The Nonviolent Jesus

On this week's episode of The Nonviolent Jesus Podcast, I reflect on Franz Jagerstatter, one of the most important saints in history.
In the late 1970s, while a student at Duke University, wondering what to do with my life, my grandmother gave me a pamphlet about Franz. I was amazed by the story of a young Austrian farmer, born on May 20, 1907, who in 1936 married Franziska, the local sacristan at their church in St. Radegund.
HIs wife, Franziska, was a saint, so he tried to become a saint too.
When the Nazis invaded Austria in 1938, nearly everyone in Austria supported the Nazis. In February 1943, Franz received a letter ordering him to turn himself in and join the Nazi military, where he would be sent off to the Russian front. He went and spoke with several priests and even the bishop. Each one of them said it was his duty as a Catholic to fight for Hitler. But what about Jesus? he asked them.
So Franz refused to fight, was arrested, imprisoned, taken to Berlin, brought before the Nazi high court, condemned to death for “undermining military morale,” and beheaded on August 9, 1943.
I’ve been studying him for decades, and in the 1990s, became a friend of his wife Franziska and family. In this episode, I review Franz’s life, my own experience with Franziska and his beatification in Austria, and some concluding lessons, which I hope will encourage you in your own commitment to the nonviolent Jesus.
I think Franz demonstrates a new political mysticism, a sanctity that is a threat to the empire and the culture of war.
I think this has to become the new norm, as it was in the early Church.
“As a Christian, I prefer to do my fighting with the Word of God and not with arms,” he wrote from prison. “We need no rifles or pistols for our battle, but instead spiritual weapons—and the foremost among these is prayer…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.”
beatitudescenter.org
orbisbooks.org

This week marks the 81st anniversary of the US atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki.
I plan to take part in several demonstrations in California as part of my ongoing penance, prayer and witness against nuclear weapons and God’s call for peace on earth.
I speak with my friend Jack Cohen-Joppa, who along with his wife, Felice, has published The Nuclear Resister newspaper since 1980.
With over 200 issues, they have chronicled over 100,000 anti-nuclear and anti-war civil disobedience actions and related prosecutions covering thousands of activists, and encouraged support for the women and men jailed and imprisoned for such nonviolent actions.
Their newspaper has tracked every public action that involved crossing a line against war and nuclear weapons, that is, every campaign, every local and regional grassroot effort, and the rise and fall of national movements. When you open its pages or study their website, you discover a whole world of peace activism that few know about.
It routinely documents nonviolent direct actions—including recent demonstrations at California's Vandenberg Space Force Base where activists protest the testing and modernization of nuclear missile systems.
Jack's nuclear education began in 1978 while participating in a year-long civil disobedience campaign at the Rocky Flats nuclear weapons plant outside Denver, and standing trial with Daniel Ellsberg and eight others that autumn.
Theirs is a lifetime of steadfast resistance in campaigns at the Pentagon, Livermore Labs, Los Alamos Labs, the Nevada Test Site, the Trident submarine bases and the Plowshares
“We face a nuclear threat now that is comparable with the threat we faced during the Cold War,” Jack says. “Our challenge is to continue to delegitimize and stigmatize the building of nuclear weapons.
I am in touch with the people who believe that hope is a verb and take action. We believe that this is work worth doing.”
Listen in and discover an ongoing grassroots movement against nuclear weapons and get with the program.
Please visit their site at: www.nuclearresister.org
Supporters can sign up for action alerts, read chronicled histories of dissent, and find instructions on how to write letters of support to imprisoned peace activists.
For those of us who have spent time in jail and prison for civil disobedience against nuclear weapons, Jack and Felice are longtime faithful heroes.
He continues to study, write and speak publicly about nuclear issues.
Beatitudescenter.org
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🌻, John

On this week's episode I reflect on the Gospel of John, chapter 11, the story of the raising of Lazarus, based on my book, Lazarus Come Forth!
I propose that John rewrote the Gospel story to portray Jesus as the God of life who calls humanity in the person of Lazarus out of the tombs of death, out of empire, violence and war, and command us to unbind humanity from the trappings of death and let humanity go free in the fullness of life and resurrection peace.
The message is: have nothing to do with death, with violence, injustice, war or anything that inflicts death on others. Instead, live life to the full, and help others live life to the full.
Possibly you'll recognize yourself in these scriptures:
How the male disciples promise to walk with him but never show up;
How the professional mourners weep over Lazarus, even though they just tried to stone Jesus to death;
How Martha tries to stop Jesus’ nonviolent resistance;
How Jesus announces, "I am the resurrection and the life. Whoever is fully alive here and now in the present moment of resurrection peace, and believes in me as I walk the way of life and nonviolence and confront the forces of death, will never die.” “Do you believe this?” he asks us.

