Peacemakers Podcast

In this episode of the Peacemakers Podcast, we shares the story of Jennifer Dohrn — midwife, activist, longtime student of Zen, and a person whose life has been shaped by the simple, radical practice of listening.At the heart of this episode is the birthing center she helped build in the South Bronx of New York.Created for women and families who had often been pushed to the edges of healthcare, the center became more than a medical facility. It became a living response to the community around it. This is an episode about what becomes possible when we truly listen to the people around us — and allow that listening to guide our action.If this conversation moves you, please consider becoming a paid subscriber. You’ll get access to all of our content—podcasts, articles, event recordings, and more—and help sustain the work of Zen Peacemakers.Learn more at www.zenpeacemakers.orgWe invite you to support this work. Become a paying subscriber to the Peacemakers Podcast or join the Zen Peacemakers community as a member.Show Credits:* Speaker: Jennifer Dohrn* Interview Conducted by: Ewa Orczykowska* Recording Date: January 17, 2025* Hosts: Jim Hōden Fricker* Audio Editing/Engineering: Jim Hōden Fricker This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit voice.zenpeacemakers.org/subscribe

There is a difference between knowing a thing and being changed by it.In this episode of The Peacemakers Podcast, we enter the heart of the Auschwitz-Birkenau Bearing Witness Retreat, held each November by Zen Peacemakers. Through the voices of Barbara Wegmüller, Bernie Glassman, Fleet Maull, Genro Gauntt, Tani, and Jishu Holmes, this episode explores what it means to sit at the selection site, read the names of those who were killed, and allow the place itself to become the teacher.This is not simply an episode about history, memory, or the past. It is about what happens when we stop holding suffering at a distance and allow it to change us. Again and again, the voices in this episode point toward the same realization: Auschwitz is not only about what happened then. It is about what lives in us now.Bernie Glassman reminds us that to remember is “to make whole again,” and this conversation becomes an invitation into that difficult and necessary work of remembrance. Not as an idea, not as blame, and not as despair, but as a practice of presence.If this conversation moves you, please consider becoming a paid subscriber. You’ll get access to all of our content—podcasts, articles, event recordings, and more—and help sustain the work of Zen Peacemakers.Learn more at www.zenpeacemakers.orgWe invite you to support this work. Become a paying subscriber to the Peacemakers Podcast or join the Zen Peacemakers community as a member.Show Credits:* Speakers: Barbara Wegmüller, Bernie Glassman, Fleet Maull, Genro Gauntt, Tani, and Jishu Holmes* Publication Date: June 10, 2026* Host: Jim Hōden Fricker* Audio & Video Editing/Engineering: Jim Hōden Fricker This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit voice.zenpeacemakers.org/subscribe

There are stories that history books only partially hold—and others that live on in families, in land, in memory carried across generations.In this episode of the Peacemakers Podcast, we listen to Southern Cheyenne leader Chris Tall Bear as he shares the story of the 1864 Sand Creek Massacre—not as distant history, but as something still present. His ancestors survived Sand Creek. What he offers here is a continuation of memory: held in place, in lineage, and in the responsibility to remember.Chris walks us through the broken treaties, the political ambitions, and the violence that led to Sand Creek. He speaks to what remains unresolved. A question of how we live with histories that have not been fully recognized.A question of what remembrance asks of us now.And a quiet, ongoing possibility—that through acknowledgment, conversation, and presence, something can begin.Listen in to this heartfelt and necessary conversation.If this conversation moves you, please consider becoming a paid subscriber. You’ll get access to all of our content—podcasts, articles, event recordings, and more—and help sustain the work of Zen Peacemakers.Learn more at www.zenpeacemakers.orgWe invite you to support this work. Become a paying subscriber to the Peacemakers Podcast or join the Zen Peacemakers community as a member.Show Credits:* Speaker: Chris Tall Bear* Recording Date: April 01, 2026* Hosts: Jim Hōden Fricker* Audio & Video Editing/Engineering: Jim Hōden Fricker* Event Coordinators: Geoff Shōun O’Keeffe & Chloe Wright* Related Video: HERE This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit voice.zenpeacemakers.org/subscribe

