of the counterscript (if they agree that there even IS a counterscript). Of which, once again, Brueggemann is aware. The script, he says, is not monolithic, one dimensional or seamless. To me this is an acknowledgment that it is not always clear; that we do see "through a glass darkly" and can only be faithful to what we know; and that this is based in the mystery that is God. Then, like Vincent Donovan, we can say, "Never accept and be content with unanalyzed assumptions, assumptions about the work, about the people, about the church or Christianity... The day we are completely satisfied with what we have been doing; the day we have found the perfect, unchangeable system of work, the perfect answer, never in need of being corrected again, on that day we will know that we are wrong, that we have made the greatest mistake of all."

So the 19 theses (or my posting of them) probably tells you a lot more about me and where I'm at than it tells you about Walter Brueggemann. That's ok. I don't agree with everything he says either. But that's the magic of the counterscript. So long as we "quarrel among ourselves" about the main focus of the script (without detracting from it), hopefully we're just provoking each other on to love and good deeds.

Walter Brueggemann's 19 theses

2008-01-08T13:04:00.000+11:00

These have been out for a while now, but I've just come across them and I think it's brilliant. Brueggemann originally talked about them in 2004 at an Emergent gathering. You can find the original here, with the mp3s of his talk. Incidentally, this is a transcription from the tapes, so words like "illusive" could possibly be "elusive".

1. Everybody lives by a script. The script may be implicit or explicit. It may be recognized or unrecognized, but everybody has a script.

2. We get scripted. All of us get scripted through the process of nurture and formation and socialization, and it happens to us without our knowing it.

3. The dominant scripting in our society is a script of technological, therapeutic, consumer militarism that socializes us all, liberal and conservative.

4. That script (technological, therapeutic, consumer militarism) enacted through advertising and propaganda and ideology, especially on the liturgies of television, promises to make us safe and to make us happy.

5. That script has failed. That script of military consumerism cannot make us safe and it cannot make us happy. We may be the unhappiest society in the world.

6. Health for our society depends upon disengagement from and relinquishment of that script of military consumerism. This is a disengagement and relinquishment that we mostly resist and about which we are profoundly ambiguous.

7. It is the task of ministry to de-script that script among us. That is, too enable persons to relinquish a world that no longer exists and indeed never did exist.

8. The task of descripting, relinquishment and disengagement is accomplished by a steady, patient, intentional articulation of an alternative script that we say can make us happy and make us safe.

9. The alternative script is rooted in the Bible and is enacted through the tradition of the Church. It is an offer of a counter-narrative, counter to the script of technological, therapeutic, consumer militarism.

10. That alternative script has as its most distinctive feature, its key character – the God of the Bible whom we name as Father, Son, and Spirit.

11. That script is not monolithic, one dimensional or seamless. It is ragged and disjunctive and incoherent. Partly it is ragged and disjunctive and incoherent because it has been crafted over time by many committees. But it is also ragged and disjunctive and incoherent because the key character is elusive and irascible in freedom and in sovereignty and in hiddenness, and, I’m embarrassed to say, in violence – [a] huge problem for us.

12. The ragged, disjunctive, and incoherent quality of the counter-script to which we testify cannot be smoothed or made seamless. [I think the writer of Psalm 119 would probably like too try, to make it seamless]. Because when we do that the script gets flattened and domesticated. [This is my polemic against systematic theology]. The script gets flattened and domesticated and it becomes a weak echo of the dominant script of technological, consumer militarism. Whereas the dominant script of technological, consumer militarism is all about certitude, privilege, and entitlement this counter-script is not about certitude, privilege, and entitlement. Thus care must betaken to let this script be what it is, which entails letting God be God’s irascible self.

13. The ragged, disjunctive character of the counter-script to which we testify invites its adherents to quarrel among themselves – liberals and conservatives – in ways that detract from the main claims of the script and so too debilitate the focus of the script.

14. The entry point into the counter-script is baptism. Whereby we say in the old liturgies, “do you renounce the dominant script?”

15. The nurture, formation, and socialization into the counter-script with this elusive, irascible character is the work of ministry. We do that work of nurture, formation, and socialization by the practices of preaching, liturgy, education, social action, spirituality, and neighboring of all kinds.

16. Most of us are ambiguous about the script; those with whom we minister and I dare say, those of us who minister. Most of us are not at the deepest places wanting to choose between the dominant script and the counter-script. Most of us in the deep places are vacillating and mumbling in ambivalence.

17. This ambivalence between scripts is precisely the primary venue for the Spirit. So that ministry is to name and enhance the ambivalence that liberals and conservatives have in common that puts people in crisis and consequently that invokes resistance and hostility.

18. Ministry is to manage that ambivalence that is crucially present among liberals and conservatives in generative faithful ways in order to permit relinquishment of [the] old script and embrace of the new script.

19. The work of ministry is crucial and pivotal and indispensable in our society precisely because there is no one [see if that’s an overstatement]; there is no one except the church and the synagogue to name and evoke the ambivalence and too manage a way through it. I think often; I see the mundane day-to-day stuff ministers have to do and I think, my God, what would happen if you talk all the ministers out. The role of ministry then is as urgent as it is wondrous and difficult.

Christmas 2007

2008-01-08T12:01:00.000+11:00

This year my family decided to make Christmas presents instead of buying them. I think maybe it's one of the best ideas we've ever had. It meant that everyone had to think harder, both about what you're going to give and about the person you're giving it to. It meant you also had to put a lot of time and effort in instead of money, and a lot of yourself at the same time.

We did it Kris Kringle style, so each person had one person to make something for. I got my brother, and made him a wine rack. Admittedly I had some technical help from Chelsea (and the dog toy she plays with in the bath), but mostly did it myself.

And Jane got me. She made me this amazing painting, which is now hanging up in pride of place in our kitchen.

Persevering with faith

2008-01-08T11:37:00.001+11:00

Just sent this to a friend - an excerpt from a letter Thomas Merton wrote to Dorothy Day. I think it covers well why sometimes our wanting to control our experience of God, or have God meet our expectations, it doesn't work...why the more we struggle to control faith the less we actually get of it. Only Merton puts it much better than that.

Perseverance – yes, more and more one sees that it is the great thing. But there is a thing which must not be overlooked. Perseverance is not hanging on to some course which we have set our minds to, and refusing to let go. It is not even a matter of getting a bulldog grip on the faith and not letting the devil pry us loose from it – though many of the saints made it look that way. Really, there is something lacking in such a hope as that. Hope is a greater scandal than we think. I am coming to think that God (may He be praised in His great mystery) loves and helps best those who are so beat and have so much nothing when they come to die that it is almost as if they had persevered in nothing but had gradually lost everything, piece by piece, until there was nothing left but God. Hence, perseverance is not hanging on, but letting go. That of course is terrible. But as you say so rightly, it is a question of His hanging on to us, by the hair of the head, that is from on top and beyond, where we cannot see or reach. What man can see the top of his own head? If we reach it – this we can do – we stand a good chance of interfering with God’s grip (may He forgive us).

(On a lighter note, why is it that none of my emails to people contain such profound zingers as Merton's letters? 'Hope is a greater scandal than we think'? 'Perseverance is not hanging on, but letting go'? Yeesh. Maybe if I become a hermit my correspondence will improve.)

The cost of defending the indefensible

2007-12-19T11:35:00.000+11:00

Good article here - the last paragraph especially. Here's an excerpt:

Vietnam was the first war in which it cost $1 million to kill one enemy soldier.

Our alliance with the US is a pressure upon us to arm expensively and inappropriately. It is clear from what is occurring in Iraq that high-tech systems are ineffective when the enemy is elusive. We are also incompetent in the high-tech marketplace. We have submarines which after rebuilding still cannot do the job and we have obsolete navy helicopters purchased as state-of-the-art.

Without counting the surveillance and other aircraft on order, we are talking of spending $22 billion just on new fighter planes. That is enough money to save dozens of our dying country towns. We have lost many of our F111s in training crashes, and the new fighter planes cost about $US170 million apiece: should such high-tech wizardry be out of contention for a nation the size of Australia?

Fresh produce

2007-12-18T15:25:00.000+11:00

I've become quite the keen gardener. It's all Wendell's fault. Not really interested in flowers and such, I'd much prefer to grow something useful like fruit and vegetables, and so growing fruit and vegetables is exactly what I've been doing. So imagine my delight when my zucchini plant finally yielded results a couple of weeks back. Check this fine specimen out:

Impressive, no? What a marvellous piece of produce. All by the sweat of my brow. What a fine meal that zucchini will make.

But perhaps appearances can be deceiving. Scroll down for a more accurate picture.

Yep, it's miniature. Only about 4cm long, and not getting any longer. Needless to say not too many meals will be gleaned from it. Looks like it's going into the box marked "Simon's failed fruit and vegetable projects". Along with these carrots from a few years ago:

(Actually we're doing quite nicely out of my vegetable patch now, but the tiny zucchini did amuse me)

April 24

2007-12-11T20:53:00.000+11:00

Many of you will be aware that in June 2007, I was involved in disrupting Operation Talisman Sabre, a series of military exercises involving over 30,000 Australian and US troops. Along with four friends (Simon Reeves, Carole Powell, Sarah Williams, Krystal Spencer), I walked onto the Samuel Hill Air Base in the Shoalwater Bay Military Area in Queensland, to invite military personnel to trade in their war games for peace games. After spending an hour and a half with the troops, we were arrested and charged with trespassing (without lawful excuse) on Commonwealth land. More information about our action can be found at http://samuelhill5.blogspot.com/.

Those of you who have been following the (seemingly interminable) court processes will be relieved to know that today the four of us who pleaded not guilty received the date of our trial. We will front the Yeppoon Magistrates Court on April 24th 2008. Having already signed and submitted a formal admission of our presence on the base, we intend to argue that we had lawful excuse for doing so. While the chances of such an argument succeeding are slim, we plan to take the same spirit of transforming hopefulness, joy and peace into the courtroom that we took with us into the military zone.

If you're of the praying persuasion, please pray that the truth would be spoken and known on that day. Pray for boldness and courage, for peace and the presence of Christ in our words and actions.

For those who follow the church year, our trial date falls on the feast day of St Fidelis of Sigmaringen, who paid the ultimate price for refusing to renounce his beliefs (ironically, at the hands of my fellow Protestants). He died praying, as Jesus did, "Pardon my enemies, O Lord: blinded by passion they know not what they do." May we all, like Jesus, have the courage to renounce violence even when threatened, and learn to love and forgive our enemies.

Spare Change: my soundtrack to 2007

2007-12-11T15:58:00.000+11:00

(Spare change refers to the fact that most of these songs are from albums I picked up for under $3, but also the theme of a broader type of change, and how I've engaged with it more deeply this year. If you want a copy, email me your address.)

It’s been quite a year – visits from John Dear, Jarrod and Harry from Peace Tree, and Ciaron O’Reilly have inspired and moved me beyond talk of nonviolence to action. The central event of peace games in the midst of war games at Talisman Sabre continues to be a formative experience as we go through the court process into 2008. But most of all this year I’ve learnt to value my family and my mobs: Julie and the girls especially, but also inspiral, Urban Seed and Brunswick Baptist.

1. Something Beautiful – Sinead O’Connor
I picked this up for $3 at a primary school fete. It was an advanced copy of her new album Theology, in which she basically appropriates a bunch of Psalms and sings them out of her own experience. Now I’m not much one for worship songs, but this one captures it pretty much perfectly – not just the usual ‘divine ego-boosting’, but an acknowledgement of our own brokenness, and lament for the brokenness of the world, and the final cry of “Who’ll dress their wounds?” which becomes the exhortation to be “something beautiful”. It’s Sinead’s response to the events following 9/11 and you can’t help but hear the heartbreaking agony when she sings the outro.

