Whether you are new to organizing, or if you have been protesting since the 70s, this is a moment that is calling us all into action. ICPJ is joining with network partners to host conversations or trainings and share resources. This session will focus on specific practices and tools that can be used in the midst of chaos and the threat of state violence.

The training is co-led by Dr. Sarah Nahar and Jonathan Brenneman, organizers and educators working at the intersection of faith, social movements, and nonviolent strategy.

Dr. Sarah Nahar draws on her climate justice work, Black feminist scholar-activism, and Mennonite globalism to ground her leadership in disciplined, transnational solidarity. She has trained clergy and faith leaders in moments of heightened tension, including public witness challenging the Unite the Right mobilizations in Charlottesville, with a focus on collective safety and moral clarity. She brings extensive global experience, having served as Executive Director of Community Peacemaking Teams and as a resource person with the Martin Luther King, Jr. Center for Nonviolent Social Change.

Jonathan Brenneman brings a practice-oriented approach to Nonviolent Direct Action shaped by his heritage as a Palestinian Christian and his work with Christians for a Free Palestine. He supports faith communities engaging in nonviolent public witness and solidarity to challenge Christian Nationalism and its foreign policy expression in Christian Zionism. His work emphasizes movement ecology, strategic campaign planning, collective preparation, and the cultivation of shared skills for public action.

Participants will:

Learn core principles of Nonviolent Direct Action
Practice identifying points of intervention and layers of sanctuary
Develop skills for both responsive and planned collective action
Reflect on how faith traditions support moral persuasion and public witness

Whether participants agree or disagree with every framework offered, the invitation is to focus on readiness. What skills do I need to practice now in order to say yes when invitations for solidarity come? This training invites us to lean in together with clarity, discipline, and trust in divine accompaniment.

Interfaith Council for Peace and Justice (ICPJ) empowers our communities, people of faith and congregations, mutual aid groups, network organizations, and individual volunteers, to make radical systemic change with love within Washtenaw County and across Michigan.

We do this by building capacity to:
* center racial, economic, and environmental justice;
* create spaces for co-learning, healing, conflict resolution, connecting with others, and collaboration; and
* move between work to educate, mobilize, and organize with a focus on coordinated systems-level change.

Nonviolent Direct Action Training

By Interfaith Council for Peace & Justice

Nonviolent Direct Action Training