May these sacred words be a blessing to you and orient your practice this week.
Editor’s Note: This post was originally posted on Andrew DeCort’s Facebook page on January 21, 2026, 3:16 a.m.
Here is a reminder from MARCH about what this is all about:
“The Nationwide Day of Truth & Freedom on Friday, January 23…is a nationwide day of non-violent moral action — calling on people across the country to participate through work stoppage, public witness, community action, and solidarity in response to escalating harm and violence tied to federal immigration enforcement.”
This day will be remembered as a spiritual turning point in American history. Please be part of it.
*** Jesus
“You have heard that it was said, ‘Eye for eye, and tooth for tooth.’ But I tell you, do not violently resist an evil person. If anyone slaps you on the right cheek, turn to them the other cheek also. And if anyone wants to sue you and take your shirt, hand over your coat as well. If anyone forces you to go one mile, go with them two miles. Give to the one who asks you, and do not turn away from the one who wants to borrow from you.
You have heard that it was said, ‘Love your neighbor and hate your enemy.’ But I tell you, love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, that you may be children of your Father in heaven. He causes his sun to rise on the evil and the good, and sends rain on the just and the unjust. If you love those who love you, what reward will you get? Are not even the tax collectors doing that? And if you greet only your own people, what are you doing more than others? Do not even pagans do that? Be perfect, therefore, as your heavenly Father is perfect.” Jesus (Matthew 5:38-48
*** Bonhoeffer
“Decisive: Church defending itself. No risk taking for others.” Bonhoeffer from prison (8:500)
“Our relationship to God is no ‘religious’ relationship to some highest, most powerful, and best being imaginable… Instead, our relationship to God is a new life in ‘being there for others,’ through participation in the being of Jesus. The transcendent is not the infinite, unattainable tasks, but the neighbor within reach in any given situation.” Bonhoeffer from prison (8:501)
“Christianity stands or falls with its revolutionary protest against violence, arbitrariness, and pride of power and with its apologia for the weak. . . . So Christianity means a devaluation of all human values and the establishment of a new order of values in the sight of Christ.” Dietrich Bonhoeffer in 1934 (13:402)
*** Baldwin
“People who cannot suffer can never grow up.” James Baldwin, The Fire Next Time
“The revolution which was begun two thousand years ago by a disreputable Hebrew criminal [Jesus] may now have to be begun again by people equally disreputable and equally improbable.” James Baldwin, speech to the World Council of Churches
*** Romero
“The church considers this its ministry: to defend God’s image in human beings.” Oscar Romero, January 21, 1979
*** King
“The dark shadow of a deep disappointment settled upon us. So we had no alternative except that of preparing for direct action, whereby we would present our very bodies as a means of laying our case before the conscience of the local and national community… ‘Are you able to accept blows without retaliating?’ ‘Are you able to endure the ordeals of jail?’ …
You may well ask, ‘Why direct action?’ Why sit-ins, marches, etc.? Isn’t negotiation the better path?’ You are exactly right in your call for negotiation. Indeed, this is the purpose of direct action. Nonviolent direct action seeks to create such a crisis and establish such a creative tension that a community that has constantly refused to negotiate is forced to confront the issue. It seeks so to dramatize the issue that it can no longer be ignored… there is a type of constructive nonviolent tension that is necessary for growth… [W]e must see the need of having nonviolent gadflies to create the kind of tension in society that will help [people] to rise from the dark depths of prejudice and racism to the majestic heights of understanding and brotherhood…
A just law is a man-made code that squares with the moral law or the law of God. An unjust law is a code that is out of harmony with the moral law… One who breaks an unjust law must do it *openly*, *lovingly*…and with a willingness to accept the penalty. I submit that an individual who willingly accepts the penalty by staying in jail to arouse the conscience of the community over its injustice, is in reality expressing the very highest respect for law…
We merely bring to the surface the hidden tension that is already alive. We bring it out in the open where it can be seen and dealt with. Like a boil that can never be cured as long as it is covered up but must be opened with all of its pus-flowing ugliness to the natural medicines of air and light, injustice must likewise be exposed, with all of the tension its exposing creates, to the light of human conscience and the air of national opinion before it can be cured…
I gradually gained a bit of satisfaction from being considered an extremist. Was not Jesus an extremist in love – ‘Love your enemies, bless them that curse you, pray for them that despitefully use you.’” Martin Luther King Jr., “Letter from Birmingham Jail” (291293, 294, 295, 297)
*** Hillesum
“Give your sorrow all the space and shelter in yourself that is its due, for if everyone bears grief honestly and courageously, the sorrow that now fills the world will abate. But if you do instead reserve most of the space inside you for hatred and thoughts of revenge-from which new sorrows will be born for others-then sorrow will never cease in this world. And if you have given sorrow the space it demands, then you may truly say: life is beautiful and so rich.” Etty Hillesum, An Interrupted Life
*** Lorde
“Anger is loaded with information and energy… When we turn from anger, we turn from insight.” Audre Lorde, “The Uses of Anger: Women Responding to Racism”
“Recognizing the power of [love] within our lives can give us the energy to pursue genuine change within the world, rather than merely settling for a shift of characters in the same weary drama.” Audre Lorde, The Master’s Tools Cannot Dismantle the Master’s House
