PEACE AND JUSTICE COMMITTEE
This Committee supports Quaker testimonies through events, letter writing, educational opportunities, and witnessing in the wider community. For example, we compiled the list of Recycling Resources (see The Green Pages) and Fair Trade Coffee Resources (see We Support....Chicago Fair Trade Congregations pages).
Update and Agenda for January 22nd, 20112
1. Renny Golden’s Visit
For the past few months we have been working on arranging Renny Golden to come speak to OPFM. At a previous Peace and Justice meeting, Amanda reported she had contacted Renny who said she is interested, but the dates have not been worked out.
We are still waiting to see if we have a date, and if Renny can recommend a movie on a related topic (to recommend to OPCTJ. In the meantime we urge Friends to read Renny’s book, War on the Family, which we have in the OPFM library.
2. Adult RE Session on the Peace Testimony
In November, we decided that we will run a one-hour session on the first reading of the ILYM Peace Resources workshop on Sunday March 4th, 2012. The required reading is available from the Peace Resources page on the ILYM webpage: http://www.ilym.org/tiki-read_article.php?articleId=28
Bob put this link into the newsletter, (but with the date of March 14th so we need to correct that). Please read the article.
3. FCNL Lobby Training
Jim Cason, from FCNL, is willing to hold a one time 2-hour lobby session with us and other faith based social concerns people in the Chicago area. Wil arranged a room at the main Oak Park Library. An advertisement has gone out to the Community of Congregations. Kelly will send out a similar blurb to the Oak Park Leaves/Wednesday journal.
Title: Lobbying Legislators
Purpose: To train persons in faith traditions how to effectively communicate
their concerns to legislators
Date: Sat. March 10, 2011 9-1 Small meeting room, Oak Park Public Library
Does someone want to forward the invite to other Friends meeting’s peace and Social Justice committees?
4. Recent Contact to and from Senators
Kelly and Wil received a letter from Sen. Kirk in response to phone calls asking him to end the war in Afghanistan. Kelly scanned it and sent it to Bob who forwarded it to Pam. It should appear in the Feb newsletter.
5. Guantanamo Bay Anniversary NRCAT Action Month
January 11, 2012 was the 10th anniversary of the arrival of the first prisoners at Guantanamo. Kelly made 20 copies of a postcard designed by NRCAT, brought them to Meeting Jan 8th, and 8 Friends signed them. These have been mailed. Kelly also attended a rally on Jan 11th in Federal Plaza, about 100 people were there about 1/3 in orange jumpsuits, however, there was no media coverage.
Kelly has not yet written her letter to the editor on the topic.
6. Divestment from For-profit Health Insurance Agencies
Due to info from Ida, we discussed the issue of for-profit healthcare services. Wil sent an email to the ILYM reps to AFSC and FCNL about the divestment movement and asked them to consider looking into it.
7. February Meeting with Sen. Kirk
Senators will be home the week of Feb 20-24th. Wil is arranging a meeting with Sen. Kirk for Chicagoland Friends.
8. Rahm Emmanuel and proposed changes to protest laws
Judy has expressed concern about Rahm Emmanuel’s drive to make protest in Chicago more difficult and illegal. This is a major concern in the area peace community as the measures Rahm has proposed, under the pretext that he is preparing for the May NATO G-8 meetings, will be permanent. Occupy Chicago, Midwest Anti-War Mobilization, CANG8 and several other organizations are organizing efforts to stop Rahm’s plan. Several alderman have also asked for modifications and as of Tuesday Jan 17 it appears fines for resisting arrest or obstructing a police officer will increase, but not double as originally planned. Changes to park hours and demonstrations at public places will likely pass the city council so protest in Chicago will be limited to between 8 am – 10 pm (6-11 in parks). [Note while this sounds reasonable it eliminates the legality of encampments such as the ones Occupy Wall Street had in NY, which were already illegal here in Chicago since parks close at 11 pm.]
9. FCNL Letter writing
Wil will be transferring to the EFM. We need someone to take over his once a month duty of bringing social concern letter writing material to Meeting.
10. Re-Consider our recommended charitable contributions
In fall we recommended charitable contributions and B.M. agreed with our proposal. We recommended paying a total of $1900 for the 11-12 fiscal year with 700 of that being paid immediately and the other 1200 being sent later after we had a better sense of our income. The 700 has been sent.
At the last Meeting for Business Val reported that in December we had more or less an equal number of expenditures and income, but by the first week of January we had a $400 deficit. So we may be asked to cut some of our charitable contributions. At the same time we had a young frond From Upper Fox Valley come talk about an upcoming event in Kenya she and several ILYM friends will attend and they are requesting funds.
Please review the following two charts, and we will submit a report Feb B.M.
List of contributions we have made
Peace and Justice immediate (2011) pay contributions recommendations:
AFSC, national $50
AFSC, Chicago $100
FCNL $150
QEW $50
OPRF walk-in Ministry $50
PADS $50
Holiday food and gift $100
Ceasefire $75
Project Lakota $75
--------
total $700
Please download the following document to see a chart with all our recommendations.
This Committee supports Quaker testimonies through events, letter writing, educational opportunities, and witnessing in the wider community. For example, we compiled the list of Recycling Resources (see The Green Pages) and Fair Trade Coffee Resources (see We Support....Chicago Fair Trade Congregations pages).