I wanna make
Something beautiful
For you and from you
To show you
To show you
I adore you…

They dress the wounds of my poor people
As though they're nothing
Saying "peace, peace"
When there's no peace

And in their want
Who'll dress their wounds?…

2. The Tallest Man, the Broadest Shoulders Pt 1 – The Great Frontier Pt II: Come To Me With Only Playthings Now – Sufjan Stevens
I’d been hearing about Sufjan Stevens and Illinoise since 2005 when Thom Morgan was banging on about him, but I managed to hold out on hearing him until this year. The first time I heard this song was when I sat down on the plane to return to Yeppoon for our first court appearance, and I fell in love with it immediately. Partly because it’s unlike anything I’d heard before – the arrangements are so delightfully lush, and it’s more like soundtrack music than just your average pop song.

I count the days the Great Frontier
Forgiving, faced the seventh year
I stand in awe of gratefulness
I can and call forgetfulness

And when I, and when I call
The Patient, the Patient fall
The Spirit, the Carpenter
Invites us to be with her

3. The Hard Road (Restrung) – Hilltop Hoods with Adelaide Symphony Orchestra
When I take kids on an Urban Seed walk, we always finish up with a reflection on the time, with a slide show set to a groovy, contemporary (but relevant) song. For years, it’s been Joel Turner’s These Kids, until this year began and we all said that if we heard These Kids once more, we’d have to do something rather unpleasant to Joel Turner (and most of his Modern Day Poets). So we found another song. And now, after a whole year of it, I’d like to do something unpleasant to the Hilltop Hoods.

Bail me out, a failure out once again,
Next weekend, bail me out, drunk again,
And I never will forgive myself,
For putting you through all that hell,
I went from high school dropout to factory labourer,
Slave to the clock until four, went from sleeping on the floor,
To being out on tour, now no stopping me,
I’ll finish with a bang like Kurt Cobains biography.

Going down the hard road, down the hard road,
Don’t know where I’ve been, and don’t know where to go its like,
Going down the hard road, down the hard road,
Don’t know where I’ve been.

4. Cowboys – Counting Crows
This album’s not out until next year, but since they’ve delayed the release of the album for six months (and because I’ve listened to it enough this year), I reserve the right to release this song right about now. It’s a return to form for what has been my favourite band for many years now.

I’ll wait for you where Saturday’s a memory
And Sunday comes to gather me
Into the arms of God who’ll welcome me
Because I believe…Oh I believe…

And I know I could look at anyone but you now
I could fall into the eyes of anyone but you now
So come on, come on, come on, come on,
Come on through now…

This is a list of what I should have been but I’m not

5. Times Like These – Jack Johnson
The night before we went into the military base we stayed at a local’s house. His support of us was totally amazing, not just giving us a place to sleep, but feeding us too. And then, just because he somehow knew, he put on Jack Johnson. And now Jack Johnson will always be that moment in my mind of perfect hospitality and the way God sometimes makes her presence so clear when you most need it.

There will always be stop and go and fast and slow
And action reaction and sticks and stones and broken bones
Those for peace and those for war
And God bless these ones not those ones but these ones

Make times like these and times like those
What will be will be and so it goes

6. Close to Me – The Cure
Picked up the Cure’s best of album for just $2 at Savers, and it’s been on regular rotation. Close to Me got more airplay than most.

But if I had your faith
Then I could make it safe and clean
If only I was sure
That my head on the door was a dream

I've waited hours for this
I've made myself so sick
I wish I'd stayed asleep today
I never thought this day would end
I never thought tonight could ever be
This close to me

7. Eve of Destruction – Screaming Jets
A sensational cover of a Barry McGuire song written in 1965, this could just as easily have been written last week. Great protest song.

Think of all the hate there is in Red China
Then take a look around at your own backyard
You may leave here for four days in space
And when you return it's the same old place
They’re pounding out the drums, the fright and disgrace
You can bury your dead, but don't leave a trace
Hate your next-door-neighbor but don't forget to say your grace…

Tell me over and over and over again my friend
You don’t believe we’re on the eve of destruction

8. With My Hammer – Seize the Day
Following the trials and tribulations of the Pine Gap 4 was really inspiring for me, and lots of what was done early this year by the Christian Activist Network was supporting them. This song comes from the album put out to raise funds for their defence, and is itself an incredibly inspiring story about the four women who participated in the Seeds of Peace Ploughshares action, when they disabled an Indonesian warplane bound for East Timor.

With my hammer I break the chains
I will not remain in silence
I will stand and I will defend
My right to fight against violence
No prison can contain the freedom that we gain
When we move through fear

9. This Flight Tonight – Joni Mitchell
I spent a lot of time away from home this year, at least compared to usual. I swore I’d never get sick of flying, it’s too much fun, but there were some times this year when I was done with it. But this song is less about flying than it is about being away from home…from those people and places you love. There were definitely lots of times this year when I missed those I loved, especially because of the geographical distances between us. This is about sitting on the plane and thinking, “Turn this crazy bird around…I shouldn’t have got on this flight tonight…”

I’m drinking sweet champagne
Got the headphones up high
Can't numb you out
Can't drum you out of my mind
They’re playing goodbye baby, baby goodbye,
Ooh, ooh, love is blind

Starbright, starbright
You got the lovin' that I like, all right
Turn this crazy bird around
I shouldn’t have got on this flight tonight

10. Never Never Gonna Give You Up – Barry White
Picked up Barry White’s Best Of for 50 cents at a Salvos Op Shop, and it’s totally awesome. This is vintage Barry. Barry White always makes me think of my mate Anthony. Not for romantic reasons, just because when I first met Anthony at a nonviolence workshop, we were set the task of creating our ideal nonviolent community, and Anthony decided that in such a community, people would only listen to Barry White. I can see why. How can you fight with music like this?

Never, never gonna give you up
I'm never, ever gonna stop
Not the way I feel about you
Girl, I just can't live without you

I'm never ever gonna quit,
'Cause quittin' just ain't my schtick
I'm gonna stay right here with you
Do all the things you want me to

11. On This Side – Claire Bowditch
Last summer I’d been listening to a bit of Claire and was just loving how local it is. This is just a happy little tune about everyday joys. And that’s what I’ve learnt towards the end of this year – that running around furiously trying to save the world means nothing when you don’t have a healthy home life. I know that now.

It's a quiet night at home now,
Little miracles in bed
And a birdy on my windowsill,
That makes happy happen in my heard.
It's funny all the little things,
So boring to describe,
They taught my joy her roots,
And they brought my life alive.

12. Touch – Noiseworks
Corny? Heck yeah. Overearnest 80’s pop rock? You better believe it. Just let yourself go, get caught up in the soaring guitar riffs and you’ll feel it.

Another day is goin' out, yeah
A sea of faces cryin' out
With all we have today
You think we'd stop and take a look now, yeah
All I want to say
Is maybe that we should reach out

Everybody - reach out and reach out and
Reach out and touch somebody
Reach out and reach out and
Reach out and touch somebody

13. Dogs – Damien Rice
This year I decided I would make more intentional time to be alone, for my sanity. One Monday (my day off) in January I went to a park over in Northcote and laid down in the shade of a tree for an hour and just listened to music. There were certain points when I was listening to this song where it was pure bliss; you’re lost in the feelings the music evokes in you, and it’s nothing but delight.

She lives with an orange tree
The girl that does yoga
She picks the dead ones from the ground
When we come over

And she gives, I get without giving anything to me
Like a morning sun
Like a morning
Like a morning sun
Good good morning sun

14. Impossible – Screaming Jets
My song of the year. Screaming Jets were one of the big bands of my youth, but I somehow missed their strong social conscience. It’s been a theme song the whole year, getting more deeply involved in activism, often against what seems like overwhelming odds. But this song brings home to me that it’s not just about “winning”, it’s actually about the kind of person I want to be. Maybe the end result sometimes feels impossible…but I’m gonna die trying.

You can’t do much about whats gonna happen today
And you can’t do much about yesterday
You can’t say much against some angry individual
You can’t say much against the majority.

Well ain’t it like being impossible
But there ain’t no harm in trying
And I say hell man
Ain’t this like being impossible.
But I'm gonna die tryin’.

"it's not difficult to be magical. do try to keep up!"

2007-12-04T16:35:00.000+11:00

Totally amazing article in today's Age about children...read it and devour it. By Barry Dickins, a playwright.

NOT long ago I was in the merry midst of very contented infants for whom I was the guest poet. Children know poetry is for them.

Sometimes I think that's all they know; but of course their wisdom is endless because they swear allegiance to Joy.

Happiness they are good at. Grief they respect. Death they write about.

The children I was with were preps at Saint John's Catholic Primary School, in Clifton Hill. How old are preps? How old is Joy?

I have no idea why they were so carefree that first morning when I started to write verses with them; it was a pretty nice day and two women teachers sat in with us.

The birds whistled to each other and I politely inquired of a pretty little girl of four or so, what she was up to?

It wasn't quite nine in the morning, and we were all sitting on the floor.

"Well," she replied casually, shielding her eyes from the sun in the bright window panes. "At 4½ you are not up to that much."

Another child, so small I nearly trod on him, looked up innocently and said: "I had no idea you were this old."

Well, I am.

We commenced to compose cartoons and draw eagles and cypress trees, that sort of thing.

One boy wept in a perfect fury because he couldn't sharpen his grey lead pencil.

These emotions are understandable in a world filled with frustrations and anguishes.

He sobbed so much his drawing paper submerged beneath his sorrows.

Later we were talking, still on the floor, where it's always best to talk because there are no levels of importance, about drugs and overdoses, for they know everything, children.

A particular North Melbourne AFL footballer had turned up drunk to train at Arden Street Oval, and the media had swooped on him — called him moronic, in fact.

"I think that his mummy should have hugged him a lot more," smiled a young pupil, resting her chin on her fingertips in the most nonchalant way imaginable.

"If she had actually hugged him more he might have been late for training; but he wouldn't have been able to do wrong."

We drew an elephant.

Lately the commentators have been writing most hatefully about the footballer Ben Cousins, calling him everything, including a drug addict and drunkard. They won't be happy until he is dead, I think; then they'll say he is tragically misunderstood.

But kids see all things differently. A tree can look like flames to them.

I asked a child last week at a school what she thought of Ben Cousins. She said she didn't think of him.

I know the reason I work so often in schools is to be taught by children.

They're the future and they trust surrealism. They're interesting. And exuberant.

Just for once it would be terrific if children called the shots, and not the experts, who aren't funny.

Children's molecular structure is comic and indestructible and they know it.

And they are not afraid to draw cancer or write about the end of the world either. Adults are often the end of it.

Each year I work at the Benalla Regional Art Gallery. They employ me to listen.

I listen to the local artists and that includes kids who draw and paint and write poems.

I then do some drawings myself and include snippets of conversations I've been involved in. It's fun. It's beautiful. So free.

Last year I met a tiny girl of three named Maeve. She was putting the final touches on an incredible sort of cabinet that was half-drawn with coloured crayons, yet some of the tiny drawers in it undid and pulled out; it was definitely magical.

I asked the child how she did it, and she grinned at me and said in a whisper, "It's not that difficult to be magical. Do try to keep up!"

I've never forgotten she said that.

Children are a better world. That is all I understand of this bewildering phase of our battered old planet.

They redeem everything that is debauched.

They are rather like perpetual flowers, children, incapable of poison.

Fruitful Conversations

2007-11-25T13:41:00.000+11:00

Let me recommend Harry's new blog to you. Harry hails from the Peace Tree community in Perth, and there's a lot to like about him and his thinking.

He's a bit of a church history geek (like me, but much more hardcore) but has a mind like a steel trap and articulates like...someone who...someone who articulates stuff...really really well.

Chelsea teacher

2007-11-17T21:50:00.000+11:00

Scene: Our front garden; me weeding, Chelsea (3 and a half) watering random things (some of them plants).

