50 years ago last month my dad, the local vicar, stood in front of a bulldozer on the edge of Durham city to stop it clearing a site on Flass Vale a bit of urban wilderness. This sparked a local campaign to stop the development and included a mass picnic which hundreds attended. Flass Vale was saved and my dad’s non-violent direct action helped spark action and continues to inspire me.

So many weasel words are spoken, so many speeches pledging action on global warming are delivered, oil companies spend millions (tiny proportions of their profits) on advertising their green credentials. Thousands of rousing speeches are given at protest marches, millions of words are written in petition, thousands of messages in Whatts App, Signal etc. As each year passes, I become more convinced that the way for me to protest is not through words but rather symbolic action. Often saying nothing, letting the action speak for itself. ‘Actions not Words’ as one of the CCA banners reminds us.

Carrying an ark, kneeling at a prayer vigil, glued to the road, walking slowly and silently are all ways of witnessing to my lack of faith in our present government, but total commitment to the God of life. When I placed my red blood handprint on the glass front of BAE Weapon Systems London Office behind a group of CCA members kneeling in prayer it felt like a holy action a sacrament of civil disobedience.

In civil disobedience, to quote Sue Parfitt, we put our bodies on the line and witness to an incarnate God who in Jesus walked amongst us. With his hands he healed, broke bread, washed feet, broke rules. Through symbolic action, such as his Palm Sunday parody of a military procession and his overturning of temple tables, he challenged the principalities and powers of his day, which led to his arrest, imprisonment and death.

Public acts of rebellion are often physically uncomfortable, involving getting cold, stiff, tired hungry and are psychologically challenging, evoking feelings of fear, vulnerability, anxiety and sometimes anger. But if entered prayerfully can be moments of real joy and deep solidarity with each other, Jesus the gentle revolutionary and God’s creation.

Such is the sacramental nature of some of CCAs actions, I find that they deepen my faith and encourage me to be a bit more reckless in trusting God’s Spirit at work in non-violent protest. A powerful action can feed me for weeks, knowing that with others we’ve stood up to the forces of death and destruction so rampant in these times. Like the sacrament of the Eucharist, I end up wanting to return to it and be fed again by God’s blessing present in the action and in my companions.