Bending the Arc

In an earlier Bending the Arc post from 7/31/2024, we detailed the efforts of JCoR and its partners in calling upon the US Congress and Department of Homeland Security to approve legislation aimed to stop the supply of arms and ammunition from the United States to Haiti and an invitation to join Advocacy Days in D.C. later this month. Even if you cannot go to Washington, your voice can still be heard!

WRITE to your congressional representatives and president with this template letter: https://quixote.org/action#/16 

CALL your congressional representatives (contact information available here: https://www.usa.gov/elected-officials )
For more details, visit: https://jcor2030.org/stop-illegal-u-s-arms-to-haiti-advocacy-days/ 

JCoR - Justice Coalition of Religious - is a group of 23 non-governmental organizations that are accredited to collectively represent over 200 congregations of Roman Catholic women and men Religious at the United Nations (UN) Headquarters in New York. UNANIMA International is one of the NGOs that make up JCoR, and CSA is one of 23 Congregations who make up UNANIMA International.

Challenge Day is an interactive anti-bullying program featuring music, exercises, impactful encounters, and discussions over one entire school day. It will be held in the small gymnasium of Fond du Lac High School and led by two energetic, charismatic, and highly trained facilitators dispatched from California. Each day 100 students and 30 volunteers confront stereotypes and prejudices and other underlying causes of bullying. See www.challengeday.org for a short video on the home page which beautifully shows what happens in this powerful workshop.

Adult volunteers participate side-by-side with the 100 freshman students per day selected by the administration, staff, and teachers. The Challenge Day facilitators (from Oakley, CA) will provide the necessary training for volunteers on the selected day(s), prior to the students entering the small gym.

Thirty (30) adults are needed each of the four days, October 14-17, from 8:00 am - 3:45 pm. Volunteers are required to commit themselves to the whole day in order to provide the optimum support for students. Lunch is provided to volunteers without charge. You may sign up for one or multiple days. If more than one day, you might consider a rest day in between.

BACKGROUND CHECK: All volunteers are required to complete a background check per the Fond du Lac School District. This is standard procedure for involvement in student activities such as Challenge Day. All volunteers are required to complete this form, even those returning from previous years. After you have submitted this form, you will be sent an email to complete the background check process.

Challenge Day is an annual effort by United for Diversity. CSA is a membership partner of United for Diversity and a co-sponsor of Challenge Day.

As Spring’s plantings have turned into Summer’s harvest, Land Justice Futures has been inviting you to deepen your roots alongside us in both Mother Law and Complicit No More, traditions and movements stewarded by the Indigenous movement leaders who advise us. 

These movements call us into a wider and deeper approach to ecological and racial repair—an approach that extends land justice to the paradigm-shifting cultural and structural change we must create for the future of life with our beloved Earth. 

(If you missed their first free hour-long Introduction to Mother Law and Complicit No More, you can come to the next, on Monday, August 19 at 4pm ET (3pm CT, 2pm MT, 1pm PT). Register here.) 

Now, Autumn is on the horizon—and with it, the launch of the Motherhouse Starter Series. After months of planning, the details of the program are finally available.Here are just a small sample of the 15 seasoned visionaries joining us:

• Mommabear, Condoled Bear Clan Mother of the Mohawk Nation and steward of the Mother Law tradition (Session 1)
• Pat McCabe, Woman Stands Shining, (Diné) activist, artist, writer, ceremonial leader, and international speaker (Sessions 1 & 4
• Sarah Augustine (Pueblo/Tewa), Author, activist, and co-founder of the Coalition to Dismantle the Doctrine of Discovery (Session 2)
• Max Dashu, feminist historian, artist, and author of Witches and Pagans: Women in European Folk Religion, 700–1100 (Session 4)
• Rev. Dr. Kelly Brown Douglas, Black womanist theologian and author of Resurrection Hope: A Future Where Black Lives Matter (Session 6)
• Michelle Schenandoah (Oneida) speaker, writer, thought leader, founder of the organization Rematriation and Complicit No More. Presented as a spiritual advisor to the Pope in the First Nations Delegation at the Vatican that prompted his apology regarding Indian Residential Schools. (Sessions 1 & 7)

In addition to the faculty: There is a Theological Council!
Along with the Land Justice Futures team and our faculty, our Theological Council will be there to find opportunities to connect to the spiritual, emotional and somatic side of the work, in ways that are accessible to people of all spiritual affiliations. 
See the full list of faculty and theological council members here on the info and registration page.
 