Chelsea (pointing to a rose bush): That plant's dead.
(I look around for the dead plant that she's pointing at, and only see the rose bush, which is most definitely alive and healthy. Then I see what she's pointing at; a flower that's well past its prime, drooping and browned off around the edges.)
Me: Oh, right...yes. That flower is a bit brown and yucky isn't it?
Chelsea: It's still beautiful though.
(at which point I'm thinking Heck no, it's awful...but then I think, why do I think it's awful? Because it's no longer what society would recognise as a useful gift? Why isn't a dying rose considered as beautiful as a budding rose? If she can see beauty, who am I to tell her not to? I look at her, appreciating the insight she's just taught me.)
Me: Maybe you're right Chelsea. You're much smarter than me.
(then...wait for it...)
Chelsea: Not smarter. Just a different kind of smart.
(At this point I'm totally astounded. I can't help being gobsmacked by the incredible wisdom of that remark, so much so that I stop what I'm doing and look straight at her. She can see beauty in a dead or dying rose; I can do logic. And she's articulated that perfectly. But then she follows it up with an even more profound insight.)
Chelsea: Sometimes we don't like the things that we see. But the things are still beautiful.

Not preachy. Not self-righteous. Just the matter-of-factness of a child.

I think that may just be my quote of the year.

inessential weirdnesses

2007-11-07T16:26:00.000+11:00

An excellent article unpacking some of the excesses and dangers of professional middle class activism...well worth recognising some of the ways we can unconsciously exclude due to our own cultures, especially our "inessential weirdnesses".

"For professional-middle-class progressive activists like myself, it's easy to understand why working-class people would be alienated by the mainstream culture of well-off people. After all, we tend to be alienated by it ourselves, because it represents values we've rejected, like greed and materialism. But the idea that working-class people would have any negative reactions to our own subculture, in particular our values-based "alternative" norms, tends not to occur to us."

More here.

Wendellsdays

2007-11-07T13:49:00.000+11:00

A Wendell Berry quote for every Wednesday...well, if I remember that is.

“We have lived by the assumption that what was good for us would be good for the world. And this has been based on the even flimsier assumption that we could know with any certainty what was good even for us...

We have been wrong. We must change our lives, so that it will be possible to live by the contrary assumption that what is good for the world will be good for us. And that requires that we make the effort to know the world and to learn what is good for it. We must learn to cooperate in its processes, and to yield to its limits. But even more important, we must learn to acknowledge that the creation is full of mystery; we will never entirely understand it. We must abandon arrogance and stand in awe. We must recover the sense of the majesty of creation, and the ability to be worshipful in its presence. For I do not doubt that it is only on the condition of humility and reverence for the world that our species will be able to remain on it.” – Wendell Berry, A Native Hill.

Blessed Franz Jaegerstatter

2007-11-06T09:13:00.000+11:00

When I greeted Julie the other day with my hands raised triumphantly in the air, and declaring, "Franz Jaegerstatter! Beatified!" she replied, "I have no idea what you just said." Nonetheless, my excitement over this occasion is unabated. Here is John Dear's article on the beatification of Jaegerstatter:

Blessed Franz Jagerstatter

BY JOHN DEAR

There were many consoling, inspiring, uplifting moments last Friday, October 26th, 2007, in Linz, Austria at the beatification of the anti-war hero Franz Jagerstatter. The resounding applause for his 94 year-old widow Franziska. The reading of the declaration. The unfurling of the 30 foot banner with Franz’s photo and the sight of dozens of bishops and cardinals standing up, looking up--at last!--to Franz. But the most moving was the presentation of his relics. Franziska kissed them, gave them to a cardinal for the Cathedral in Linz, then wept. She knows it now. Franz no longer belongs to Austria. Now he belongs to the world. And his work is just beginning.

This celebration, for me, was one of the best events in the institutional church in recent decades, and one of its most political, daring and hopeful. If the institutional church now says Franz was right, then Ratzinger was wrong, nearly all the Catholics of Austria and Germany were wrong, and the church has the potential to wake up and return to the Gospel nonviolence of its ancient history. Franz he is still a force of controversy throughout Austria, but he is the closest saint in recent centuries to resemble those daring, early Christians. This is exactly what we need: saints who inspire us to follow the nonviolent Jesus, say No to war, resist the culture of war, speak out for peace, work for justice, and combine the full mystical and political dimensions of faith.

The witness of Franz Jagerstatter has been at the heart of my own journey My grandmother gave me a booklet about Franz while I was at Duke University, trying to decide what to do with my life. I was stunned by this story of a young father, husband, and farmer, born on May 20, 1907, who was called into active service by the Nazis in February, 1943, politely refused, was imprisoned in Linz, condemned to death for “undermining military morale,” and beheaded on August 9, 1943. His witness encouraged me to become a Jesuit and an advocate for peace, justice and nonviolence. “Consider two things: from where, to where,” Franz wrote his godson from prison, just a few weeks before his execution. “Then your life will have its true meaning.” I’ve been trying to take his good advice.

In 1985, I read Gordon Zahn’s ground-breaking biography, “In Solitary Witness,” while living in a refugee camp in El Salvador. In the 1990s, I made a pilgrimage to St. Radegund to pray at Franz’ grave and visit Franziska and the Jagerstatters. It was a joy and a blessing to embrace her and her family last week. (We also learned that my friend Gordon, who has suffered for years with Alzheimer’s, just entered a hospice program and may be approaching his last days.)

On the night before the celebration, nearly a hundred Pax Christi members from Austria, England and the U.S. gathered for a meal and reflections on Franz’s life. The two hour Mass on Friday morning was broadcast live on national TV in Austria and Germany. Afterwards, our Pax Christi contingent processed through the streets of Linz, stopping first at the Bishops’ house where Franz went for counsel only to be told to fight for Hitler. (It was there, Franziska says, that he emerged from the building feeling very sad and said, “They don’t dare themselves, or it’ll be their turn next.”) Then we stood in the courtyard of the building which the Nazis turned into a prison, where he was held a few months before being transferred to Berlin. (His cell, on the second floor overlooking the courtyard, is now a business office.) Then we crossed the Danube, took a tram up the mountain to a church overlooking the city and the Alps, and enjoyed a special lunch. Later, many attended the new opera written about Franz, and celebrated a feast in honor of Franz and Franziska hosted by the Governor. A holy day to remember!

Throughout the pilgrimage, I reflected on the famous dream Franz had, which pushed him to say No to war. In 1938, he dreamt of a beautiful train and huge crowds rushing to board it. Then he heard a voice saying, “This train is going to hell!” Next he saw a vision of many people suffering. He awoke terrified and told Franziska, then later wrote about it from prison. The dream, he wrote, was about Nazi patriotism, idolatry and warmaking.

But I wonder if his nightmare was about all patriotism, idolatry and warmaking, our global rush to violence, killing, war and nuclear weapons. His dream describes our quiet, steady support for American imperialism, military domination, war on Iraq and Afghanistan, corporate greed, environmental destruction, and ignoring the cry of the world’s poor. Franz wrote fiercely about the loss of our soul. We are losing our souls and we don’t know it, he said. “I would like to call out to everyone who is riding in this train: ‘Jump out before this train reaches its destination, even if it costs you your life!’”

That is what many of us are saying. Like Franz, we’re trying not to get on the train to hell, even though crowds rush to board it, and we’re crying out, “Don’t get on this train. Don’t support the culture of war. Don’t make nuclear weapons at Los Alamos. Don’t spend your life becoming rich while 900 million starve. Don’t worship the flag of empire. Become a conscientious objector, a nonviolent resister, a public peacemaker, a Christian.”

But what astonishes me most is that Franz didn’t just reason his way to oppose an unjust war (which is what most good people conclude about him: he realized that Nazi warfare was unjust, so he refused to fight, and did the right thing.) I believe Franz went much farther. With Franziska, he climbed the heights of faith, the kind that moves mountains. “He prayed all day long,” one of his cellmates testified. He received daily communion, gave to those in need, spoke out as necessary, tried to teach his priests and bishops, prepared for death and tried to do all things for the honor of God. He became a person of deep mystical prayer, and made the connection between Gospel politics and Gospel spirituality. By the time of his death, I submit, Franz understood that to follow the nonviolent Jesus and give one’s entire life to God meant that you could never kill, support war, or compromise with evil.

“Just as those who believe in Nazism tell themselves that their struggle is for survival,” he wrote from prison, “so must we, too, convince ourselves that our struggle is for the eternal Kingdom. But with this difference: we need no rifles or pistols for our battle but, instead, spiritual weapons…Let us love our enemies, bless those who curse us, pray for those who persecute us. For love will conquer and will endure for all eternity. And happy are they who live and die in God’s love.”

On the morning of his death, Father Albert Jochmann, the pastor of Brandenburg, visited Franz in his cell, brought him communion and heard his confession. He also offered a Bible. “I am completely united with God and any reading would disrupt my union with God,” Franz said to the priest’s amazement. That day, he wrote to Franziska in his last letter, “The heart of Jesus, the heart of Mary and my heart are one, united for time and eternity.”

Who dares say such a thing? The recent collection of letters by Mother Teresa, which I read on the plane to Austria, testify clearly that she never felt such union with God. Few do. Franz did. It was the natural culmination of his steadfast, wholehearted pursuit of God and God’s reign of peace, which required both nonviolent resistance to idolatry, empire and war, and full-time devotion to prayer, worship and nonviolent love. As the world’s violence worsens, I think Franz will emerge as one of history’s greatest saints.

Franz never gave up on the church, even though every single priest, pastor, chaplain and bishop he knew advised him to fight for the Nazis, for the sake of his wife and children. He held his ground, felt sad, and prayed for them. On the day of his execution, Father Jochmann told Franz about an Austrian priest, Fr. Franz Reinisch, who had recently been executed for refusing to fight. This report consoled Franz a great deal. (Now we know that some 4,000 priests were killed by the Nazis.) Like Franz, we have to reach out and convert every priest, pastor, bishop and cardinal who supports war, nuclear weapons, and patriotic imperialism to the Gospel wisdom of active love, nonviolent resistance and steadfast peacemaking.

Because Franz Jagerstatter broke new ground, we do not have to do this work alone. Yes, we may be harassed, even arrested and imprisoned, but unlike Franz, we will not be alone. We can join and form communities of peace and justice to help each other take a stand for peace, support one another, and speak out in one voice against our nation’s wars and injustices. Together, we can build movements to say our No to the School of the Americas, the U.S. war on Iraq, bombing Iran, and building nuclear weapons at Los Alamos, and like Franz, help one another plumb the mystical depths of Gospel nonviolence until we, too, are completely united with Jesus, Mary and the God of peace.

“We must do everything in our power to strive toward the Eternal Homeland and to preserve a good conscience,” Franz wrote from prison. “Though we must bear our daily sorrows and reap little reward in this world for doing so, we can still become richer than millionaires--for those who need not fear death are the richest and happiest of all. And these riches are there for the asking.” “There have always been heroes and martyrs who gave their lives for Christ and their faith. If we hope to reach our goal some day, then we, too, must become heroes of the faith.”

“If one harbors no thought of vengeance against others and can forgive everyone,” he wrote, “he will be at peace in his heart--and what is there in all this world more lovely than peace? Let us pray to God that a real and lasting peace may soon descend upon this world.”

“The crucial lesson to be learned,” Gordon Zahn declared, “is that, however hopeless the situation or seemingly futile the effort, the Christian need not despair. Instead he can and should be prepared to accept and assert moral responsibility for his actions. It is always possible, as Jagerstatter wrote, to save one’s own soul and perhaps some others as well by bearing individual witness against evil.”

“Through his bitter suffering and death,” Franz wrote, “Christ freed us only from eternal death, not from temporal suffering and mortal death. But Christ, too, demands a public confession of our faith, just as the Fuhrer, Adolf Hitler, does from his followers. The commandments of God teach us, of course, that we must render obedience to secular rulers. But only to the extent that they do not order us to do anything evil, for we must obey God rather than men.”

“A prophet with a global view and a penetrating insight.” “A shining example in his fidelity to the claims of his conscience.” “An advocate of nonviolence and peace, a voice of warning against ideologies, a deep-believing person for whom God really was the core and center of life.” This is how the Bishop of Linz described our blessed Franz last week.

Let’s hope and pray for more saints, prophets and martyrs like Franz, and try our best to emulate him.

Wendell Berry is a freakin' genius...

2007-10-30T16:28:00.000+11:00

That is all.

