JOHN DEAR is a priest, retreat leader, author, and peace activist. He has served as the executive director of the Fellowship of Reconciliation, an interfaith peace organization, and was a Red Cross coordinator of chaplains at the Family Assistance Center in New York City after the September 11, 2001, attacks. He has traveled to the world's war zones on missions of peace and has been imprisoned repeatedly for civil disobedience in anti-war protests. He lives in northeastern New Mexico.