To know Martin is to know where he stands on the issues of social justice. And this episode shines a spotlight on who and what first inspired him to take his activism to the next level and sustained his faith in the process. Supported by the timely poetry of Edna St Vincent Millay and Ferlinghetti and by Martin’s own call to action in these uncertain times, this episode is an uplifting reminder that we must all effect change by finding that passion in our own hearts!
To know Martin is to know where he stands on the issues of social justice. And this episode shines a spotlight on who and what first inspired him to take his activism to the next level and sustained his faith in the process. Supported by the timely poetry of Edna St Vincent Millay and Ferlinghetti and by Martin’s own call to action in these uncertain times, this episode is an uplifting reminder that we must all effect change by finding that passion in our own hearts!
M-S-W Media Media.
Martin Sheen:
Hello, and welcome to the Martin Sheen Podcast with yours truly, Martin Sheen, of course, and I'm delighted to be your host for this podcast pilgrimage where the destination is the journey itself. Along the way, I plan to share stories and personal memories of some of the many people, places, and events that have helped to shape my life. Happy and continuing struggle as an artist and a man to unite the will of the spirit with the work of the flesh. I also hope to explore poetry as a powerful form of expression and communication by proxy, as it were, and how poetry is such a vital and necessary component of our spirituality and our public discourse. And from time to time, I'll invite friends, fellow actors, poets, scholars, and family members to join our pilgrimage and discuss what inspires their artistic journey. And so, friends, let us begin.
Recently, I attended a No Kings rally where a young man asked who inspired me to get involved at such an old age. “Well,” I laughed “A guy named Berrigan. It's all his fault.” And I left it at that. But in fact, it was true. And though I did not meet him until 1981, Daniel Berrigan had a profound effect on my life.
Since his early and frequent nonviolent protest against social injustice and the war in Vietnam during the 60s and 70s. I was particularly struck when he was sent to federal prison with his brother Philip for burning draft cards with homemade napalm at Catonsville, Maryland, in 1968. He reasoned that it made more sense to burn the draft cards of young American men than permit the American government to burn Vietnamese children while remaining legally unaccountable and morally unchallenged. Such a rare moral conscience, though devoutly to be wished, was equally feared by both church and state.
Thus, the brilliant American Jesuit was rendered, quote, “a meddlesome priest and belonged in prison.” And yet he urged fellow travelers to risk the same fate.
But shortly before he began his prison sentence, Dan was confronted by a pacifist with a reasonable lament. “It's different for you, Father Berrigan. You don't have any children. What's going to happen to our children if we go to prison for opposing the war?”
Father Berrigan's response was no less lamentable. “What's going to happen to them if you don't?” And they took him away.
They were taking him away again in the summer of 1981, when I came to New York to participate in a docudrama on the trial of the Plowshares. Eight long after his release from prison and at the end of the Vietnam War, and long after The American peace movement had virtually dissolved.
Dan, again with his brother Philip, and now with six close friends, entered the security area of the General Electric plant in King of Prussia, Pennsylvania. And approached the unarmed nose cones of two MX nuclear missiles. They poured their own blood over them and beat them with hammers. In a powerful and symbolic fulfillment of the ancient command of the prophet Isaiah. “Beat swords into plowshares and study war no more.”
The action struck at the very heart of American militarism. And the immorality of the arms race. And this small group of Catholic radicals would pay dearly. Found guilty, the eight defendants were facing over 10 years in federal prison. Now, however, they were free, pending an appeal. And the director, Emil de Antonio, decided to make a documentary film on the group and their action, using the trial transcripts, with actors playing all members of the court and the defendants playing themselves. Thus I made my entrance into Dan Berrigan's life. Playing the trial judge, Samuel Salas.
Granted, reality must shed image in order for friendship to begin. Still, I was not prepared for such an extraordinary reality or friendship. Berrigan was perhaps the most admired and beloved Catholic priest in the United States. And by far its most famous Jesuit. Yet he wore secondhand clothing with no Roman collar. And he lived in a tiny apartment in a New York City working class neighborhood. And though this thin and handsome Daniel had spent considerable time among lions in many dens, he was gentle and friendly, with a quick smile and a hearty laugh.