As Jesus approaches the tomb, he issues three new commandments:
“Take away the stone!”
“Lazarus/Humanity come forth!”
“Unbind humanity and let him go free.”
Listen for my conclusion of this climactic call of John’s Gospel, and what our mission is today.
See what you think. I hope you like it.
My book is available here
More writings from me: beatitudescenter.org
You can find me on Substack https://fatherjohndear.substack.com/
🌻, John

On today’s new episode of “The Nonviolent Jesus Podcast,” I speak with my friend Dr. Catherine Meeks, a nationally recognized leader in racial healing and founder of the Turquoise & Lavender Institute for Transformation and Healing.
Her latest book is .Bridging the Rivers of Difference: A Proclamation of Unity in Resistance
Her other books include The Night Is Long but Light Comes in the Morning: Meditations on Racial Healing, and The Quilted Life: Reflections of a Sharecropper’s Daughter. She spent 25 years as chair of the African American Studies program at Mercer University.
“I grew up poor and black in Arkansas, and my way in the world is to connect to the spiritual and God and the way people should be treated right,” she says. This country was founded on the notion that some humans were worth more than others, included black people and women. The Constitution wasn't talking about us. The Heritage Foundation has been working militantly with Project 2025, but we have to be willing to stop having a hierarchy of human value.
“Racism has injured us all,” she continues. “Everyone has been wounded by it. The culture in the US reinforces the notion that people of color are inferior to white people, but we're all made in God's image and we all deserve to be treated right. We have to create new narratives and trust each other enough to work for the general welfare that benefits everybody, not just one set of people."
“We need to recognize the nonviolent Jesus. To dehumanize another person is violent while Jesus was always respecting people. There is no Jesus for warmongers. War is never going to end other wars. We need to reimagine what nonviolence really is about. I see this moment as a time to come to grips with what kind of human we want to be.”
Listen in to hear the powerful words of Dr. Catherine Meeks!
www.turquoiseandlavender.com
beatitudescenter.org
https://fatherjohndear.substack.com/

“My mantra now is, ‘Let it go, let it go, let it go,’” theologian Ron Rolheiser tells John Dear
On today’s episode I speak with my friend writer and theologian, Fr. Ron Rolheiser, one of the most popular Catholic writers in the world, about his new book, Insane for the Light: A Spirituality for Our Wisdom Years, the conclusion of his trilogy of modern spiritual classics, following The Holy Longing and Sacred Fire.
Fr. Ron Rolheiser is the author of many other best-sellers including The Restless Heart, The Shattered Lantern, Forgotten Among the Lilies; Prayer; and The Passion and the Cross. Orbis published an anthology, Ron Rolheiser: Essential Spiritual Writings.
He recently retired from his position as President of the Oblate School of Theology in San Antonio, Texas, but continues to write, teach and speak around the country.
You can learn more about him at his website: www.ronrolheiser.com
Speaking about a spirituality for our wisdom years, Ron invites us to address anger, and other forms of resentment and bitterness, and let it go into softness, forgiveness, and gratitude.
“I've spent most of the years of my life in leadership and now nobody's asking for my opinion,” he says. “Letting go of control is difficult. As my health deteriorates, I have to learn to let go. My mantra now is, ‘let it go, let it go, let it go.’ But as I move from full time activity into passivity, I’m asking myself, ‘Who am I when I stop doing? When you're God's beloved, how do we actually own that?’”
“In my lifetime I've never lived through darker days,” he adds. “We're trying to solve violence with violence, but violence begets violence. Politicians are openly saying that compassion is weakness. We've never needed the message of nonviolence more than now.
"The Sermon on the Mount is the greatest moral code ever written. We have to be the ones who stand up and live in hope! To do that, we have to keep a subversive sense of humor.”
Listen in to this great wisdom teacher and be inspired!
beatitudescenter.org
ronrolheiser.com
🌻, John