Workshop: Peacemaking, Political Prisoners and Plowshares at Jonah House

Overview

Students will participate in DePaul University Ministry’s spring break service trip to Jonah House, Baltimore, Maryland. Students will need to be accepted by the Department of University Ministry after going through their application process. In addition to University Ministry’s preparatory meetings, students will be required to attend two three-hour sessions before leaving on the social justice service experience. They will meet each evening for reflection and keep a journal during the week they are at Jonah House. This will include a minimum of five hours of reading, writing and reflection during the experience. They will then meet for two two- hour sessions after they return to reflect upon the experience and discuss pertinent complementary readings (15 hours). They will submit a short reflection paper on the experience.

Goals

• To study and become educated regarding the Plowshares Peace movement and the notion of political prisoners of conscience.
• To immerse oneself in an experience of education and action around nonviolent peacemaking.
• To reflect both intellectually and experientially upon concepts, theories and experiences of nonviolent peacemaking in the Catholic Worker, Jonah House tradition
• To become familiar with seminal peacemakers Dorothy Day, Liz McAllister, Daniel and Phil Berrigan and other individuals and actions which are part of the Plowshares peacemaking tradition
• To encourage regular reflection and integration of praxis and critical analysis
• To view videos, read articles and writings, and have experiences of nonviolent peacemaking

• Disciples and Dissidents: Prison Writings of the Prince of Peace Plowshares (2001)
• Can’t Jail the Spirit: Political Prisoners in the U.S. (1998)
• The Sacrament of Civil Disobedience, John Dear, S.J.
• Other articles and handouts from Jonah House

• Preparation Gathering One: Introduction to Jonah House, nonviolent peacemaking and plowshares; handouts and discussion; video–Catonsville 9 –Discussion; Reading assignment from Jonah House and Disciples and Dissidents
• Preparation Gathering Two: Discussion of readings; in-class written reflection; overview of concept of political prisoners and peacemaking; Overview of concept of journaling and preparation for journaling, reading and reflecting during the Jonah House experience; assignment of readings by Phil Berrigan and Liz McAllister and from Can’t Jail the Spirit
• During the trip: Daily group reflection sessions each evening; daily individual journaling
• Post Trip Gathering One: Discussing how the experience and the theory are related or unrelated; review key journal insights; decide on focus for reflection paper integrating experience and readings

• Attendance and Active Participation in All Sessions – 25%
• Journal Entries – 25%
• Oral Review by Faculty Member – 25%
• Final Reflection Paper – 25%

• Berrigan Archives Collection – DePaul University Library
• Jonah House Library
• Seeds of Nonviolence, John Dear, S.J.
• To Dwell in Peace: An Autobiography, Daniel Berrigan, S.J.
• Peace Be With You: Justified Warfare or the Way of Nonviolence, Eileen Egan
• Swords into Plowshares: Nonviolent Direct Action for Disarmament, Peace and Social Justice, Arthur Laffin and Anne Montgomery, Eds.
• Peace Is the Way: Writings on Nonviolence from the Fellowship of Reconciliation, Walter Wink, Ed.

Workshop: Body Wisdom, Non-violence, and the Pursuit of Peace

Peace Studies: How to educate the central nervous system for survival and non-violence. The skeletal system is organized to support us in gravity. The force of gravity shapes our skeletal system and teaches us how to be in its field. It bends, turns and torques in its many joints, produces red blood cells, and is hot wired for movement by the central nervous system. If my eyes are working well I can see to turn. If my ears are working well I can hear with balance. If my skin can feel I sense movement around me, and temperature. If my nose is working well I can small what attracts and repulses me. All which has been endowed by nature to protect us in nature. In other words, the gravity of a situation may call upon us to react quickly for our very own survival. In other words, the gravity of a situation may call upon us to react quickly for our very own survival. How quickly we are able to turn and rise from lying, sitting, or standing, may determine whether we survive an environmental challenge or a physical assault by man or animal.

