wfn.org | ALC News Service Noticias September 7 2003

[Worldwide Faith News <wfn@igc.org>]

ALC NEWS SERVICE
E-mail: director@alcnoticias.org

ALC HEADLINES:
EL SALVADOR: Lutherans opposed to sending Salvadoran troops to Iraq
ECUADOR: Media justice
NICARAGUA: CEPAD and ACNUR sign agreement with government to attend refugees
PERU: Inter-religious Women for Peace Network
USA: Marcos Witt won 2003 Grammy Latino Award

EL SALVADOR
Lutherans opposed to sending Salvadoran troops to Iraq

SAN SALVADOR, September 1, 2003 (alc). The Lutheran Synod spoke out against 
sending a military contingent to Iraq and called on parliament to strike a 
decree that authorized the operation and is lobbying so that these troops 
be dedicated to reconstruction in El Salvador.

In a letter sent to the El Salvadoran parliament, Lutheran Bishop Melardo 
Gomez said that the situation in Iraq is highly dangerous with daily 
violent acts that to date have caused dozens of deaths among occupying 
forces and the Iraqi people itself.

As a result, the lives of the up to 380 soldiers sent to Iraq are at risk. 
This military contingent, he said, was not prepared to carry out 
peacekeeping tasks but security tasks as it is going to substitute US troops.

In a Pastoral Letter to the faithful from the Salvadoran Lutheran Church, 
Bishop Gomez reported that he has requested that the Legislative Assembly 
strike the legal decree that authorized sending Salvadoran troops to Iraq 
and noted that in Nicaragua there are similar initiatives.

I pray that you help us to let the world know about this clamor that comes 
from our people who reject the war and the risk that our compatriots face 
in that occupied nation, the bishop said.

The Salvadoran Lutheran Synods Department of Human Rights agreed to lobby 
the legislative body, arguing that El Salvador is a member of the United 
Nations and has signed the Chapultepec Peace Agreements (1992), in which it 
committed itself to working for peace and reconciliation.

The bishop emphasized that the decree that authorizes sending the 
Salvadoran troops is not legal, as El Salvador has not declared war on Iraq 
and the majority of the international community is opposed to the war and 
the military occupation of Iraq.

He recalled the attack on the UN headquarters in Bagdad and that the attack 
on the Spanish base in Diwaniya, the center of operations that commands the 
Salvadoran forces in Iraq, is close to Nayef, where the Salvadoran 
contingent has been sent, despite having been the target of recent violent 
attacks.

ECUADOR
Media justice

By Carlos Ramos
QUITO, September 3, 2003 (alc). A prestigious polling firm in the capital 
city of Quito recently published the results of a survey about the 
popularity, credibility and positive management of several politicians 
responsible for different state sectors.

The same study also measured which institutions have the greatest 
credibility and are most trusted by Ecuadorians who live in Quito and 
Guayaquil, Ecuadors two most populated cities. According to the survey, 12 
percent have confidence in the Church (in this poll and in many sectors of 
society the Church is exclusively considered to be the Catholic Church).

In August 2003, 14 percent of Ecuadorians said they have confidence in the 
communication media, 12 percent in the armed forces, and 12 percent in both 
the municipalities and the anti-corruption commission.

If the results are compared with a poll taken in January, the changes are 
significant. In January, the Church was in first place with 38 percent, 
followed by the armed forces with 13 percent. Communication media were in 
third place with 8 percent, the anti-corruption commission had 5 percent 
while the municipalities had 4 percent.

Why did the Church (understood to be Catholic) fall 26 percentage points in 
six months? The explanation lies in a scandal that broke in March that 
allegedly implicated the Rev. Carlos Flores in several crimes, including 
embezzlement. Flores reportedly amassed a fortune while he was Quito 
customs officer in 2000-2002 under the government of Catholic Gustavo Noboa.

Flores is currently a fugitive from justice living in the United States. 
His guilt has not been established but the major media coverage given to 
the scandal has meant that the general public is convinced that he and his 
superiors were guilty: the priest for having stolen money and the hierarchy 
for having allowed him to exercise a public role in the first place.

The case leads us to make several reflections. The first is the 
inconvenience of mixing a priestly or pastoral role with a public and 
political role. The second is the lack of common sense and discipline on 
the part of the hierarchy that allowed a priest to exercise such a delicate 
role. Thirdly, it is false to assume that a single personal can moralize 
corrupt public arenas; it is absurd to believe that a priest can moralize a 
brothel by administering it honestly.

The most important lesson that we can glean is what we could call media 
justice. This is the tremendous power of modern media to present a case 
from their own perspective and to lead the population to judge and condemn 
the involved, regardless of whether they are in fact guilty.

Finally, the case invites us to reflect about the enormous importance of 
our individual conduct as it can lead us to raise up our community of faith 
or to cause immense damage.

NICARAGUA
CEPAD and ACNUR sign agreement with government to attend refugees

By Trinidad Vasquez
MANAGUA, September 4, 2003 (alc). The director general of Migration Luis 
Rodolfo Toruqo and the Evangelical Pro Denominational Alliance Council of 
Churches (CEPAD) and the UN High Commissioner on Refugees (ACNUR) signed an 
agreement to carry out a project to legalize and document thousands of 
foreigners who entered Nicaragua in the 1980s.

