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I'm an extremist by nature: a big-wave surfer and habitual entrepreneur who wrote a book a couple of years ago about adventurous faith. I started writing about radicalism because I thought I was part of the movement. But then I started looking for radicals.

I wanted to connect with and learn from others on the extreme. On business trips, I would take extra time to explore the cities' countercultural corners. I posted queries on edgy Christian websites like TheOoze.com and emergent blogs. Some said the Amish were the best example. Some mentioned Rob Bell, Shane Claiborne, and Bono. Some mentioned their pastor or youth leader.

I began randomly interviewing strangers. Pity those like the woman in her mid-50s who sat on an airplane next to me between Portland and Denver. "What do you think about Christian radicals?" I asked her.

She was not a fan. Modern radical Christians, she complained, have hijacked their faith traditions and changed the original intents. She mentioned people who picket abortion clinics as the perfect example. "They don't seem very smart to me, because they don't understand the teaching of their own faith. They shove it down people's throats."

"Those people," she concluded, "are on the fringe to me." And she had no respect for anyone who was on the fringe.

Before returning to her Sudoku game, she paused thoughtfully, removed her glasses, and leaned over to say, "Actually, the anti-war protesters of the Vietnam era were a good kind of radical."

So for this random sample of one, carrying signs and marching can make you a radical. But it depends on where you are marching and what's on your sign. Radicalism is somewhat of a moving target, it seems.

So maybe seat 24C wasn't the place to look. I needed to go where real radicals hang out. I needed to find that anti-war, anti-Starbucks, wheatgrass-eating, yoga-practicing population of Ralph Nader supporters. So I head to Pioneer Square in downtown Portland. Locals call it Portland's living room because people just hang out there all the time, rain or shine, playing Hacky Sack and eating their hotdog-stand giant pretzels. Between the original Pioneer Courthouse and Nordstrom, a few people in the square are passing out fliers about various causes and meetings taking place throughout the city. Someone hands me a slip of paper that points out that our country spends $486 billion on the military and only $29 billion on diplomacy. Yep, I thought, this place is a radical's breeding ground.

This bunkered bastion of goths and freaks and street preachers has a thriving Starbucks located on the northwest corner. I venture inside for an Americano with steamed soy, and find more anti-war fliers on the tables. Through the big window, I can see out into the square; a guy is holding a binder, trying to stop people walking past him. He is trying to gain their support for something. He is about 28 years old, wearing a skull cap, and sporting a full beard. Perfect.

His name is Nate, and he's the local head of Greenpeace. I tell him about my quest and ask him what it's like to be a radical.

"I can see why people think we are on the fringe"—he uses that same phrase my airplane seatmate used. "But I don't think we are radicals at all." He smiles a genuine smile and gives me a look to suggest he's about to offer some insider information.

"Greenpeace was actually started by a Quaker—a Christian!" He sees that I am visibly shocked by this claim, which I later find out to be mostly true. The founding members, most of them, anyway, were devout Quakers based in Vancouver, British Columbia.

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February 2009, Vol. 53, No. 2