There are two types of justice. The first type of justice is primarily concerned with equalizing the scales. You insult me, so I have the right to insult you back. You break into my home, so I have the right to break you. You attack my nation’s soil, so I have the right to put you into the soil. This type of justice is commonly referred to as punitive or retributive justice; it has its most popular basis in the Biblical sanction to redress harm by taking an “eye for an eye.”

Punitive justice relies on fear. A justice of fear is preoccupied with the loss of something deemed important or valuable, and it is generally fixated on the militant preservation of social comforts. These social comforts range from material possessions to intangibles such as relationships or values. The fear of losing respect has spilled more bloodshed than all of the isms combined. On a personal level, the cycle of violence that fear based justice perpetuates is founded on a lie that we must sometimes want to harm another person. Fear based justice is incapable of stopping the cycle of violence because it makes self- defense morally preferable to creative suffering. On a national and global scale, this mentality has resulted in unfathomable atrocities.

Countering a justice of fear, the supreme Chinese philosopher of the Tao Te Ching advises that, “There is no greater misfortune than underestimating your enemy. Underestimating your enemy means thinking that he is evil. Thus you destroy your three treasures and become an enemy yourself.” (Mitchell 69). The three treasures are simplicity, patience, and compassion. If one is “patient with both friends and enemies, they will accord with the way things are” (Mitchell 69), and if we are compassionate toward ourselves, we will reconcile all beings to the world. Whereas fear based justice may succeed in presenting a mirage of mutual understanding, in actuality it only establishes the practical foundation for revenge.

Unlike the selfish and sometimes malicious characteristics that define fear based justice, the virtues of simplicity, patience and compassion are the cornerstones of authentic justice, or what can be referred to as courageous justice; it is a type of justice that radiates with luminescent empathy for the alienated and downtrodden. Courageous justice sees the scales of equality as a devious device of distraction that takes us away from the truth of our inner connectedness to each other and the Earth. The scales can never be even in the eyes of courageous justice because equality presupposes separation.

Courageous justice was totally embodied by the political saint Mohandas K. Gandhi. Throughout his life Gandhi worked for a type of justice rooted in the undying vitality of truth and principled action. Early in his career he became a barrister and strove to master British jurisprudence. As a leader of ashrams he was expected to arbitrate disputes and settle petty grievances. As an intrepid opponent of untouchability and child marriages he challenged Hinduism to renounce its dogmatic affiliation with hate injected casteism. And as a social reformer in South Africa and India he struggled against the barbaric precepts of white supremacy.

But perhaps the purest expression of courageous justice can be seen in the way Gandhi related to the rural poor of India. At the age of 51, he vowed to stop wearing his familiar garb and don simple Khadi dress. Gandhi wanted to completely self- identify with the poor. What did it mean to be called Mahatma (translated as “Great Soul in Beggars Clothing”) and own more than the lowliest child? Towards the end of his prolific life he had forgone eating anything except nuts, some fruit, and an insipid porridge. Gandhi could not stomach the thought of enjoying more nutrition than a starving mother. He once said that “there are people who are so hungry in this world that God can only come to them in the form of bread.” This is a beautiful example of courageous justice because Gandhi did not want to be equal to the poor; he wanted to become one with the poor. Courageous justice stands in opposition to the fallacy of separate but equal; it also stands for the proposition that we are all inseparable.

Finally, courageous justice is a significant feature of a larger scientific, social, and spiritual phenomenon called ahimsa. Ahimsa can be understood as the power which emerges within an individual once they eradicate the desire to harm any living entity. The individual who is consumed with the power of ahimsa is not at all concerned with fear based incentives such as personal reputation, the protection of commodities, or even national pride.

So according to Gandhi, we can trust ahimsa to achieve a type of justice that does not leave dirt and destruction in its wake. Ahimsa is a clean and constructive justice that can only be understood “in its positive form, which means the largest love, the greatest charity.” A follower of ahimsa must love their enemy. Gandhi said, “The gift of life is the greatest of all gifts. A person who gives it in reality disarms all hostility… And no one who is himself or herself subject of fear can bestow that gift. She must therefore herself be fearless. We cannot practice ahimsa and be a coward at the same time. The practice of ahimsa calls forth the greatest courage.”

Sources

All quotes from Gandhi are taken from The Penguin Gandhi Reader, Edited by Rudrangshu Mukerjee  (Penguin Books 1993)

Tao Te Ching, Translated by Stephen Mitchell (Harper Perennial 1998)

by Kit Miller

On April 18, 2012, the Gandhi Institute co-sponsored an talk called ‘The Courage to Refuse War’ with Columbian conscioustions objector Sebastián Patiño with several Rochester faith groups and with the Fellowship of Reconciliation. These are my notes from the talk. All errors in terms of facts and figures are mine!

While US youth struggle with little or no funding for jobs, education, and services, the US spends over $6 billion a year in support of Columbia’s military…….

Sebastián Patiño is 19 yrs old. He is a Conscientious Objector (CO) in Columbia, a US ally. Officially, Columbia does not have a mandatory draft for the armed services.

