wfn.org | Episcopal Presiding Bishop urges debt relief

[Daphne Mack <dmack@dfms.org>]

For more information contact:
Episcopal News Service
Kathryn McCormick
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99-084

Presiding Bishop urges Congress to pass debt relief bill

by Kathryn McCormick

(ENS) Citing the biblical call for Jubilee and the Episcopal 
Church's ministry to the poor, Presiding Bishop Frank T. Griswold 
has urged Congress to support a bill that would bring debt relief 
to the world's poorest countries.

"I believe this bill fulfills a difficult task," he said in 
testimony (see text in Newsfeatures) submitted to the House 
Committee on Banking and Financial Services. "It offers a Jubilee 
vision of debt relief, moving the United States into a position 
of world leadership on this issue." He added that the bill also 
"lifts up" the call for debt relief issued by last summer's 
Lambeth Conference of Anglican bishops "to genuinely benefit the 
poor by creating sophisticated mechanisms for poverty reduction, 
accountability, and good governance."

Griswold's three-page statement was a result of two days of 
meetings with what he called "a very diverse group" of leaders 
from government and international organizations in Washington, 
D.C. Griswold said that he was encouraged by conversations about 
"public service as a form of ministry."

After meeting with Rep. James A. Leach (R-Iowa), chair of 
the committee, the presiding bishop was invited to testify on the 
proposed Debt Relief and Poverty Act of 1999 currently before 
Congress. Since he had to chair the Executive Council meeting in 
Wisconsin, preventing him from attending the bill's June 15 
committee hearing, Griswold sent a statement to the committee.

The bill, sponsored by Leach and Rep. John LaFalce (D-New 
York), would cancel most debt owed to the United States by 
heavily-indebted poor countries and reduce debt owed by these 
countries to the World Bank, International Monetary Fund and 
other international financial institutions.

It also would require each country aided through the bill to 
establish a human development fund dedicated to reducing the 
number of persons living in poverty, expanding access of the 
poorest members of society to basic social services and 
preventing the degradation of the environment. The legislation 
would expand the number of eligible countries from the current 29 
to 45.

Lambeth Conference concern

In his testimony, Griswold told the committee that debt 
relief had been a chief topic of concern at last summer's Lambeth 
Conference, the once-a-decade meeting of all the bishops of the 
worldwide Anglican Communion. He noted that the 750 bishops at 
the conference eventually adopted without dissent a statement 
calling for the cancellation of unpayable debts of poor countries 
and for more responsible action from debtor and creditor 
countries, governments and non-governmental organizations (NGOs).

With that as background, Griswold pointed to two concerns 
that undergirded his statement supporting debt relief. 

First is Jubilee 2000, the worldwide movement for debt 
relief inspired by the biblical texts in Leviticus 25, in which 
God told Moses that vineyards and fields must be allowed to rest 
and recuperate every seventh year. Further, every 50th year 
should be a Jubilee Year in which the land is allowed to lie 
fallow, slaves are set free, land returned to its original 
owners, and debts canceled.

"The essence of Jubilee is related to suspending patterns--
patterns of work, patterns of domination, patterns of 
acquisition," Griswold said.

The second concern, he said, is combating poverty. "For me,
for the Anglican bishops, and for most advocates 
for debt relief, the reality that overwhelming debts push the 
poorest members of our earth deeper and deeper into poverty is 
cause to take action. These poor countries are caught in a cycle 
of debt they cannot escape, borrowing more money to make payments 
on old debts," he said.

Servicing debt can take up to 40 percent of a poor country's 
budget, takes money away from much-needed human development, 
education and environmental projects and sends it to rich donor 
nations, he said.

Countries under these debt burdens probably could have made 
some better spending decisions in the past and, of course, debts 
should be paid as a rule, Griswold said, "but that must be 
weighed against the cost of human suffering."

That suffering, he noted, "is almost unimaginable by U.S. 
standards." He asked the committee to "imagine the homeless 
person you see in the streets of Washington, and then imagine 
that 80 percent of Washington was in or near that same 
condition....Something must be done."

Passage of the Debt Relief for Poverty Reduction Act, he 
added, would offer a concrete step toward beginning to create 
conditions in which many of these countries can lift themselves 
from poverty.

--Kathryn McCormick is associate director of the Office of News 
and Information of the Episcopal Church.