Members of the International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons participate in a procession during a vigil in New York City Aug. 9, 2025, marking the 80th anniversary of the 1945 atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, Japan. (OSV News/Gregory A. Shemitz)
by John Dear
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On this week's episode of "The Nonviolent Jesus Podcast," I speak with Melissa Parke, executive director of the International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons. A coalition of nongovernmental organizations from more than 100 countries, the campaign was the winner of the 2017 Nobel Peace Prize.
Parke is the former minister for international development for Australia, and was a member of the Australian Parliament from 2007 to 2016. Prior to being elected to Parliament, she worked as an international lawyer with the United Nations in Kosovo, Gaza, New York and Lebanon from 1999 to 2007.
"ICAN was started in Melbourne by a group of friends who sat around a small kitchen table to discuss what they could do to abolish nuclear weapons," she said. "Today, through the work of ICAN, the United Nations' Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons has 101 nation signers. They are saying, 'We do not accept that nuclear weapons are a legitimate security measure.' We are working to stigmatize nuclear weapons until they are abolished."
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"Most of the world's problems today stem from humanity's disconnection from nature and each other," Parke said. "We forget that we are all connected. What we do to each other and the planet we ultimately do to ourselves. Action is the antidote to a sense of helplessness. We all have a right to demand answers from our governments. We can each ask our local, city and state governments to join the ban treaty."
