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Annual Spring Retreats
Our region has been holding annual weekend spring retreats since the
Spring of 1995. The sites for the retreats have varied from a conference
center in the Poconos, the Burlington Friends Conference Center in New
Jersey, the Grail Conference Center in Cornwall-on-Hudson, NY, to another
denominational retreat center in New Jersey. The retreats offer those
concerned with peace and justice issues a chance to enjoy the support
and fellowship of like-minded people. At the same time, we schedule
a varied program including several inspirational and highly-informed
leaders from the US, and from Latin American and Caribbean countries.
This coming spring we are planning to hold the retreat at the Center
for Educational Design and Communications in Washington, DC over the
weekend April 15-17, 2005. We always aim to make the weekend as inexpensive as possible. The food is nutritious and good, but not fancy. Dormitory facilities with bunk beds are the order of the day, although in special cases, depending on the conference center, private rooms for families can be arranged. For the upcoming retreat April 7-9, 2006 at the Burlington Friends
Meeting Conference Center in Burlington, New Jersey, there will be dormitory
rooms. We anticipate that one of our members will be doing the cooking
for us.
A FEW HIGHLIGHTS OF THE MID-ATLANTIC
RETREAT APRIL 15-17, 2005
We held our annual retreat during April 15-18, 2005 at the Center for Educational Design and Communication in Washington DC. For the first time, our annual retreat was jointly sponsored by national Witness for Peace (WFP) as well as by our region. Janna Bowman and Holly Miller, national WFP staff, gave us excellent briefings on Colombia and CAFTA. And Grace Louis Perkins led us in two refreshing and power-sensing reflections. This retreat was especially unique in that many of the attendees stayed over to Monday to participate in a lobbying program planned by Janna and Holly on the issues surrounding Colombia and CAFTA. The theme of the retreat was 'Confronting our Empire's Cycle of Military and Economic Violence.' Marino Cordoba is currently in exile from Colombia and living in the US, and is a leader in working for human rights for displaced Afro-Colombians. He spoke to us vividly about the violent takeover of lands belonging to Afro-Colombians by para-military groups and by the Colombian army, possibly for the purpose of the construction of a trans-Colombian oil pipeline from Venezuela to the Pacific coast. Michelle Karshan, former foreign press liaison for Haiti's Presidents Preval and Aristide, spoke eloquently on the US plans and execution of the coup-d'etat that removed President Aristide from office. For many years there were numerous anti-democratic forces active in Haiti, the majority of which were sponsored by the US and which ultimately planned or assisted the coup. Michelle listed the actions/policies of Aristide that created such great displeasure in Washington, including: (1) Haiti's good relations with Cuba; (2) Aristide's raising the minimum daily wage to $1.70, (3) Aristide reducing the amount of cocaine trans-shipped through Haiti; and (4) Haiti's resistance to privatization. Adrían Peréz Contréras of the Grupo Vicente
Guerrero in Mexico spoke to us about many issues confronting the farmers
of Mexico, in particular how Mexico has lost its food self-sufficiency.
The change in 1992 in the Mexican laws regarding holding of communal
lands resulted in the rich buying up parcels of land and growing specialty
crops for export. This together with the implementation of NAFTA policies
meant that more and more grain is now being imported from the US into
Mexico, including corn! More and more small farmers and their families
are being forced to leave their farms because of their need for cash.
Many of the women wind up working in Maquilas in the towns and cities.
He also described how the World Bank has given loans to Mexico under
the strict condition that banks and telephone services, among others,
would be privatized.
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