As we remember the suffering of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, we continue to pray that world leaders will take decisive action to end the manufacturing of these weapons of mass destruction and address the ongoing consequences of the arms race.

On August 6, nearly 500 individuals gathered for an online prayer service to commemorate the tragic events of August 6 and 9, 1945, when the U.S. dropped atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, Japan. It is estimated that over 200,000 lives were lost those days. 

If you missed the online event, the recording is available now here:

The statistics reported are staggering and terrifying. Some of these include the fact that 1) the U.S. and Russia maintain roughly 1,800 of their nuclear weapons on high-alert status and can be launched within just minutes of a warning; 2) today’s weapons are even more powerful than those of 1945; 3) the President of the United States has the sole authority to authorize the use of nuclear weapons.

Sisters, associates, and friends in the United States are urged to contact Congress about taking action to support nuclear disarmament. Specifically, we urge support for House Resolution 77, which calls on the United States to embrace the goals and provisions of the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons, and to pursue five important policies that would move us back from the brink of nuclear destruction. 
Looking for more information? The Clinton Franciscans are sharing this resource sheet.

Tuesday, August 13 is the partisan primary in the state of Wisconsin, where voters choose the candidates they prefer for a political party to nominate in the November general election.

CSA encourages voting for candidates who promote the common good. Pope Francis makes it clear: “Catholics and all people of good will are to be multi-issue voters, not single-issue voters,” in the 2024 elections and in our continued participation in public life. Know your candidate's views on the issues most important to you.

In Wisconsin, you can find voting and polling information at https://myvote.wi.gov/en-us/.

Also in Wisconsin, there will be two constitutional amendment questions on the ballots August 13. The Wisconsin League of Women Voters explains them here: https://my.lwv.org/wisconsin as does the ACLU.

For all your voting decisions, we encourage use of Network Lobby’s Equally Sacred Multi-issue Voter Checklist.

Update:

CSA and other faith-based organizations and their partners are calling upon the US Congress and Department of Homeland Security to approve legislation aimed to stop the supply of arms and ammunition from the United States to Haiti.

Haiti is facing one of its most challenging periods in recent history. Armed gangs control much of the country’s infrastructure, kidnappings and murders are now commonplace, and nearly five million people face food insecurity. Although guns and ammunition are not manufactured in Haiti, the tightening grip of armed groups on the country is made possible by an abundant supply of guns and ammunition that are flowing into Haiti, primarily from the United States. Weak gun laws in several U.S. states–combined with insufficient national investment in the prevention of weapons smuggling through the port of Miami–allow trafficking of guns from the US to Haiti.
In response, CSA and other faith-based organizations and their partners are calling upon US residents to participate in a joint action to call upon US Congress and the US Department of Homeland Security to take serious and reasonable actions to stop the illegal flow of arms and ammunition from the United States to Haiti.This group seeks the passage of several pieces of legislation that are currently under consideration in US Congress and would support the reduction of arms being trafficked to Haiti from the US.

The four bills currently introduced in the U.S. Senate and the House of Representatives can be found here.

Americans across the country are asked to join this group’s efforts by signing and sharing this letter. Simply enter your address to have the letter sent directly to the legislators in your area and to President Biden. Our advocacy does matter!

For those willing/able to take greater action, there will be a Lobby Day in Washington D.C. September 25-25, 2024. Anyone interested in participating can register by August 30.

Register

There is funding available to help with travel costs.

Of interest, the group Stop US Arms to Mexico has created a report with an interactive map that identifies where bad gun dealers are in the U.S. and how their weapons and ammunition end up in Haiti. 