Naivety

2007-10-24T23:05:00.000+10:00

Chelsea, Ella and I were standing outside Savers on Sydney Road last Saturday when a guy walked - or rather, hobbled - past us. He had a big bushy beard, wild hair and was wearing a filthy khaki shirt and pants. Tied to his leg with two strips of black cloth was a broom handle - a makeshift splint, presumably. He looked decidedly uncomfortable as he lurched awkwardly along the pavement.

After he was a suitable distance away, Chelsea (3 1/2) said, "That man was funny!" I was a bit unsure of how to respond. "Yeah," I said. "He had a stick tied to his leg!"

"No!" she laughed, amused by my naivety. "He wasn't wearing any shoes!"

to vote or not to vote?

2007-10-24T11:36:00.000+10:00

I just wanted to plug a fascinating, exciting conversation that's going on at the Christian Activist Network e-list about the virtues and vices of voting and not voting (or ultimately, what does discipleship look like in the context of our political system?). Rather than rehashing the entire thing over here, I'll just suggest that anyone who is interested in following the conversation, or in being involved in it, subscribe to the e-list (go to http://www.freewebs.com/christianactivistnetwork and click on the Yahoo groups link). But here are a few tasters:

* "Surely the best way to get a better deal for the poor and the oppressed in Australian society is to have people in government whose policies are inclined to favour the poor and oppressed? If those who are on the side of the poor and oppressed don't vote, then politicians with policies that favour those who already have many things will be elected and working for the poor and oppressed will be that much harder."

* "Vote if you want to, for what its worth, but don't get sucked into the myth that you are doing anything very political. Not voting, on the other hand, can be quite political in a country with compulsory voting."

* "Ultimately this [voting] is similiar to the Empires compulsion to burn incense to Caesar. The burning of incense to Caesar was the acknowledgment of Caesars power, and diety. In a compulsory election, you are being forced to take part in a process that hands the authority,
and power to others to take human life, to imprison people, and to continue to see the oppression of others by state decree. By participating you are complicit in the handing over of power over others, to individuals."

* "It's a measure of how much stock we put in the world's power and methods that we're not willing to trust that God will make it come out alright, and that it won't often look like we expect... And that's really the bottom line for me...do we trust in the way the world works
or the way God works in Jesus? Even when it looks ineffective by the world's standards? So I say vote or don't vote if that's what your community has discerned faithfulness to God to be, not because of a perceived outcome."

Also, anyone interested in faith-based refusal to vote can attend a planning meeting tomorrow night (Thursday 25th) at 8pm at the Den (116 Little Bourke Street, Melbourne).

Why?

2007-10-23T23:07:00.001+10:00

The latest in kids' fashion...

2007-10-23T23:05:00.003+10:00

That's right! Rush right in and get your kids some KILLTEC! They're what kids everywhere are dying for...

just another day in brunswick

2007-10-23T13:42:00.000+10:00

Julie, the kids and I were sitting in the study the other day when we happened to look out the window at an elderly Italian gentleman leaning on our front fence. There's nothing unusual about this: we frequently have elderly Italian gentlemen leaning on our front fence, because it's not too far from the shops, but far enough away to take a break if you're elderly, and presumably they've leaned on several other fences on the way, and I'm glad our fence can provide this hospitable service. As we watched him, he casually leaned over the fence and broke off a flower from one of the several rose bushes in our front yard. Again, nothing particularly unusual; people do that from time to time, and since we have plenty of them, it doesn't bother me.

But what happened next was definitely unusual. Rather than smelling the flower, or stashing it in his pocket, or engaging in any other manner of flower appreciation, he put the stem between his thumb and forefinger and rubbing it up and down proceeded to denude the entire stem of foliage. Every leaf and thorn was removed, including the flower. Then, with the stem all that remained, he bit into it and began to chew. Casually, like it was a licorice stick or some other snack he enjoyed from time to time. When he'd finished that mouthful, he had another.

Now I don't know if rose stems have some kind of curative properties; I'm no botanist or plant expert of any kind, but I confess I was somewhat dumbfounded and mystified. Anyone have an explanation for this? Has anyone tried rose stems as a snack?

The land of the free...

2007-10-18T17:24:00.000+10:00

Seriously America...hang your head in shame.

October 17, 2007 -- Pace e Bene co-founder Fr. Louie Vitale, O.F.M. and Fr. Steve Kelly, S.J. were sentenced today by Magistrate Hector Estrada to five months in federal prison for nonviolent action they took at Ft. Huachuca, Arizona, a facility where Army training in torture techniques is carried out.

They began their sentences immediately.

Major General Antonio M. Tacuba, who served in Iraq and wrote a report critical of torture carried out at Abu Ghirab prison, phoned the Franciscan and Jesuit priests the night before to convey his support and to express his belief that "history will honor your actions." Their lawyer, Bill Quigley, shared General Tacuba's words of support with the court.

The judge, who confessed that the case had put him in "an uncomfortable position," meted out to both men three months in prison for trespass and two months for disobeying an office. They will be incarcerated at a federal prison in Florence, Arizona.

Before the sentencing, Vitale and Kelly read a statement to the 50 people who had gathered to support them. As part of their declaration, they said: "We will keep trying to stop the teaching and practice of torture whether we are sent to jail or out. We have done our part. Now it is up to every woman and man of conscience to do their part to stop the injustice of torture."

We pray for Louie and Steve -- and invite people everywhere to follow their conscience in resisting violence and in building a culture of nonviolent options.

Challenging the Politics of Fear

2007-10-18T14:52:00.000+10:00

Below is the text of a talk I gave at the recent Pax Christi event "Australia's Security and the New Nuclear Threat", complete with bad jokes and shameless self promotion.

I’d like to begin by acknowledging the traditional custodians of the land on which we meet tonight, the Wurundjeri people, and acknowledge the way in which they have been victims of the politics of fear.

Speaking of the politics of fear, as people about to be subjected to a monologue by a Baptist preacher you have every reason to be quaking in your boots. But in a demonstration that even irrational hope can win over fear, this Baptist preacher has been given 20 minutes maximum. I don’t know if that’s brave or hopeful or just naïve. At least it should calm some of your fears.

I want to talk with you this evening about how we might begin to challenge the politics of fear. I’m pretty sure we’re all reasonably familiar with this idea of the politics of fear. It’s a tool that has always been used by governments and those in authority to keep a population under control, as famously observed by the Nazi Reichsmarshall and Chief of the Luftwaffe Hermann Goering in the Nuremburg trials, “The people can always be brought to the bidding of their leaders. All you have to tell them is that they are being attacked and denounce the peacemakers for lack of patriotism and exposing the country to danger. It works the same in any country.” As we have seen here, whether it’s the children overboard, or Iraq’s weapons of mass destruction, the war on terrorism, or more recently Sudanese refugees, it really does work the same in any country. When people are kept in a constant state of fear, no matter how much they are told to be alert not alarmed, they are much more susceptible to control, to unquestioning obedience, and to maintaining the status quo.

But I think we need to acknowledge that it’s not just conservative governments who use fear to keep populations under control, the left uses fear as much as right does – global warming, nuclear power, even dare I say it here nuclear weapons. There’s no denying there’s much to be afraid of, but it’s worth acknowledging that the left is not immune to using the politics of fear, they’re just different fears with different outcomes. Whereas the right tends to use fear to enforce the status quo, the left tends to use fear to undermine the status quo. Both methods, dare I say it, are mirrors of and reactions to each other, a transferral of the same types of destructive dynamics. Don’t get me wrong, sometimes the ends of both are, in fact, quite legitimate, but if the means by which these ends are achieved is fear, I believe it’s illegitimate regardless of your motive.

What I want to propose is that not only must we transcend these categories of left and right, but we must transcend fear as a way of motivating people, whether that motivation is designed to sedate or inflame. Gandhi had this idea that means are like the ends in seed form; so in the same way that if you plant an acorn you have to expect an oak tree, if you use fear you have to expect a world of fear. So a world without fear will require different means.

So what I want to suggest is that one of the best ways that we can begin to challenge the politics of fear is to refuse to cooperate with it at all. That is, we must refuse to allow it to control our lives and our decisions, but also that we must refuse to use it ourselves to control others’ lives and decisions. I agree with Thoreau who said, “If you want to convince someone that they are wrong, do right. But don’t try to convince them. People believe what they see.”

Of course refusal to cooperate with fear is not without risks – indeed, the very basis of fear is usually the idea that something we have is under threat. Whether it’s our freedom, or our possessions, or someone we hold dear, we are indeed a people with much to lose, particularly in the West. But if we only fear losing that which we hold on to, then perhaps letting go of all we do not need is the key to freedom. As Aung San Suu Kyi has famously said, “The only real prison is fear, and the only real freedom is freedom from fear.”

At the heart of Christianity is this idea of the costliness of this freedom – we talk of following Jesus, often somehow conveniently forgetting that Jesus’ resistance to empire and fear led to his crucifixion. The very central motif of Christianity is the cross, the idea that one must lose one’s life in order to save it. So bearing the costs of our resistance should not be alien to the Christian life. I’m involved with a group of Christians who for some time now have been exploring the power of nonviolent resistance to empire, and beginning to recognise the costs associated with that.

We have been greatly concerned for some time about Australia’s increasing reliance on violent military strategies to engage international conflicts rather than nonviolent ones. In June this year 20,000 US troops joined with 12,000 Australian troops in a series of military exercises called Operation Talisman Sabre. It takes place in a pristine wilderness area called Shoalwater Bay, which is about 80 kilometres north of Rockhampton on the central Queensland coast. Talisman Sabre involves live fire exercises which includes bombing and the use of active sonar, which has a devastating effect on the marine life and the Great Barrier Reef. They were practicing, amongst other things, offensive invasion tactics.

And so five of us began our resistance, our challenge to the politics of fear. As part of a wider peace convergence, we headed north to demonstrate that another world is possible. We wanted not merely oppose them, but do so in such a way that our very actions would point the way to a better alternative – in the words of Gandhi, literally be the change we wanted to see in the world. We knew that if the military had any reason to believe that there were civilians in the training area, they would have to stop the exercises, so the best thing for us to do would be to gain access to the restricted military zone and make our presence known.

Inspired by the prophet Isaiah’s vision of a day when people will “train for war no more”, we wanted to see the base transformed from somewhere where war games were played to somewhere peace games were played. And so we brought a frisbee with us. It was a ridiculous gesture, in many ways; walking into the middle of thousands of troops engaged in war games, asking them to stop in order to play frisbee and talk about nonviolence with five Christian peace activists.

We entered the Shoalwater Bay Military facility armed only with a peace flag, a frisbee, and two letters for the generals explaining why we were there. After three hours of walking through the bush, we found the main air force base where the generals commanded their troops and began to walk up the middle of the landing strip, where we could be seen easily, to invite the soldiers to talk. When we found them, we told them we were peaceful, unarmed people, that we wanted them to stop their war games and play peace games instead. Expecting to be told at gunpoint to lie down on the tarmac, we were rather surprised when they agreed not only to talk with us, but to play frisbee as well. At that point they shut down the base, and miraculously we got our wish – for more than an hour and a half we saw the base transformed from a place where people trained to kill those they disagreed with, to a place where people talked respectfully with those they disagreed with. From a place where missiles, bombs and bullets cut through the air to a place where frisbees glided gracefully through the air. When it started raining we were invited into the hangar area where we were given food and drink and talked with the soldiers for about an hour and a half about violence, nonviolence, Iraq, and US foreign policy. Shortly thereafter Queensland police arrived, arrested us and charged us with trespassing on Commonwealth land. Our trial is likely to be around March next year.

