Spiritual Roots of Protest: Nonviolence in our Times?

The Spiritual Roots of Protest retreat at Kirkridge gathers justice and peace activists from the Christian traditions to dive deep into the complexity and contradictions held in the question of nonviolence in our time. What is revolutionary gospel nonviolence now in this conjunction of fascism and white Christian nationalism?

In the tradition of the 1964 Spiritual Roots of Protest gathering hosted by Thomas Merton, our conversations and discernment will be grounded in Christian spiritual practice. We will be held by the rhythm of the hours believing that disciplines of prayer, sacrament, and silence are formational and essential to our work of building a new world. 

Moreover, our goal is to attend to the urgent questions of nonviolence. So often Christian nonviolence is watered down by our churches. It is used to divide movement communities between “peaceful protestors” and “rioters.” Nonviolence often falls short in the mouths of white liberals further giving validity to the powers that be. Yet, we know that nonviolence can be a vocation and tactical call that is radical, revolutionary, and threatening to the powers and principalities. But we cannot do that work without confronting the difficult questions. Our hope is to challenge one another, our convictions, and our longings. In a time when both the gospel and its nonviolent commitment are under assault, we hope to address hard questions with our lives and community.

The questions and containers are continuing to be discerned and will in part be created by those within the circle in our time together. But some questions we could imagine holding include:

• How do we see violence and nonviolence in the Gospels?
• Is nonviolence possible or just for those privileged enough to keep a distance from the reality of violence?
• How does nonviolence shapeshift in the context of class struggle?
• Is nonviolence a tool of white supremacy? 
• For those who benefit from white supremacy, can nonviolence be a radical form of reparations? A way of disinvesting from violence?
• Are we truly being incarnational by policing and distancing ourselves from the holy rage of the youth (who are often POC) resisting state violence?