People of Faith Peacemakers

Justviewpoint.org connects people of conscience working for social justice. The Twin Cities groups represented on this site seek to transform a culture of violence to create a culture of justice, peace, and sustainability. 

      GROUPS and CAMPAIGNS on JUSTVIEW:

  People of Faith Peacemakers

New Earth Partnership

Link to Community of St Martin

Congregations Caring for Creation

 

 

 

People of Faith Peacemakers is a resource and support group for those concerned about peace and justice from a faith perspective. Breakfast meetings, open to everyone, are from 8 to 9:30 am at St Martin's Table, 2001 Riverside, Minneapolis, on the 2nd and 4th Wednesdays of the month. FFI Eleanor 763-784-5177  elj@yackel.org

People of Faith Calendar

 

UPDATED CALENDAR – June 2009
 
June 24 – a day at Hospitality Place; focus on “Constantine’s Sword” film and discussion, facilitators Roy Wolff, others from POFP. Begin at 9 am, soup lunch; bring snacks.

Directions from St. Martin’s Table:

1:          Start out going NORTHWEST on RIVERSIDE AVE/CR-48 toward 20TH AVE S.          0.2 mi

               2:          Turn RIGHT onto CEDAR AVE S/CR-152. Continue to follow CR-152.               0.3 mi               

               3:          Merge onto I-35W N.  12.6 mi          

               4:          Merge onto LAKE DR/CR-23 N via EXIT 31B.      2.1 mi               

               5:          Turn RIGHT onto E GOLDEN LAKE RD.  0.2 mi              

               6:          End at 20 E Golden Lake Rd Circle Pines, MN 55014-1725          

Estimated Time: 20 minutes Estimated Distance: 15.39 miles

 

July 8  - “Reflections on Constantine’s Sword” and other topics from the June 24 retreat. Facilitators are retreat planners

 

July 22 “Sudan” Mary Duvall shares experiences from her recent trip to Sudan. Mary represents Lutheran World Relief, a relief and development organization

 

August 12  to be determined

 

August 26  “Stories from Burma/Myanmar” told by Bernice Johnson, teacher of refugees in Thailand

3,000 years ago the Shan people came south from China and settled in a land now called Burma. The fascinating history of Burma/Myanmar and the current cruel military rule is told in a recently published book by Bernice Johnson, The Shan: Refugees without a Camp, by an English Teacher in Thailand. She will tell her own and Burma’s story.

 

People of Faith Peacemakers is a resource and support group for those concerned about peace and justice from a faith perspective.  Breakfast meetings, open to everyone, are from 8 to 9:30 am at St Martins Table, 200l Riverside, on the 2nd and 4th Wednesdays of each month. See:  www.justviewpoint.org. or 763-784-5177

 

People of Faith may receive this calendar by email. To join this list serve, email cmasters@bitstream.net

 

Please join us on the 2nd and 4th Wednesday of the month for questions and discussion on these important topics!

 

 

ONGOING  for a Calendar of Peace Events and Meetings: Minneapolis Alliance of Peacemakers www.mapm.org  People of Faith Peacemakers is a MAP member

EVERY WEDNESDAY:

7-8 a.m. PEACE VIGIL at Alliant TechSystems <http://www.circlevision.org/alliantaction.html>  



5:00 · 6:00 p.m. Lake Street/Marshall Avenue Bridge · A TWIN CITIES ANTI-WAR TRADITION <http://www.worldwidewamm.org/> 



PEOPLE OF FAITH PEACEMAKERS support the following Minnesota Peace Lobby Agenda by Jack Nelson Pallmeyer

MINNESOTA PEACE LOBBY AGENDA

 

Background:

 

Many U.S. citizens and people throughout the world hope the Obama administration will choose new approaches to security.  Alternative foreign policies are needed in order to address critical domestic and international problems.  We believe U.S. foreign policy should be guided by three insights. 

 

Key Insights:

 

·       It is a grave danger to confuse military power with real strength.  The world is changing.  U.S. power is diminished.  Our economy is weak.  Our military is strong, but counterproductive given the problems we face.  There are no military solutions to most of our nation’s or the world’s problems.

 

·       Our security and hope rest in joining the community of nations to solve pressing problems, building international partnerships, and respecting international law.  We will be welcomed as a good global partner or we will fail as a global bully.        

 

·       The nation’s economic crisis has many causes but is best understood in relation to disastrous wars, excessive military spending, and failed foreign policies.  Living standards are declining for most Americans because laws were changed to reward the greedy few and because U.S. military spending equals that of the rest of the world combined.  Enlightened domestic and foreign policies will allow us to address climate change, revitalize the U.S. economy and meet critical health and other social needs.

 

Peace Movement Agenda for Change:

 

I.       Dismantle the infrastructure for disastrous wars:

 

1.      Endorse the Cluster Bomb Treaty and urge all nations to comply.

 

2.      Abandon the missile defense system and engage Russia and China to reduce nuclear arsenals.     

 

3.      Reject U.S. plans to militarize space and join with others to preserve space for peaceful purposes.    

 

4.      Convene a global conference to cut global military spending by 50% and redirect funds to address climate change and global poverty.

 

5.       Stop production of unneeded weapons systems and confront the “disastrous rise” of the “Military Industrial Complex” (President Eisenhower’s words.) 

 

6.      Close many of the more than 750 permanent foreign U.S. military bases.

 

7.      Close the prison at Guantanamo Bay and the CIA secret prisons, end the practice of rendering prisoners to third countries, and issue a blanket policy precluding torture or degrading treatment of prisoners.   

 

8.      Develop renewable energy sources that reduce our use of oil and renounce the Carter Doctrine which says the U.S. has the right to use “any means necessary, including military force,” to maintain unrestricted access to Persian Gulf oil.    

 

9.      Renounce the Bush Doctrine of pre-emptive war.

 

II.     Building an infrastructure of peace & prosperity:

 

1.                 Recommit the United States to support and strengthen the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty.    

 

2.                 Commit the United States to strengthen the United Nations, and to respect international law and nonintervention.  

 

3.                 Acknowledge climate change as the gravest security threat to the United States and the world and redirect resources accordingly.    

 

4.                 Disentangle U.S. foreign policies from imposition of failed economic policies and flawed trade agreements. 

 

5.                 Create a cabinet-level Department of Peace to teach and implement effective mediation and conflict resolution skills that build peace and prevent violence and armed conflict.

 

6.                 Abandon the “war on terror” and address the root causes of terrorism (end illegal occupations, address economic and political grievances, view terrorism as a criminal enterprise.)

 

III.  Resolution of current conflicts:

 

1.      Organize a complete and total withdrawal of U.S. troops and private military contractors from Iraq within nine months. 

 

2.      Accelerate negotiations, begin withdrawing U.S. troops from Afghanistan, and avoid escalating U.S. military involvement in Pakistan. 

 

3.      Help resolve the Israel-Palestine conflict through determined, balanced diplomacy.

 

4.      Negotiate with Iran and work to make the Middle East a nuclear weapons free zone.

 

5.      Improve relations with Latin American nations:

 

·        Close the prison at Guantanamo;

·        Shut down the U.S. Army School of the Americas;

·        Replace the “war on drugs” with efforts to reduce demand and to expand effective treatment;

·        Normalize relations with Cuba; and

·        Renegotiate the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA).

 

 
Jack Nelson-Pallmeyer
jacknelsonpallmeyer@yahoo.com  

Webworker cmasters@bitstream.net

Photography of peaceworkers by Michael Bayly is exhibited on his website: Faces of Resistance

Worldwide Independent Media:   Indymedia http://www.indymedia.org