KEY POINTS:
Father Kevin Saunders sounds as if he's just not really that surprised.
Yes, the elderly priest says from Melbourne, he understands one of his flock, a certain Father Peter Murnane, has got himself into a little trouble with the law.
No, says the head of the Dominicans in
Australasia, the order does not necessarily agree with everything the renegade priest does. But they do support him as a fellow Dominican, and Father Peter is really a very nice man.
It's possible, he muses, there could be some sort of repercussion within the order for the bearded, cycling Auckland friar who is nearing his seventies.
But those discussions haven't been held, and anyway the order acknowledges Father Murnane has the right to act according to his conscience.
For Father Peter this meant taking a sickle to one of the domes at the Waihopai spy base, then praying for the dead in Iraq along with his co-accused, organic gardener Adrian Leason and farmer Sam Land (collectively the Anzac Ploughshares), as the trio awaited their inevitable arrest.
This is normal behaviour for Ploughshares, small groups committed to peace and disarmament. Their action has inspired support from such diverse organisations as the Addington Women's Revolutionary Craft Circle, whose motto is to "make tea not war", to the Anglicans at St Matthew-in-the-City and a variety of other campaigners for peace.
But it has drawn a fair bit of criticism too, not least a barrage of emails and calls to the Catholic headquarters in Auckland saying what appalling behaviour this was for a Catholic priest who is supposed to be a man of peace, following the dictates of the Gospel.
Father Peter has been called a zealot and Prime Minister Helen Clark, condemned the action as a senseless act of vandalism.
So what was it really all about? To understand why the Anzac Ploughshares did such a seemingly strange thing, you need to take a look at the name they use.
The Anzac bit of the name is self-explanatory but the Ploughshares bit has a very long history.
A ploughshare is the cutting blade of a plough and all over the world small groups of people come together every now and then to make non-violent statements using the name.
The origin is Biblical, from the words of the prophet Isaiah, though not everyone who acts under the name is religious. They share the message though - it's a call to peace, a call to turn instruments of war into instruments of peace and productivity, just as Isaiah said for people to "beat their swords into ploughshares".
In the eyes of the Anzac Ploughshares, Waihopai made a good target. To them, it is part of a global intelligence network aiding America in its war on Iraq.
Father Kevin points out that within the Dominican order, as within the wider church, there are a variety of approaches. Where some might view such actions to be almost Christ-like, others would think them foolish and potentially criminal.
Father Kevin himself thinks it a little ambitious to say Father Peter and the fellow Ploughshares' behaviour was Christ-like but anyone who is prepared to suffer for their beliefs - and Father Murnane could go to jail - can sometimes be seen in that light.
"Hmm, I'spose it's more like being a martyr. The word martyr means witness and I suppose it's someone taking a risk in order to pay witness to their beliefs."
He says he might have a word with the Catholic Bishops in New Zealand to see what they are thinking about it all.
It may be, or may not be, that Father Peter will be asked to tone down his protests a bit, but he won't be booted out of the Dominican Order, or the priesthood. That would not be appropriate, says Father Kevin.
"In a sense this protest action, I guess, is in accord with his preoccupations in life and his own personal lifestyle is very much in accord with poverty and the simplicity of life and so forth."
And you have to remember, says Father Kevin, in the early church Christians were generally pacifists.
While some groups might go to extremes, Father Kevin says they can also remind people of basic Christian values and perspectives on life - "so I guess he reminds us of some of these things".
He then says God Bless and signs off, adding that hopefully things will work out justly and peacefully for all.
Back in Auckland, the Bishop of Auckland, Patrick Dunn, has decided not to talk. But head of Catholic Communications Lyndsay Freer says his view might be guessed at given his reaction to a previous action by Father Peter.
This was a few years ago when the priest spilled his blood in the shape of a cross, on the carpet at the American Embassy in Auckland, in another protest against the Iraq war.
Father Peter has been protesting for years. Bishop Pat wrote a letter to the Embassy apologising for the offensive behaviour and offering to pay the bill to clean the carpet.
Freer says she thinks that while most Catholics would agree peaceful protest is perfectly legitimate, they would not think it legitimate if it entailed the destruction of property.
She describes Father Peter as a crusader who operates on a different level to most people.
"Those who know him, and I'm one of them, know that he is actually a very gentle man and he wouldn't harm anybody. He's completely sincere and committed to the cause of peace."
Father Peter and the Ploughshares are by no means alone in these types of actions.
Moana Cole is a New Zealander who went to jail in America for her part in disabling a B52 bomber when she was in her early 20s.
She is 39 now, a Catholic and a lawyer who can't talk about the case of the Waihopai trio as it is before the courts and she is helping represent one of the accused. But she does talk about why she did what she did just before the first Gulf War.
Silence about war means complicity in war, she says, which is why since the 1960s pacifists have moved from being conscientious objectors to proactive in approach.
Cole had gone to America to work with a Catholic activist group called Catholic Worker [and though there is no formal link with this group and Ploughshares, the Waihopai trio all belong] and worked in the soup kitchens and with the poor.
When war appeared inevitable she and others went to Griffiths Airforce Base in New York - which she says had just won the prize for the most secure base - and, knowing that children were going to be killed, decided to put their bodies between the weapons of war and their intended targets.
Incredibly, armed only with hammers, she and others managed to attack a B52 bomber which had nuclear-tipped air-launch cruise missiles, putting the plane out of action for the duration of the war.
They did this even though the bomber was on what is called 'five minute alert' which means the engine was running and the plane was fully loaded. It even had an armed guard underneath.
They poured their own blood on the plane and stayed and prayed until their arrest.
Their defence was that under international law indiscriminate bombing is illegal, but this failed and they went to prison - though there has been the occasional Ploughshares court victory.
Cole sees the actions not as martyrdom or zealotry - pointing out Ploughshares have included Gandhists, Buddhists and atheists - but as appropriate human action.
"Usually at the time they're done they're not necessarily popular, nor are they necessarily fully understood and usually with the fullness of time they come to be."
Madness? Not according to Archdeacon Glynn Cardy, Anglican vicar of St-Matthew-in-the-City, who says there is a long history of "troublemaking" in Christianity. Protest actions can be misconstrued, he says - it's hard to have the perfect protest.
But look at Jesus, who drove the moneychangers out of the temple in Jerusalem.
"He destroyed other people's property, disrupted legitimate business and brought upset into a holy place."
Cardy says society needs people like them to "draw our attention to those things we tend to ignore."
Would you break the law and enter a burning house to rescue trapped children, he asks. "Ploughshares would say that war is raging out of control, children are trapped and we need to help."
CLARION CALL
"They shall beat their swordsinto ploughshares, their spearsinto pruning hooks; nation shallnot lift sword against nation;and there shall be no moretraining for war." Isaiah 2:4
* Ireland: In 2003, five people were acquitted in Dublin after disarming a US military C40A logistics supply plane at Shannon Airport which they said was a pitstop for American troops. They beat on the plane with hammers, poured their own blood over it then prayed for the dead in Iraq. Their defence invoked the Irish Constitution, which guarantees the neutrality of Ireland.
* Britain: In the late 1990s a group of women in Lancashire entered a British Aerospace factory armed with hammers and wrote off a Hawk jet fighter. The planes were being made in America and were being sold to Indonesia which used them in East Timor. Their defence the planes were genocidal weapons succeeded.
