Season for Nonviolence Opening

Today marks the opening of A Season for Nonviolence inspired by the nonviolent actions of Mahatma Ghandi, Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. and César Chávez. These great men, as ordinary people, at different ages, educational backgrounds, and life conditions, exhibited courageous acts during their lives that inspire us. Gandhi, King and Chávez all practiced nonviolent strategies in order to accomplish virtually insurmountable tasks – Gandhi to free the Indian and South African people from government oppression, King to free the African Americans from social oppression, and Chávez to free the farm workers from economic oppression.
These three men didn’t just create nonviolent resistance from the air. They had many teachings and philosophies that influenced them.
One influence, Henry David Thoreau 19th c. at age 29 was jailed because he protested against slavery by refusing to pay taxes. Gandhi later adopted Thoreau’s views on passive resistance.
Mohandas “Mahatma” Gandhi, a lawyer, (19th c.) When he was thirty-six he called for civil disobedience against repressive government laws in S. Africa. When he was sixty-one, he defied British government’s tax on salt in India by marching more than two hundred miles to the sea to teach Indians how to make their own salt mobilizing millions of Indians to follow his example. Women also influenced Gandhi. He said, “I learned the lesson of nonviolence from my wife.”
Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr, an ordained minister. (20th c.) When he was nineteen, he attended a lecture on the life and teachings of Gandhi. When he was twenty-seven, at the ending of the Montgomery Bus boycott, he taught reconciliation when he said, “As we go back to the buses let us be loving enough to turn an enemy into a friend.” When he was thirty-two, he visited India with his wife to learn about Gandhi. He became convinced that nonviolence is the most powerful tool for social change. He also appreciated the contributions of women to social change. He said, “I am indebted to my wife Coretta, without whose love, sacrifices, and loyalty neither life nor work would bring fulfillment. She has given me words of consolation when I needed them…”
César Chávez, a farm worker, (20th c.) was born on a small farm near Yuma, Arizona that his grandfather homesteaded in the 1880's. At age ten, life began as a migrant farm worker when his father lost the land during the Depression. Together with thousands of displaced families, the Chávez family migrated throughout the Southwest, laboring in fields and vineyards. Chávez left school after the eighth grade to help support his family. When he was twenty-three, Chávez coordinated voter registration drives and battled racial and economic discrimination in California and Arizona following the nonviolent actions exhibited by Gandhi and King.
Hampton Roads Network for Nonviolence sponsors A Season for Nonviolence each year to focus educational and media attention on the philosophy of attaining peace through nonviolent action as demonstrated by Mahatma Gandhi, Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., and César Chávez. A Season for Nonviolence was co-founded by Arun and Sunanda Gandhi of the M.K. Gandhi Institute for Nonviolence and a group of ten ministers forming the Leadership Council of The Association for Global New Thought. You can find more information about the Season for Nonviolence at their website, www.agnt.org.
No matter the age, education or economic background, Gandhi, King, and Chávez set an example of nonviolent action for us to follow. Robert F. Kennedy (20th c.) summed it up by saying, “It is from numberless diverse acts of courage and belief that human history is shaped. Each time a man stands up for an ideal, or acts to improve the lot of others, or strikes out against injustice, he sends forth a tiny ripple of hope, and crossing each other from a million different centers of energy and daring, those ripples build a current which can sweep down the mightiest walls of oppression and resistance.”
From 19th century philosophers to 21st century ordinary people, the movement for nonviolent social change continues. Each of our efforts, being ripples of hope, will transform our society to one of equality, justice and peace.