Update and Agenda for January 22nd, 20112
1. Renny Golden’s Visit
For the past few months we have been working on arranging Renny Golden to come speak to OPFM. At a previous Peace and Justice meeting, Amanda reported she had contacted Renny who said she is interested, but the dates have not been worked out.
We are still waiting to see if we have a date, and if Renny can recommend a movie on a related topic (to recommend to OPCTJ. In the meantime we urge Friends to read Renny’s book, War on the Family, which we have in the OPFM library.
2. Adult RE Session on the Peace Testimony
In November, we decided that we will run a one-hour session on the first reading of the ILYM Peace Resources workshop on Sunday March 4th, 2012. The required reading is available from the Peace Resources page on the ILYM webpage: http://www.ilym.org/tiki-read_article.php?articleId=28
Bob put this link into the newsletter, (but with the date of March 14th so we need to correct that). Please read the article.
3. FCNL Lobby Training
Jim Cason, from FCNL, is willing to hold a one time 2-hour lobby session with us and other faith based social concerns people in the Chicago area. Wil arranged a room at the main Oak Park Library. An advertisement has gone out to the Community of Congregations. Kelly will send out a similar blurb to the Oak Park Leaves/Wednesday journal.
Title: Lobbying Legislators
Purpose: To train persons in faith traditions how to effectively communicate
their concerns to legislators
Date: Sat. March 10, 2011 9-1 Small meeting room, Oak Park Public Library
Does someone want to forward the invite to other Friends meeting’s peace and Social Justice committees?
4. Recent Contact to and from Senators
Kelly and Wil received a letter from Sen. Kirk in response to phone calls asking him to end the war in Afghanistan. Kelly scanned it and sent it to Bob who forwarded it to Pam. It should appear in the Feb newsletter.
5. Guantanamo Bay Anniversary NRCAT Action Month
January 11, 2012 was the 10th anniversary of the arrival of the first prisoners at Guantanamo. Kelly made 20 copies of a postcard designed by NRCAT, brought them to Meeting Jan 8th, and 8 Friends signed them. These have been mailed. Kelly also attended a rally on Jan 11th in Federal Plaza, about 100 people were there about 1/3 in orange jumpsuits, however, there was no media coverage.
Kelly has not yet written her letter to the editor on the topic.
6. Divestment from For-profit Health Insurance Agencies
Due to info from Ida, we discussed the issue of for-profit healthcare services. Wil sent an email to the ILYM reps to AFSC and FCNL about the divestment movement and asked them to consider looking into it.
7. February Meeting with Sen. Kirk
Senators will be home the week of Feb 20-24th. Wil is arranging a meeting with Sen. Kirk for Chicagoland Friends.
8. Rahm Emmanuel and proposed changes to protest laws
Judy has expressed concern about Rahm Emmanuel’s drive to make protest in Chicago more difficult and illegal. This is a major concern in the area peace community as the measures Rahm has proposed, under the pretext that he is preparing for the May NATO G-8 meetings, will be permanent. Occupy Chicago, Midwest Anti-War Mobilization, CANG8 and several other organizations are organizing efforts to stop Rahm’s plan. Several alderman have also asked for modifications and as of Tuesday Jan 17 it appears fines for resisting arrest or obstructing a police officer will increase, but not double as originally planned. Changes to park hours and demonstrations at public places will likely pass the city council so protest in Chicago will be limited to between 8 am – 10 pm (6-11 in parks). [Note while this sounds reasonable it eliminates the legality of encampments such as the ones Occupy Wall Street had in NY, which were already illegal here in Chicago since parks close at 11 pm.]
9. FCNL Letter writing
Wil will be transferring to the EFM. We need someone to take over his once a month duty of bringing social concern letter writing material to Meeting.
10. Re-Consider our recommended charitable contributions
In fall we recommended charitable contributions and B.M. agreed with our proposal. We recommended paying a total of $1900 for the 11-12 fiscal year with 700 of that being paid immediately and the other 1200 being sent later after we had a better sense of our income. The 700 has been sent.
At the last Meeting for Business Val reported that in December we had more or less an equal number of expenditures and income, but by the first week of January we had a $400 deficit. So we may be asked to cut some of our charitable contributions. At the same time we had a young frond From Upper Fox Valley come talk about an upcoming event in Kenya she and several ILYM friends will attend and they are requesting funds.
Please review the following two charts, and we will submit a report Feb B.M.
List of contributions we have made
Peace and Justice immediate (2011) pay contributions recommendations:
AFSC, national $50
AFSC, Chicago $100
FCNL $150
QEW $50
OPRF walk-in Ministry $50
PADS $50
Holiday food and gift $100
Ceasefire $75
Project Lakota $75
--------
total $700
Please download the following document to see a chart with all our recommendations.
| agenda_jan_2012_peace_and_justice.doc |
Here is a link to the Minutes of P&J Committee meetings. They are working documents for internal use and have been password protected; please contact the Clerk of Oak Park Friends Meeting for access to these pages.
Here is a .pdf of An Ecumenical Call to Just Peace, drafted by the World Council of Churches. It is to be studied and discussed at ILYM in June 2012.
| anecumenicalcalltojustpeace.pdf |
