News Briefs
Episcopal News Service. August 14, 2002 [2002-192-1]
Anglican Peace and Justice Network expresses dismay at Mideast impasse
(ENS) Members of the international Anglican Peace and Justice Network issued a statement August 12 expressing "deep dismay at the continuing impasse between Israelis and Palestinians" and deploring "the unbroken cycle of violence that has claimed too many innocent lives on both sides." (Full text on the Episcopal Church's Peace and Justice Ministries web site at http://www.episcopalchurch.org/peace-justice/middleeast.asp) The statement assured both Israelis and Palestinians of "our love and support in ending this long and troubled conflict. We embrace all those who have lost loved ones in the violence and extend our deepest sympathies."
The primary cause of the present violence, according to the statement, "is the continuing Occupation of the West Bank and Gaza imposed by Israel which inflicts humiliation and suffering on the Palestinian people, inflaming passions and breeding further violence. Collective punishment of the Palestinian people must be brought to an end."
Members of the network said that they were also "deeply troubled by the use of U.S. made weapons and aircraft provided to Israel and being used for attacks on civilian targets," urging a moratorium on "the use of such weapons which violate U.S. law."
In outlining steps "to achieve a sovereign and independent Palestine living alongside a secure Israel recognized by and at peace with her neighbors," the statement urged the withdrawal of Israeli forces from Occupied Areas; the introduction of an international peacekeeping force in the Occupied Territories to maintain security; humanitarian relief for the Palestinians; and the immediate resumption of negotiations.
"The unconditional recognition of the state of Palestine must be hastened if peace is to prevail in the Middle East," the statement concluded. It also called on the faith communities, especially the Anglican Communion, to pray for peace and "to exercise a ministry of presence in the region as a gesture of solidarity with the people."
New archbishop of Canterbury challenges plans for attack on Iraq
(ENS) Archbishop of Canterbury-elect Rowan Williams of Wales has joined other church leaders in questioning the legality and morality of plans for an American-led attack on Iraq in a declaration that was sent to Prime Minister Tony Blair.
The declaration was written by Pax Christi, the international Roman Catholic peace movement, and says that "it is deplorable that the world's most powerful nations continue to regard war and the threat of war as an acceptable instrument of foreign policy, in violation of the ethos of both the United Nations and Christian moral teaching."
The statement, signed by over 3,000 leaders, added, "The way to peace does not lie through war but through the transformation of structures of injustice and of the politics of exclusion, and that is the cause to which the West should be devoting its technological, diplomatic and economic resources."
Williams has said that it would be immoral and illegal to support an American war on Iraq without authorization by the United Nations. Bishop Richard Harries of Oxford said it would be difficult to see how military action in Iraq could meet the criterion for a "just war." Church of England theologians argue that a war must have "proper authority and right intent."
Middle East Council of Churches expresses alarm at prospect of military intervention in Iraq
(ENS) The Middle East Council of Churches (MECC), an umbrella organization of Orthodox, Catholic and Protestant churches with headquarters in Beirut, has issued a statement expressing alarm about possible U.S. military action against Iraq.
The August 5 statement said that the MECC "views with disappointment and increasing alarm intensified efforts in the United States to gather support for major military action against Iraq. Apart from its humanitarian concerns for the Iraqi people who, for over a decade, have been ground down by sanctions and daily air raids, the MECC is committed to Iraq not least of all because of the cries of its member churches there for peace and sanity."
The statement said that the council viewed the conflict as "one against the people of that country, the common people, not the politicians or power brokers. The UN sanctions, themselves a type of violence, have not really touched Iraq's governing elite, but have caused the people untold suffering."
"Not only has the sanctions regime failed; that failure is now to be compounded by an initiative that lacks justification and has discernible or constructive goal," the statement said. "It has no support in the region. All that military offensive will leave behind is ruin and a shattered country. Chaos will ensue. In the meantime, nothing will be done to ameliorate the human suffering that has already scarred and ruined a whole generation of Iraq's youth, caused the death of thousands of infants, destroyed one of the region's most productive and creative middle classes, and left a wasteland, a swirling pool of despair and rage, a time-bomb to bedevil the future."
