wfn.org | NCCCUSA CEFR Staff Travel to Cuba and Haiti

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NCCCUSA CEFR Staff Travel to Cuba and Haiti
National Council of the Churches of Christ in the USA
Internet: wendym@ncccusa.org

Contact: Wendy S. McDowell, NCC, 212-870-2227

NCC1/28/98  FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

NATIONAL COUNCIL OF CHURCHES CEFR STAFF TRAVEL TO CUBA AND 
HAITI

 NEW YORK, Jan. 28 ---- Eight National Council of 
Churches/Church World Service staff will travel to Cuba and 
Haiti Jan. 28 - Feb. 11 to dialogue with the Cuban churches 
about the effects of the Pope's visit and to make firsthand 
observations about the two Caribbean countries which can be 
used to educate churches in the United States.

 The delegation will visit Cuba Feb. 5-Feb. 11, 
following a week in Haiti Jan. 28 - Feb. 4.

 "We felt that this was an ideal time to visit Cuba, two 
weeks after the Pope has left," explained the Rev. Oscar 
Bolioli, Director of the NCC's Latin America and the 
Caribbean Office and a member of the delegation.  "We will 
have the opportunity to hear firsthand the interpretation 
the Cuban people have made of the Pope's message."

"After things have calmed down and the press has left 
is also the time to put in place a more precise strategy 
about changing U.S. directives which restrict humanitarian 
aid," said the Rev. Dr. Rodney Page, Executive Director of 
Church World Service for the NCC, who will lead the 
delegation.  "We will question again how we can improve life 
for the victims of the conflict between the U.S. and Cuba -- 
the poor and most vulnerable in Cuba."

CEFR Staff Will Deliver School Kits, Gather Observations in 
Cuba

 This particular delegation includes members of the 
NCC's Community Education and Fund Raising (CEFR) network, 
which confronts injustices of hunger and poverty through 
education and fund raising in support of the work of Church 
World Service and its ecumenical and church partners 
worldwide.  The CEFR program includes an administrative 
center in Elkhart, Indiana, as well as 24 regional offices 
and 7 satellite offices located around the U.S.

"This is the first time CEFR personnel will go to Cuba, 
so one purpose of the visit will be their training," Rev. 
Bolioli said.  "They can come back with more data and 
information for educating the churches here in the U.S. 
about Cuba and Haiti."

 An official NCC delegation led by the Rev. Dr. Joan 
Brown Campbell, NCC General Secretary, traveled to Cuba in 
December and issued a statement calling on NCC members to 
redouble efforts to press the U.S. Government to lift its 
embargo, to increase humanitarian assistance to the people 
of Cuba and to educate and mobilize the members of NCC 
congregations about the reality of life in Cuba.  "This 
visit will help to meet all of the goals," Rev. Bolioli 
said.

 "We will also offer a symbolic gesture of support in 
the form of 300 school kits that we will deliver to a Cuban 
public school on Feb. 6," Rev. Bolioli said.  "Members of 
the delegation have been collecting pencils which they will 
give to the children of the school at that time."

Delegation members will meet with the Medical 
Commission of the Cuban Council of Churches, which 
coordinates the Humanitarian Aid Program, on Feb. 6, then 
visit several CWS supported projects, including a hospital, 
elder care home, emergency clinic and maternity clinic.

"Hopefully, we can come up with some specific ways to 
improve the life of people in Cuba," Rev. Bolioli said, 
"perhaps by concentrating on meeting the medical equipment 
needs of one emergency clinic in Old Havana.  Then, we could 
trace the concrete results of our aid."

 The delegation will also continue to strategize about 
ways that the NCC and its member communions can pressure the 
U.S. government to allow direct flights to Cuba for 
humanitarian aid and to pass a bill allowing for the sale of 
food and medicine to Cuba.

 Over the past five years, the NCC has sent 38 shipments 
of food, medicine, medical equipment, school supplies and 
other goods to Cuba totaling nearly 300 tons with a market 
value of over $7 million, but humanitarian shipments have 
become more expensive and more difficult to deliver given 
U.S. restrictions.

Haiti Provides Comparison to Cuba; Delegation will visit 
Projects

 "We are traveling to Haiti so that the delegation 
members can see another country in the region to which they 
can compare Cuba," Rev. Bolioli explained.  "Haiti is the 
poorest country in this hemisphere and, like other countries 
in the region, has suffered from political turmoil and 
corruption."  Delegation members will visit a reconstruction 
project CWS has supported since the military left Haiti.

 During their week-long stay in Haiti, delegation 
members will visit CWS supported development projects in 
Port au Prince and in other parts of the country, including 
agricultural cooperatives, a people's bank and educational 
and training initiatives.  On Feb. 2, the delegation will 
spend a full day visiting a notable project in Petit Goave 
called the Children Returned from Guantanamo Project, run by 
the Ecumenical Committee for Peace and Justice (COPJ), which 
has recuperated 60 of the 200 children returned to Haiti by 
the United States Navy by helping them enter school and 
aiding their families.  The delegation will worship in a 
Baptist Church in Port au Prince and will visit with leaders 
and staff of the Protestant Federation of Haiti.

The delegation will also spend a day in the Dominican 
Republic in the middle of the trip.  On Feb. 4, delegation 
members will arrive in Boca Chica, located about 30 
kilometers from Santo Domingo, the capital of the Dominican 
Republic.  There, on Feb. 5, they will visit the CWS 
supported project "Caminante" which aims to prevent the 
widespread problem of child prostitution by providing meals, 
medical care, recreation, and a non-formal education program 
for children as well as by directly intervening in families 
to make sure children remain in school.

 In addition to Dr. Page and Rev. Bolioli, the 
delegation members include: Mr. Randy Naylor, Director of 
the NCC's Office of Communication (United Church of Canada); 
Mrs. Jill Hicks, member of the NCC's General Assembly, 
(United Methodist Church); Mrs. Janet Young of York Center, 
Ill., Director of the CEFR Regional Office in 
Chicago/Northern Illinois (Evangelical Lutheran Church in 
America); Mr. Rodger Clark of Harrisburg, Penn., Asst. Dir. 
Of CEFR Regional Office in Pennsylvania (American Baptist), 
; Mr. David Allen of Syracuse, N.Y., Asst. Dir. Of CEFR 
Regional Office in Upstate New York (ELCA), and Mr. Gerry 
Colfelter, Western U.S. Development Office for CWS, 
Altabena, Calif.

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