Gary Cozette: “Close the SOA.”
[Posted by PPF, 5-8-08]

2007 Peaceseeker Award to Anita David & Beth Pyles
for Serving in Iraq with Christian Peacemaker Teams

Each year the Peace Fellowship recognizes Presbyterians on the front lines of peacemaking with the Peaceseeker Award. Anita David and Beth Pyles served on the Christian Peacemaker Team in Baghdad, maintaining a nonviolent presence in the midst of spiraling violence and civil war. Their work ranged from documenting torture in the Abu Ghraib prison to training a Muslim Peace Team in nonviolence. During this time, four CPT members were kidnapped; Quaker Tom Fox was found murdered and the three others were released. David belongs to Chicago’s Lake View Presbyterian Church. Pyles is a Presbyterian pastor in W. Virginia. Briefly visits here in the late spring of 2007 with David and Pyles about the Iraq war, responsibility, guilt, nonviolence and the Presbyterian Church.

Briefly: How did you decide to accompany the Iraqi people during the invasion of their country?  

Pyles: I was a student at Princeton Seminary in September 2001. Lots of people who lived in the town were in the Towers. In this very privileged, safe place, even a seminary, I saw that fear and ugliness were bleeding into things. As a pacifist, I knew what our US response would be---heart-breaking, but predictable. I became part of a Princeton Seminary peace group and we spoke about "standing in the way of violence" and learned about Christian Peacemaker Teams. I felt a sense of call to go to Iraq. I must say that receiving this award is humbling, because Anita and I both know how small our contribution to the peace of the world is. The bravery that you see in millions of Iraqis who have never picked up a weapon --- staying with those people was a privilege for us.   

David: I was ready to work with our team in Palestine. I got a call asking me to go to Iraq. I said no. The call came again and again until I said yes. This was the right thing. We each do what we have the power to do. I’m a believer in the power of answering yes. You can shock yourself by what you can achieve beginning with a yes.

Briefly: Was there ever a possible nonviolent response to 9/11?

Pyles: My vision of a nonviolent response to 9/11 is this: we might have given ourselves time and space to mourn. Acute shock is the worst time to decide or act. Second, we might have realized that the literal people who did this were already dead--beyond any human action. Next, we might have had a national conversion as adults. We might have called ourselves to our highest, best selves, not our worst, most base selves. Like the Amish when the schoolgirls were murdered, perhaps we might have spoken of forgiveness. Perhaps we might have tried to reach across the divide for understanding. Eventually we might have challenged ourselves to see our own part in it---not to justify or excuse it, but like the Alcoholics Anonymous Program Step “to conduct a fearless moral inventory of yourself.” Maybe we could have talked about sharing economic prosperity a little better.

Briefly: What is the best step for the US in Iraq now?

Pyles: We must not abandon them economically. They are in economic ruin. The Red Cross reports that every day is worse---the infrastructure, food, education, medical care. We need to bleed money into Iraq and to be generous. We have created a fairly predictable monster. Presbyterians will need to be generous.

David: I wrote to my friends in Baghdad to ask whether they want the US to just leave Iraq now. Most said “No, you can’t just leave us. You owe us.” One said, “Yes, just get out, you are the cause of the disaster, terrorism, murder of innocent people, ethnic distinction and crimes of all types. Iraq is getting worse.” Another said, “The existence of U.S. troops is very, very significant at the time being. If they pull back from Iraq: an endless civil war and then one will forget about a country called Iraq; Al-Qaida will emerge in a new form.”

 Still others hope that the U.S. will fix its mistakes in Iraq. For the immediate present, we will just go on ripping bodies apart, theirs and ours. Until that oil bill of privatization is signed, George Bush will never leave Iraq.

Briefly: Who will control the oil?

Pyles: As a condition of its withdrawal of troops, the US has insisted that the Iraqi Parliament pass laws allowing for privatization/foreign investment in Iraq’s oil reserves. The US argues that foreign investment is needed in order to rebuild Iraq’s economy. There are many historical examples of foreign/private investment in the rich resources of an otherwise poor nation which prove that the people of that nation seldom profit.

