Everything begins with that no, spoken with the heart's full energies, a suffering and prophetic word, a word issuing from the nature and direction of things. No. A time to tear and pull down and root out. A time for burning out the accumulated debris of history, the dark noisome corners of our shrines, a universal spring-cleaning. So that the symbolism of Catonsville may become a permanent method and symbol. Of what?
Of moral process. Not of escalated ethical improvement, or social engineering of American dreams, or exportation of techniques. We have had enough of that; we must speak of something other, closer to the dark roots of our existence, to beginnings, to the heart of things.
The Bible has many powerful images to bring reality to our shocked attention once more. Exodus, metanoia, conversion, a new way for man. The mysterious, stormy, jealous, destructive, heartbreaking Other keeps propping the rotten fabric of human invention and arrangement. He will not indefinitely allow man the sweet slavery into which he sinks like a flaccid complacent lover. No, every slavery is an invitation to another exodus; every exodus is guided by a dark promise.
— Daniel Berrigan, The Dark Night of Resistance