Sebastián began by describing what it is like to live in a country that has been enduring civil conflict for close to 60 years.
The numbers are hard to integrate:
More than 50000 people are gone, victims of what are called ‘forced disappearances’;
Recruitment of child soldiers aged 8-17 is the 4th highest in world;
More than 800 mass grave sites, some with hundreds of bodies, dot the country–one just a few miles from Sebastian’s home.

He shared his reasons for resisting military service, in a country where resisting such service renders you a second class citizen, or worse. “I resist because I don’t want to have connection with so much violence and devastation. 46 percent of my people live in poverty. The only way to get ot of military service is by ‘paying out’.
People who can afford it opt out, so it is the poor who pay again by having their young men forced to serve.”

Trying to be a CO in Columbia is difficult and dangerous. Without the military ID that young recruits receive, Sebastian is unable to obtain a job, or to officially graduate from the school he attended, or to travel by road in the country. It is dangerous for him even to use mass transit in Bogota, the city where he lives, because the military stops young people using the trains and detains them if they do not have military identification. Sebastian described ‘street run ups’ when the military illegally detains young people (see photo).
Many youth disappear through these roundups; from 2004-2007 there were 150,000 registered complaints of this happening.
Although Columbia’s Supreme Country outlawed street run ups in November, 2011, they continue to occur.

A friend and fellow CO, Jose, who was illegally recruited during a street run up was taken from Bogota to the Amazon region on the other side of the country. He was threatened with a knife by a military officer for refusing to participate. The Fellowship of Reconciliation, the Mennonite church of Columbia and others created a campaign to release him. After some months, Jose was released. When he went to a security office to get a background check for a job, he was arrested and charged with desertion. The campaign to release him was re-eneacted. He was released but is now on parole. All of this happened to Jose simply for following his conscience.

Sebastian is grateful to his family, to the Fellowship of Reconciliation and to the Mennonite church in Columbia for their support of him as well other COs. Unfortunately the Catholic church, a major institute in Columbia, does not support them.

US taxpayers are heavily involved. Current annual allocation to Columbia from the US is $9 billion dollars. 72% of those funds goes to the military. In addition, the US military maintains 14 bases in Columbia.

Sebastian asks the people in the US to do whatever they can to stop funding the war and violence in Columbia.

For more information about Sebastian and his national speaking tour with the fellowship of reconciliation,
see Columbia project

To contribute to the Fellowship of Reconciliation project in Columbia,
donate here.

Conditional nonviolence is incapable of overcoming unconditional evil.

Nonviolence is the opportunity to suffer for your enemy.

To harbor zero malice towards any sentient being is only the beginning of nonviolence.

Only through self-identification is it possible to treat a vicious person with grace.

Pacifism is the refusal to preempt war on oneself.  

Faith without action is unpublicized doubt.

VIOLENCE

Logic and violence are never far apart: notice how there is always a reason for striking back.

The world ferments with undistilled violence.

No weapon is more sinister than another; from stones, to switchblades, to stealth bombers, all weapons have agony as a goal.

In cultures of violence a normal person is someone who walks around under great duress without saying anything.

Violence is a burning lack of awareness.

Without restorative justice prisons become monster farms.

One aspect of embodiment is a continued focus on celebration and gratitude.  When I was in the early days of learning Nonviolent Communication, I asked the originator of that work, Marshall Rosenberg, how he developed the capacity to become more present to his own life.  He smiled and pulled out a little book from his pocket (now perhaps he would pull out a smart phone!) and showed me his gratitude log. “This is how I do it still,” he said.  “whenever I have a  free moment I jot down what I am grateful for.”

That practice has supported me to train my attention on the ongoing flow of gifts I can tend to take for granted: blue skies and birdsong as I type in this moment, a good night of sleep, food, help from colleagues, friends, neighbors and family that flows in all of the time.  Gratitude of this kind balances tendencies I have to overwork, and to worry about the future because it invites me to awareness of what is in front of me.  It helps me to stay open and curious that I don’t know what my most important act of the day will be!  Maybe it will be the thing I predict (a meeting or writing something like this).  Maybe it will be stopping to notice and connect with someone, especially when I notice distress, instead of just walking by.

Paul Chappell, who is visiting the  Gandhi Institute later this week, added to my understanding of the importance of celebration and gratitude through his recent book Peaceful Revolution by noting that this  practice also leads to increased sense of stewardship.  More appreciation of my body helps me want to take better care of myself. The same is true for my relationships, and for the earth itself.

Invite friends and family to hear Paul speak in Rochester this Friday, Mar 23 7:30 pm- FREE! Donations gratefuly accepted.  C-span will record this talk.

http://bethechangerochester.org/ai1ec_event/paul-chappell-lecture/?instance_id=1

One aspect of embodiment is a continued focus on celebration and gratitude.  When I was in the early days of learning Nonviolent Communication, I asked the originator of that work, Marshall Rosenberg, how he developed the capacity to become more present to his own life.  He smiled and pulled out a little book from his pocket (now perhaps he would pull out a smart phone!) and showed me his gratitude log. “This is how I do it still,” he said.  “whenever I have a  free moment I jot down what I am grateful for.”

