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Note #8398 from PCUSA NEWS to PRESBYNEWS:

Overcoming violence
GA04105
July 1, 2004

Overcoming violence

WCC official urges ecumenical group to make peace 'a now thing'

by Shane Whisler

RICHMOND, July 1 - Dr. Bernice Powell Jackson, the newly elected North
American President of the World Council of Churches (WCC), thanked the
Presbyterian Church (USA) for their past support of the WCC and challenged
her listeners to make love and peace "a now thing" in their churches.

Powell Jackson, the featured speaker at Wednesday morning's General Assembly
Ecumenical Breakfast, spoke of the WCC's Decade to Overcome Violence campaign
and its acronym, DOV, which is pronounced "dove," then commented, "Little did
we know how much the world would need a little bird of peace from the
church."

 Powell Jackson, the executive minister of Justice and Witness ministries of
the United Church of Christ in the USA, is one of eight co-presidents of the
WCC.

The DOV theme, specially focused this year on the United States, was planned
long before the terror attacks of Sept. 11, 2001. It was inspired by the need
to stop violence against women and children worldwide, she said, but became
even more relevant with the terror attacks and the war in Iraq.

 Referring to an exchange between Peanuts characters Charlie Brown and
Peppermint Patty, Powell Jackson asked: "Is love a 'now kind of thing,' or is
it only hope and memories?"

She then made a gentle but powerful call to action, noting that this is a
Presidential election year.

"Regardless of who the president (-elect) is on Nov. 3," she said, U.S.
churches should urge the administration to create a new, cabinet-level
Department of Peace.

This is the way to security, she said, contending that love is indeed "a now
thing" and that there is power and promise in peace.

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