As Sojourners has extensively reported, torture and other denials of basic human rights are spreading like a global epidemic. We would like to invite you to join us in putting feet to our concerns during Easter week, April 1-10. We will gather to act nonviolently in Washington, D.C., to urge an end to the American government’s support for torture-practicing dictatorships.
The campaign will begin with training, prayer, and planning. Expected actions later in the week include peaceful demonstrations outside the White House, the Congress, and other locations. We will use torture tableaux, leafletting, appeals to policy-makers, conversations with tourists and government officials, self-education, and other actions in support of meaningful legislation. We hope all events will be infused with a spirit of worship.
We feel a particular responsibility to speak and act against the regular practice of torture and political repression in countries that receive large-scale American military and economic aid. Such aid serves to strengthen these regimes and makes us side with oppression rather than with liberty and justice.
We hope to make extensive use of Easter week imagery in conveying our message. Our hope is to have an effect on the flurry of legislative activity that traditionally occurs just before Easter and on the thousands of tourists who visit Washington at cherry blossom time. Smaller weekly actions are planned for about two months after the main event, to provide a continuing Christian presence, praying and acting for human rights.
The goals of the campaign are:
• To make more people aware of U.S. support for torture and repression.
• To develop personal relationships with individual officials and to encourage their concern and action.
• To hold the Carter administration to its human rights statements.
• To make connections between overseas torture and the economic
underpinnings of torture.
• To work toward significantly reducing U.S. support for regimes that practice torture and repression.
The sponsors of this campaign are Sojourners Fellowship, Liberty to the Captives, a direct action group based in Philadelphia, and The Other Side, a magazine of Christian discipleship.
Everyone is urged to read and meditate upon the events of Passion Week, asking for guidance as to how the campaign might in some way reflect Jesus’ own journey.
We invite you to be in Washington for the Easter action, April 1-10. Please write us if you are coming so we know how many people to plan for. Tell us if you can come for one or two days during the following weeks in April and May. Perhaps you could send us a contribution to help with expenses. If you can’t make it to Washington, be praying that the power of Christ’s death and resurrection with soften many hearts. We can send you more information and put you on a campaign mailing list if you desire.
Remember the countless victims of torture and ask yourself if you can come, if you will pray, if you can help with expenses. Our Lord Jesus Christ, who was tortured to death by government authorities, still suffers among the world’s imprisoned.
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