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Vigil for Social Leaders in Colombia

Saturday, October 3, 2020
6-7pm
online

 

IRTF is proud to serve on the Steering Committee of Christian Peacemaker Teams (CPT)

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Vigil for Social Leaders in Colombia

Sat, Oct 3, 6pm Eastern Time

Join us on Facebook Live or Zoom ID: 98389623638

Taking action to highlight the stories and the nonviolent struggle of social leaders’ daily experiences in Colombia is essential to our mission.

Lately, there has been an increase in insecurity across Colombia. And to add to the wound, the already wide gap of inequality continues to widen, primarily in sectors that have historically been discriminated against through policies that promote racism, sexism, homophobia, classism, and war.

As part of our new campaign, #ModusOperandi, we want to explain why violence against human rights defenders is not a coincidence. More than 100 human rights defenders have been killed this year alone. These killings cannot even be counted as State negligence since the mechanisms to protect these leaders’ lives are non-existent. Instead, it is a structural dynamic aimed at privileging the interests of the most powerful at the cost of the lives of the impoverished.

Join us in a liturgy for social leaders as we pray for those who are seeds* of hope and those who continue to resist the State’s violence.

#OneTimeIs #Coincidence #TwoTimesIs #Negligence #ThreeTimesIs #ModusOperandi

*seeds: People who have been assassinated and buried as seeds and their struggle lives on.

 

CPT: Building partnerships to transform violence and oppression. 

Vision: A world of communities that together embrace the diversity of the human family and live justly and peaceably with all creation. 

Values: Christian Peacemaker Teams is committed to work and relationships that: Honor and reflect the presence of faith and spirituality; Strengthen grassroots initiatives; Transform structures of domination and oppression; Embody creative non-violence and liberating love.

 About IRTF: IRTF was formed in 1980 by people of faith and conscience as a nonviolent response to the horrific violence that took the lives of Archbishop Oscar Romero and four US women serving on mission teams in El Salvador (including two from Cleveland: Jean Donovan and Sister Dorothy Kazel). It is the deep commitment to human rights of people throughout northeast Ohio—and friends across the US and beyond—that keeps us faithful to our mission of solidarity four decades later.

Memory and Resistance: 40 Years

Inspired by the martyrdom of Jean Donovan and Sister Dorothy Kazel in El Salvador in 1980, we uphold the legacy of these remarkable women and, in their spirit of solidarity, uplift the struggles of all oppressed peoples. Over the course of the next year, the Memory & Resistance Coalition will highlight, celebrate, and commemorate our collective legacies of resistance through an art exhibition, webinars, expert panels, spoken word and musical performances, public discussions, book discussions, and more.