Original article:

A mobilizing initiative organized by faith-based organizations concerned about the illegal flow of weapons from the USA to Haiti, which is fueling the ongoing gang violence from which all Haitian people are suffering. Learn how your community can advocate against gun trafficking and exports. Print the poster.

Join this webinar on July 30 at 4 pm CT.

Register here

Live interpretation will be provided between English, Haitian Creole, and Spanish.

Feel free to visit the Nuns Against Gun Violence website and use any of their free resources to further your efforts to end gun violence.

Media is reporting that Senate Majority Leader Schumer will bring two bills to vote this week.

The Kids Online Safety Act (KOSA), sponsored by Sens. Blumenthal (D-Conn.) and Blackburn (R-Tenn.), would put in place regulations for how social media companies can operate online involving minors.  The bill would add a "duty of care" to mitigate the promotion of harmful content and addictive features.  

The Children and Teens Online Privacy Protection Act (COPPA 2.0), sponsored by Sens. Markey (D-Mass.) and Cassidy (R-La.), would update online privacy standards technology companies use for minors on their platforms and would ban targeted advertising to kids.

Please join the Alliance to End Human Trafficking in urging the Senate to pass these bills. Take Action Now.

For more information on these developments, refer to the article at: https://thehill.com/policy/technology/4787769-schumer-to-bring-kids-online-safety-bills-to-vote-this-week/ 

You are encouraged to contact your senator and ask them to co-sponsor S.1723 and vote yes when it comes to the Senate floor for a vote.

By supporting this legislation, we are taking a momentous step as a Nation toward recognizing and honoring boarding school survivors, descendents and those who never had the chance to return home. Survivors and their descendants deserve the opportunity to heal from historical injustices in a way that is meaningful and aligned with their cultural values.

This federal commission will:

• Locate church and government records
• Examine the location of children forcibly placed in U.S. Indian boarding schools
• Hold culturally-appropriate public hearings to collect testimony from survivors and descendants
• Gather institutional knowledge from subject matter experts
• Document the boarding schools’ ongoing impacts
• Tell the truth by sharing findings publicly with cultural sensitivity
• Provide a final report with a list of recommendations for healing

For your reference, the National Native American Boarding School Healing Coalition (NABS) U.S. Truth & Healing Commission Bill advocacy toolkit is available here.

Follow Senate floor schedules and webcasts here: https://www.senate.gov/legislative/floor_activity_pail.htm 
 

A Texas company is now installing ammunition vending machines in grocery stores across Alabama, Oklahoma, and Texas.

Read this message from the Democracy for America Advocacy Fund: “The company behind these machines claims their age-verification technology makes these transactions safe. But we know better. No amount of technology can prevent these machines from normalizing gun violence and making deadly weapons more accessible than ever.

We need to stop this dangerous trend before it spreads. We need to send a clear message that our grocery stores should be safe spaces for families, not convenient pit stops for potential killers.
We've already lost too many lives to gun violence. We can't make it even easier for tragedy to strike.

We're up against a powerful, well-funded gun lobby that puts profits over people's lives. But we have something stronger: the will of Americans who are tired of living in fear of gun violence.”

Tell Congress to act now. Demand a nationwide ban on ammunition vending machines in grocery stores.  
 

Congress has before it bipartisan, commonsense legislation poised to better support and protect unaccompanied migrant children entering the U.S. while simultaneously helping to address the enormous immigration court backlog. 

Unaccompanied migrant children should not be left to navigate a bewildering and complex U.S. immigration system designed for adults, most having made the arduous journey to this country to escape poverty and violence. This situation leaves them vulnerable to human trafficking and other dangers.

Immigration Court Efficiency and Children’s Court Act (H.R. 6145/S.3178)

H.R. 6145/S. 3178 would create a more child-friendly environment in which unaccompanied migrant children are more likely to receive due process and better oversight, while simultaneously relieving strain on the U.S. immigration court system by grouping similar cases and streamlining the handling of pending cases of children awaiting adjudication by the U.S. immigration system. The bill draws from best practices for children’s proceedings used in other judicial settings. Among the provisions, the court structure would allow for the presence of legal and social service organizations to provide a touchpoint for children so they could be better screened for and protected from human trafficking.

