Over the last eight months, it has felt, at least to me, difficult to imagine constructively and hopefully. While the work of the Office of Peacebuilding and Policy continues to cover a range of topics and organizational partners, we have spent considerably more time than usual in relation to Israel and Palestine.
Making connections is one of my life’s joys, and the Christian Citizenship Seminar (CCS) held on April 11-16 in Washington, D.C., was a place to make them.
Registration is still open for the Ecumenical Advocacy Days Spring Summit 2024, an in-person event on May 17-19 in Washington, D.C. The Church of the Brethren’s Office of Peacebuilding and Policy is a sponsor of the event and director Nathan Hosler is on the planning team, alongside other ecumenical partners.
Church of the Brethren general secretary David Steele was among more than 140 global Christian leaders signing a new letter, released during Holy Week ahead of Easter, calling for a permanent ceasefire in Gaza.
The Church of the Brethren’s Office of Peacebuilding and Policy was one of the endorsing organizations for a prayer vigil calling for a ceasefire in Gaza, held Thursday afternoon, March 21, on Capitol Hill in Washington, D.C., as part of the Lenten Ceasefire Campaign organized by Christians for Ceasefire.
Plastic first started being created on a global scale in the 1950s. Since then, annual plastic production has exploded to an estimated 460 million tons as of 2019. While plastic has many beneficial uses, single-use plastics have become a real environmental threat.
The new Death Row Support Project (DRSP) Team started their work in January, upon the retirement of founder and former director Rachel Gross. One change the team has made is in the process for writers to connect with pen pals on death row. The team invites anyone interested in writing to someone on death row to attend an informational session on Zoom.
The Christian Citizenship Seminar (CCS) planned for Washington, D.C., on April 11-16 will bring senior youth and their adult advisors together in the nation’s capital to engage the theme “And They Fled: Advocating for Just Immigration Policy” (Matthew 2:13-23).
Church of the Brethren general secretary David Steele was one of more than 20 Christian leaders signing a letter to President Biden saying, in part: “The time for a comprehensive ceasefire is now. Every day of continued violence not only increases the death toll in Gaza and the cost to civilians but also fosters further hatred toward Israel and the United States and irreparably damages the moral standing of the United States in the broader Middle East. There is no military solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.”
The Church of the Brethren’s Office of Peacebuilding and Policy was one of more than 150 faith-based organizations and groups that signed a significant letter to Congress on the issue of immigration. More than 660 individual faith leaders also signed the letter, which was facilitated by the Interfaith Immigration Coalition.