When I became a follower of Jesus, everything changed. My citizenship, my allegiance, my purpose. I no longer belonged to the kingdoms of this world. I was transferred from the kingdom of darkness to the kingdom of light. A kingdom that doesn’t operate by the rules of power or control or violence. A kingdom that looks like Jesus. But I’ll be honest. The more I advocate for Palestinians, the more I speak out against injustice, the easier it is for me to lose sight of Jesus. I get angry. I get bitter. I feel rage. And if I’m not careful, I stop reflecting the kingdom of Jesus and start reflecting the kingdoms of this world.

And that’s not the path I want to be on.

In a world where division and violence appear stronger than ever, how do we break the cycles of hate and work for healing for ourselves and our community? How might we embody both courage and love, taking action for change without recreating the harm we're resisting? Watch our conversation with Kazu Haga, a nonviolence and restorative justice practitioner and trainer, and author of the book Fierce Vulnerability, as we explore the ways in which our personal and collective healing are woven together. Through the intersections between Christian peace spirituality and Buddhist practice, lessons from the fields of nonviolent organizing and trauma healing, and a shared hope and longing for the Beloved Community, we hope that this conversation will encourage and inspire you as you seek to live out the divine peace wherever you are.

I’ve been thinking about the Western craving for what I sometimes call a Disneyland ending—a curated, comforting wrap-up to hard stories. I'm in one of these moments. Bear with me as I try to unpack what it feels like when people abandon the ones we care about—or the work we do to stand alongside them.

Today, on Earth Day, I think about how caring about social problems and caring about ecological impacts are intertwined. A consumerist mindset that prizes accumulation above all else results in the devastation of environments that nurture not only flora and fauna, but provide food and water to human creatures as well. And when humans are without food and water, they encroach on other environments, pushing out the plants and animals residing there. The pattern keeps repeating and expanding, resulting in things like fires and floods, climate migration, and species extinction.

“What will happen?” This question kept popping into my head as I sat in the van, winding through the rugged mountains of Kula, somewhere between Montenegro and Kosovo. Together with the artists from the acting troupe Magic Theatre (Magični Teatar), we were on our way to perform a play with women living in Kosovo. The project aimed to bring together women of Albanian and Serbian ethnicity, using theatre and artistic expression to empower those from areas affected by conflict. The twist? The actresses weren’t professionals—they were going to be local women who had never acted before but were willing to give it a shot.

On March 25, 2025, video footage went viral showing a Tufts University student, Rumeysa Ozturk, being arrested by ICE agents while walking to class. Her quiet, stunned compliance—the way she whispered "I'm a student at Tufts..." as agents pulled her away—echoed through social media like a lament. Though she was later released, the imagery haunts: an unarmed woman of color, quietly disappeared in broad daylight, on a college campus.

This is not an isolated moment. It’s part of a broader climate of fear and dehumanization toward immigrants in our country—especially those whose presence challenges dominant narratives of whiteness, power, or security. In the face of all this, a friend recently asked me, “What would Jesus do?” That question hits hard. And it’s worth flipping: What did Jesus do? Because we actually have a pretty solid record.

“Deconstruction” has become a bit of a buzzword in Christian circles, but it is in fact not an exclusively “Christian” phenomenon. Deconstruction is a very normal and natural process of unlearning and relearning, which all people all over the world experience at one time or another to various degrees throughout their lives. It is a natural part of human development. As peacebuilders and as Christians, we should embrace this process as an opportunity to mature.

We in Boise have seen the effects of recent Executive Orders concerning refugees first-hand and are responding by mobilizing churches to “stand in the gap” to help families who have recently arrived in the US but whose funding has been suspended. Read more to find out how.

If I could boil down my desire for our churches and communities into one word, I think it would be solidarity. Sometimes God teaches us how to build solidarity with one another by following his call for solidarity with the “other” - the wounded, oppressed, marginalized, widow, orphan, and even enemy. In the end, as we embark on a spiritual journey of solidarity with our neighbor, we will also find deeper solidarity with God, because we’re joining him in the work he’s already about and agreeing to meet him where he calls us.