For us, this act of noncooperation with fear was deeply empowering. One, we were not cooperating with a system that says you need a violent military in order to be safe. We believe that violence only breeds fear, only nonviolence can breed love and peace. Secondly, we were not cooperating with a system that says do not challenge the status quo. The fences and signs around military bases and threats of legal action are all designed to frighten the average citizen into silence. By refusing to have our resistance dictated by those barriers, we demonstrated in a very small and humble way that it is possible. And thirdly, we were and are continuing to challenge a system that says if you do challenge the status quo, we will unleash sanctions on you that will make you think twice about challenging it again. The whole legal system is designed to intimidate and control you. When we were arrested we were thrown in a large police truck that is designed to cause sensory deprivation – metal walls, and no windows. In the watchhouse there is a total lack of privacy down to the toilet facilities. But the whole time we maintained our joyful attitude. As we sat there making jokes, singing and telling stories one of the policeman said to us, “You guys are enjoying this way too much.” When the system designed to intimidate does not intimidate, it loses its power.

I’m aware that many people think these kinds of acts are strange, but I don’t think they are. Not doing anything is strange. Failing to resist, accepting the way things are, that’s what is strange. Allowing the government to spend $55 million dollars a day on military machinery we don’t use while our own people go hungry and homeless for lack of resources – that is strange. Putting the needs of the economy before the needs of people and the earth on which all of our lives depend, that’s strange. We need to redefine normal back to what is proper for human life and society instead of the economy.

And I think that’s exactly what is at stake here, our very imaginations. Instead of seeing a world that is catastrophically irredeemable, we need to see a world that is pregnant with possibility, ripe for change.

Like I said earlier, that’s not to say that there aren’t costs involved. But if we’re prepared to send our brothers and sisters, mothers and fathers, sons and daughters off to fight war, how much more ought we be prepared for peace to cost us? And if we are not prepared for it to cost us anything, why are we surprised there is no peace?

The words of Trappist monk and nonviolence hero Thomas Merton have become one of my mantras, “If this task of building a peaceful world is the most important task of our time, it is also the most difficult. It will, in fact, require far more discipline, more sacrifice, more planning, more thought, more co-operation and more heroism than war ever demanded.”

And so with Christian peacemaker teams I want to ask you what it might be like if people committed the same resources to nonviolent peacemaking that armies devote to war?

It is this kind of imagination, and willingness to pay the cost that will characterise any effective challenge to the politics of fear. It’s a challenge I would invite anyone to take up.

Meryl and Lee's wedding

2007-10-17T14:55:00.000+10:00

Well it was quite a wonderful day, though definitely emotionally intense for all concerned. I include here the text of the little spiel I gave, in case anyone's vaguely interested.

Well it’s been quite a journey for both of you to get here. It’s always a bit nervewracking for couples on their wedding day, not knowing what to expect, so Lee you’ll be relieved that Meryl hasn’t gotten on any flights today, and no doubt Meryl you’re relieved that Lee isn’t taking shorthand on the proceedings for Monday’s MX.

But I want to share with you a quote that sums up what I would wish for you both on this day, a quote by a woman by the name of Edith Wilson. I have no idea who she is but what she says here is gold. “Marriage is not a lifelong attraction of two individuals to each other, but a call for two people to witness together to God’s love. The basis of marriage is not mutual affection, or feelings, or emotions and passions that we associate with love, but a vocation, a being elected to build together a house for God in this world.”

A vocation to build together a house for God in this world. What on earth might that mean? Are we talking about building a temple? A church? An ark? A three bedroom brick veneer? Well our traditional idea of marriage is very much as Edith Wilson describes; a lifelong attraction of two individuals, based on mutual affection, feelings, emotions and passions.

The problem with this view is not that it’s entirely wrong, but that it’s incomplete, it’s too small. Because let’s face it, if this is the God of the universe that is doing the calling, then the vision must be for something larger than just you two. If marriage is a vocation to build a house for God in this world, then it’s too small a vision to say it’s just about your love and affection for each other. Besides, any marriage that is built solely on affection, or feelings, is unlikely to last, regardless of what Hollywood will tell you, because feelings change, often several times in a day.

And so this quote refers to marriage as a vocation. The word comes from the Latin word vox, or voice, and vocare, meaning to call. Vocation, then, is not something that happens merely inside yourself, but is a call from outside of you. In the case of marriage we’re talking about a religious vocation, in the same sense as monks and nuns have a vocation (only without the celibacy thing). Marriage is two people who have been called together by God to demonstrate in a particular way what the love of God looks like in the world – to literally be the image of God’s love for others.

Because the God who calls us to love is Herself, love – not the kind of love depicted in a quirky romantic comedy, or the romance in the climax of a fairy tale or even a steamy sex scene. The love we see lived out in Jesus is an unconditional acting in the best interests of the other, a costly love that gives of itself seeking nothing in return. This is an active, creative, transforming love that does not allow suffering or injustice to go unchallenged, a love that looks outwards welcoming all people, especially those who think they’re not worthy, and a love that heals and reconciles brokenness of all kinds.

So your wedding today is not just about you. If marriage is a vocation to build a house for God in this world then marriage is not about you two sheltering each other against the world, it’s about you two working together for the good of the world. It’s about you two mirroring what God is like, and in so doing beginning the work of redeeming the world around you.

Nonviolence calendar

2007-10-12T13:27:00.000+10:00

David Johnson, Quaker and peace activist, has spent a couple of years now compiling a nonviolence calendar. For every day of the year, he has found a story of nonviolence that happened on that particular day. With priority going to lesser known stories (there are many of them that we don't hear about very often! particularly involving women and minorities to whom the recording of history has often been unkind) he has managed to fill all but two days of the year. Each entry has a summary and then the extended story.

November will be available on the Quaker website this November, with the entire thing due out in 2008, but I thought I'd just give a taster he just passed on to me. This is an amazing resource, and I encourage you to seek it out when it is released in its entirety next year.

11th October
Thomas Lurting 1632-1713 British naval sailor turned Quaker returns pirates to their homeland Oct 1663.
Thomas Lurting (1632-1713) was pressed into naval service in 1646 aged 14, and fought as a gunner and boatswain. After contact with Quakers on board he (probably 1654) sighted his gun against the enemy, when "the word of the Lord ran through me - what if I had killed a man?". From that moment he refused to fight. In Oct 1663, ten pirates boarded a merchant ship he was on, and Lurting persuaded the captain and crew not to attack them, and eventually to return them unharmed to their homeland Algiers. His nonviolent response encouraged the pirates to be nonviolent, and they parted the Algiers shoreline as friends. Returning to London a celebrity, Lurting told King Charles II "That I thought it better for them to be in their own Country".

12th October
Elizabeth Fry 1780-1845 Quaker prison and social reformer
Elizabeth Fry (21/5/1780-13/10/1845) was born into a Quaker family, and though a socially active and light-headed in her youth was transformed into a compassionate and tireless worker for the poor and the imprisoned. Initially she found herself fearful and uncertain what to do, but as she followed her leading she was given confidence and courage. Her gift was to bring light and love to all situations. She mixed inspired compassion with hard work and commonsense to became a leading advocate of prison reform, starting her work with women in Newgate prison, London.

13th October
Bob Hunter 1945-2005 Nonviolent environmental activist & legendary Greenpeace leader
Bob Hunter (13/10/1945-2/5/2005) was a Canadian environmentalist, journalist, author and politician. A member of the Don't Make a Wave Committee in 1969 which sailed to Amchitka in 1971, and co-founder of Greenpeace in 1972 with Patrick Moore. Hunter was a long-time campaigner for environmental causes and helped lead successful campaigns to ban commercial whaling and nuclear testing. A highly unconventional individual who pioneered many nonviolent direct actions, such as using zodiac inflatable boats, it has been said "Greenpeace will forever bear the mark of his crazy, super-optimistic faith in the wisdom of tilting at windmills."

Croft Ave

2007-10-12T12:08:00.000+10:00

Some images from Croft Ave, just over the road from The Den...

The Mad Farmer Liberation Front

2007-10-05T13:44:00.000+10:00

Now I'm not much one for poetry, but Wendell Berry is absolutely amazing. Enjoy.

Love the quick profit, the annual raise,
vacation with pay. Want more
of everything ready-made. Be afraid
to know your neighbors and to die.
And you will have a window in your head.
Not even your future will be a mystery
any more. Your mind will be punched in a card
and shut away in a little drawer.
When they want you to buy something
they will call you. When they want you
to die for profit they will let you know.

So, friends, every day do something
that won't compute. Love the Lord.
Love the world. Work for nothing.
Take all that you have and be poor.
Love someone who does not deserve it.
Denounce the government and embrace
the flag. Hope to live in that free
republic for which it stands.
Give your approval to all you cannot
understand. Praise ignorance, for what man
has not encountered he has not destroyed.

Ask the questions that have no answers.
Invest in the millenium. Plant sequoias.
Say that your main crop is the forest
that you did not plant,
that you will not live to harvest.
Say that the leaves are harvested
when they have rotted into the mold.
Call that profit. Prophesy such returns.

Put your faith in the two inches of humus
that will build under the trees
every thousand years.
Listen to carrion -- put your ear
close, and hear the faint chattering
of the songs that are to come.
Expect the end of the world. Laugh.
Laughter is immeasurable. Be joyful
though you have considered all the facts.
So long as women do not go cheap
for power, please women more than men.
Ask yourself: Will this satisfy
a woman satisfied to bear a child?
Will this disturb the sleep
of a woman near to giving birth?

Go with your love to the fields.
Lie down in the shade. Rest your head
in her lap. Swear allegiance
to what is nighest your thoughts.
As soon as the generals and the politicos
can predict the motions of your mind,
lose it. Leave it as a sign
to mark the false trail, the way
you didn't go. Be like the fox
who makes more tracks than necessary,
some in the wrong direction.
Practice resurrection.

--Wendell Berry

In the laneway

2007-10-05T12:31:00.001+10:00

Blackstump

2007-10-03T13:18:00.000+10:00

Went to Blackstump Christian Music Festival for the first time on the weekend, as part of my work with Urban Seed. About 6000 people go to this thing, mainly for the music, but we were there to run some workshops, worship spaces, and participate in panels. As usual then, Urban Seed ended up around the edges…

The highlight for me was just hanging with “the mob” (Kate, Spriggsy, Brent, Emma, Jason, Gemma, Bec and Charlie) and spending time getting to know these people better. Our sessions seemed to go really well too, with me running nonviolence for the first one and Brent, Kate and I sharing the second one. I was on a panel too, talking about politics and faith. I shared the stage with Donna Mulhearn, two guys from the public service (Labor) and a guy from the Australian Christian Lobby. A bit hard to unpack the complexities in just under an hour, but it was good fun to have a rant anyway and challenge some deeply entrenched cultural ideas.

As usual at these sorts of events, it’s the things that go wrong that make for the most amusing and fun moments, so thanks to Formule 1 motels, cranky people and Hugh Evans for the entertainment.

Good too to catch up with Donna Mulhearn and spend some time chatting over the events of the past couple of years (Pine Gap 4, her human shield time, G20, APEC and Talisman Sabre).

Pray for Burma

2007-09-25T23:23:00.000+10:00

Just received this today via email from Ken Butigan of Pace e Bene:

The demonstrations inside Burma have escalated into a full-scale nonviolent Gandhian revolution.

Yesterday 200,000 monks, civilians, and students marched through the capital city of Rangoon, calling for human rights and democracy. The day before, they forced through barriers on the street outside Aung San Suu Kyi's house to go and visit her. She stepped outside for a brief conversation and it was the first time she can been seen in 4 years. Our colleagues inside Burma tell us that she looked fit and healthy. I am attaching a photo here of her -- you can see her in the middle with yellow shirt clasping her hands together.

When the monks approached her, she started crying as she was overwhelmed by their courage and bravery.

Yesterday, inspired by the strong support from Hollywood actors and actresses, several of Burma's most prominent actors joined the protests and offered alms to the marching monks, a highly symbolic and important show of support.

We have been briefing journalists virtually 24 hours a day as they cover the situation. Tonight we are going on CNN and BBC World. There are over 2,500 news articles on Burma right now -- the #1 story in the world.

Journalists are calling this the "Saffron Revolution", noting the color of the monks robes.

Ominous news is that the regime is shaving heads of some of its soldiers so they can pose as monks and these "monks" can incite military soldiers into a crackdown.

