Wisconsin Conference Partnership with
Wisconsin Maya Partnership, Chiapas, Mexico
INESIN - Institute for
Intercultural Studies and Research
Contact
History
Inesin
Closing the School of the Americas
Pastors School
Upcoming Trips
Coffee Program
Contact:
Rev. Charles Wolfe
Plymouth Congregational United Church of Christ
2401 Atwood Avenue
Madison WI 53704-5604
(608) 249-1537
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History
For ten years, the Wisconsin Conference of
the United Church of Christ has been in partnership with the Roman Catholic Diocese of San
Cristobal de las Casas. The relationship grew around the Guatemalan refugees who had
fled to Mexico in the 1980's. Twenty thousand people lived for some years within the
San Cristobal Diocese, creating a severe strain on the resources of the church which
already was heavily involved in helping the many poor indigenous people in the area.
Our involvement began as a way to safely accompany refugees who wanted to return to
their homes.
Bishop Samuel Ruiz, bishop in Chiapas from
1950-2000, was an outspoken advocate of the indigenous people in his Diocese. He
served as a mediator between the Mexican government and the Zapatista forces to talk about
possibilities for peace, sometimes putting his life at risk to do so, until discussions
fell apart.
Bishop Ruiz retired in January of 2000.
He continues as president of the Fray Bartolome de Las Casas Human Rights Center in
San Cristobal.
Bishop Felipe Arizmendi Esquivel has been
appointed by the Vatican to succeed Bishop Ruiz. He served as Bishop of
Tapachula, a Chiapas city on the border with Guatemala for the past nine years. He
is known as a moderate.
Don Felipe Arizmendi, at a diocesan
assembly, "I come with the will to serve, to learn and to understand the reality of
this region." Already he is under enormous pressure from the six powerful
curial cardinals opposed to Latin American liberation theology, Mexican federal and state
governments as well as the autenticos coletos (local ranchers and businessmen) to stop
enabling the indigenous to take charge of their own lives both religiously and
politically. Yet he continues to visit the villages weekly in an effort to build
relationships.
An intimidating military presence is
still felt in the countryside as
trucks and soldiers rumble their way through villages, stopping and detaining people at
checkpoints, and just generally disrupting the flow of everyday life. With the 2000
election of Presidente Vicente Fox after over 70 years of PRI rule, a new day may have
dawned in Mexico. We continue to watch and wait with prayerful hope.
Numerous delegations from Wisconsin have
traveled to Chiapas over the years, bringing money, resources, support and the prayers of
the Wisconsin Conference to our brothers and sisters in faith. We
work in covenant with the Illinois Maya Partnership Committee of the Illinois
Conference to coordinate our trips and plan effectively for the future.
(excerpted from the National Catholic Reporter,
June 16, 2000)
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Two Ways to Support our Partnership
INESIN-
Institute for Intercultural Studies and Research
The Wisconsin Conference is helping to
support Institute for Intercultural Studies and Research. At the "Bible School," people of
different faiths from communities in Chiapas come to study the Bible, share fellowship,
learn about first aid and community health, sustainable agriculture, women's issues and
conflict resolution. Catholics and Protestants sitting together in America is not
unusual, but in Chiapas it still has radical overtones. The Ecumenical Center has
been described as a "sanctuary in the midst of political conflict." The
Diocese has purchased a set of buildings which can house classrooms and overnight guests
as well as provide agricultural space for teaching and menu supplementation. We are
hopeful that we can be a positive force for support and encouragement to our brothers and
sisters as the Ecumenical Bible School continues to grow in public witness to
Christ's ministry. Questions and contributions can be sent to the Wisconsin
Conference, %Wisconsin Maya Partnership.
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Closing the School of the Americas.
The Wisconsin Conference has been a strong advocate for closing the
School of the Americas at Fort Benning, Georgia, renamed the Defense Institute for
Hemispheric Security Cooperation.
