{"id":180714,"date":"2021-03-15T12:00:25","date_gmt":"2021-03-15T12:00:25","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/?p=180714"},"modified":"2021-03-10T07:45:01","modified_gmt":"2021-03-10T07:45:01","slug":"my-long-lost-conversation-with-john-lewis-on-his-vision-of-nonviolence","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/2021\/03\/my-long-lost-conversation-with-john-lewis-on-his-vision-of-nonviolence\/","title":{"rendered":"My Long-Lost Conversation with John Lewis on His Vision of Nonviolence"},"content":{"rendered":"
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In this never-before-released interview, the late civil rights leader and congressman talks systemic racism, permanent warfare, extreme poverty and nonviolence as a way of life.<\/em><\/div>\n<\/blockquote>\n
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SELMA, ALABAMA – MARCH 01: Rep. John Lewis (D-GA) speaks to the crowd at the Edmund Pettus Bridge crossing reenactment marking 55th anniversary of Selma’s Bloody Sunday on March 1, 2020 in Selma, Alabama. Mr. Lewis marched for civil rights across the bridge 55 years ago. Some of the 2020 Democratic presidential candidates attended the Selma bridge crossing jubilee ahead of Super Tuesday. (Photo by Joe Raedle\/Getty Images)<\/p><\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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3 Mar 2021 – <\/em>Last summer, after Congressman John Lewis died, I posted a photo on social media of me and John from a memorable afternoon we spent together in his congressional office. It was 26 years ago. We had talked for a while, and then filmed a formal conversation on nonviolence.Needless to say, it was one of the greatest days of my exciting life.<\/p>\n

We stayed in touch over the years, and a few years ago, I ran into him in a parking lot in Washington, D.C. \u201cWhy don\u2019t you ever come and see me?\u201d he asked. I wanted to respond that he was so famous now, I couldn\u2019t get through his staff. Instead, I promised I would. In fact, I tried hard to get him to join our Campaign Nonviolence grassroots project, and speak at our national conference, but it turned out, by then, he was too sick.<\/p>\n

Last summer, I was invited to join the national committee of Selma Jubilee \u2014 the annual crossing of the Pettus Bridge in Selma, Alabama \u2014 to mark the historic 1965 march led by John Lewis where he and hundreds of others were chased by horses and beaten up. The horrific event led to Martin Luther King\u2019s March to Montgomery and the Voting Rights Act. It is the oldest ongoing civil right march against racism and for justice in the United States.<\/p>\n

\u201cIf someone had told me when I was marching from Selma to Montgomery that one day I would be in the Congress, I would have said you\u2019re crazy. But you know, it shouldn\u2019t be strange.\u201d<\/strong><\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

This weekend, March 5-7, marks the 56th anniversary of the Selma march, and the first totally online commemoration. The organizers and I have worked hard since last summer to put together an astonishing three-day online program that will feature over a hundred speakers and participants, including many national leaders<\/a> (such as Rev. William Barber, Rev. Jim Lawson and Dr. Bernard Lafayette) as well as original foot soldiers from 1965. All of the events are free, but you have to register for it<\/a>. We expect thousands of people from around the country and world to watch.<\/p>\n

Part of the extensive program includes a film series. We were unable to attain the film rights for the recent John Lewis PBS films, so I went looking in my own collection for a copy of the interview I filmed with the great man all those years ago. After having it digitized, I finally watched it for the first time, and the memories immediately flowed back<\/p>\n

It was 1995, I was 35-year-old newly ordained priest fresh out of jail after hammering on a nuclear weapon in a Plowshares disarmament action with Philip Berrigan.\u00a0 Watching John in the interview, you see him at his best \u2014 calm, centered, clear, earnest, kind, gentle and wise, full of the wisdom and peace that comes from a lifetime of redemptive nonviolent suffering love, as King would say.<\/p>\n

Here below, for the first time in print, is a lightly edited transcript of our conversation. I offer it in the hope that readers will join the massive online commemoration this weekend to celebrate John\u2019s life and the ongoing movement. We hope to broadcast the video interview sometime during the online events. In the meantime, may it inspire us to keep on marching, organizing and speaking out against systemic racism, permanent warfare, extreme poverty, nuclear weapons and environmental destruction, and to pursue John Lewis\u2019 glorious vision of a new culture of nonviolence.<\/p>\n

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A photo from John Dear\u2019s meeting with Rep. John Lewis in 1995. (WNV\/John Dear)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Let me start right off and ask you what nonviolence means for you and how you got involved and committed to the life of Christian nonviolence?<\/strong><\/p>\n

I must tell you that I grew up in rural Alabama during the \u201840s and 50s. I grew up in a Christian home where there was a great deal of love. At an early age, I came to appreciate the philosophy and discipline of Christian love. So, I view nonviolence as Christian love in action. It is a part of my faith; it is believing that love is the most powerful force in the universe. And somehow, someway, you have to live it.<\/p>\n

Tell me how you got involved in organizing sit-ins against segregation in restaurants and how you formed the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee.<\/strong><\/p>\n

I was deeply inspired by Martin Luther King Jr. and Rosa Parks. When I was a young child in Troy, Alabama, about 50 miles south of Montgomery, I would visit Montgomery and I saw signs that said \u201cwhite men, colored men, white women, colored women, white waiting, colored waiting.\u201d Segregation was the order of the day. And I resented the system of segregation, and I wanted to do something about it.<\/p>\n

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