David: Iraqis have told me that Iraq is happy to sell its oil to the US. The Iraqis are smart about oil. They have been in the oil business for a long time. Iraqis believe the oil belongs to them and so the majority of the revenue derived from their oil should, likewise, go to Iraq. Under the regulations imposed by the International Monetary Fund, debt forgiveness required privatization of Iraq’s oil. The US Congress voted to withhold promised US reconstruction funds if the Iraqi Parliament refuses to pass privatization legislation. Privatization legislation, if approved, means production share agreements, PSAs, which are usually given where there is risk that oil will not be found. However, Iraq’s oil is the cheapest to extract in the world and is high quality. PSAs, which are favored by the multinational oil companies in the US., allow multinationals control of energy resources and extremely high profit margins. They have up to 40 year terms and stabilization clauses that protect the corporations from future legislative changes. Iraq’s oil was nationalized 35 years ago. No other Middle Eastern nation has privatized its oil. Neighboring states have constitutions that specifically prohibit foreign control over their energy reserves.

Briefly: So what will happen in this situation?

David: Iraqis are not going to give up their oil. Both Sunni and Shi’a parties in the Iraqi Parliament are opposed to PSAs and foreign control of their oil fields. The Iraqi government is not trusted by Iraqis. In the broadest sense, the Iraqi people do not believe that their government is there to do right by them. The Iraqi Parliament recently voted that only the Parliament can approve the continued presence of the Multinational Force. Prime Minister Maliki can no longer act independently to retain the US presence. The vote will come in January 2008.

Briefly: So it’s possible that they may vote for us to leave. What position does that put the US in?

David: I don't know how Mr. Cheney and Mr. Bush will react to not getting Iraq’s oil. However, remember that we are building the world’s largest Embassy. It will have the largest information gathering network outside of Washington D.C. and Pres. Bush recently announced his plans to keep US troops in Iraq as is the case in South Korea, for over 50 years. I believe that the interests of the America and the financial interests of Mr. Bush and Mr. Cheney diverge. They win if the oil bill goes their way, even if the US loses the war.

Briefly: What do we as a nation need to learn from the Iraq war?

David: You can’t fix other states. Also, there will be peace when peace becomes more profitable than war--- but there's no reason to believe that justice will follow. What's left to learn? We have already learned it---a completely failed US policy and a ruined country, both Iraq and the US. The nation already knows that we made a terrible mistake, we just haven't corrected it.

Pyles: There is a perception that we are “losing” in Iraq, so there is a lot of blame-shifting going on. I would compare it to blaming an abused wife --- as if it is the fault of the Iraqi people that the war is failing.

David: We are going to be buried by this guilt. As Americans we are going to understand that all of this devastation happened because of lies. The lives of Iraqis will remain changed for the rest of their lives, because of what we did. The Iraqi people are decent people. The words Iraqi, Arab, Islam, Muslim have been demonized. Take 27 million people and assume that one million will have died in this mess. About 2.5 million have left the country. And another 1.5 million are refugees within their own country. A total of 4 million Iraqis are refugees because of what we did. I don’t know the estimated number of Iraqis participating in the insurgency, but that leaves nearly 22 million Iraqis who have never picked up a gun. They have been vilified by the administration and by the press.

Pyles: Of the friends I made in Baghdad, none are still there. They are dead, detained, disappeared or have fled.

David: There is another consequence of this war, the Patriot Act and the Military Commissions Act of 2006. We need to restore habeas corpus, stop illegal spying, ban torture, and ban secret evidence. George Bush has made himself King and this new Congress has done nothing about restoring our rights under the Bill of Rights or meeting the minimum under the Third Geneva Convention. They have not gone back to Bush with a bill to get out of Iraq. I want to tell people to snap out of it. There is no intention to do good in Iraq and what good intention can be found in trivializing our Bill of Rights? Our government officials legalize torture and we as a nation stand by and let it happen. Nobody walks away from this.

Pyles: One thing we need to learn is to be better students of our own history, so that we won’t always just ask, “Why do they hate us?” When you kill someone’s children, even accidentally, they remember. The ignorance we have displayed in Iraq is staggering. In September of 2005 I was in a taxi in Iraq and the driver spoke to me through the translator about Hurricane Katrina. He knew all about it and was expressing condolence. We would do better to be less self-obsessed and pay more attention to the larger world.