That practice has supported me to train my attention on the ongoing flow of gifts I can tend to take for granted: blue skies and birdsong as I type in this moment, a good night of sleep, food, help from colleagues, friends, neighbors and family that flows in all of the time.  Gratitude of this kind balances tendencies I have to overwork, and to worry about the future because it invites me to awareness of what is in front of me.  It helps me to stay open and curious that I don’t know what my most important act of the day will be!  Maybe it will be the thing I predict (a meeting or writing something like this).  Maybe it will be stopping to notice and connect with someone, especially when I notice distress, instead of just walking by.

Paul Chappell, who is visiting the  Gandhi Institute tomorrow night, added to my understanding of the importance of celebration and gratitude through his recent book Peaceful Revolution by noting that this  practice also leads to increased sense of stewardship.  More appreciation of my body helps me want to take better care of myself. The same is true for my relationships, and for the earth itself.

Invite friends and family to hear Paul speak in Rochester this Friday, Mar 23 7:30 pm- FREE! Donations gratefuly accepted.  C-span will record this talk.

http://bethechangerochester.org/ai1ec_event/paul-chappell-lecture/?instance_id=1

We are busy this month at the Gandhi Institute prepping for the annual celebration of the Season for Nonviolence, January 30-April 4.

We are thrilled to have the support of a major media campaign by the Ad Council for the Season this year, and the support of 15 local groups involved with planning the Season since last summer.

Highlights of this newsletter include:

• Meet the Gandhi Fellows
• River Keepers in Action
• Highlights from the 2011 M.K. Gandhi Fall Intensive
• Interview with Professor Dena Swanson of the Warner School
• Upcoming Events

View the full newsletter here

• Wheelbarrow
• Shovels
• Rakes
• Gardening gloves
• Colorful outdoor paint to decorate our fence
• Composter
• 48’ of Rain Gutter to create a rain collection system
• Cinderblocks
• Hand trowels
• Tarp
• Mulch and compost
• Straw bales
• Shed or lumber for a shed
• Asparagus starts
• Seed Potatoes
• Flower bulbs or seeds

All the more so when the subject is religion and spirituality.

Happily, around Rochester anyway, college students are among the first to grasp the importance of dialogue. Husain Bawany, 21, a junior biology and religious studies major at St. John Fisher College, organized a recent, highly successful event he dubbed “Coexistence, Dinner and Dialogue” for about 65 students and a few others from Rochester-area colleges. They met Dec. 10 at Fisher, where they shared a meal, shared some of their religious beliefs and experiences, and began to explore ways they can be a part of each other’s lives. They were Christian, Muslim, Jewish, Hindu, Buddhist and others.

Bawany, a Muslim and a native of Pakistan, has lived in Brighton since he was a young child. He pulled this event together as part of his work as a fellow with the M.K. Gandhi Institute for Nonviolence at the University of Rochester.

“There’s a lot of support from the colleges,” he says, “for us to come together and expose ourselves to others’ religious beliefs, eye to eye, with a civil discourse.” In all traditions, Bawany says, “service is a universal.” Pulling together to do something for others, he says, is a powerful way to build a relationship. One of the first things they’ll do, Bawany says, is write cards with greetings of hope to be distributed to refugee children at Mary’s Place, a refugee services center in Rochester.

“I grew up Baptist,” says Eric Williams, 20, a junior accounting major at Fisher with a religious studies minor.

His faith is important to him, Williams says, but he’s very interested in other religious views.

Faith “isn’t about following rules,” he says, “but finding a relationship with God.” He believes there are things he can learn from students from other faith traditions.

Naomi Ahsan, 22, a UR neuroscience major from Brighton and a Muslim, says an Interfaith Leadership Institute that she and Bawany attended last year at Georgetown University in Washington taught them there are protocols (speaking only for yourself, for example, not for all members of your faith) that make the conversation easier. The Coexistence gathering, she says, “is one of many efforts to foster a real dialogue. There is a belief that people do have similarities if you dig deep enough.”

There are many misconceptions and simple questions people have concerning other faiths, Bawany says. And this event gave students a chance to ask, and test. It also was an opportunity for students who have no religious faith or who are skeptical to sharetheir views.

I give these students a lot of credit for being smart enough to know that the conversation is essential not to bridging all religious differences, but to seeing the humanity in others — and discovering that humanity puts us on the road to nonviolent approaches to solving problems. It’s a tough thing — to share deep principles of faith that we accept as true, all the while learning to accept and even search for the truth in others’ views.

“We welcome people coming together,” says Kit Miller, who directs the Gandhi Institute, “because in an odd way, we are so conflict-averse these days that we actually add to the potential for violence by ignoring its causes.”

But to make the most of dialogue, she says, “you have to be willing to be changed.”

Mark Hare’s column appears Tuesdays, Thursdays and Sundays. He can be reached at (585) 258-2351.