John Dear > Quotes

“Everything I've read about Christians in prison for their non-violent witness to Christ rings true. Whether it's St. Paul, St. Edmund Campion, Dorothy Day or Dr. King, the experience remains the same: God comes close to those in prison. God's spirit is unleashed on the person who suffers imprisonment in a spirit of obedient love. God is a God of prisoners, a God of the poor, a God of the oppressed--but most of all, as the life of Jesus testifies, a God of nonviolent resisters. God is a God of nonviolence and peace.”
― John Dear

“Non-violence confronts systematic injustice with active love, but refuses to retaliate with further violence under any circumstances. In order to halt the vicious cycles of violence, it requires a willing acceptance of suffering and death rather than inflicting suffering or death on anyone else.”
― John Dear, Living Peace: A Spirituality of Contemplation and Action

“Those of us who would follow Jesus are precluded from drawing the sword. We are people who love our enemies; who prefer to undergo violence rather than inflict it upon others; who reject every form of violence, from nuclear weapons to chemical weapons to Trident submarines to handguns. (...) We renounce war and violent self-defense, tear up the just-war theory, and embrace gospel nonviolence. We not only put back any swords we have, but we beat them into plowshares. The unarmed Christ disarms us. Christ's community, the Church, is a community of nonviolence.”
― John Dear, Jesus the Rebel: Bearer of God's Peace and Justice

“Catastrophic climate change is the natural consequence of global systemic violence. That means, it is intimately connected with racism, sexism, classism, militarism, war, nuclear weapons, and every form of violence. If we want to deepen our nonviolence and our conscious oneness with the earth, we have to connect the various facets of systemic violence with environmental destruction so we know what we are up against, what we are resisting, and how broad out creative nonviolence needs to go.”
― John Dear, They Will Inherit the Earth: Peace and Nonviolence in a Time of Climate Change

“In Yosemite, we see how everyone can inherit the earth. But that gift requires a change of heart, a new intention, a deliberate turning. From now on, we must go forward, back into the world of violence and war, to do our part to end the killing, the suffering, and the ongoing destruction of Mother Earth. Yosemite, along with all of creation, calls us to wake up, stand up, and stop the insane destruction of the earth before it's too late.”
― John Dear, They Will Inherit the Earth: Peace and Nonviolence in a Time of Climate Change

“Jesus calls us to … “hate” money, give it away to the poor, simplify our lives, practice universal love and compassion, and focus our attention, time, and energy on the God of love and peace. Of course,, this either/or teaching can be applied to all the consequences of the idolatry of money. Jesus could just as easily say: “You cannot serve both God and country. You cannot serve both God and war. You cannot serve both God and nuclear weapons. You cannot serve both the God of life and peace and the false gods of death and war. It’s one or the other.”
― John Dear, The Beatitudes of Peace: Meditations on the Beatitudes, Peacemaking & the Spiritual Life

“Everyone is called to live their lives right now in the kingdom of God, to practice now as if they were already in the fullness of the presence of the God of peace. As we do, we will reject every form of violence, from war and executions to racism and sexism to nuclear weapons and corporate greed to destructive behavior to the creatures and Mother Earth.”
― John Dear, They Will Inherit the Earth: Peace and Nonviolence in a Time of Climate Change

“To utter this prayer (the Lord’s Prayer) is to renounce our national identity and recognize our true identity as a son or daughter of the God of peace, our beloved Father (and Mother), and a brother or sister of every human being on earth. With this prayer, we breathe in and out our dependence of God and God’s Kingdom, and place our entire focus on the God of peace and God’s kingdom.”
― John Dear, The Beatitudes of Peace: Meditations on the Beatitudes, Peacemaking & the Spiritual Life

“For Jesus, we are merely stewards of Mother Earth, nonviolent people living in and tending the Creator's glorious vineyard. We are not to destroy it or one another, but live and work in peace in this glorious creation. it's time we learn the lesson, Jesus tells us, and do our part to car for the vineyard of creation.”
― John Dear, They Will Inherit the Earth: Peace and Nonviolence in a Time of Climate Change

“I do not think "purity" means perfection, nor is it an unreachable goal. When Jesus calls us to purity of heart, he's calling us to an inner journey toward an ever-widening heart of love and compassion for all others, all creation, and the Creator. Purity of heart or inner purity is a process, a way of life, not a static goal. He calls us to a soft heart that beats, not a cold heart of stone. When understood this way, this Beatitude becomes an exciting invitation to an inner journey of love, compassion, nonviolence, and peace.”
― John Dear, The Beatitudes of Peace: Meditations on the Beatitudes, Peacemaking & the Spiritual Life