 Instead of missionaries, assembly spends on causes By John H. Adams The Layman Online Sunday, June 23, 2002
The $124,000 is the estimated cost of paying for those social causes for three years - equivalent to calling one more missionary home for three years. In less than an hour, the commissioners approved the three recommendations of the National Issues Committee. Taco Bell was targeted (with a price tag of $35,325 for three years) because of its alleged unfairness to farm workers. The commissioners authorized up to $84,000 to figure out how to protest eminent domain more vociferously - in a project of interest principally to the Presbytery of Baltimore, which sent the overture calling for the study. And they anted up another $14,660 to build the denomination's case for "restorative justice" – which seeks to eliminate "pain" for victims, the community and the villains. One commissioner asked what kind of results should the denomination expect from these and other social stands. "In our history, have we been able to accomplish things after they were assigned?" she asked. "Is this worth it?" Vernon Broyles, associate director of the denomination's national ministries division, replied, saying, "We never know exactly. But we do know that the word of our stated clerk carries a lot of weight." Stated Clerk Clifton Kirkpatrick uses the social policies of the General Assembly to reprimand presidents, politicians, world leaders, business people and others. Taco Bell was selected for scorn in an overture from the Presbytery of Tampa Bay, which calls on Presbyterians to boycott the restaurant "and all Taco Bell products until Taco Bell, Six Ls Corporation and the Coalition of Immokalee Workers [a union] mutually agree to begin negotiations that can lead to resolution of inhumane working and living conditions." Advocates of the resolution said Taco Bell is unique among major fast-food restaurants in using only hand-picked tomatoes, which is the source of the labor dispute. Other restaurants, they say, use machine-picked tomatoes. One commissioner suggested that the boycott could hurt workers as well as shareholders. But Barbara Flythe of the Presbytery of New Brunswick said some of the workers, who visited her at a booth in the exhibit hall adjacent to where the commissioners met, said they all favored the boycott. Financial questions were raised about only one of the three issues -- the government's use of eminent domain to acquire property for public purposes. But when asked if the projected three-year cost of $84,000 for the study could be lowered, commissioners were assured that it may not cost that much. One commissioner wasn't convinced. He noted the complexity of resolving the government's use of eminent domain, fair-market compensation requirements and the need for planning boards to be able to acquire private land for public projects. The General Assembly voted 297-176 to call for a boycott of Taco Bell, but did not specify whether it would include both tacos and burritos. "It appears to me that this a free-market issue and, therefore, the PCUSA should stay out of it," said Elder John VanGenderen of the Presbytery of San Gabriel. With its title -- "On Developing a Social Witness Policy on 'Takings'" -- the Presbytery of Baltimore overture (02-51) obscured the fact that the government takings issue is exclusively about a Baltimore project. But Commissioner Albert Putsey of the Presbytery of Wabash Valley did not miss that point. "I think it would be poor policy to have a specific presbytery prepare a specific policy for the denomination," he said. The denomination's Advisory Committee on Social Witness Policy, which worked for the Baltimore overture, will play a key role in the study and policy development. The commissioners approved the Baltimore overture by a vote of 353-130. The commissioners voted by a show of hands to approve the resolution on restorative justice, which was submitted by the Advisory Witness on Social Witness Policy. The resolution calls restorative justice "a creative and constructive alternative to the widespread understanding of justice as retribution, with its emphasis on retaliation or punishment. Restorative justice is not oriented toward the imposition of penalties, or the exaction of revenge, or the infliction of pain, but toward the realization of the Biblical visions of shalom and the kingdom of God. A simple definition of restorative justice is "addressing the hurts and the needs of the victim, the offender, and the community in such a way that all -- victim, offender, and community -- might be healed." |
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