Negotiations to sign this agreement lasted two years, said CEPAD delegate 
Blanca Fonseca, who is also the ACNUR representative in Nicaragua. The 
project contemplates legalizing all refugees that entered Nicaragua in 
these years, above all Salvadorans and Guatemalans who were fleeing the 
internal war in their own countries.

There are an estimated 4,000 undocumented refugees in Nicaragua, who 
remained after the repatriation process that took place in the 1990s. The 
CEPAD/ACNUR delegate said that there are very few refugees from other 
countries with the exception of a few Colombians who fled the violence in 
their countries.

Among other things, ACNUR advises Peruvians and Ecuadorians who are 
arrested for lacking documents when they are in transit to the United 
States. This week 17 Peruvians were detained, including a pregnant women 
and a child. They were turned over to the Peruvian Embassy in Managua for 
their repatriation.

In the first phase the project will cost US$3,000 funded by ACNUR. Eleven 
migration officials will work from September 16 to November 15 to update 
the data of the refugees.

Once there is a list, Migration-ACNUR will publish it in the dailies so 
that people come forward to legalize their documents. They will be 
exonerated from any fines.

Once the first phase has been finalized, the goal is to achieve a migratory 
amnesty for these refugees. Migrations will present the project to the 
Executive Branch and it will then be discussed in the National Assembly.

CEPAD/ACNUR have been working on this project for two years, in the face of 
demands from Salvadoran citizens, many of them members of Evangelical 
Churches, who do not have residency visas.

On the other hand, CEPAD/ACNUR was selected by agencies in the region to 
represent Central America, Belize and Cuba in a general ACNUR assembly to 
take place in Geneva from September 24 to October 3 in order to report 
about the situation of refugees around the world.

PERU
Inter-religious Women for Peace Network

LIMA, September 5, 2003 (alc). Women from different Latin American and 
Caribbean countries, representing different spiritual and religious 
expressions met in this capital from August 23-26 and agreed to create the 
Inter-religious Women for Peace Network.

This new network forms part of the World Conference on Religion and Peace 
(WCRP)	Womens Global Network, said Pastor Judith VanOsdol, coordinator of 
the Women and Gender Pastoral Commission for the Latin American Council of 
Churches (CLAI)

In its founding document, the network stated that given the importance of 
strengthening and enriching our societies with a spiritual contribution, we 
see the need to create spaces that allow us to combine our objectives and 
strategies to jointly construct a road to unity, solidarity, equity and 
reciprocity.

It added that in order to fulfill this challenge we affirm the creation of 
a Regional Network of Women of Faith of Latin America and the Caribbean as 
part of the WCRP Womens Global network in order to initiate a process to 
know, recognize, respect and celebrate our diversity and plurality.

It added that after reflecting on the Beijing Action Platform and the 
Beijing + 10 process to take place in 2005, women believe that it is urgent 
to work to overcome violence in its many manifestations, placing particular 
emphasis on gender violence, among other issues.

For that reason, they recommend we train ourselves in an effective manner 
to influence institutions that have decision-making power as well as to 
lobby governments to implement processes to ensure the fulfillment of the 
Beijing strategies and objectives.

  They also called on the WCRP to help them reach these objectives and 
voiced their immense gratitude for the imitative to launch the network.

USA
Marcos Witt won 2003 Grammy Latino Award

MIAMI, September 5, 2003 (alc). Evangelical singer Marcos Witt won the 2003 
Grammy Latino Award for the best Christian music album with Sana Nuestra 
Tierra (Heal Our Earth).

According to CanZion Producciones Sana Nuestra Tierra was recorded live 
in Houston, Texas when Christians came together to pray and call on God to 
heal the earth after the tragic September 11, 2001 terrorist attack in the 
United States.

The Latin Academy of Recording Arts and Sciences recognized Witt and Juan 
Salinas production September 3 at the 2003 Latin Grammy ceremony held in 
Miami.

Witt was born in San Antonio, Texas in 1962 but grew up in Durango, Mexico 
with his Evangelical parents and is one of the leading Christian artists at 
an international level.

He has 25 recordings in Spanish and recently launched his first effort in 
English. He has written seven books in Spanish and one has been translated 
into English. He is a speaker and pastor of the Hispanic Community at the 
Lakewood Church in Houston Texas. He is married with four children and his 
wife, Miriam Lee, accompanied him to Miami.

Sana Nuestra Tierra is a project born from the heart of God in order to 
comfort and bring peace to everyone who sincerely listens to these songs, 
prayers and reflection, said representatives from the CanZion Group, 
founded by Witt with branches in Mexico, Argentina and Paraguay.

The recording was made with special guests who came from different parts of 
the world to participate in the event in Houston. Mayor Lee Brown attended 
along with other public officials from the United States.

This award is not for Marcos or for the CanZion Group, but for the entire 
body of Christ that, thanks to God, is becoming increasingly present in 
events of this magnitude. What we once dreamed, that Christian music would 
reach high levels of quality and impact, is now taking place, one 
representative from the Group.

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