    My indictment of myself and my country is that we are a people who worship success, we equate wealth with goodness. It’s an idolatrous, counter-Christ assumption for a Christian to make. It’s simplistic to say that the invasion was all about oil, but if there was no oil in Iraq, we would not have cared. As Christians, we should be down on our knees, seeking forgiveness and transformation from a “prosperity gospel” that we believe whether we think so or not. In Dt. 8, God warns Israel about the promised land----“You will prosper and forget me.”

    On a practical level about Iraq, what should we learn? Mainline Protestants need to stop being so quiet in public. Aren’t we tired of Pat Robertson and others being the Christian voice in the world? Just yesterday a Muslim friend still in Iraq asked me on-line “what is the Christian Broadcasting Network?” The voices of the Pat Robertsons of the US are heard world-wide and are being understood as representative of what it means to be a Christian. It’s little wonder that others fear us so.

Briefly: Christian Peacemaker Teams served in Iraq from 2002 through Feb. 2007. What’s next?

David: We have just put together a proposal for a team to return to Iraq in the near future. It’s pending.

Briefly: Accompaniment is becoming a new model for mission among Christians who are willing to take risks on behalf of nonviolence. What would you say to those considering Accompaniment?

Pyles: I am a 51 year old white, middle-class woman from West Virginia who has never been in a fistfight. I’m not brave. I’m not creative. I am extraordinarily ordinary. If I can do something, you can do something too. It’s all in God, who is extraordinary. Some are called as full-time accompaniers. My call is to be part of both accompaniment and in a local church. What matters is being there, in the midst of violence to try to transform violence to peace in that moment--- and for someone to bring back from the places of violence an eye-witness, to tell the stories of the people there who are suffering. It is being a witness in the Biblical sense of speaking the truth.

                                                                                                                                              Briefly: How do you view the Presbyterian Church (PCUSA)?

Pyles: I love being a Presbyterian. We are blessed by such a rich tradition and by so many of wisdom and courage who have come before us. We Presbyterians are awfully worried about numbers in the pews and that’s important. But if we lose our prophetic way of being in the world, it doesn’t really matter how many of us are in the pews. Every day when I see how kind and giving Presbyterians are, I am

David: We belong to a denomination that believes in peacemaking and has for a long time—day in, day out. Presbyterians engage these issues. One member of my church, Laurie Empen, serves on the Chicago Presbytery Middle East Task Force, which has existed for over 30 years. Lake View Presbyterian Church in Chicago is the church where I was baptized as a child and to which I returned as an adult. I learned about CPT from members of my church who went to Palestine for CPT. The Social Justice Committee there is amazing—and on a huge range of issues, from affordable housing and Fair Trade to making sure gay and lesbian people can serve in the church to education and senior nutrition. We’ve sent 2 teams to New Orleans to help rebuild homes. Our pastor, Joyce Douglas Strome, aids and abets all those who wish to make their voices heard. This is a welcoming church and it is growing. Each time I come back from Iraq, the number of new people stuns me. This church supports its members to act. It has provided me financial and spiritual support for two and one half years in Iraq. When I say yes, my church says yes to me. It’s the biggest gift in the world to hear that yes.
 

For background on Iraq Oil Privatization, see short, ground-breaking article by Col. Ann Wright (retired US Army, US Army Reserves and US Dept of State) at www.truthout.org/docs_2006/052607Z.shtml

Among other things, they provide helpful information and brief comments on overtures dealing with:

July 28 - August 3, 2008

Paths toward Peace and Justice:
Spirituality, Earth-Care, and the Prophetic Word in a time of Violence

[posted by Doug King, 3-25-08]

In partnership with the Witherspoon Society, the Presbyterian Peace Fellowship, Presbyterians for Restoring Creation, and the Presbyterian Peacemaking Program.