In this episode of the Peacemakers Podcast, we sit with Hozan Alan Senauke — a Zen priest, teacher, musician, and lifelong practitioner of engaged Buddhism — in a conversation that feels less like an interview and more like being in the presence of a life deeply lived.At the heart of Hozan’s path is a simple but demanding vow: “I will not abandon you.” Not as a sentiment, but as a practice. A North Star. A way of meeting suffering without turning away — while still holding boundaries, clarity, and compassion.Through stories from his life — from sangha relationships to refugee camps, from Bangladesh to India — Hozan brings the Three Tenets into lived reality. Not Knowing. Bearing Witness. Taking Action. Not as abstract ideas, but as something we return to again and again, especially when it would be easier to walk away.There’s a quiet honesty in this conversation. A recognition that staying present is not always comfortable, not always clear — but that something essential unfolds when we remain in relationship.If this conversation moves you, please consider becoming a paid subscriber. You’ll get access to all of our content—podcasts, articles, event recordings, and more—and help sustain the work of Zen Peacemakers.Learn more at www.zenpeacemakers.orgWe invite you to support this work. Become a paying subscriber to the Peacemakers Podcast or join the Zen Peacemakers community as a member.Show Credits:* Speaker: Hozan Alan Senauke* Recording Date: March 28, 2023* Hosts: Geoff Shōun O’Keeffe, Jim Hōden Fricker* Audio & Video Editing/Engineering: Jim Hōden Fricker* Event Coordinators: Micka (妙心) Moto-Sanchez, Geoff Shōun O’Keeffe* Related Video: HERE This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit voice.zenpeacemakers.org/subscribe

In this episode of the Peacemakers Podcast, Zen teacher Paul Haller reflects on how the practice of Zen meets the realities of a divided world.Paul grew up in Northern Ireland during The Troubles, a time when political conflict and religious identity shaped daily life. Neighborhoods, schools, and communities were divided, and the tensions between Catholic and Protestant communities formed the backdrop of his early years. Those experiences left deep impressions about fear, identity, and the ways people come to see one another as “other.”In our conversation, Paul shares how Zen practice — and particularly the Zen Peacemakers’ emphasis on Bearing Witness — offered a way to meet these divisions without turning away. Rather than retreating from the world, the practice invites us to enter it more fully. To listen. To see suffering clearly. And to discover how compassion can arise when we stop holding tightly to fixed positions.Paul’s reflections remind us that peacemaking is not abstract. It grows directly out of our lived experience — the places we come from, the histories we inherit, and the willingness to face them with an open heart.This episode explores how practice moves from the meditation cushion into the streets, into communities, and into the complicated human realities we share.If this conversation moves you, please consider becoming a paid subscriber. You’ll get access to all of our content—podcasts, articles, event recordings, and more—and help sustain the work of Zen Peacemakers.Learn more at www.zenpeacemakers.orgWe invite you to support this work. Become a paying subscriber to the Peacemakers Podcast or join the Zen Peacemakers community as a member.Show Credits:* Speaker: Ryushin Paul Haller* Recording Date: October 23, 2020* Hosts: Geoff Shōun O’Keeffe, Jim Hōden Fricker* Audio & Video Editing/Engineering: Jim Hōden Fricker* Event Coordinators: Micka (妙心) Moto-Sanchez, Geoff Shōun O’Keeffe* Related Video: HERE This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit voice.zenpeacemakers.org/subscribe

We see suffering.Something inside says: Do something.Another voice answers: What if I get it wrong?In this episode of the Peacemakers Podcast, Geoff Shōun O’Keeffe sits down with five longtime Zen Peacemakers to explore the raw, human edge of Taking Action—the third of the Three Tenets.Not a strategy.Not performance.Relationship.From street retreats in Los Angeles to immigrant support in Seattle, from community councils in Helsinki to integrated housing projects in Vermont and New York, one thread runs through it all:Action is intimacy.Action is ceremony.Action is staying when things get uncomfortableIf you’ve ever wondered whether you’re doing enough—or too much—this conversation is for you.Please consider becoming a paid subscriber. You’ll get access to all of our content—podcasts, articles, event recordings, and more—and help sustain the work of Zen Peacemakers.Learn more at www.zenpeacemakers.orgWe invite you to support this work. Become a paying subscriber to the Peacemakers Podcast or join the Zen Peacemakers community as a member.Show Credits:* Speakers: Geoff Shōun O’Keeffe, Joshin Byrnes, Jitsujo T Gauthier, Daiken Nelson, Mikko Ijäs, and Genjo Marinello* Recording Date: September 2, 2025* Hosts: Jim Hōden Fricker* Audio & Video Editing/Engineering: Jim Hōden Fricker* Event Coordinators: Clotilde Wright, Geoff Shōun O’Keeffe* Related Video: HERE This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit voice.zenpeacemakers.org/subscribe