The statement urged the Christian churches of the West "to speak to their governments," arguing that violence will mean more suffering. "The churches of the Middle East are committed to peace that comes through the power of the Word to establish justice, and champions the cause of the poor and downtrodden. We believe that through peaceful intervention, the moral force of truth can break the cycle of violence in Iraq, in Palestine, and throughout the world."
The statement was signed by the Rev. Riad Jarjour, general secretary of the MECC.
Church World Service urgently appeals for aid to suffering in West Africa
(NCC) Returning from a recent trip of church leaders to the troubled nations of West Africa, the Rev. John McCullough, executive director of Church World Service, has appealed to the U.S. and United Nations for aid to "a troubled sub-region of West Africa that has known too much suffering." The eight-member delegation visited Guinea, Sierra Leone, Liberia and the Gambia.
McCullough wrote Secretary of State Colin Powell and UN Secretary General Kofi Annan about the urgent need for peace in Liberia, where civil war has raged off and on since 1989, displacing nearly half the population. The delegation visited a camp near Monrovia, the capital of Liberia, where 6,000 people have not had access to food aid from international aid agencies.
CWS also is calling for multifaceted assistance to the region, especially to Sierra Leone which is attempting to recover from a brutal civil war that ended last January after 11 years of violence. The ecumenical humanitarian agency supported by members of the National Council of Churches is helping some 25,000 Liberians who have sought refuge in Sierra Leone. It has also helped the Liberian Council of Churches and other faith-based groups to provide material for shelters, food, income-generating projects, and trauma counseling for internally displaced Liberians.
CWS is now seeking appointments with Powell and Annan to discuss West Africa's urgent needs, as well as a meeting with the United Nations High Commissioner of Refugees, members of the U.S. Congress, and ambassadors to the UN from Guinea, Sierra Leone and Liberia.
Anglican Pakistani bishop reacts to recent violence at Christian hospital
(Barnabas Fund) Bishop Mano Rumalshah of Peshawar, Pakistan, expressed deep sorrow at the recent attack on Taxila Christian Hospital that killed five nurses as they left chapel services.
"After nearly 100 years of Christian diakonia [service] at this hospital, for anyone to brutalise those faithful servants of God is not only a criminal act against humanity but also an act against God," said the bishop. He cut short a visit to the United States when diocesan officials begged him to return because "we need someone with whom people can cry."
Rumalshah asked Christians around the world to pray for staff at the hospital, which specializes in treating eye diseases common among the poor. "I appeal to people of sense and goodwill that sanity may prevail, with healing and reconciliation," he said.
Although the hospital is run by the Presbyterians, all Christians in Pakistan are feeling the vulnerability because of recent attacks against Christians. In October 2001 four gunmen burst into a church service in Bahawalpur and killed 15 Christians, most of them women and children. Later a grenade attack on the international church in the diplomatic area of Islamabad killed five, including two Americans. A recent shooting at Murree Christian School, serving mostly the children of foreign missionaries, killed six Pakistanis.
The government of Pakistan is making strenuous efforts to protect the Christian community but there is speculation that recent attempts to provide more political representation for non-Muslim minorities may actually have provoked violence as a protest. Some speculated that the violence stems from the Pakistani government's alliance with the international campaign against terrorism led by the United States.
Earlier in the year Rumalshah had pleaded with several western Christian agencies working in Pakistan to allocate more funds for security, especially to provide professionally trained security guards.
Ecumenical group looks at implications of September 11 attacks
(WCC) An ecumenical gathering on the theme, "Beyond September 11: Implications for US churches and the world," has outlined the basic principles for human and national security. In a statement at the end of the August 5-6 meeting outside of Washington, DC, the participants called on American churches to "press their government to work for a just resolution of the Palestine-Israeli conflict," and to "speak out against the threat of military attack by their government against Iraq."
The statement, addressed to the Central Committee of the World Council of Churches meeting in late August, calls for "ongoing dialogue" with Christians and other faith communities around the world. It also argues that the war on terrorism led by the United States is threatening genuine peace. "Peaceful relations among nations and peoples are achieved through multilateral decision-making, not by the unilateral economic and military actions of one country," the statement said.
"As Christians we put our security in the hands of Jesus Christ and the biblical witness that says 'perfect love casts out fear'," the statement concluded.
The meeting was organized by the WCC, the National Council of Churches and Church World Service.