Just amazing to see the power of the human spirit.

Jack and Jeremy

Citizens Against War Crimes

2007-09-24T13:15:00.000+10:00

Just received this via email...interesting that all the news coverage of the last sitting day of parliament was centred around the childish bickering of politicians, with no mention of this...

Media Release: (Thursday 20 September 2007; Canberra)

Iraqi deaths due to US invasion - 1,051,145 (Just Foreign Policy, & The Lancel - UK medical journal) "We had to destroy the country in order to save it."

Citizens Arrest of John Howard, Alexander Downer, Philip Ruddock, & Brendan Nelson as War Criminals.

"Point of order Mister Speaker: I have a Warrant for the arrest of John Howard, Alexander Downer, Philip Ruddock, & Brendan Nelson as War Criminals."

Yesterday in Federal Parliament at Question Time, an anti-war activist confronted the Government with a formal Citizens Arrest Warrant, charging them with various breaches of international law. (see Warrant below)

Peter McGregor, a retired academic from Newcastle, was himself then arrested, & charged with 'unlawful entry on inclosed lands' & taken into custody. McGregor was calling for the Speaker of the House of Representatives to have the police arrest the 4 Ministers. "Just the Howard Government's abandoning of Habeas Corpus should make it a social pariah, especially with those who believe in the rule of law & human rights. Instead of people like me, the Pine Gap 4, the Talisman Sabre Peace Convergence, Rising Tide, Greenpeace, etc. resorting to acts of civil disobedience, it would be preferable if groups like Amnesty, councils for civil liberties, university law faculties, etc. practiced what they preached, and brought formal legal charges against the Howard Government for its War Crimes." "In order for evil to triumph, it is enough for good people to do nothing."

No date has been set for the trial, but McGregor will be pleading not guilty.

Contact: Peter McGregor - mcgregorpeter@yahoo.com.au & 49293587
----------
Warrant for the Citizens Arrest of John Howard, Alexander Downer, Philip Ruddock, & Brendan Nelson: John Howard, Prime Minister; Alexander Downer, Minister for Foreign Affairs; Philip Ruddock, Attorney-General; & Brendan Nelson, Minister for Defence are hereby charged, to be trial by the International Criminal Court, with:

(1) Planning, preparing, initiation or waging a war of aggression or a war in violation of international treaties, agreements or assurances - VI (i) Nuremburg Principles

(2) Participation in a common plan or conspiracy for accomplishment of the above - V (ii) Nuremburg Principles

(3) Participating in the use of cluster bombs in contravention of the AUSTRALIAN MINES CONVENTION ACT, 1998

(4) Participating in the use of weapons of mass destruction in breach of the GENEVA Convention including Fuel Air Explosives which cause death by asphyxiation

(5) Conspiring to pervert the course of justice by
(i) abandoning habeas corpus both in the domestic 'anti-terror' laws & in international policy; &
(ii) covering up or defending the use of torture & over breaches of the GENEVA Convention, the International Covenant for Civil & Political Rights, & the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, against Australian – and other - citizens, at Guantanamo Bay

(6) Failing in its duty to protect Australian citizens overseas, & conspiring to continue the illegal detention of Australian citizens without trial or changes for over 5 years

(7) Demonizing and incarcerating asylum seekers under the policies of mandatory detention and fortress Australia. Such policies contravene the legal principle of habeus corpus and have induced undue suffering and mental illness for detainees.

Dated this Wednesday 19th September, 2007.

Signature(s): Peter McGregor: (mcgregorpeter [at] yahoo.com.au)

Issued & authorized by Citizens against War Crimes

falling

2007-09-21T11:54:00.001+10:00

Skydiving in pictures...

The view from the sky over Torquay...magnificent day, about 20 degrees, no clouds and no wind.

This was the hardest part. Not because it was scary, it was just totally counterintuitive to get out of a moving plane. Plus when you're going at several hundred kilometres an hour there's a whole lot of wind going past.

Woo! Nothing but excitement!

Falling away from the plane as quickly as possible...

Freefalling at 220 kph...

Not the most attractive look, but hey, it's pretty hard to avoid.

The magnificent view - surprisingly enough, I was able to enjoy it while falling.

Under the parachute - had a go of steering. No wind meant the landing was very fast, and not particularly pretty.

Back safely on the ground.

...

2007-09-21T10:17:00.001+10:00

Guilty! Of trying to see our Senator

2007-09-11T10:23:00.000+10:00

So this is John's statement after his trial...

by Rev. John Dear

CommonDreams.org September 9, 2007

On Thursday, September 6th, 2007, six of us were found guilty in Federal court in Albuquerque, NM by a Federal judge for trying to visit the office of our senator. We will be sentenced in a few weeks. The message? It is a Federal crime to attempt to speak to an elected Republican about the U.S. war on Iraq. Don’t visit your senator. Don’t get involved. Don’t speak out. Don’t take a stand for peace–or you too may end up in jail.

It all started one year ago, on September 26, 2006, when nine of us entered the Federal Building in Santa Fe, New Mexico, and tried to take the elevator to the third floor to the office of Senator Pete Domenici to present him with a copy of the “Declaration of Peace,” a national petition campaign aimed at stopping the U.S. war on Iraq, bringing our troops home, and pursuing nonviolent alternatives and reparations. Over three hundred seventy five similar actions took place across the nation that week.

The Senator‘s office manager came downstairs, said she would only allow three of us upstairs, and after forty five minutes of waiting and negotiations, we nine just decided to go upstairs, figuring we had a right as group of constituents to deliver our petition to the Senator’s office.

As we stepped onto the elevator, a policeman put his foot in the door, and the next thing we knew, the power was turned off. So there we stayed–for some six hours. At one point, a police officer brought over a chair for one elderly member of our group who uses metal crutches. It seemed the officer was inviting us to make ourselves at home. He even said he supported our anti-war stand.

By the end of that memorable day, with over twenty police officers, SWAT teams, and FBI officials standing in the lobby, the Homeland Security director told us we had the choice to be arrested, jailed and tried, or cited and tried. He never gave us a warning, never told us to leave, never read us our rights. We took the citations, and for the past year, have been in and out of court, waiting to testify about our attempt to visit the Senator’s office.

The prosecution would hear none of it. As far as the prosecutor was concerned, we went there to disrupt the Federal Building and shut down the elevator. He seemed to think we liked being in an elevator. He, of course, had been a marine for decades, and now commands a national guard unit, and was just back two days before the trial from directing military operations in Colorado Springs. He called the police and the senator’s assistant to testify against us. They said we had plenty of warning, said we threatened to do a sit in, and said we disrupted the government’s office work.

Then it was our turn. One by one we took the stand–Philip, Michella, Sansi, Ellie, Bud and me. Our excellent pro bono lawyers, Todd Hotchkiss and Penni Adrian, asked us why we went to the Federal Building and what happened. We each testified that we intended to bring a copy of the “Declaration of Peace” statement to the senator’s office, in the hope that it could be faxed to him, that he would sign it, and that he would work to stop this evil war.

During my testimony, I was asked about the lists of names I brought with me that day. I had printed out the name of every U.S. soldier killed in Iraq, and some ten thousand Iraqi civilians killed, and said I thought they would help remind us why we were there, that perhaps we might leave them with the Senator’s staff. The judge interrupted me and asked if I carried those names around with me all the time. While unfortunately it’s now all too common for many of us to spend our time at demonstrations reading the names of the dead, I held back from saying, “Yes, don’t you? Don’t you care about the U.S. soldiers who’ve been killed, and the countless, innocent Iraqi civilians killed?” Instead, I said I always carried with me information about the war and how to stop it.

It was a grueling, exhausting eight hour day. At the end, the judge returned with his verdict but then launched into a speech explaining why he believed the police and the senator’s staff person, and not us, particularly, not me. He said the fact that I carried with me the names of every U.S. soldier killed and some ten thousand Iraqi civilians killed proved I intended to be there a long time, and shut down business in the Federal Building. He basically called us all liars, and defended the government’s evil war.

I’m not so sure that on the day one year ago I did intend to shut the Federal Building down, as noble a nonviolent act that might be in such times. Only a few months before, I brought a group to meet with Governor Bill Richardson, and he received us warmly, and let me speak for twenty minutes about why he should work to end the war on Iraq, disarm Los Alamos and abolish our nuclear weapons, and end the death penalty in New Mexico. I didn’t rule out the possibility that in fact Domenici’s staff might be willing to hear us. In the end, however, the police themselves disrupted business as usual. They turned off the elevator. They shut down the Federal Building. They prevented us from visiting our elected representative’s office.

So what do we learn from this experience? What is the message from Federal Court in New Mexico? I suppose it’s this: Anyone who dares visit their Republican senator to speak against this evil war is liable of a Federal crime. Don’t presume you have any rights in this so-called democracy. Those days are over.

The judge said he would sentence us within thirty days, so there’s more to come. He asked each of us to submit a statement to him. We face 30 days in jail and a $5000 fine, which I certainly won’t pay.

Meanwhile, the real crime continues, and the real criminals get away with mass murder, with the crucial, full backing of our courts. The war goes on, the killings go on, and the lives of our sisters and brothers in Iraq, Afghanistan, Palestine and elsewhere are shattered. Our government, in its race to become a global empire, has sunk to all new levels of corruption, lying, repression, and old fashioned hubris. Our task is permanent nonviolent resistance against the culture of war, nonviolence as a way of life, full-time non-cooperation with violence, war, and empire.

All things considered, then, it’s a great blessing to be found guilty of speaking out against this evil war. I hope more and more people will write their senators and congress people, especially Sen. Pete Domenici of New Mexico, and demand that they end this war; that more and more people will sign up at www.declarationofpeace.org and keep building the movement against this war; that more and more people will march for peace, vigil for peace, organize for peace, agitate for peace, speak out for peace, fast for peace, cross the line for peace, pray for peace, and find themselves guilty of pursuing a new world without war.

In such times as these, there may be no greater blessing.

articulate graffiti

2007-09-11T10:22:00.001+10:00

hmm...yes, indeed

2007-09-11T10:20:00.000+10:00

JD faces court...again

2007-09-06T11:57:00.001+10:00

Thinking of my good friend John Dear as he faces court on September 6 in New Mexico for a nonviolent action he did last year with 8 others, when along with about 380 other groups around the US, they went to visit their local member. They brought a letter requesting that he agree to work to end the Iraq war, and were stopped in the elevator by security, who held them there for 7 hours. They spent the time reading the names of the Iraqi dead. Because of John's record, he faces one or two months in prison - for going to visit his local member! It's unbelievable what they won't allow in the US now in terms of dissent, and all this APEC stuff is making me realise it's happening here too. It's a kairos time in terms of political dissent in the West - we must hold our own, supporting one another, or we risk losing further civil liberties and freedoms we've previously taken for granted.

So uphold John in your thoughts and prayers, please. He's a remarkable man of peace.

More info here.

The wisdom of Peter Maurin

2007-09-06T11:54:00.001+10:00

"The world would be better off
if people tried to become better,
and people would become better
if they stopped trying to become better off.
For when everyone tries to become better off
nobody is better off.
But when everyone tries to become better
everyone is better off."

- Co-founder of Catholic Worker movement

Check this out...

2007-09-04T15:42:00.000+10:00

This video shows three police in Montreal pretending to be 'black block' anarchists at a nonviolent action and how they are uncovered and exposed (with rock in hand!).

Great response and excellent leadership as a union leader stands up to them and defuses the situation, isolating them from the rest of the group and clearly marking them out until they become exposed as agents provocateur. It's blown up on the national news in Canada.

It's been talked about for years that police do this to incite riots - and everyone knows it happens all the time, but it's incredibly hard to prove unless you can isolate them like this and get some kind of proof.