In this episode of the Peacemakers Podcast, Roshi Joan Halifax reflects on Appamāda—a Buddhist teaching often translated as vigilance or heedfulness, and here offered simply as care.Speaking from a life shaped by civil rights work, caregiving, and decades of practice alongside Bernie Glassman, Joan explores what it means to stay present with moral distress without rushing toward answers. Drawing on Bernie’s teaching of Not Knowing and Bearing Witness, she invites us to let response arise not from ideology or strategy, but from direct contact with suffering—our own and the world’s.Through images of water—fluid, responsive, inclusive—and the story of Anishinaabe grandmother Josephine Mandamin carrying a single bucket along the shores of the Great Lakes, Joan points to a practice grounded in responsibility at human scale. Not grand solutions, but showing up. Not certainty, but care. Again and again.This is a conversation about conscience, community, and the small, faithful acts through which our vows are lived—moment by moment, right where we are.If this conversation moves you, please consider becoming a paid subscriber. You’ll get access to all of our content—podcasts, articles, event recordings, and more—and help sustain the work of Zen Peacemakers.Learn more at www.zenpeacemakers.orgWe invite you to support this work. Become a paying subscriber to the Peacemakers Podcast or join the Zen Peacemakers community as a member.Show Credits:* Speaker: Roshi Joan Halifax* Recording Date: December 12, 2023* Hosts: Geoff Shōun O’Keeffe, Jim Hōden Fricker* Audio & Video Editing/Engineering: Jim Hōden Fricker* Event Coordinators: Clotilde Wright, Geoff Shōun O’Keeffe* Related Video: HERE This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit voice.zenpeacemakers.org/subscribe

This episode of the Peacemakers Podcast features reflections from Bernie Glassman, drawn from a three-day gathering held in 2014.Across those days, Bernie occasionally spoke from the vantage point of the first, second, and third twenty-year periods of his life — not as a formal structure, but as a way of noticing how practice matures through time. What comes through most clearly is not biography, but how the Three Tenets — Not Knowing, Bearing Witness, and Taking Action — continually shaped his responses to life.Listening now, these reflections feel less like a retrospective and more like an invitation. The Three Tenets are not presented as ideas to adopt, but as something already moving in each of us — in how we meet uncertainty, stay with what is difficult, and allow action to arise from real presence.If this episode resonates with you, we invite you to support the ongoing work of Zen Peacemakers by becoming a paying subscriber.Join our Community Platform to learn more hereShow Credits:* Speaker: Bernie Glassman* Recording Date: 2014* Hosts: Geoff Shōun O’Keeffe, Jim Hōden Fricker* Audio & Video Editing/Engineering: Jim Hōden Fricker This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit voice.zenpeacemakers.org/subscribe

In this episode of the Peacemakers Podcast, we sit with T. Marie King in a conversation that invites honest reflection on identity, power, and how we show up in community.Rather than offering answers or analysis, this episode creates space to notice what we assume, who we may be missing, and how listening itself can become an act of care and responsibility. Rooted in lived experience and grounded presence, T. Marie’s work challenges us to slow down, brave discomfort, and allow ourselves to be changed.This conversation is closely connected to place, especially Selma and Montgomery, Alabama—cities that continue to shape the moral and emotional landscape of our shared life. It also points toward the Zen Peacemakers’ upcoming Bearing Witness to Racism in America Retreat in April 2026. This contemplative immersion is not about fixing the world, but about letting experience work on us.If this episode resonates, you are also invited to join T. Marie King for a free online Zen Peacemakers event, Perspective + Empathy: Learning Beyond Our Own Lens. Details for both the retreat and the online event can be found in the show notes.If you value these conversations, please consider becoming a paying subscriber and supporting the ongoing work of Zen Peacemakers. Learn more at www.zenpeacemakers.orgShow Credits:* Speaker: T.Marie King* Recording Date: June 23, 2022* Hosts: Geoff Shōun O’Keeffe, Jim Hōden Fricker* Audio & Video Editing/Engineering: Jim Hōden Fricker* Event Coordinators: Micka (妙心) Moto-Sanchez, Geoff Shōun O’Keeffe* Related Video: HERE This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit voice.zenpeacemakers.org/subscribe

The Art of Appreciative Attention — with Poet & Teacher John BrehmAs we approach the end of the year, Geoff and I wanted to offer something a little different—something quieter, more spacious, and genuinely nourishing. This week’s Peacemakers Podcast feels like exactly that.Geoff opens with one of his own poems, a tender moment he rarely shares publicly, and we talk together about how poetry has shaped his way of slowing down and really seeing what’s right in front of us.We’re joined by our friend John Brehm, poet, teacher, and longtime companion of Zen Peacemakers, who leads us into what he calls the art of appreciative attention. John invites us to lay down the old habit of treating poems like riddles to decode, and instead approach them as living presences—something we enter, savor, and let work on us from the inside out.Through Joy Harjo, Elizabeth Bishop, Rilke, and his own new anthology The Poetry of Grief, Gratitude, and Reverence, John shows how poetry can dissolve the boundary between ourselves and the world, opening a gentler, more curious way of being.His teaching is beautifully simple:Notice what you love, and let that be enough.As we close out the year, we’re grateful to share this unique, heartfelt episode—an offering to help us pause, reconnect, and remember the deeper threads of our practice.Thank you for listening, for practicing with us, and for being part of this circle.If this conversation moved you, we invite you to become a paying subscriber and support the Peacemakers Podcast. You can learn more atwww.zenpeacemakers.org This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit voice.zenpeacemakers.org/subscribe