The School of the Americas (DIHSC) is a combat school in Georgia, run by the
United States government. It was founded to teach counterinsurgency techniques but
instead of contributing to the development of democracy, it has undermined American values
by advocating physical abuse, "neutralization" of targets, blackmail, false
imprisonment, use of truth serum, illegal detentions, as well as spying on civilian groups
and opposition political parties. The School of the Americas is charged with
training noted assassins and terrorists responsible for the deaths of Archbishop Romero,
four U.S. churchwomen, and numerous massacres and atrocities in Latin America.
These tactics have threatened our brothers and sisters in Chiapas.
Each November, a demonstration is held at the School of the Americas in Fort
Benning, Georgia to commemorate the assassination of six Jesuit priests, their housekeeper
and her daughter in El Salvador on November 21. 1999 marked the 10th anniversary of
their deaths with 12,000 marchers present; 4,500 of them "crossing the line" in
support of closing the School.
In May of 2000, the U.S. Congress voted to close the School of the Americas by a very
close margin. However, the same bill approved a Pentagon proposal to open a new
school, the Defense Institute for Hemispheric Security Cooperation, a combat training
school for Latin American soldiers also to be located at Fort Benning. Critics call
it a cosmetic name change with no attempt to address the growing public outcry over human
rights atrocities in Latin America.
For more information, go to the Social Concerns ministry
page.
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The Pastor’s
School
In the summer of 2004, with supportive funds from Forward in Faith, the
Wisconsin Conference was pleased to send nine of its pastors to a Pastor’s
School at INESIN, the Institute for Intercultural Studies and Research in San
Cristobal, Mexico. Along with being in a beautiful, old Mexican city, the
pastors engaged in serious theological and political reflection throughout the
week. Topics included the
> theology of transformation
> examining issues of privilege in international solidarity
> Chiapas and its relation with the U.S.
> Indigenous religions and Christian faith
Biblical understandings for daily challenges
Community and individualism
> Conflict resolution
You can imagine how these topics might take on different meanings when seen in
the context of a struggling, conflict torn country. Along with classroom time,
time was made for worship and reflection, trips to outlying villages to meet
with others, field trips to Maya ruins and marketplace forays for shopping.
Pastors came home with that mysterious blend of exhaustion and excitement, eager
to tell their stories, share pictures and find ways for the gospel to take on
new meaning and flesh here at home.
The Pastor’s School is an exciting initiative of the Wisconsin Conference
whose goal is to:
Provide a unique opportunity for Wisconsin pastors to worship and study
together;
Gather in an environment in which mission and witness take on dramatic
proportions;
> Explore issues of faith, culture, poverty and evangelism with friends in
Latin America;
> Support INESIN, the Intercultural Institute for Studies and Research.
It is through relationships such as these that Christ’s gospel of love and
justice becomes real and challenging, a call to each of us to live out in faith.
We give thanks for our friends in Chiapas, Mexico and for the special
hospitality and welcome they extended to the 2004 Pastor’s School.
“Un
otro mundo es posible”
(another
world is possible)
disembarking from the plane in Mexico City because the pilot didn’t show up
hearing gunshot sounds in the night and discovering in the morning that it was
firecrackers
bright, multi-colored walls and closed gates facing narrow, cobbled streets
rice and vegetable stuffed peppers that our host, Jairo (pronounced hi-row), assured
us were not caliente yet he ate just the stuffing! His wife, Ditra, after
drinking much water and eating tortillas to cool her tongue, said that
Nicaraguans do not grow up eating caliente foods. It is the Mexicans who
do that.
washing our dishes outside in four tubs with water
warmed in morning sunlight and cooled through evening shadows
In San Cristobal de las Casas in the southern-most state of Chiapas,
Mexico, nine Wisconsin Conference UCC clergy experienced another world from August
2-11. We stayed at the Institute for Intercultural Studies and Research, a Civil
Association (INESIN) with our hosts, Jairo and Ditra, originally from
Nicaragua
and serving INESIN through the Mennonite denomination. As delegates through the
Forward in Faith grant, we went to learn and to become advocates for the school
and for the people of
Chiapas.