He was open and engaging as well, with a sharp and brilliant Irish wit. But there was something in his eyes, or dare I say behind them. That spoke another language altogether. And a part of me that understood some of that language knew that knowing him would change my life fundamentally. I had only recently returned to Catholicism after a long absence. And I was searching for a path, as I often say, to unite the will of the spirit with the work of the flesh. What better example to follow than this meddlesome priest with the enviable courage to challenge Christianity and rediscover the reality of the non violent Jesus who spent his life speaking out and acting against war, violence and nuclear weapons. Who had stood with the suffering masses, the victims of war, the starving and the poor from Vietnam to Central America to South Africa, the homeless on our own city streets, people with AIDS. And those on death row who, despite his age and fragile health, had been arrested scores of times, always with the peaceful plea that the killing might stop, that injustice might cease, and that the healing might begin. Who stood with the suffering and suffered with them from North Vietnam to Northern Ireland and the Middle East. And along the way he recorded his journey with volumes of poetry and more than 50 books, including his powerful autobiography, To Dwell in Peace. Who better indeed to join with a nonviolent protest opposing the US Government's insane nuclear weapons policy, resulting in my first arrest and one of the happiest days of my life, which gradually led to a commitment to peace and social justice for over the past 40 years.
Dan's example urges us to love our country enough to risk its wrath by drawing attention through direct nonviolent action to its destructive policies that crush the poor and ruin the environment. Dan Berrigan invites us to accept the cup as offered, not altered, and let the poor crack open our hearts so that we may become a people of peace and social justice, compassion and non violence, willing to give away the things we cherish with love, including our precious time and talent. We thus become our true selves, worthy of the long promised blessings reserved for the peacemakers and those who show mercy. And we can experience above all enviable joy and unhindered freedom. So, yeah, Berrigan, it's all his fault. And thank God I had him to blame.
Father Daniel Berrigan was an American Jesuit, as well as an author, teacher, peace activist and poet. He was also a dear friend and mentor. He was born in Virginia, Minnesota, on May 9, 1921. He was raised in Syracuse, New York, and he was ordained in 1951. He died April 30, uh, 2016, in New York City. Dan Berrigan was 96 years old.
Stay tuned. We'll be right back. And we're back.
Consider this from yours truly.
He hath the power
Though not the right.
And heaven will record
What we did or where we hid
When we saw forty seventh’s second coming.
Conscientious objector by Edna St. Vincent Millay
I shall die, but
that is all I shall do for Death.
I hear him leading his horse out of the stall;
I hear the clatter on the barn-floor.
He is in haste; he has business in Cuba,
business in the Balkans, many calls to make this morning.
But I will not hold the bridle
while he cinches the girth.
And he may mount by himself:
I will not give him a leg up.
Though he flick my shoulders with his whip,
I will not tell him which way the fox ran.
With his hoof on my breast, I will not tell him where
the black man hides in the swamp.
I shall die, but that is all I shall do for Death:
I am not on his pay-roll.
I will not tell him the whereabout of my friends
nor of my enemies either.
Though he promise me much,
I will not map him the route to any man’s door.
Am I a spy in the land of the living,
That I should deliver men to Death?
Brother, the password and the plans to our city
Are safe with me; never through me shall you be overcome.
Edna St. Vincent Millay was born February 22, 1892, in Rockland, Maine. She was an American lyrical poet and playwright who won the Pulitzer Prize for poetry in 1923, and she was the first woman to win the award. Ms. Millay was highly regarded during much of her lifetime. She died October 19, 1950, in Austerlitz, New York. Edna St. Vincent Millay was 58 years old.
The following is a selection from the book Blessed Among Us by Robert Ellsberg. The book is filled with daily reflections that explore the lives of saints as well as ordinary men and women with extraordinary stories of courage and spiritual awakening.
Dietrich Bonhoeffer
Dietrich Bonhoeffer, a Lutheran theologian, was among those Christians in Germany who recognized early on the enormity of the evil posed by Hitler's regime. The claims of the Nazi state, he believed, posed a confessional challenge, ultimately a question whether the church worshiped God or a national idol. Bonhoeffer was a leader in the so called Confessing Church, organized to oppose efforts by the state to co-op and control all the churches in Germany. In 1939, he accepted an opportunity to escape the country and teach in New York.
Almost immediately, he regretted his decision. “I will have no right to participate in the reconstruction of Christian life in Germany after the war if I do not share in the tribulations of this time with my people.”
Upon his return, he joined in a conspiracy to overthrow Hitler. When the plot eventually unraveled, Bonhoeffer and his fellow conspirators were arrested. After two years in a military prison, he was hanged on April 9, 1945.
In his early theology, Bonhoeffer had written about the cost of discipleship and the need to reject “cheap grace, the grace we confer on ourselves."
In his life in Witness, he offered a poignant model of a form of contemporary holiness not withdrawn from the world, but fully engaged his “in life's duties, problems, successes and failures. The church's task is not simply to bind the wounds of the victim beneath the wheel, but also to put a spoke in the wheel itself.”
Dietrich Bonhoeffer was 39 years old.