Jane Hanna, Coordinator

Evenings will center on all-Ranch worship with former PC(USA) Moderator John Fife and Rabbi Lynn Gottleib offering the prophetic word in the beautiful Agape Center, looking out over the valley toward Pedernal. This year there will be a concerted effort to join the "arts" side of the program with the "seminar" side. Rev. Carol Wickersham, founder of No2Torture, will design and coordinate the worship experiences. Eric Choate, graduating senior from The AZ School for the Performing Arts and pianist extraordinaire will return this summer to bless our worship experience.

Families, note that there will be a special "Peace and Justice Track" for high school students this year. Former Young Adult Volunteer Andrea Leonard will team with the College staff to build an experience that integrates the high school students into the broader community and conversation. High school seminars will be highly interactive, activity-based, and a lot of fun.

Rick Ufford-Chase and Gail Brown will reprise the popular "camp culture" begun in 2007, offering a low-cost housing and food option in the campground. Enjoy fellowship over shared meals and late night campfires. Please choose the campground for your housing option, and contact Rick to let him know that you hope to participate in the meals (including prep and cleanup) in the campground. Cost of food will be approximately $60 per person for the meals Tuesday through Saturday. Campers are encouraged to eat in the dining hall (pay as you go) on Monday evening and Sunday morning.

For more information, and to register,
go to the Ghost Ranch website
or to the page for this week.

To join us, register for one of the following courses:

The Covenant Community (Peace and Justice Witness) PJ811a

Join Rick Ufford-Chase for a “focus group” experience on developing a religious order that centers on a vocational commitment to peace and justice work. What kind of community might invite followers of Jesus into a total re-orientation of our lives? How might such a dispersed community offer the opportunity to deepen our spirituality, hallow our life support systems, and invite us into meaningful work in the world? This workshop will be highly participative, and will include daily biblical study and small group sharing.

Rick Ufford-Chase, Tucson, AZ   Rick is the Director of the Presbyterian Peace Fellowship, Moderator of the 216th General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church (USA) and a volunteer with No More Deaths and Christian Peacemaker Teams.

Faith, Workers and Economic Justice PJ811b

Are workers in your congregation or community struggling to make ends meet or be treated with respect and dignity? This workshop will offer an overview of the economic challenges facing workers, concrete strategies for challenging unjust treatment of workers, and hands-on practice in putting our faith into effective action. Participants will share in Bible study, personal reflections on work, group exercises and discussion, and "real-life" experiences supporting Santa Fe workers. Participants will gain organizing tools and resources for engaging people of faith in economic justice campaigns.

Kim Bobo, Chicago, IL   Kim is the Executive Director of Interfaith Worker Justice and co-author of Organizing for Social Change.

Trina Zelle, AZ   Trina is a Witherspoon Society co-moderator, Presbyterian Pastor and Director of Arizona Interfaith Worker Justice.

Preaching the Prophetic Word in a Time of Fear PJ811c

This workshop will be team-taught by conference preachers Rabbi Lynn Gottlieb and the Rev. John Fife.

In this seminar, Lynn will focus on women’s ways of speaking truth to power through the lens of the Jewish tradition. Lynn uses the text, story telling, poetry, ceremony and drum to help the participants experience women’s prophetic voices that are woven throughout the Hebrew scriptures. One session will focus on women in spiritual leadership in the Quran. John will draw on biblical themes from both the prophetic tradition and from the stories and teachings of Jesus. Together, Lynn and John will help participants to find their own prophetic voices in the midst of the empire.

Lynn Gottlieb, Ojai, CA   Lynn is a well-known peacemaker who has reached across many barriers and divisions to work for peace and justice.

John Fife, Tucson, AZ   John spent his ministry calling his congregants at Southside Presbyterian Church in Tucson and the surrounding community to live into their calling as children of a God of justice. John is retired and an active volunteer with No More Deaths, doing search and rescue patrol for migrants at risk in the desert.

Singing Songs of Peace in a Turbulent World PJ811d

This morning workshop will look at the rich history of the music of peace from the great hymns of the church to the plaintive folk songs of the Civil War to the rich songs of protest that fueled the Civil Rights movement of the ‘60’s. We will work together to craft music and words that help express the human longings for peace. The workshop group will produce an original piece to share with the entire group at the final celebration of the week. Instruments are welcome but not required.

