(Unsplash/Ashley Batz)
by John Dear
On this week's episode of "The Nonviolent Jesus Podcast," I share some reflections from my brand new book, Universal Love: Surrendering to the God of Peace.
In this episode, I tell how the book came about. When the pandemic began, I joined the local gym and the young person who taught the class asked me to be his guru, so I started teaching him meditation. He called God "Universal Love." One day, Universal Love came to him in prayer and called him to be "an extension of Universal Love."
John Dear's "Universal Love: Surrendering to the God of Peace" was published by Orbis Books.
Over the years of spiritual direction and conversation that followed, as we became friends and discussed all this, we also started doing writing practice at the local coffee shop on these themes, writings which one day turned into this book.
In the first part of the book, I reflect on the importance of daily meditation, letting go of control, living in intimate, trusting relationship with God, learning to surrender everything to God, and trying from now on to do only God's will, not our will. I conclude with the story of my visit with Archbishop Desmond Tutu in Cape Town, South Africa, where he confided with me his thoughts on free will as the basis of understanding God and our work for peace, justice and nonviolence, a teaching I am only now beginning to understand.
In the next episode, I'll reflect on the connection between nonviolence and surrendering our will to God, and the political consequences of doing God's will of peace in a world of war.
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