The skeletal system is also organized for flexibility. It bends, turns, and torques in its many joints, produces red blood cells, and is hot wired for movement by the central nervous system. If my eyes are working well I can see to turn. If my ears are working well I can hear with balance. If my skin can feel I can sense movement around me, such as wind. If my nose is working well I can smell what attracts and repulses me. All this has been endowed by nature to protect us in nature.

A scientist, Moshe Feldenkrais, explored the relationship of the skeletal system to the central nervous system in terms of organizing it for efficient and effortless movement. What he found was the ability for muscle to be used more effectively, a good level of health, and openness to his being in the world. In other words he found awareness through movement, which improved the overall quality of his life. His method is now taught throughout the world in many different languages with the common goal of increasing awareness of self-use.

What then does this have to do with the study of peace? If the shape and health of the brain can be changed and damaged from abuse and violence could the opposite also be true, that, to maintain a healthy state of the mind, the brain must be in an environment free of abuse and violence?

The larger question where Peace Studies is concerned is what does the central nervous system, or ecological system of the body, have to do with establishing a peaceful nature that is cultivated and maintained over a period of centuries if not millennia? In response to these question I propose this course.

Body Wisdom, Non-violence, and the Pursuit of Peace February 2, 1968

In the dark of the moon, in flying snow, in the dead of winter, War spreading, families dying, the world in danger, I walk the rocky hillside, sowing clover. Wendell Berry

Goals

• To find a connection to the body through specific movement based on the Feldenkrais Method®
• To read about somatic learning. Groundworks by Don Hanlon Johnson
• To read from Alice Walker’s Sent by Earth and explore through discussion how the body is viewed by her and the people mentioned in her writing on the subject of September 11, 2001.
• To read Wendell Berry poetry and discuss the body as viewed by him.
• To encounter a somatic experience that leads to or encourages understanding of how the body is organized by gravity.
• To experience and discuss how self-use in gravity can lead to flexible movement and thought and how it can support a person to walk a path of peace.

Lessons

The following lessons could be given over two consecutive Fridays and Saturdays, where each day the class would meet for three hours. The first 45 minutes would be experiential followed by a brief break of five minutes. This would be followed by a one-hour and 15 minutes discussion on the experience, the reading assigned for that day, and how the work relates to the pursuit of peace. The day would end with another experiential lesson lasting 45 minutes, closing with brief remarks for ten minutes.

Day One

Lesson One: Scanning the body and learning to breathe in order to move with less effort. This lesson would be followed by reading aloud from the assigned materials, discussion, and the sharing of opinions.

Lesson Two: The importance of breathing to think. This lesson would be followed by a very short discussion.

Day Two

Lesson Three: Observing what we do with frustration and how it relates to habituated thinking. This lesson would be followed by a discussion of the day’s experience and yesterday’s lesson. It would also include a discussion of the reading material on somatic learning.

Lesson Four: The importance of effortlessness in learning to expand one’s range of movement and thinking. Or how thought is connected to movement and freed by it. This would be followed by a brief discussion and reflection on the two day’s of work.

Day Three

Lesson Five: Awareness of habituated movement and how it affects thinking and emotion. This lesson would be followed by further discussion on somatic learning and Feldenkrais Method®.

Lesson Six: Awareness Through Movement®: What is it and how can we inculcate a consistent flexible use of self in everyday life to promote peace and well-being? This would be followed by a brief discussion of the sixth lesson experience.

Day Four

Lesson Seven: More Awareness Through Movement®: A movement lesson based upon the people present and what the teacher has seen in previous lessons that they can do in order to expand their movement. This would be followed by a discussion on nature, child bearing, war, and non-violence.

Lesson Eight: A brief movement lesson to assist in developing an awareness the student can take with them and use in everyday life. A longer discussion on the four-day experience to find threads of thought that connects with the pursuit of peace and peace studies.

