This is a letter from the peace and justice committe (I am only forwarding the english version, if you'd like the
spanish contact me directly and i'll send it on to you)) of the Colombian Mennonite Church which some of you
will have already received through other channels. Nevertheless I believe it is important enough to send it out
on this network. Please put the content of the letter to prayer, share it with those whom you believe would be
interested and let each of us "in the North" remain open to God's leading.
Brian Bauman
Pacific Southwest
Conference Minister for N. CA
----- Original Message -----
A CALL FROM THE COLOMBIAN CHURCHES TO THE CHURCHES IN THE NORTH IN RESPONSE TO BILL CLINTON'S VISIT TO OUR COUNTRY
Bogotá, D.C., Colombia, September 10, 2000
"So that when one member suffers, all of the members suffer as well."
(1 Corinthians 12:26)
Dear brothers and sisters. We send you fraternal greetings in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ.
A few months ago we wrote you to inform you that the U.S. Congress had approved a $1.3 billion dollar economic aid package for the Colombian government, almost 90% in arms and training to strengthen the army in its confrontations with the different guerrilla groups and against drug production.
On August 30 of this year, the President of the United States himself, Bill Clinton, traveled to our country to reinforce his support towards the Colombian government and ratify the economic aid approved by the U.S. Congress.
Thus, we see concrete evidence that the war that has caused so much bloodshed during more than 40 years will receive a strong thrust through millions of dollars in modern arms. This fact produces a deep concern for us; although the help in itself is positive, the content could create many problems to our country.
Three times in Colombia, there have been attempts to eliminate the guerilla groups and the drug-trafficking by strengthening and modernizing the army. However, as a result, the guerrilla groups have always ended up stronger and drug-trafficking network has multiplied its tentacles. In response to the guerrilla groups growth, paramilitary groups or self-defense units have expanded beyond control. As the combats intensify, peasant farmers and many other people feel obligated to leave their land, producing greater displacement. These people need some way of surviving, but the State is not offering them alternatives. For that reason they move into the rainforest to grow the only crop that they can sell - coca leaves; other types of crops are not marketable due to a lack of roads and transportation to take the produce into the cities, and in addition, opportunities in the agricultural market are cut off by imported products at much lower prices coming from other countries, including the United States and
Canada. The Colombian agricultural sector can not compete with agricultural production in countries in the North that offer State subsidies and high levels of technology.
In contrast, drug-traffickers buy coca leaves from the farmers right where it is grown, and they pay in cash. If what they have planted gets fumigated, they will abandon this land and move deeper into the rain-forest. One can see that this military intervention leads to greater displacement, more coca crops and greater ecological damage. At the same time, the peasant farmers conclude that the only thing that the State does is take away their source of survival by force, without giving them any other alternatives. Since the guerrilla groups protect the coca crops, they appear as the farmers' defender. This takes away the government's legitimacy, strengthens the guerrilla groups and opens opportunities for more drug-trafficking. Moreover, when farmers lose everything due to the combats and fumigation on their land, many of them join the guerilla groups. Additionally, the guerrilla groups are responding to the increase in military aid and arms received by the government looking for ways to augment their
own resources to buy more arms, thus feeding the arms build-up.
For that reason we believe that this type of military aid will only intensify the war, disperse the coca crops and strengthen the drug-trade business. As more arms are given to the Colombian government, more drugs will reach the United States.
Thus, we as churches must offer life-alternatives to the farmers, to the displaced peoplke and to the unemployed. We should offer proposals that legitimize and strengthen the institutional authority of the State - proposals for social justice that become real alternatives to the insurgent groups militaristic proposals. We need to open new options so that the farmers can stop cultivating coca and fortifying the drug trade. Essentially, as churches we must offer proposals that lead people towards abundant life.
In reality, the government of the United States, using the tax-payers money, is supporting the Colombian government in what we consider to be a negative form. This means that the message arriving from the North to the Colombian people becomes a message of death and destruction. For that reason we are calling the churches in the North to redeem their taxes, on one hand by demanding that the U.S. government invests this money in life-producing projects, and on the other hand by redirecting part of their taxes towards a different project in your community or in the world that promotes abundant and dignified life, as our Lord Jesus Christ has commanded us.
Thus, just as the Colombian government needs support from the United States government to continue in the war, we as churches in Colombia need defenders and supporters among the churches in the North in order to build peace and our alternative life project. Most importantly, we must build up inter-dependent relationships that allow for an exchange between us, sharing not only responses to the violence in Colombia but also to the daily experience that you live through in the North. We know that you also suffer from direct violence in some cases, as well as unemployment and poverty in your country.
We must positively transform our conflicts, and seek as a result more human relationships between the North and the South. We call the churches in the North to become sisters churches to those in the South, such that we can count on 300 sister churches in the North relating to 300 churches sanctuaries of peace in Colombia.
May this be the opportunity to incarnate the global family of faith. We need a strong base of churches that can strengthen our work as churches here in Colombia. We need to recover the networks of sister churches and other initiatives that have supported other people groups in the middle of a war context.
Brothers and Sisters, we need to transform the message of destruction and death sent by the war and the drug-trafficking into the message of dignified life, love and peace that we have as ambassadors of the Prince of Peace. We can not fulfill this call alone. We must integrate ourslves between the North and the South, because the churches are one body, and just as the apostle Paul says, "when one part of the body suffers, the whole body suffers."
We are annexing a concrete proposal about our churches sanctuaries of peace in Colombia. Please read it, enter into a discussion of discernment within your church communities and send us your comments and reflections, as the Spirit speaks to you. We want this proposal to be constructed between all of us.
Ricardo Esquivia, Director Justapaz - Mennonite Church, Coordinador of the Human Rights and Peace
Peter Stucky, President - Mennonite Church of Colombia