The Sisters of St. Agnes have a deep commitment to standing up for human dignity and protection of the vulnerable, as do other women religious communities such as the School Sisters of Notre Dame. Please take time today to contact Congress with this SSND petition and urge support for this important legislation.

In Fond du Lac, WI, your letter will automatically be sent to Senators Johnson and Baldwin and Representative Grothman, otherwise letters will automatically be sent to the state legislators in your area. Include a personal story to send a more powerful message. Once completing the survey, do not exit. You will be emailed a code to ensure it is you sending the message.

August 6 and 9 mark a shameful time in history when, in 1945, the United States dropped atomic bombs on the Japanese cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, killing over 200,000 people. Despite this horrific humanitarian tragedy, the world’s nuclear-armed states possess a combined total of about 12,100 nuclear warheads, putting the entire planet at risk of annihilation.
    
On August 6, 2024, the Franciscan Peace Center, a ministry of the Sisters of St. Francis, Clinton, Iowa, will be hosting a virtual prayer service to mark this dark day and to call for renewed efforts to eliminate all nuclear weapons.

The prayer service will be held via Zoom from 6-7:00 pm CDT on Tuesday, August 6, 2024. 

Register to Attend

The prayer service will be recorded for those who will not be available to participate in the live event.  

CSA is a co-sponsor of this event.

This statue of Saint Agnes stands in the center of the permanent collection at the United Nations. The damaged statue was found in the ruins of a Roman Catholic Cathedral in Nagasaki, Japan in 1945. The Cathedral was completely destroyed when the atomic bomb exploded half a kilometre away. The charring and mottling on the back of the statue are the result of the intense heat and radiation.
 

GET READY! Plastic Free JulyⓇ is a global movement that helps millions of people be part of the solution to plastic pollution - so we can have cleaner streets, oceans, and beautiful communities. Will you be part of Plastic Free July by choosing to refuse single-use plastics?

Take the challenge!

Curious to know what people have done for Plastic Free July? Read inspirational stories to learn what participants are doing to reduce single-use plastic waste at home, work, or in their community. Learn about the steps they took, the challenges they overcame, and lessons learned. 

Do you have a story to share that will inspire and empower others? Share it with us!

Many sisters in the CSA motherhouse have been experimenting with a variety of plastic-free household items, including laundry detergent sheets, shampoo bars, toothpaste tabs, bamboo toothbrushes, beeswax food wrap, lip balm, dryer balls, and much more. Sister Peg Spindler has created an extensive list of companies offering alternative products for your kitchen, bath, laundry, and other areas. 
 

Yoga & Nonviolence: Moving Toward a State of Inner Peace
Saturday, August 10, 2024
10:00 AM-12:00 PM Pacific Time
Join Campaign Nonviolence (A Project of Pace e Bene) for an online event with Carla Conde

In this workshop you will:

• Understand the Definition of Yoga and Its Connection to Nonviolence:
  Learn how yoga supports individual growth and betterment physically, mentally, emotionally, and spiritually.
• Explore Various Definitions of Violence and Its Types/Aspects:
  Gain a deeper understanding of what nonviolence entails.
• Learn Yoga's Principles to Address Violence:
  Discover how principles such as ahimsa (nonviolence), satya (truthfulness), and svadhaya (self-study/discovery) can address violence towards oneself and society.
• Understand the Role of the Autonomic Nervous System and Polyvagal Theory:
  Explore how these concepts impact our sense of inner peace and provide insights into cultivating self-awareness and self-regulation in daily life.
• Practice Gentle Physical Postures and Breathing Exercises:
  Enhance self-awareness, self-regulation, and empowerment through Yoga practices.
• Engage in Questions and Discussion:
  Participate in an interactive session for further clarification and discussion.

Learn more/Register