Evaluation

Attendance with participation — 60%

Journal (The journal is kept over an eight-day span which should include in class, out of class, and reading reflections) — 20%

Paper (This would be a summation of thought written in the journal and inspired by the reading and in class experience on the subject of the wisdom of the body, the importance of non-violence, and the pursuit of peace) — 20%

Reading Material

• Sent by Earth by Alice Walker
• Various poems and essays selected from the works of Wendell Berry Groundworks by Don Hanlon Johnson

Workshop: Christian Peacemaker Teams Workshop: Social Change Through Nonviolent Resistance

Christian Peacemaker Teams (CPT) trains teams of internationals for placement in domestic and international conflict settings to reduce violence through nonviolent engagement and intervention. Our work ranges from direct violence reduction to advocacy. CPT is not neutral and takes clear positions on issues of basic justice. We use a participatory approach to workshops and training—the methods we use include role-plays, simulations, small group exercises and presentations. We find that people integrate skills more effectively when given the opportunity to practice their own responses in a variety of scenarios.

Christian Peacemaker Teams Mission

Christian Peacemaker Teams (CPT) is a faith-based international non-governmental organization committed to supporting local efforts in peacemaking. The mission statement of Christian Peacemaker Teams asserts:

CPT offers an organized, nonviolent alternative to war and other forms of lethal inter-group conflict. CPT provides organizational support to persons committed to faith-based nonviolent alternatives in situations where lethal conflict is an immediate reality or is supported by public policy. CPT seeks to enlist the response of the whole church in conscientious objection to war, and the development of nonviolent institutions, skills and training for intervention in conflict situations. To help carry out this mission, CPT sends teams of trained peacemakers (usually four to eight persons from the U.S. and Canada) to different areas of the world where there is conflict in order to help reduce violence and support local efforts in peacemaking. CPT’s role in these conflict settings is not mediation, but rather, nonviolent direct confrontation of the oppressors. CPT’s steering committee asserts:

Nonviolent direct action is an approach which seeks to serve both just ends and peaceful means, most often by working alongside those who are most impacted by the unjust situation. CPT will attempt to be attentive to the truth held by every party, but it will not be neutral on questions of injustice, poverty, hunger and oppression. CPT seeks to pursue a ministry of presence and responsiveness in emergency situations and settings where violent instability often no longer permits evangelism, relief and development work. Our hope is that our presence can create an additional space of security for potential victims as we serve advocates in response to violent incidents. CPT recognizes the importance of the role of mediation in conflict settings, but this is not CPT’s primary work.

The motto of CPT, “Getting in the Way,” reflects CPT’s understanding that to confront systems of domination, peace activists must be willing to risk physical injury and possibly death in the same way that soldiers risk their lives for principles they believe in. An example of this would be Gandhi’s direct confrontation of the British colonists’ economic imperialism with the march to the sea to make salt. Many of Gandhi’s followers were beaten and killed during their nonviolent struggle for liberation. As Christian pacifists, CPTers understand that such nonviolent confrontations involve risk and are willing to make that sacrifice. To remain in the comfort of their homes in the U.S. and Canada and decry war from afar is not what their faith calls them to do. Rather, CPTers believe they are called to be active peacemakers that confront injustice with love and nonviolence.

What does “confronting injustice with love and nonviolence” and “providing an alternative to war” look like on the ground? The concrete ways these abstract goals are carried out look different in each setting where CPT works due to the collaborative work style of CPT with local partners in each country and the specific dynamics of the conflict. The strategies and forms of violence reduction that CPT engages in vary from project to project.