Working with Protestant and Catholic churches, the Wisconsin Conference and the
Diocese of San Cristobal originally formed the
Ecumenical
Bible School
more than a decade ago “to draw groups together through study, prayer,
fellowship, and breaking bread to seek peace, understanding and
reconciliation.” The school evolved into INESIN which is independent from
hierarchical structures. Christians in
Chiapas
“have been developing an effort to grow in their faith in the diversity of
indigenous groups, churches and communities here and in comprehending better
the challenges facing the churches within the social, political, economic and
religious contexts of
Chiapas
.”
San Cristobal, a city of 80,000, is located in the Highlands of Chiapas, a couple hours drive
from the nearest airport. Although Chiapas
is rich in agricultural and natural resources, inequality and injustice
prevails for many people. The Zapatista Army for National Liberation was founded
in
Chiapas, occupied
San Cristobal in 1994, advocating access to work, land, housing, food and health in addition
to education, liberty, democracy, justice, and peace. Bishop Samuel Ruiz,
recently retired from the Diocese of San Cristobal, originally mediated between
the Zapatistas and the Mexican government.
During the week we met around a table in the classroom or in small groups
outdoors in the little courtyard. Each morning we sang Spanish or English hymns.
A couple times we worshipped around a Mayan Christian altar of flowers strewn
upon pine needles, with colored corn and candles to represent the four
directions, reminiscent of a cross. Our teachers were: an anthropologist,
pastors from Catholic, Mennonite, American Baptist, Nazarene, and Presbyterian
churches, sociology scholars, social activists, and indigenous and Christian
theologians. In addition to Mexican or indigenous teachers, some were from
Belgium,
France,
Germany, and our translators from the
U.S.
They actively seek to find solutions to the poverty, marginalization, and
persecution experienced by the indigenous people and the Zapatistas.
What were our classes about?
the
missioninzing of Mayans, first by Catholics from Spain in the 1500’s, now by
U.S. evangelical churches the
effect of U.S. agricultural policies on Mexican farmers which favors U.S.
corporate farm corn the
Mexican government’s method of dealing with the Zapatistas examining how awkwardly privileged we are and looking at our assumptions, our
fears, and our hopes.
On the weekend we visited a Catholic priest and the women leaders of that church
in Amatenango. We worshipped at a 3-hour long (in Spanish!) Presbyterian
outdoors church in Tuxtla Gutierrez. On our last day, part of our group climbed the Mayan ruins of Tonina
after going past military checkpoints, running over “sleeping policemen” (speed bumps),
and seeing new military complexes installed since the Zapatista uprising. And
part of our group visited Acteal, the site of a 1997 massacre, where some of the
indigenous people described themselves as still being at war. On the 45 to 50
mile drive six military installations were encountered, complete with razor wire
fences and fully armed men.
Romans 12:1-2 created the foundation for our time together. As an invitation to
open our hearts to the story of the people of
Chiapas
we viewed life from a different perspective, a different world. Not a world of
affluence filled with many people apathetic toward faith but a world of violence
and poverty filled with people steeped in a passionate, vital faith. “Do
not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your
minds, so that you may discern what is the will of God’
Have we been transformed? As we email one another to share how we have been
affected the evidence is there. Our hearts have been moved. Indigenous Christian
faith, conflict resolution, agricultural policies and international economic
systems all become juxtaposed with farmers burning steep mountainsides to plant
more small fields of corn, colorfully dressed children selling belts and
pottery, grey clad policemen with rifles in the open air market, and a man
walking 3 hours to get from his tribal mountain village to the closest road. The
story of the land and the people call to us to look for another world, a better
world.
If you’d like to hear more we would be honored to share our experiences.
Please feel free to contact us:
Northwest Association--Phil Garrison, Lisa Bodenheim
Northeast Association--Luke Bocher, Mike Kennedy
Southeast Association--Howard Bowman, Manda Stack
Southwest Association--Jane Allerton and Lee Zortman
Coordinator, Charles Wolfe of
Madison
.
Written by Lisa Bodenheim
Upcoming Trips
August 3 - 13,
2008 - Youth/Young Adult Chiapas Trip
*click here for more information
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Wisconsin
Conference UCC
4459 Gray Rd.