The New Evangelical Partnership: Cancel Haiti’s Debt
by: Dave Belden on January 22nd, 2010 | 5 Comments »
This is great and hugely promising. There’s a whole generation of young evangelicals out there who are different in certain ways from their parents. Gary Dorrien was talking about this on Monday night on the Tikkun Phone Forum (and I hope we can get the recording up soon). Young evangelicals are more accepting of gay relationships for example. They are also more focused on world poverty. This new initiative is exactly the kind of leadership they need. This is the whole of a press release from a new organization called the New Evangelical Partnership, with a cover note from Kristin Williams at Faith in Public Life, from whom I received it:
A potentially very influential new evangelical organization, with a bold vision, has just launched with a call for total cancellation of Haiti’s debt. The organization is significant in that it brings Rich Cizik (former VP at the National Association of Evangelicals) back fully into public life and into partnership with David Gushee, who led the evangelical witness against torture. Expect this organization to address a broad agenda and have influence in churches, academia and Washington. – Kristin
Richard Cizik was one of the main promoters of environmental consciousness, or Creation Care, at the National Association of Evangelicals and was forced to resign in late 2008 after he supported same-sex civil unions on NPR’s Fresh Air program.
Influential Evangelicals Call for Cancellation of Haiti’s Debt
New Evangelical Group Launches to Mobilize Christian Support for Loan Forgiveness
As the death toll of last week’s earthquake in Haiti climbs into the hundreds of thousands and the country’s infrastructure lies in ruins, prominent US Christians are calling on governments and international lending bodies to cancel the Haitian government’s foreign debt. A statement released today, organized by the recently-formed New Evangelical Partnership for the Common Good and signed by more than 60 prominent Christian leaders, states in part:
We believe that Jesus calls us to work together to set free those who are held captive by debt… This call is especially acute in times of crisis. In light of the catastrophic earthquake and the destruction of Haiti’s already fragile infrastructure, we, the undersigned, call upon all nations and institutions that have made loans to the Haitian government to quickly and completely forgive these debts.
This mobilization (full statement and list of signers may be viewed here) is the first initiative of the New Evangelical Partnership for the Common Good, a new organization dedicated to offering a renewed Christian public witness for the sake of the Gospel and the common good. The New Evangelical Partnership is led by Rev. Richard Cizik, former National Association of Evangelicals Vice President for Governmental Affairs; Dr. David Gushee, Distinguished University Professor of Christian Ethics at Mercer University and founder of Evangelicals for Human Rights; and Rev. Steven D. Martin, a pastor and former Executive Vice President of Evangelicals for Human Rights.
“We have founded this organization to bear witness to the love of God in Jesus Christ. We have yearned to offer a better model for how Christians address public issues; to be known for always standing up for those whom God loves but the world or the church often mistreat or neglect,” Dr. David Gushee said. “We did not plan to launch our group quite yet and had no idea that an earthquake in Haiti would happen. But it seems to us that now is precisely the right time to get started, and this is the right issue.”
Although international institutions have forgiven much of Haiti’s debt, servicing the nation’s remaining debt costs the Haitian government more than $50 million each year. Relief of this burden will enable Haiti’s leaders to better meet the needs of its devastated population and infrastructure at this time of dire need.
Statement signatories include:
Richard Cizik, President, New Evangelical Partnership
David Gushee, Chair, New Evangelical Partnership
Steven D. Martin, Executive Director, New Evangelical Partnership
Joel Hunter, Senior Pastor, Northland—A Church Distributed
Samuel Rodriguez, President, National Hispanic Christian Leadership Conference
Jim Wallis, President and CEO, Sojourners
Richard J. Mouw, President and Professor of Christian Philosophy, Fuller Theological Seminary
Jo Anne Lyon, Chair, World Hope International Board of Directors
Lisa Sharon Harper, Co-founder and Executive Director, New York Faith and Justice
Randall Balmer, Professor of American Religious History at Barnard College, Columbia University
Gabriel Salguero, Pastor, The Lamb’s Church and Director, Hispanic Leadership Program, Princeton Theological Seminary
Roy Craft, Director, Martin Luther King Jr., International Chapel, Morehouse College
Cheryl Bridges Johns, Professor of Christian Formation & Discipleship, Pentecostal Theological Seminary
Adam Phillips, Chair, Micah Challenge USA
Brian McLaren, Author/speaker/activist
Jonathan Merritt, Author and activist
Amy Laura Hall, Associate Professor, Duke University
Bill Leonard, Dean and Professor of Church History, The Divinity School, Wake Forest University
Full list of signatories here.