Robert Ellsberg is an American publisher specializing in religious and spiritual exploration. He is editor in chief and publisher of Orbis Books. He lives and works in upstate New York with his wife.
Consider this.
Gun safety laws are not trying to take away the guns. They are trying to stop the guns from taking away our children.
We're going to take a brief pause now, but please don't go away. There's a lot more to come.
Thank you for staying with us.
And now, Pity the Nation by Lawrence Ferlinghetti.
Pity the nation whose people are sheep
and whose shepherds mislead them
Pity the nation whose leaders are liars
Whose sages are silenced
and whose bigots haunt the airwaves
Pity the nation that raises not its voice
but aims to rule the world
by force and by torture
And knows
no other language but its own
Pity the nation whose breath is money
and sleeps the sleep of the too well fed
Pity the nation Oh pity the people of my country
My country, tears of thee
Sweet land of liberty!
Lawrence Ferlinghetti was an American poet, painter and social activist. He garnered much acclaim for his poetry collection entitled Coney island of the mind. In 1953, he co-founded the renowned City Lights booksellers and publishers in San Francisco. And although he published and supported the beat poets, he never considered himself one of them.
He was born on March 14, 1919 in Yonkers, New York. He died February 22, 2012, in San Francisco, California. Lawrence Ferlinghetti was 101 years old.
Dreamers and Schemers by yours truly
There are many couched in slumber
dreaming tales that lost their number
long before salt water ever reached the shore;
Theirs are schemes begot in,
long before forgot in,
time gone by with emptiness
never felt before.
Far few others couched in slumber
do not scheme or count their number
never cling to what has past them,
justly measure how they’ll cast them.
Such dreams awake with confidence
embracing every consequence
ever vital, ever changing,
ever adding to their store.
Consider this.
Freedom of speech is a basic human right. It is not given by the gracious hand of any government. Nonetheless, if what we hold as true is not costly, firstly we all have to question its value.
Apparently, the current administration knows the price of everything and the value of nothing. And while it may have the power, it does not have the right to abuse or restrict any basic human right, least of all freedom of speech. The inescapable realities of disinformation, cynicism, and the lie in the land have made opportunities for active activism m and free speech vital.
And though history may not always remember, heaven will never forget what we did or where we hid during 47's second coming. And this above all, we are not asked to be successful. Um, we are only asked to be faithful. Remember, one heart with courage is a majority, because courage is contagious and inspiring. So take courage, stand up, and speak out clearly, because free speech is clearly in jeopardy, in case you hadn't heard.
I invite you to delve further into the works of the poets I shared with you, and I hope you seek out writers and poets whose work speaks to your hearts and minds with the power to inspire your life. If you've enjoyed what you've heard here, please subscribe to my podcast, the Martin Sheen Podcast, with your host, yours truly, Martin Sheen of course, wherever you find your podcasts. Yeah, I have to say that.
You can find a complete list of the poets and titles of their poems that I've chosen at our website, themartensheenpodcast.com
I want to thank the people who make this podcast possible. Our producer and research assistant, Renee Esteves, who assures me that the Internet is a real thing and a safe place if not used off label. And our sound engineer and editor, Bruce Greenspan, the man behind these rich and seamless recordings. And to his dog Gracie, our studio mascot who snores in perfect pantameter.
And so, friends, we part with the prayer from Tagore.
We are called to lift up this nation and all its people to that place where the heart is without fear and the head is held high, where knowledge is free, where the world has not been broken up into fragments by narrow domestic walls, where words come out from the depths of truth and tireless striving stretches its arms towards perfection, where the clear stream of reason has not lost its way into the dreary desert sands of dead habit, where the mind is led forward by thee into ever widening thought and action, into that heaven of freedom, dear friend, Father, let our country awake. Amen.
The Martin Sheen Podcast. All rights reserved. No part of this podcast may be reproduced, distributed or transmitted in any form without prior written consent of the author and TE Productions.
The story, “Thank God for Daniel Berrigan” by Ramon Gerard Estevez, AKA Martin Sheen, is included hereby granted Copyright permission.
Edna St. Vincent Millay, “Conscientious Objector” from Collected Poems, HarperCollins, copyright 19341962 by Edna St. Vincent Millay and Norma Millay Ellis. Used with the permission of the Permissions Company, LLC on behalf of the literary executor, the Edna St. Vincent Millay Society.
“Blessed Among Us” Bonhoeffer by Robert Ellsberg is included here by granted Copyright permission, and we thank the author for this opportunity to share his work.
Lawrence Ferlinghetti, “Pity the Nation” from Ferlinghetti's Greatest Poems New Directions copyright 2007 by Lawrence Ferlinghetti. Used with the permission of the Permissions Company, LLC on behalf of City Lights Books.