Newsletters

Date: October 12th 2007

Friends,

For ten years, the Presbyterian Peace Fellowship has made the closure of the U.S. Army School of the Americas (now called WHINSEC) one of our top priorities. Each year this vibrant movement has gotten a little closer to shutting down the funding stream that sustains the School, now located at Ft. Benning in Columbus, GA.

The witness of our members has grown ever stronger over the years, with nearly a dozen who have now spent time in prison for nonviolent acts of civil disobedience aimed at Closing the School. In the last three years, our depth of conviction has deepened as we've sent nearly fifty accompaniers to stand with our sisters and brothers in Colombia. For them, this issue is not academic. They have made it clear that people in their communities live in fear of members of both the formal military and the informal paramilitary forces, many of whom have received training in "counter-insurgency" techniques at the School of the Americas.

Here's the thing. We are very close to closing the school. It's no longer a question of whether the School will close, but only when it will close and how many of us will have the opportunity to stand up and be counted in the effort. In the last few years, as the U.S. has overtly embraced the use of torture as a technique in the so-called "war on terror," it has been clear that we must expand our efforts to insist that torture is ineffective as a security technique, morally repugnant as a matter of conscience, and totally unacceptable to us as followers of Jesus Christ.

So here are some ways that you might want to get involved in efforts to stand unequivocally against all torture:

1. Go to http://www.presbypeacefellowship.org to learn more about how to join with Presbyterians for the demonstration to close the School of the Americas on November 17th and 18th at Ft. Benning in GA.
2. Go to http://www.southwestwitness.org to learn about the Southwest Weekend of Witness in solidarity with School of the Americas Watch. On the same days – November 17 and 18, 2007, folks will come from all over the southwestern U.S. to witness together in Tucson and at Ft. Huachuca in Southern AZ, home of the U.S. Army's training center for military interrogations.
3. Check out http://no2torture.org to learn how you can get involved in a grassroots effort to end the use of torture. This group is doing great work, and it's all done by folks like you.

One other note:

On February 3 – 5, 2008, the PPF is a co-sponsor (with No2Torture, and Columbia, Fuller and Princeton Seminaries) of a working seminar at Columbia Seminary for students and faculty of Presbyterian related seminaries and colleges/universities. The title of the seminar is "Terror, Torture and Security: Theological Considerations for Tomorrow's Leaders." Our goal is to strategize on how to lift up a generation of church leaders who know that they cannot equivocate on about the moral dimensions of torture and war. If you are a student or faculty member and you want more information, drop us a note at ppfwitness@gmail.com.

May peace be with each of you as you work for peace in this troubling time.

Rick