The New Evangelical Partnership for the Common Good (NEP), a faith-based non-profit, offers a renewed Christian public witness for the sake of the Gospel and the common good. For more information, please visit: www.newevangelicalpartnership.org.
How can the third poorest country in the world pay back any loans? They should never have to back these loans!!!
I listened to the John Perkins interview with Amy Goodman on Democracy Now. It was a great interview. America works in three stages to control a country.
Stage One
Economic hit men go into a country and they offer loans to help build up the country. If the country cannot pay back the loan, we take over the majority of the resources for our giant corporations like Bechtel and Halliburton. If the leader of a country does not want to deal with us, we send in the jackals.
Stage Two
The jackals are CIA operatives who are sent into a country to assassinate the leader and overthrow the government. If that does not work, we send in the military.
Stage Three
The military goes into control a country like in Desert Storm. Saddam Hussein did not want to accept loans and become a puppet of the American government. Desert Storm was to soften up Saddam Hussein but he remained a hardliner and so in 2003 shock and awe bombings commenced. I thought it was for the oil but John Perkins said that Iraq also has the water, such as the Tigris and the Euphrates Rivers. There is also a feeling that the House of Saud is losing control and Iraq would be a good strategic base for American interests. We are really not spreading our democracy we are spreading our corporate influences over these countries.
America went into Haiti to control their farmers and farm land. We have exploited Haiti since the early 1900s.
What is truly amazing is that Stages One, Two, and Three are overt today and not covert.
Americans, for some reason, believe that other countries are corrupt but we are not corrupt and Americans just cannot believe that we are the evil empire that leads in corruption. America is the most corrupt country on planet, Earth.
May God have mercy on America!
Finally, an organization of lovers of Jesus who have found their way to love and serve and stand for ALL people! I’ve been waiting for this readiness and revelation among people who know and love Jesus for 28 years. I’d like to support and participate in this effort.
For years, I’ve held in mind that priceless statement by Archbishop Desmond Tutu: When the missionaries came to Africa, they had the Bible and we had the land. They said “let us close our eyes and pray.” When we opened them, we had the Bible, and they had the land.
Having over the past 25 years or so developed a near mindless reaction to the very word “Evangelicals,” my initial thought was “uh-oh.” They’re going to be using their “backdoor” approach — get a foot in the door, plant the agenda seeds, and ultimately take control.
That thought was immediately – I hope, fortunately – suppressed by the idea that this may be a part of the new wave that will fund, if you will, the required numbers for the human race to reach the type of critical mass that will halt, or at least slow down, our onward and determined march to self-annihilation by our hatred, our greed, our sense of superiority, our certitude, our…well you get the point.
In Dave’s statement, “there’s a whole generation of young evangelicals,” the key word for me was “young.” I’ve long since agreed with the notion put forth in a book by the wonderful Ken Carey that “Human beings have a tendency to become imprisoned in their concepts.” Regarding the generation preceding mine (as well as the one, possibly two, that have come after) the truth of this becomes abundantly clear with the passage of each day. The majority simply will not get off their position, which I’ve often thought to be a dead-on description of precisely what happened to Lot’s wife.
As a 22-year-old, standing on the grass just on the other side of Jefferson Ave at the foot of Woodward Avenue, and personally witnessing MLK’s first “I have a dream” speech in June 1963 in Detroit (before the one given in Washington), I was filled with hope. The hope began to dim in November of ‘63 but who knew what the future might bring…
23 years later I found myself in the South and again personally witnessing, but this time the not previously experienced variations of an entrenched and intense disdain for all things different: not only race, but also religion (denying the “Christianity” of Catholics, for example, and it goes downhill from that point); “class” distinctions (what’s your Zip Code?), anti-feminism, homophobia, “foreigners” – you name it.
The only hope one could possibly have in this nation is in its youth (and their enlightened elders). So yes, this is “hugely promising.”
It is unconscionable that their original debt consisted of reparations to France for their refusal to remain slaves. Absolutely outrageous! Perhaps the debt should be transferred the the families who actually benefitted from loans in later years.