Violence is not only immoral but also impractical and, finally, futile. The attitudes of nonviolence are impossible without an infusion of agape love and our reliance upon that infusion. Agape love is willingness to serve without the desire for reciprocation, willingness to suffer without the desire for retaliation, and willingness to reconcile without the desire for domination. This is clearly a Divine love that the small self cannot achieve by itself. Believe in the power of love, the power of goodness, the power of the Divine is working through us to overcome hatred and violence. That profound sense of nonviolence really works. Nonviolence is much more than a philosophical idea or a tactic. It is the way to relate to other human beings, a way of life, a way of working for change. The humanity in each of us touched. True nonviolent practice is founded on spiritual seeing. Spiritual seeing is essential nonviolence.

Please join Dr. Robert Ferrell, as he invites us to reconnect with that which is deepest in us, that which is in the highest degree, that which is essential. Often nonviolence training has understandably emphasized largely external methods or ways of acting and resisting. While these methods are important and necessary, but we must go even deeper. Unless those methods finally reflect inner attitudes, they will not make a lasting difference.

Our goal is to create a beloved community and this will require a qualitative change in our souls as well as a quantitative change in our lives. —Rev. Dr. martin Luther King Jr.

Nonviolence is a way of strength and not a way for cowards. Nonviolence is the discovery of a different kind of power. Nonviolence is a spirituality, not just a tactic. Nonviolence is always winning the friendship and the understanding of the supposed opponent. The opponent must be seen not so much as an evil person, but as a symbol of a much greater systemic evil. We must aim our efforts at that greater evil, which is harming all of us, rather than at the opponent. This love ethic must be at the center of our whole life, or it cannot be effective or real in the crucial moments of conflict. We must practice drawing our lives from this new Source, in thought, word, emotion, and deed. Nonviolence relies on a kind of cosmic optimism which trusts that the universe is finally and fully on the side of justice and truth.

Essential Nonviolence