We live in a world torn by violence and war. I am surrounded by violence of one type or another daily. Violence has been done to me. One of the tenants of the Catholic Worker is non-violence. Through the years I have evolved to see violence in different forms. One of the reasons I am now a vegan is because violence in any form is wrong and destructive–destroying our environment and destroying us. The Gospel calls us to love our neighbors. Several years ago I began to doing this 40 Day Retreat of Non-Violence. I eat one meal a day and drink water during the day. I have found it a means of reminding me of my part in our violent society and my part in protesting and turning inward to God who creates all things new and my prayer is that I too will become a new creation. I invited you to join me in this fast beginning July 1 in some form or another and look at the violence in your life, and around you, and let God work with you on your inner being, and from this to grow into a new awareness with God in Christ.. This year I am praying for the prisoners at Guantanamo and for Bradley Manning.
Fr. River+
An invitation to participate in the
ANNUAL FORTY-DAY FAST
For the Truth
of
Gospel Nonviolence
“This is the kind (of unclean spirit) that can be driven out only by prayer and fasting.”
MARK 9:29
An Invitation to Fast for the Truth of Gospel Nonviolence
The test of the sincerity of one’s prayer is the willingness to work for that for which one prays.
The test of the sincerity of one’s work is the willingness to pray for that for which one works.
—St. John Chrysostom
Jesus Christ is the incarnation of the true God, who is Agapé, Unconditional Love, Unending
Forgiveness and Everlasting Mercy toward all without exceptions. The person who sees Jesus sees
God, for Jesus and God are One. Jesus is the Incarnation of God. It is the Spirit of this God, the Spirit
of Jesus which is life giving. It is this God in whose image and likeness we are formed. There is no
other God. All that is not of the only true God is illusion, idolatry and death.
The God of the New Testament, the God who dwells fully in Jesus Christ, the God in whose image
and likeness human beings are made, the only true God is not a warrior God who will lead people in
historical victories over enemies. The Way of Jesus is not the way of violence, retaliation and enmity.
The Way of the Jesus of the Gospels is the Way of Nonviolent Love of all. What Jesus taught by word
and deed for times of common affairs, as well as for times of crises, is nonviolence, non-retaliation,
love of enemy, forgiveness seventy times seven, return of good for evil—mercy. Since God is love and
Christ is God, to live in the life of God is to obey Jesus’ new commandment to “love one another as I
have loved you.” This means that the Christian—the human being who says he or she desires to follow
Jesus—commits herself or himself wholeheartedly to following Jesus, who did not use violence and
who did not threaten the use of violence, but chose instead—even under the threat of lethal violence—
to overcome evil with love. Jesus Christ is the truth of God and Nonviolent Love of friends and
enemies is the truth of Jesus Christ.
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Therefore, it must be said clearly, and again and again, that violence is not the Christian Way, that
violence is not the Gospels’ Way, that violence is not the Apostolic Way, that violence is not the Way
of Jesus, that violence is not the Way of God. It must be said clearly, and again and again, that this
does not mean that only nuclear violence and retaliation are contrary to the Way of Jesus—but all
violence and retaliation, even culturally condoned, romanticized and legalized violence and retaliation,
are contrary to the Way of Jesus, which is the Way of Eternal Salvation for one and all. Hence, any
activity that cannot be conducted without violence or any end that cannot be achieved without violence
is an activity or an end that cannot be conducted or achieved by the followers of Jesus Christ. It is also
an activity or end that is not needed in God’s Plan of Redemption through, with and in Jesus, the
Christ.
Violence is mutiny against mercy. In a world that is daily engulfed by the organized mercilessness of
governments, militaries, corporations and media, Jesus’ teaching is clear. Christ authorized no one to
substitute violence for merciful love. As the renowned biblical scholar, Rev. John L. McKenzie
concludes, “If we cannot know from the New Testament that Christ totally rejects violence, then we can
know nothing of His person or message. It is the clearest of teachings.” All the ways of God are mercy.
In the Incarnation of Mercy in the Nonviolent Jesus, God’s being, outside of time and beyond the world,
unfolds itself in time and before the world. Mercy is what God is. Mercy is why we are. Mercy is what
we need. Mercy is what God wants. Mercy is the supreme attribute of the Father, the Son and the Holy
Spirit. The Way of Nonviolent Christlike Merciful Love is the path for our pilgrimage to the Absolute.