Tom Zehnder and Tim Gibbs Zehnder, Los Angeles, CA   Tom Zehnder and Tim Gibbs Zehnder are twins who currently compose, arrange, perform and record as an independent duo based in Los Angeles. Tim plays bass and doumbek, Tom plays guitar and djembe, and the two raise their voices together in elaborate duets. Mostly self taught on their instruments, Zehnder freely moved between the “ear-playing” folk/rock world and a sight-singing, music-reading realm at school. As their compositional voices grew, they pursued and earned degrees in music composition from UCLA, both graduating summa cum laude. For more information, see www.ztheband.com

Restorative Justice: Building Peace through Relationships PJ811e

Fundamental to peace building is the ability to form mutually respectful relationships. This course will explore and articulate the intersecting principles of a continuum of peace building educational practices that are based on relationship skills. Shared principles and skills from emotional intelligence (EQ), the constructive engagement of conflict (CEC), peacemaking circles (PMC) and restorative justice (RJ) will be discussed and expanded. Faculty and students from the United World College (UWC) whose mission is to make education a force to unite people, nations and cultures for peace and a sustainable future will be featured in the weeklong discussion.

At the intersection of these educational practices is the assumption that relationships are fundamental to all lasting and meaningful human endeavors. Based in the humanistic movement, these practices share a multitude of beliefs and we will examine, articulate and develop these shared values, principles and beliefs. Intersecting principles include: that all human beings have dignity and worth, that there is an innate quality in humans that leads them to seek accord, belonging and connection, that self-awareness is central to conscious decision making, that there are multiple truths, that relationships are more important than power, that story telling is central to understanding and that the personal is the political.

Central to this seminar is the belief that sincerely promoting justice, inclusion, transparency, honesty and collaborative communication is the most effective way to build peace. We will explore and articulate educational practices that invite and model integrity, innovation, wisdom, compassion, hope, resilience, spiritual presence, accountability, forgiveness and respect for the innate dignity and goodness of all people.

As we strengthen relationships, we strengthen peace. When conflicts arise in our families, our schools, our communities and nations, we have mutually respectful and solid relationships through which we can constructively engage in the conflict in order to problem solve collaboratively.

These practices intend to co-create, through education and practice, a world in which people have the skills, understanding and commitment to make empathic and wise decisions to create peace and prosperity in themselves, with their friends and relations, communities and finally between nations.

Amy McConnell Franklin, Taos, NM   Amy is an educator and trainer in emotional intelligence. She works with teachers, parents and students to create more self-aware, intentional, empathetic, creative and resilient individuals, families, schools and communities as a fundamental path to peace. With a background in international public health, Amy is involved with articulating and synthesizing the continuum of peace building educational curricula in order to help raise a generation of citizens schooled in the importance of mutually respectful relationships, international interconnectedness and planetary sustainability.

Prophetic Ministry in an Eco-Justice Frame PJ811f

Throughout this class, practical strategies for transformation will be combined with theological reflection and ethical analysis about the environmental crisis. The hopeful theological vision eco-justice "the well-being of all humankind on a thriving Earth" will inform consideration of issues like global warming and environmental racism. Recent research in "strategic framing" will provide insights and tools for personal and social change that are especially appropriate for congregational programming. Clergy and laity will be empowered for effective leadership in their churches and communities.

Rev. Peter Sawtell, Denver, CO   Peter is the Executive Director of Eco-Justice Ministries, an ecumenical agency based in Denver, CO. He is prominent in the faith-based environmental movement for his strong emphasis on the distinctive role of churches, "as church," in providing moral leadership. He taught at Ghost Ranch in 2004, led workshops at the Churchwide Gathering of Presbyterian Women in 2006, and has been a presenter at many other ecumenical and denominational conferences. Peter is widely known for his Eco-Justice Notes commentaries. He is an ordained minister in the United Church of Christ, has served as co-pastor of congregations in Iowa, and is a volunteer member of the Environment & Energy Task Force of the national UCC.

Creating a Culture of Peace: Nonviolence Training for Personal and Social Change PJ811g

Strengthen your spirit and your skills for peacemaking! Gain a holistic and practical foundation in the spirituality and practice of active nonviolence --- the peaceful ways of engaging in situations of violence, injustice and conflict. You will explore the nature of violence, analyze the stages and roles of peaceful personal and social change, and learn about building communities of trust and support for the work of justice and peace. You will practice planning concrete peacemaking projects.

