Women and Nonviolence – Waging Peace at Home and Abroad

Leave a comment

Here is a link to an article by Dr. SK Lo, board chair of the Asian American Unity Coalition, “Trust, Storytelling, and Community Strength: A Five-Hour Journey in Nonviolence.”

April 30th Testimonial:

I attended the Women and Nonviolence – Waging Peace at Home and Abroad this April. I was not heavily involved in the Metro Surge. I have young kids and felt that keeping my home life steady and secure was the best course of action. However, we were not unaffected. There was racist, homophobic, and horrible propaganda being littered on my street and you could tell the children could feel the tension. They asked about the “secret police” signs and more. 

By attending Women and nonviolence I was able to see, more deeply, all of the wonderful things going on in my community. The structure was so effective with its theory and real-life applications of the 12 Practices of Civic Alignment. The speakers were diverse, as were the experiences. I came away with this uplifted feeling that all of our small actions matter and a lot of small things done by many people created a powerful shift in our communities. Aspiring to be better as individuals creates a ripple effect that helps everyone and everyone has something to contribute.

Chelsea P.

December 2025

“To practice nonviolence, first of all we have to practice it within ourselves.”

— Thich Nhat Hanh

“All violence begins with the personal, with the I, and with a point of decision, a crossing of a line, where each of us chooses momentarily to view another living being as an It rather than a Thou. The ultimate purpose of each act of violence, each reduction of another person from a Thou to an It, is to control the other. . . . Our choices matter, even on what seems like a small scale. They have resonance in the universe. When we truly see another person or living being as a Thou, we cannot dominate or control them. We then must enter into a different kind of covenant, where power is shared.”

—Pamela Cooper-White, The Cry of Tamar: Violence against Women and the Church’s Response

November 2025

“I want you to understand that we are part of the natural world. And even today, when the planet is dark, there still is hope. Don’t lose hope. If you lose hope, you become apathetic and do nothing. And if you want to save what is still beautiful in this world—if you want to save the planet for the future generations, your grandchildren, their grandchildren—then think about the actions you take each day.”

— Jane Goodall

October 2025

“After a rain mushrooms appear on the surface of the earth as if from nowhere. Many come from a sometimes vast underground fungus that remains invisible and largely unknown. What we call mushrooms, mycologists call the fruiting body of the larger, less visible fungus. Uprisings and revolutions are often considered to be spontaneous, but it is the less visible long-term organising and groundwork—or underground work—that often laid the foundation. Changes in ideas and values also result from work done by writers, scholars, public intellectuals, social activists and participants in social media. To many, it seems insignificant or peripheral until very different outcomes emerge from transformed assumptions about who and what matters, who should be heard and believed, who has rights.”

—Rebecca Solnit, Hope In the Dark