The works of war are not the works of Christlike mercy. Yet, since the fourth century most Christians
have not proclaimed that violence is not the Christian Way, that violence is not the Gospels’ Way, that
violence is not the Apostolic Way, that violence is not the Way of Jesus. In fact, during the last 1700
years, at one time or another, Christians have justified, as consistent with the Way of Jesus,
participation in such activities as war, capital punishment, torture, assassination, the burning to death
of heretics, witches and homosexuals, colonialism, violent enmity-creating nationalism, violent
tribalism, violent revolution, abortion, genocide, wife-beating, child-beating, etc. And they have
participated in these horrors, believing they are not engaged in evil, but in faithfully following Jesus.
The spiritually symbolic low point of this false proclamation of and witness tothe Gospel—this
incarnational heresy—occurs on August 9 in the years of Our Lord during World War II. On August 9
in 1942 Christians in Auschwitz, Poland—because of the nurturing they received in their Churches—
believed they were following Jesus when they destroyed Edith Stein, Saint Teresia Benedicta of the
Cross—in a gas chamber. On August 9 in 1943 Christians in Berlin, Germany—because of the
nurturing they received in their Churches—believed they were following Jesus when they beheaded
Blessed Franz Jagerstatter, a Christian who refused to join Hitler’s military. On August 9 in 1945
Christians from the United States—because of the nurturing they received in their Churches—believed
they were following Jesus when in nine seconds they incinerated tens of thousands of human beings in
Nagasaki, the oldest and the largest Christian community in Japan.
Today, as for most of the last 1700 years, most Christians continue to be nurtured by their Churches
into the belief that those energies, understandings, emotions and spirits—which have lead inevitably to
hundreds of million of August 9s, large and small, over the centuries—are consistent with faithfully
following Jesus Christ. Today most Christian Churches and their leaderships still do not unequivocally
teach what Jesus unequivocally taught on the subject of violence and enmity. Today most Christian
leaders and most Christians still adamantly and obstinately refuse to proclaim that violence is not the
Christian Way, that violence is not the Gospels’ Way, that violence is not the Apostolic Way, that
violence is not the Way of Jesus, and therefore violence cannot be the Way of the faithful follower of
Jesus.
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It is because of this tragic and sorrowful fact that this Forty Day Fast for the Truth of Gospel
Nonviolence is undertaken again this year for the thirty-first time. It is an entreaty to the Christian
Churches, to the Christian Churches’ leaders and to the individual Christian to repent and turn to the
Christ and learn what God’s will is. It is an appeal to the Christian Churches, to the Christian
Churches’ leaders and to the individual Christian to learn from Him, who unambiguously teaches by
word and deed the Way of Nonviolent Love of friends and enemies as the Way of God, what the Way
of authentic Christian discipleship is. For this is certain, unless this viperous poison of justified, socalled
Jesus endorsed violence and enmity is entirely flushed out of the institutional Churches of
Christianity and out of the hearts and minds of their people, no structural, administrative, personnel,
policy, practice or procedural changes will be worth a spiritual farthing (1 Cor 13). It will just be
sending the same old utterly destructive poison through an updated Church intravenous line.
This Fast for Gospel Nonviolence, for Jesus’ Nonviolence, is a prayer and a plea that the
Universal Church gather in Ecumenical Council on some August 9 in the not too distant
future and declare once and for all that violence is not the Christian Way, that violence is
not the Gospels’ Way, that violence is not the Apostolic Way, that violence is not the Holy
Way, that violence is not the Way of Jesus, that violence is not the Way of God, and
thereby disassociate Herself and Her membership forever from the xenophobic,
nationalistic, jingoistic, tribalistic, parochial, ethnocentric, racist, bigoted, monster gods of
violence and enmity, and from their brutal theologies and politics. Thereby, the Church
will at last be what it was in the beginning for all humanity, and what Jesus intended is it to
be, namely, the extension in time and space of the Nonviolent Jesus Christ of the Gospels,
who teaches as the Way of God and as the Way to peace a Way of Nonviolent Love of all—
friends and enemies—no exceptions.
Please do pray and fast for this intention, as you are able. The smallest effort done in the Spirit of
Christic love in order to bring Jesus’ saving truth, life, love and peace to humanity will be honored
by God and will be fruitful beyond all human calculation.
Submitted for your personal and merciful meditation in Christ-God, amidst the anguish and absurdity
of a world being mercilessly crucified daily by violence.
EMMANUEL CHARLES MCCARTHY