LOVING YOUR NEIGHBOR!

"Teacher, which commandment in the law is the greatest?"

He said to him, "You shall love the Lord, your God, with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your mind. This is the greatest and the first commandment. The second is like it: You shall love your neighbor as yourself.”  Matt. 22:36-39

Since the inauguration of President Obama a small group of dedicated members of Witness Against Torture are living out, not only this second, great command but also the Beatitudes as they hunger and thirst for righteousness. These seven people have transplanted themselves to live for 100 days in a Japanese Buddhist Temple in Washington DC.

During this 100 Days Campaign they, with individuals and other groups* who might join them for a day or a week, hold daily vigils from 11 am to 1 pm, Monday through Friday, no matter the weather, in front of the White House. They also speak to Congressional representatives, schedule weekly, public lectures and film screenings, fast and pray. Their purpose: To close the U.S. detention facilities at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba, and end indefinite detention, torture and rendition by the U.S. within the first 100 days of the new administration.

 

President Obama has already signed an executive order to close Guantánamo Prison, but Witness Against Torture says, “After seven years of detaining hundreds of men without trial, 100 days more is 100 days too long.” They are vigiling to speed up the process, asking that detainees either be tried or released, and also requesting accountability for the torture that occurred in Guantánamo and other American prisons. In addition they are seeking to gain immediate release of seventeen Uyghur [Weeger] men who remain incarcerated at Guantánamo. The Uyghur, a Turkic-speaking people of Central Asia, experience repression in China. These detainees are judged to have never been a threat to US national security, and are slated for release. However, then US Secretary of State Colin Powell, said on August 12, 2003 that the Uyghurs will not be returned to China, where they were likely to face torture or execution. The Uyghurs continue to be incarcerated.¹

 

1. Uyghur Human Rights Project, 2/11/2009, http://www.uhrp.org/categories/Issues/Uyghurs-in-Guantanamo/

* Some members of Parishioners for Peace & Justice joined with NJ Peace Action and spent 4 days with the campaign.

 

We wish you a peaceful, blessed Lent.

 

“If we could read the secret history of our enemies, we should find in each man's life sorrow and suffering enough to disarm all hostility.”                                          Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

 

                                                                        3/08/09 Issue 10