Samuel Hill 5

2007-09-04T14:28:00.001+10:00

No, it's not the latest boy band, it's that group otherwise known as the 'Shoalwater' or 'Frisbee 5'. I've just created a website for our little group, so we can all put our musings and news in one central place to direct people to, so head on over there and check it out...there's not much there now but we're all going to add our stuff as things happen.

for the vegetarians among us

2007-08-17T15:03:00.001+10:00

Beautifully placed right next to Nando's near my house...someone's put "eating animals" on the stop sign.

here we go again

2007-08-14T11:27:00.000+10:00

I'm giving up the news again. No more newspapers, tv news, nothing. I stand by my previous reasons for doing so, but add the following Thomas Merton quote to the mix:

"Nine tenths of the news, as printed in the papers, is pseudo-news, manufactured events. Some days ten-tenths. The ritual morning trance, in which one scans columns of newsprint, creates a peculiar form of generalized pseudo-attention to a pseudo-reality. This experience is taken seriously. It is one's daily immersion in "reality". One's orientation to the rest of the world. One's way of reassuring himself that he has not fallen behind. That he is still there. That he still counts!

My own experience has been that renunciation of this self-hypnosis, of this participation in the unquiet universal trance, is no sacrifice of reality at all. To "fall behind" in this sense is to get out of the big cloud of dust that everybody is kicking up, to breathe and to see a little more clearly." (Thomas Merton: Faith and Violence)

Last time I tried this, just under a year ago, stuff I was doing ended up in the paper the next day, so...we'll see what happens.

Pace e Bene 2007

2007-08-07T16:03:00.000+10:00

Headed to Adelaide the day after court for the gathering of the Pace e Bene Oz people from around the country. We drove down south of Adelaide to a place called Middleton, to a Christian Brothers House there that overlooks the ocean. Amazing views from the house.

The beach is pretty amazing too - very flat so the tide comes in and out a long way.

Anyway, we worked pretty hard and worked out a lot of things for Pace e Bene and the spirituality of nonviolence in the future and the present.

And here's the crew!

The mention

2007-08-07T15:14:00.001+10:00

The 18 arrestees (two of the original 21 had already been processed, one arranged to plead guilty in her absence) turned up at the Yeppoon foreshore on Thursday morning August 2 to process to the courthouse. The sea was like glass, a sensational morning. We danced the hokey pokey then took the banners and walked together to the courthouse.

After that we stood in a circle and shared a bible passage, quote, or just talked about how we were feeling.

Then after a brief wait, we entered the courthouse only to wait again while they got ready.

Finally all was ready and they asked for all the adjournments first - which it turned out included the not guilty verdicts. Luckily one of the experienced guys went first, so he was able to arrange with the magistrate to be excused from appearing at the review mention which she scheduled for October 4th.

After that the procedure was pretty simple; you just went up when you were ready and said your name, the magistrate read you the charge and asked if you understood it, then asked if you wanted the same conditions. Sometimes she asked one or two more questions. Then you were excused. When it came time for my turn, all was going smoothly until I heard my phone start ringing behind me. Julie had it in the bag and couldn't get it in time to turn it off, so she had to leave. The magistrate was not impressed, but she didn't know it was mine so she just made a general comment to the gallery and I was done.

Jess and Carole pleaded guilty, and both made brilliant statements. The magistrate told Carole she "shared your aspirations for peace" but had to enforce the law.

Since it was only 10:30am when we were all finished, we all decided to go and enjoy the rest of the day in a magnificent part of the world. We went to the beach first.

Then we went for a drive through Byfield to the Byfield (or Blue Route) gate. I hadn't been to any of the demos at the gates over the whole Peace Convergence week because we were preparing. This was therefore the only gate I'd been to - it was the gate where we emerged from the base in the police car and they stopped here to arrested us before transferring us to another vehicle for the trip to Rockhampton. It was totally weird to be there - not least because the overwhelming thing at the time was being cold and wet, with the ground totally muddy, and here we were now with dry dust and about 28 degrees. Mostly it just brought back memories though of sitting in the divvy van and staring at this very sign, for about half an hour, just wondering if they were going to press charges or not, and wondering what would happen next.

No police around this time, but a family did drive past us in their car, open the gate, and drive into the base. A very strange feeling.

Great to have Ella there with us. The shirt is one I made to wear into the base, but as it turned out it was too cold to have it visible! So I wore it to the court proceedings instead.

Afterwards we went back to some local's houses and had a bonfire and BBQ dinner. Such a beautiful place, and you could see every star in the sky. By the end of the day I was totally exhausted but the day had been really relaxing and wonderful.

A message from David Bradbury

2007-07-24T21:36:00.000+10:00

In case you don't know who David Bradbury is, check out his profile here. We hung out with him a bit up at Talisman Sabre and he's been doing this stuff for years - amazing stories, but most of all an incredibly knowledgeable person. So this is well worth a read - it's a letter he wrote to all of us regarding uranium mining and the nuclear issue:

A message to all Activists from David Bradbury:
Yeppoon June 20,2007
Email contact: ahardrain@aapt.net.au

Dear Activists,

Thank you for your commitment to make the big effort to come to Shoalwater for these actions of the past week. Please keep 'the faith' on this issue when you return home. Let your friends know so they will come to the actions in 2009. Inevitably it will be an ongoing campaign to chase the US military out of our country and alert our fellow Australians to the moral and environmental consequences of supporting a US military 'lifestyle' based on an ongoing commitment to war.

As you know, any US administration whether its Bush (Republican) or the Democrats uses the military to advance its economic and political goals to dominate the world. And as Helen Caldicott pointed out in her speech at the Yeppoon townhall, the next step in that plan is to use space to control everything that moves on land, on sea or through the air.

Rumsfeld, Downer and co when they signed. that secret pact in 2004 to exploit Shoalwater Bay and Australia euphemistically called it a missile 'defence' system. But its 'offensive' in nature and intent. In order to put space platforms up there and maintain them all year round, they need tremendous amounts of energy. Fossil fuels won't do it. They need our uranium to power the space platforms into orbit. They need our uranium to make the nuclear warheads. And like Shoalwater Bay with its 'wide open spaces' and the deserts of NT to test their latest space age guided missiles, they need a place to dump the nuclear waste that nobody on mainland America is willing to take.

Step one is already in place. As you know, both major parties are now committed to open slather uranium mining. Step five is in place. The Federal government has paid $12million and bought Aboriginal approval for a nuclear waste dump at Tennant Creek right next to the Halliburton built and controlled rail link from Darwin.

Australia sits on 40% of the world's uranium. I cannot stress enough how critical the coming months are going to be leading into the federal election. If the nuclear lobby has its way it will be disastrous for Australia, disastrous for the world. We have to get candidates elected to the Senate who can block the legislation approving more uranium mines. Labor and Howard won't do it.

In making A Hard Rain (my latest anti-nuclear doco) I explored the latest research on radiation exposure. Scary stuff. It reveals that a double strand break occurs in the DNA - the blueprint of life itself - at radiation exposure levels far lower than what the health authorities are leading us to believe. Scientists agree that the double strand break (DSB) in the DNA is the precursor to cancer and birth defects.

If like the Labor party, we selfishly put aside the morality of shipping our yellowcake overseas to impact on others, there's still a huge 'what's in it for us?' reason to oppose uranium mining. Our very survival.

When uranium is mined, 80% of the radiation is left behind in the discarded tailings once the yellow cake (uranium oxide) is taken out for export. Radioactive lead, bismuth, polonium, radium and thorium. The miners just dump it at the mine site in huge mountains because it has no commercial value. The great concern for us as Australians is the radiation is now up on the surface in finely pulverised form to blow in the wind to any corner of Australia. Easily. It can and will also enter the underground water table via the tailings dams to travel far off site. Its blowing in the wind and weeping into the water.

Like exploded 'depleted' uranium particles, these tiny dust size specs from uranium mining waste are alpha radiation emitters. The most deadly form of radiation. Once breathed in or ingested into the body, they have dire consequences. They impact on the cells and potentially damage the DNA. The double strand break. Radiation doesn't have to come to you in the air from a nuclear power plant or bomb.

Consider this one fact alone: BHPBilliton's Olympic Dam uranium mine in South Australia is seeking to triple its uranium output. If approved, the company will bring to the surface of Australia 40 million tonnes of radioactive ore each year for the next 50-100 years. Forty million tonnes of radioactive waste ground into dust form and dumped there each year! Radioactive to blow around Australia in the wind for the next 250,000 years. A cancer epidemic of unquantifiable proportions emitting from the centre of Australia coast to coast is what we're looking at. The radiation genie out of the bottle that cannot be put back.

What can I say? The politicians aren't listening. Like the impossibility of stopping Talisman Sabre overnight, I haven't got many immediate answers in the face of a similar mainstream media blackout on the uranium/nuclear issue that we've faced on Talisman. I do know that we have to oppose it with all our might. And there is strength in numbers and our collective imagination when we come together with a common purpose as we have for Shoalwater.

You are the' shock troops' who had enough concern and awareness to come to Shoalwater Bay. I'm appealing to you now when you go home to switch your energy immediately over to fight for this big one before the federal elections.

In the coming weeks go to www.frontlinefilms.com.au/blog website and other links from that site as we build an overnight campaign of what we need to do. In lieu of any mainstream media coverage to generate publicity or genuine debate on 'our side' to the nuclear issue, we will have to use the internet and word of mouth with friends to build a big grassroots movement virtually overnight to fight the mainstream parties on this issue. I'm knackered myself. Not just from helping organise the Shoalwater campaign. It hasn't stopped since I made Blowin' in the Wind. But we can't give up and take a break just yet. Not until the federal election is over at least.

Regards and hang on for the ride!

David Bradbury

So if you get a chance, get along to the screening of his new film on Thursday at 6:30. It's called "A Hard Rain" and will be showing at Trades Hall (corner Lygon and Victoria Sts Carlton). It's a film giving the "other side of the nuclear debate". Entry $10/$8. More info at http://www.nukefreeaus.org/.

St. Sharbel Makhlouf

2007-07-24T10:58:00.000+10:00

Although this saint never traveled far from the Lebanese village of Beka-Kafra, where he was born, his influence has spread widely.

Joseph Zaroun Maklouf was raised by an uncle because his father, a mule driver, died when Joseph was only three. At the age of 23, Joseph joined the Monastery of St. Maron at Annaya, Lebanon, and took the name Sharbel in honor of a second-century martyr. He professed his final vows in 1853 and was ordained six years later.

Following the example of the fifth-century St. Maron, Sharbel lived as a hermit from 1875 until his death. His reputation for holiness prompted people to seek him to receive a blessing and to be remembered in his prayers. He followed a strict fast and was very devoted to the Blessed Sacrament. When his superiors occasionally asked him to administer the sacraments to nearby villages, Sharbel did so gladly.

He died in the late afternoon on Christmas Eve. Christians and non-Christians soon made his tomb a place of pilgrimage and of cures. Pope Paul VI beatified him in 1965 and canonized him in 1977.

update

2007-07-24T10:53:00.000+10:00

So it's been a while since I've posted anything on the saints' days. Rather than going back and trying to catch up, I'll start again from now. Hopefully the ones who missed out won't hold it against me. :D

As far as other stuff going on, I've decided to plead not guilty at my mention next week (August 2). That means a trial later in the year. That's kind of cool. Lots to think through there, and it's been a huge decision to make. If I get 5 minutes I might try and get down some of the process to making it, but there's so much else on it's not likely. So of the five of us, the four from Melbourne are pleading not guilty, and Carole from Brisbane is pleading guilty.

Had Urban Seed staff retreat last week, which was good and frustrating and fun and challenging and meaningful and exhausting. Got to go to the beach one evening as the sun was setting, and even though it was freezing it was incredibly beautiful:

You get the idea. It was great just to spend some time with the whole mob, 'cos we don't get to do that very often.

More of Thomas Merton on results

2007-07-24T10:35:00.000+10:00

I recently posted a quote from a letter that Thomas Merton wrote to Jim Forest, and then I re-read the whole letter last night and think it is worth presenting here in its entirety. As long as it is, devote some time to reading it. It is eerie how similar the situation is to today: replace 'Vietnam' with 'Iraq', and 'Catholic' with 'Christian' and there's not a whole lot of difference. The only problem is: where are the Mertons today to give clarity and perspective like this?

