The Chelsea Standard
A Heritage Newspaper
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Michigan Friends Center to host talk about Gandhi
By Sheila Pursglove, Special Writer
PUBLISHED: May 1, 2008
Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi - India's "Father of the Nation" - dedicated his life to the philosophy of nonviolent action and to spreading the concept around the world.
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The Michigan Friends Center on Clark Lake Road north of Chelsea will host a presentation about Gandhi from 1:30 to 3:30 p.m. Saturday, by Rev. Robert L. S. Brown, retired pastor of The United Methodist Church.
Brown, a resident of the Chelsea Retirement Community, will speak about his friendship with Arun Gandhi, the fifth grandson of Gandhi and founder of the M.K. Gandhi Institute for Nonviolence at the University of Rochester (N.Y.)
Brown, whose interest in nonviolence began in high school during World War II and continued as he prepared for ordained ministry in the Methodist Church, will discuss how people might move toward a culture of nonviolence.
When Brown was a young man, Mohandas Gandhi, a major political and spiritual leader of India who was assassinated in 1948 at the age of 78, was at the climax of leading a nonviolent movement toward Indian independence from Great Britain.
Gandhi - a Hindu also known by the Sanskrit word Mahatma, meaning "Great Soul" - was a pioneer of Satyagraha, a philosophy that stresses resistance to evil through active, non-violent resistance.
In reading about Gandhi's life and work, Brown became convinced that nonviolent resistance was not only workable on an international scale, but was in keeping with his Christian faith. This conviction has guided him throughout 62 years of ministry and beyond.
In 2004 Brown attended a lecture by Arun Gandhi, who was born in South Africa and grew up under that country's discriminatory apartheid laws. According to the Web site of the M.K. Gandhi Institute for Nonviolence, Arun Gandhi learned from his parents and grandparents that justice does not mean revenge, it means transforming the opponent through love and suffering.
Brown and his daughter joined the Gandhian Legacy Tour and in 2005 spent 19 days in India under Arun Gandhi's leadership.
Since then, Brown has been in regular correspondence and had multiple meetings with Arun Gandhi, and enjoys sharing what he has learned with others.
"I was very inspired when I heard Bob Brown speak last year on his friendship with Arun Gandhi and felt that it was important to bring his story to a wider audience," said Elaine Economou, executive director of MFC. "It's incredible that we have Bob living right here in Chelsea. He has a warm and engaging presence and a very powerful story to tell that will resonate with people of all faiths who are interested in Gandhian peace practices, something that he has been engaged in for much of his life.
"These stories resonated with me especially as a mother of three young boys. I was interested in how Arun Gandhi went to live with his grandfather as a boy and learned to become aware of his thoughts and actions. These were real lessons that I could translate into my parenting and they motivated me to work at this aspect of my children's development."
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