I.   Objective

1. To understand key concepts underlying nonviolence
2. Become familiar with examples of how nonviolence is successfully used to reduce violence and facilitate social change.
3. Introduction to practical skills in nonviolence, including how to successfully organize vigils and campaigns for social change

II.  Tentative Course Outline (Contact hours: 5 three-hour sessions)

1. CPT’s approach to intervening in conflict situations
   1. CPT’s vision and strategy
   2. Storytelling that highlights the concepts that underlie CPT’s use of nonviolence in the field
   3. Power Tableau activity—to show dynamics of power structures
   4. Introduce idea of public witness and begin brainstorming
   
   Readings: CPT literature packet to be read before first session

B. Strategic Nonviolence vs. Nonviolence as a Way of Life

1. Sharp’s theory of nonviolence—strategy
2. Kingian and Gandhian nonviolence—way of life
3. Wink’s argument—the spiritual basis of nonviolence
4. Life-style issues—living simply, war tax resistance, etc.
5. Nonviolent decision-making—consensus

Readings:
Power and Struggle, Gene Sharp (certain chapters)
Gandhi, selected readings
Martin Luther King, Jr., selected readings “The Powers that Be”
Walter WinkWar tax resistance handout

3. Confronting Power, Part 1

1. Watch “A Force More Powerful” video
2. Developing campaigns—elements of campaign; symbolic actions, vigils, fasts
3. Role of civil disobedience in public witness/ Arrets, Jail, Court—choices and expectations
4. Decide on vigil scenario—using consensus

Readings:
Handouts on how to organize a public witness, consensus and facilitation of meetings, public witnesses
“Methods of Nonviolence” handout, Gene Sharp
“A Force More Powerful,” video
CPT at School of the Americas, video

5. Confronting Power, Part 2: Action Preparation
   
   1. Media: How to write a press release, call backs, role plays on how to talk to media
   2. Detailed scenario of action and leadership roles; discuss contingencies
   3. Practice run-through of vigil; role play leafleting; role play dealing with hostile heckler
   4. Continued discussion on role of civil disobedience in public witness: arrest, jail, court—choices and expectations

   Readings:
   Handouts on media and on legal system and arrest/court

6. Confronting Power—Part 3
   
   1. Reducing violence through intervention—a series of simulations and role plays from the CPT experience in Hebron and Colombia, and inner-city violence

   Readings:
   Hebron Journal, Arthur Gish (certain chapters)

III.  Requirements of the Course (Criteria for student evaluation)

1. Participation in class discussion and activities—everyone must participate in group activities (role plays, etc.)
2. Demonstration that the material has been read
3. Written paper—write essays on four of eight questions
4. Successful completion of nonviolent direct action/public witness

Workshop: Dispute Resolution

Title: Understanding Mediation as a Method of Dispute Resolution
Faculty Member: Craig B. Mousin 55 E. Jackson Blvd., Room 853, (312) 362-8707

Overview: This workshop is an introductory course on mediation as a method of dispute resolution. You will study what mediation is as well as contrast it with other forms of dispute resolution such as arbitration, negotiation, and litigation. You will explore when mediation can be employed by individuals and groups to resolve conflict. You will investigate different theories of mediation as problem solving or as transformation of the parties to mediation. You will also explore the role and responsibility of the mediator in planning and holding a mediation session. You will participate in different role play situations to identify key issues in the mediation process. Finally, you will mediate a mock dispute and participate in constructive review of the mediation. Because this is an introductory workshop, you will not learn all the necessary skills to become a mediator. Rather, by exploring how mediation takes place, you will inquire how the mediation process leads to the resolution of disputes by exploring each of the critical parts of the mediation process. Class will meet in five three-hour sessions.

Goals:

1. To understand what mediation is and is not and compare it to other models of dispute resolution.
2. To explore different theories and models of mediation.
3. To understand the opportunities conflict presents for transformation and problem solving.
4. To explore the responsibilities and roles that a mediator engages in when planning and leading a mediation.
5. To participate in a number of role plays exploring different parts of the mediation process as well as a mediator in a hypothetical dispute and join other students in evaluating the mock mediation.
6. To understand how the mediation process is designed to reach mutually agreed upon solutions to disputes in various settings.