In the innovative tradition of popular education which draws upon the wisdom, knowledge and experience of participants, you will tell your own stories and listen to the stories of famous and ordinary peacemakers. This interactive, experiential retreat will relate to many issues in your world, such as war and militarism, domestic violence, environmental destruction, discrimination, poverty, community and school violence, and dealing with controversy. Join us in this CCP training for reflection and skill building, and depart with renewed energy to cultivate change in your world. (NOTE: This is a prerequisite course for CCP).

Janet Chisholm, Bangor, PA   Janet coordinates peace and justice programs at Kirkridge Retreat Center and the national CCP training program which she developed. She is an engaging and inspiring trainer. At FOR, Janet served as executive director and training coordinator, and is the past chairperson of the national Episcopal Peace Fellowship. Janet is an activist and popular speaker and writer on active nonviolence with experience in religious education, anti-poverty programs, and teacher education. Her academic degrees are in Religion and Human Development.

Poetry of Protest A811f

In this workshop we will look at poetry as a strategy for speaking out about the ideas and issues which matter most to us. Audre Lorde wrote that poetry is a way to "predicate our hopes and dreams toward survival and change, first made into language, then idea, then into tangible action." Whether it’s the war in Iraq, the crisis in the environment, the proliferation of violence, or what happens in your office, we will open the door to expression and discover how to turn anger into art, perspective into poetry.

This course will be open to those who would like to read and discuss protest poetry, but especially to those who would like to write in this area. We will interpret both the terms "poetry" and "protest" broadly, allowing us to examine parts of letters and essays that use poetic language, prose poetry and song, and we will consider protest to be both political and personal, public and private. Examples and models will be both historical and contemporary.

Anita Skeen, Okemos, MI   Anita is the Arts Coordinator for the Residential College in the Arts and Humanities at Michigan State. She is the author of five books of poems and has taught at the Ranch in the Creative Arts Festival and Fall Writing Festival for 29 years.

"Do Not Forsake Us in Our Time of Conflict" S811

NOTE: Participants in this course will not be housed at Casa del Sol.

The Casa del Sol Prayer of Jesus expresses the vision and commitments of the young Community of Casa del Sol and its spirituality center in the high desert of New Mexico. One of the prayer’s phrases, "Do not forsake us in our time of conflict," speaks of the pain of our brokenness as an earth community and our desire for peace and commitment to relationship. This integrated week between Casa del Sol and the Ranch (allowing for up to 50 participants) will consist of meditative prayer at the beginning and end of each day, of teaching and sharing in the Agape Center in the mornings, of rest and silence in the afternoons, and of further reflection and embodiment of our week’s theme in the evenings.

The week will be led by J. Philip Newell (Companion Theologian for the Community of Casa del Sol), Alison Newell (Teacher of Spiritual Direction in Scotland). Rabbi Nahum Ward-Lev of Santa Fe, NM, will be joining us, as well as a representative of the Islamic Community of New Mexico.

J. Philip Newell is a poet, a scholar and a teacher. Formerly Warden of Iona Abbey in the Western Isles of Scotland, he is currently Writer Theologian for The Cathedral of The Isles on Cumbrae and Companion Theologian for the Community of Casa del Sol. He is internationally acclaimed for his work in the field of Celtic spirituality, including his best known titles Listening for the Heartbeat of God and his poetic book of prayer Sounds of the Eternal. For more information see www.jphilipnewell.com.

Ali Newell is a Church of Scotland minister who works as a spiritual advisor for the Ignatian Center of Spirituality in Glasgow. She and her husband have four children and live in Edinburgh.

Nahum Ward-Lev, Santa Fe, NM Nahum is a rabbi who has taught scripture at synagogues, churches, and retreat centers across the country, including Ghost Ranch. He is also the Scholar-In-Residence at Temple Beth Shalom, Santa Fe.

Guest leaders

For more information, and to register,
go to the Ghost Ranch website
or to the page for this week.