On February 15 Forest wrote that he was in a bleak mood; no one seemed to be listening to CPF (Catholic Peace Fellowship). “I feel like an ant climbing a cliff, and even worse, for in the distance there seems to be an avalanche…Perhaps you have some thoughts that would help?”

Thanks for the letter and for the awful, and illuminating, enclosure. I can well understand your sense of desperation. And the “bleak mood.” And also I am glad that you wrote about it. As you say, there are no clear answers, and you can guess that I don’t have magic solutions for bleak moods: if I did I would use them on my own which are habitually pretty bleak too. But that is just part of this particular life and I don’t expect much else.

Actually, I would say one thing that probably accounts for your feelings, besides all the objective and obvious reasons, you are doubtless tired. I don’t know whether you are physically tired or not but you have certainly been pouring your emotional and psychic energy into the CPF and all that it stands for, and you have been sustained by hopes that are now giving out. Hence the reaction. Well, the first thing is that you have to go through this kind of reaction periodically, learn to expect it and cope with it when it comes, don’t do things that precipitate it, without necessity (you will always have to).

And then this: Do not depend on the hope of results. When you are doing the sort of work you have taken on, essentially an apostolic work, you may have to face the fact that your work will be apparently worthless and even achieve no result at all, if not perhaps results opposite to what you expect. As you get used to this idea you start more and more to concentrate not on the results, but on the value, the rightness, the truth of the work itself. And there too a great deal has to be gone through, as gradually you struggle less and less for an idea and more and more for specific people. The range tends to narrow down, but it gets much more real. In the end, as you yourself mention in passing, it is the reality of personal relationships that saves everything.

You are fed up with words, and I don’t blame you. I am nauseated by them sometimes. I am also, to tell the truth, nauseated with ideals and with causes. This sounds like heresy, but I think you will understand what I mean. It is so easy to get engrossed with ideas and slogans and myths that in the end one is left holding the bag, empty, with no trace of meaning left in it. And then the temptation is to yell louder than ever in order to make the meaning be there again by magic. Going through this kind of reaction helps you to guard against this. Your system is complaining of too much verbalizing, and it is right.

This country is SICK, man. It is one of the sickest thing that has happened. People are fed on myths, they are stuffed up to the eyes with illusions. They CAN'T think straight. They have a modicum of good will, and some of them have a whole lot of it, but with the mental bombardment everybody lives under, it is just not possible to see straight, no matter where you are looking. The average everyday 'Catlick' is probably in worse shape than a lot of others. He has in his head a few principles of faith which lend no coherence whatsoever to his life. No one has ever sought any coherence from him or given him the idea that he needed any. All he has been asked to do has been to measure up to a few simple notions about sexual morality (which he may or may not quite make, but anyway he knows where he stands - or falls on his face) and he has been taught that the cross and sacrifice in his life mean in practice going off to war every twenty years or so. He has done this with exemplary, unquestioning generosity, and has reaped the results: a corresponding brutalization, which is not his fault and which he thinks has something to do with being a real human being. In this whole area of war and peace, no matter what the Council may have said about the average layman and the average priest are all alike conditioned by this mentality. Furthermore, when it is a question of a kind of remote box score of casualties which gives meaning to life each day, they no longer think of these casualties as people, it is just a score. Also they don't want to think of them as people, they want casualties, they want someone to get it, because they have been brutalized and this is a fully legitimate way of indulging the brutality that has been engendered in them. It is not only for country, it is even for God.

You can be as indignant as you like about this: and it is sickening, but being indignant has its disadvantages. It gets you into the same damn-fool game. Take the myth of “getting results.” What is the driving power behind the massive stupidity in Vietnam, with its huge expense and its absurd effects? It is the obsession of the American mind with the myth of know-how, and with the capacity to be omnipotent. Once this is questioned, we will go to any lengths, ANY lengths to resolve the doubt that has thus been raised in our minds. The whole cockeyed American myth is at stake in Vietnam and what is happening to it is obvious, it is tearing itself into little shreds and the nation is half nuts in consequence. The national identity is going slowly down the drain in VN and a lot of terrible things are happening in the process. We are learning how bestial and how incredible are the real components of that myth. Vietnam is the psychoanalysis of the U.S. I wonder if the nation can come out of it and survive. I have a hunch we might be able to. But your stresses and strains, mind, Dan’s, all of them, are all part of this same syndrome, and it is extremely irritating to find oneself, like it or not, involved in the national madness. The fact that you and I and our type have a special answer which runs counter to that of the majority seems at first to make us sane, but does it really? Does it save us from being part of the same damn mess? Obviously not. Theoretically we understand that, but in fact our hearts will not admit it, and we are trying to prove to ourselves that (a) we at least are sane decent people, (b) sanity and decency are such that our sanity and decency ought to influence everybody else. And there is something to this, I am not preaching a complete anomie. Yet the others think the same about themselves.

In a word, you have said a lot of good things, you have got a lot of ideas across, it has perhaps caused some good reactions among the bad and what has it achieved in terms of the whole national picture: precious little. The CPF is not going to stop the war in Vietnam, and it is not even going to cause very many Catholics to think differently about war and peace. It is simply going to be another image among images, in the minds of most Catholics, something around which are centered some vague emotional reactions, for or against. Nevertheless, you will probably, if you continue as you do, begin the laborious job of changing the national mind and opening up the national conscience. How far will you get? God alone knows. All that you and I can ever hope for in terms of visible results is that we will have perhaps contributed something to a clarification of Christian truth in this society, and as a result a few people may have got straight about some things and opened up to the grace of God and made some sense out of their lives, helping a few more to do the same. As for the big results, these are not in your hands or mine, but they can suddenly happen, and we can share in them: but there is no point in building our lives on this personal satisfaction, which may be denied us and which after all is not that important.

So the next step in the process is for you to see that your own thinking about what you are doing is crucially important. You are probably striving to build yourself an identity in your work and your witness. You are using it so to speak to protect yourself against nothingness, annihilation. That is not the right use of your work. All the good that you will do will come not from you but from the fact that you have allowed yourself, in the obedience of faith, to be used by God's love. Think of this more and gradually you will be free from the need to prove yourself, and you can be more open to the power that will work through you without your knowing it.

The great thing after all is to live, not to pour out your life in the service of a myth: and we turn the best things into myths. If you can get free from the domination of causes and just serve Christ’s truth, you will be able to do more and will be less crushed by the inevitable disappointments. Because I see nothing whatever in sight but much disappointment, frustration and confusion. I hope we can avoid a world war: but do we deserve to? I am not thinking so much of ourselves and this country but of all the people who would be killed who never heard of New York and of the U.S.A. even, perhaps. It is a pity that they should have to pay for our stupidity and our sins.

The real hope, then, is not in something we think we can do, but in God who is making something good out of it in some way we cannot see. If we can do His will, we will be helping in this process. But we will not necessarily know all about it beforehand.

Thomas Merton to Jim Forest, February 21st 1966: from The Hidden Ground of Love: Letters.

I'm also writing an article on nonviolence, and intend to use these ideas to argue for "faithfulness, not effectiveness" as primary in the struggle for justice.

Birds of pray

2007-07-05T17:04:00.000+10:00

Every morning we’d been woken by the kookaburras. If you’ve ever been camping, you’d know that birds are often the first creatures stirring in the morning, but ordinarily you’d expect peaceful twittering, not the raucous laughter of the kookaburra. But there they were, these iconic Australian birds, day after day, faithfully rousing us from our slumber with their mirthful calls.

We were camping at a caravan park in Yeppoon, almost 150 of the 300 people who had converged from around Australia to demonstrate a peaceful alternative to war. Just a few kilometres up the road, the Australian and US militaries were practicing to kill; Operation Talisman Sabre they called it, a series of live fire exercises including bombing and short range missile attacks. Projectiles cutting their destructive way through the sky, ultimately crashing to earth with explosive ferocity. Beautiful, pristine earth, thousands of years old rainforest with untold complexity of ecosystems; destroyed in a split second of human malevolence.

Birds, of course, have a special place as God’s messengers in biblical stories. From the dove that Noah sent out from the ark, which has become the universal symbol of peace, to the ravens feeding Elijah in the wilderness; from the Spirit that descends upon Jesus like a dove at his baptism to his likening himself to a hen brooding over her chicks. In the indigenous lore in the place where I’m from, Melbourne, Australia the creator spirit is known as Bunjil, the eagle. Birds have a special place in spiritual lore; they soar above us, majestic, mysterious, floating near the heavens, seemingly untouched, unreachable by we earth-bound creatures.

Five of us from the peace convergence decided to oppose the war games by walking openly onto the base to request that they be stopped. In fact, we were positing an alternative; bringing a frisbee with us, we wanted to invite the soldiers to stop their war games in favour of peace games. A peaceful projectile floating gently between people, connecting them in the name of fun. We were aware, of course, that by setting foot on the base it would be likely to raise the ire of those who were conducting the exercises; soldiers, probably armed, and in aggressive mode. We wanted to be ready in ourselves for the likely aggression we would encounter. Choosing early morning as the most likely time to go undetected, we jokingly coded our entry time as, “When the kookaburras laugh.”

The whole week had been spent preparing, but it was essential that we be centred in ourselves at the moment of entry. After waking at 5:30am, we met together to pray; to respond to the Spirit’s leading, to act out of love rather than fear. Sitting in a circle, we descended into a period of silence. Connected in such a powerful way in such a powerful moment, I felt enfolded in the Spirit of Life that surrounded us. Quietly we began to sing, then hear from the Beatitudes, then a Thomas Merton quote. The formalities over, we had only to wait on the Spirit for leading.

Suddenly, inexplicably, the silence was broken by the laugh of a single solitary kookaburra. We opened our eyes, looked at each other, and joined in the laughter. No one needed to say anything; we were ready.

We walked for three hours through the bush to reach the fence; the five of us with our cameraman and documentary filmmaker Dujon. Dujon had journeyed the whole week with us, present for our planning, our meetings, our prayer times. We had grown close to each other, and as the time came for our entry, he was increasingly concerned for us and our safety. While not a Christian himself, Dujon had a keen sense of how important our faith was, and how it connected us to every living thing around us. Nonetheless, when he left us at the fence, he felt keenly aware of the risk we were taking. His return journey would be filled with questions for our welfare.

Until, as he rounded a bend in the road, he was stopped in his tracks by an eagle. Standing in the middle of the road as he approached, it turned and looked at him. With piercing eyes, it stared into him; then turning its head, it crouched, sprang into the air and flappings its powerful wings, flew into the sky. Dujon later told us that he knew at that moment that we would be ok; that this eagle had been sent to reassure him, and that it would watch over us. He continued on his return journey in that confidence.

We walked onto the main base in total confidence in the God of peace; not for one second did we feel unsafe. As we were arrested and taken outside the gates in the police car, a jet roared overhead. A bird of death disturbing the birds of life.

The following Sunday morning, out on bail, we attended Quaker meeting. Quaker meetings are usually silent affairs, waiting on the Spirit’s leading and prompting. Occasionally someone might speak, to bring a “word of ministry” for the group.

On this occasion several people spoke; but one stood out in particular. A lady who had been participating in the peace convergence all week was walking to the gates of the military base. With a group of 150 people, she had walked past a police road block and now found herself meandering slowly enough to be left behind by the group. As she walked silently down the dirt road, two emus emerged from the bush to her left. Immediately she stopped in her tracks as they stepped hesitantly out onto the road, watching her. It was, she recounted, a God moment; she spoke to them, telling them of her desire for peace for their home, for their families, for herself, and how she was working towards it. She apologised on behalf of the human race for all we had done to harm them They continued to watch her as she spoke, and as she talked that morning she recounted a sense of acknowledgment; that they heard her, and thanked her for all we were doing.

Kookaburras, eagles, and emus. All native birds, all part of the majestic ecosystem of the Shoalwater Bay wilderness, all significant messengers of God, symbols of the Spirit, present and at work. I thank God for the way we were looked after by God’s Spirit – undoubtedly present in unseen and unnoticed ways – but visible to us in these winged messengers.