REQUIRED READING

• Fisher, Roger and Ury, William, and Patton, Bruce, Getting to Yes, Negotiating Agreement Without Giving In. (2 nd Ed., 1991)
• Moore, Christopher W., The Mediation Process, Practical Strategies for Resolving Conflict. (3 rd Ed., Jossey Bass Publishers, 2003)
• Handouts in Class

RECOMMENDED READING

• Baruch Bush, Robert A, and Folger, Joseph, The Promise of Mediation, Responding to Conflict through Empowerment and Recognition (Jossey-Bass Publishers, 1994)

WORKSHOP SESSIONS:

1. Exploring Dispute Resolution Models. Defining mediation and comparing it to negotiation, arbitration, litigation and the role of the different parties in each model; when should mediation be used; kinds of conflict where mediation may prove helpful.
   Fisher: 1-14; Moore: 1-40; Handouts.
2. Mediation Methods: Neutrality and Confidentiality Issues; separating people from the problem; focusing on interests, not positions; seeking mutual gain and using objective criteria.
   Fisher: 15-94.
3. The Role of the Mediator and Preparing for Mediation: Qualities of a mediator; preparing for mediation—how preparation facilitates understanding and conflict resolution.
   Moore: 81-114; 153-190.
4. Conducting a Mediation: Beginning the session, defining issues; uncovering hidden interests and generating options for settlement.
   Moore: 193-266.
5. Mock Mediation and Evaluation: Videotape of mock mediation session; class discussion evaluating mediation.

EVALUATION

1. Attendance and active participation in all sessions — 25%
2. Videotape of one mock mediation session with paper evaluation the mediation — 35%
3. Final paper on topic agreed upon with faculty member — 40%

Peacemaking Organizations, Opportunities and Resources on the Internet

8th Day Center for Justice
American Friends Service Committee
Chicago Coalition Against War and Racism
Christian Peacemaker Teams
(P.O. Box 6508, Chicago, IL 60608, 312-432-1213)
Fellowship of Reconciliation, New York
Gandhi Institute
Grass Roots Voices
Iraq Peace Pledge Campaign
MLK Center
Nonviolent Peace Force
Pax Christi, USA
Peaceful Tomorrows
School of the Americas Watch
United for Peace Coalition
Voices in the Wilderness
War Resisters League, New York
(212) 228-0450

Other Resources for Nonviolent Peacemaking and Faith Based Social Justice Articles

“A Widow’s Plea for Non-Violence” by Amber Amundson
“Violence Doesn’t Work” by Howard Zinn
“A Pure, High Note of Anguish” by Barbara Kingslover
“Thoughts in the Presence of Fear” by Wendell Berry
“Why I opposed the Resolution to Authorize Force” by Rep. Barbara Lee
“In the Valley of the Shadow: A September 11, 2001 Reflection” by Rev. Ken Sehested and Rev. Kyle Childress of the Baptist Peace Fellowship for North America
“Dissenting Voices” by Jihan Alaily in the Al-Ahram weekly
“A Hymn for Resisters” by Daniel Berrigan, SJ
“Blessed are the Nonviolent” by John Dear, SJ
“World Day of Peace Message 2002” Pope John Paul II

Web Sites

Pax Christi USA U.S. Chapter of International Catholic Peace Movement
Common Dreams News Center (alternative progressive news commentary)
Z Magazine
The Transnational Foundation for Peace and Future Research
Antiwar.com
Independent Media Center
Mother Jones News and Resources
Institute for Public Accuracy News Releases
Foreign Policy in Focus/Progressive Response – Agenda to Combat Terrorism
American-Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee
Center for Defense Information – Terrorism, Military, and Security Policy
One World.net (value-based, culturally diverse news)
Peace Action Organization
America Magazine
Sojourners Magazine
Alternet (alternative independent news)
Refdesk (links to international periodicals and news)

Ritual/Liturgical Resources (both ecumenical and interfaith suggestions)

U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops Office of Social Development and World Peace
Pax Christi USA
Promoting Understanding among Peoples of All Faiths
University of Dayton Campus Ministry
United Church of Christ