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203rd Annual Meeting to tackle justice issues
April, 2002
Resolution calls for churches to support people of Colombia
When Stan Duncan, pastor of the United Church of Christ in Abington, traveled with an ecumenical delegation to Colombia last year, he knew he would learn a lot and benefit from the experience.
He didn’t know how much the trip would benefit those on the other end as well.
“The people there were so grateful. They said ‘we’ve been fighting for years, and no one has ever come and stood with us. No one’s ever cared,’” he said. “They feel so alone and for us to be with them, and pray with them, was really a special moment.”
Duncan was inspired to help organize another trip to Colombia this year – this one sponsored by three conferences of the United Church of Christ: Massachusetts, Connecticut and Central Atlantic.
The 203rd Annual Meeting of the Massachusetts Conference will be asked to approve a resolution related to the trip which: pledges prayers and support to the delegation and the people of Colombia; calls on the three conferences to establish a presence in Colombia; and calls on local churches to urge U.S. policymakers to replace military aid to the country with humanitarian aid. [Go to full text of resolution.]
Those who go on the trip will have a chance to meet with people at churches and on farms, as well as government officials and human rights organizers.
“The main purpose is for people to see what’s happening there, to see what effect our government’s policies have on the people of Colombia,” Duncan said.
Duncan said most people don’t realize that Colombia has been embroiled in a civil war for almost 50 years, and that U.S. policies are partly to blame.
In the late 1980s, he said, the U.S. lobbied Colombia to do away with regulations setting minimum prices for growers and producers of coffee. As a result, coffee prices decreased and coffee growers were thrown into poverty.
At the same time, the U.S.’s efforts against drug production in Bolivia drove growers of coca (from which cocaine is produced) out of that country and into Colombia, which is now the chief supplier of coca for the U.S. market, Duncan said. Rebel groups began taxing the coca growers and using the proceeds to pay for more weaponry.
And, in 1999, the U.S. sent $1.3 billion to the government of Colombia for the effort against drugs – funds that have gone to the military and to defoliation campaigns which are aimed at coca crops, but which also destroy legal crops and poison water supplies, Duncan said.
“The church needs to have people like me or you or anybody voicing the opinion of a moral vision,” Duncan said. “We’ve got a right to be up there and be heard.”
“If we are not part of the public dialogue for national and international policy, then it is only left to the special interest groups,” he said.
Resolution calls on churches to work toward ending homelessness
When Len Dalton, a member of Plymouth Church in Framingham, volunteered to help homeless families sheltered by the state in area motels, he was not prepared for what he would find.
“The situation is atrocious,” he said. “There is this constant flow of families from one motel to another. There was one family with six kids. They were living in two rooms, with no kitchen and the parking lot as their playground.”
Comment on these articles through our Discussion Forum Dalton has seen a family forced to move on almost no notice, and with no transportation, because they are not allowed to stay in any one motel for more than 90 days. He has met children who are two and three years behind in school because of their continual moves from one school system to the next.
Dalton heads up an effort at Plymouth Church to provide hot meals, groceries, diapers and other assistance to these families. But he is the first to admit that the church’s efforts are treating the symptoms, not the problem.
“The solution is not to have them living in these hotels,” he said. “It’s just not working. And the state is pretty much sentencing these kids to end up in the same situation, because they can’t get educated.”
Dalton’s church is one of four that, along with the Conference Commission on Mission and Justice, is sponsoring a “Resolution to End Homelessness in Massachusetts” at the 203rd Annual Meeting. The others are Brighton Evangelical Congregational Church UCC, Central Congregational Church, UCC, in Jamaica Plain and Hancock United Church of Christ in Lexington. [Go to full text of resolution.]
The resolution calls on local churches and associations to offer services to homeless people while simultaneously advocating for legislative solutions to homelessness. It also calls on churches to support affordable housing in their own communities.
“Homelessness is on the rise in Massachusetts,” said Fran Bogle, Just Peace Coordinator for the Metropolitan Boston Area. “There are 387 families living in motels or in cars, and that is up from 120 two years ago.”
But, Bogle said, advocates for the homeless sense that the Legislature is more willing now then ever to work at eliminating homelessness – partly because it is so costly to house families in motels, partly because it has become clear that better communication between state agencies could go a long way toward solving the problem.
“There are all kinds of things that church groups and faith communities can do right now, from making calls to legislators to doing practical things for families in motels, like bringing them meals and providing transportation,” she said.
The resolution calls on churches to work with organizations such as the Massachusetts Coalition for the Homeless and Faith in Action Together, which early in March gathered 200 people at the State House for a Lobby Day. Nine people from five Conference churches took part, asking legislators to create a statewide application process for homeless people in search of housing assistance. Currently people must apply in each community.
