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NCC posturing

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The Presbyterian Layman Volume 33, Number 3, Posted May 22, 2000

Bob Howard - PLC Chairman
Robert L. Howard, Chairman
Presbyterian Lay Committee
Regardless of one’s beliefs about custody and asylum for Elian Gonzalez, surely all would agree his case deserved more conciliation and less confrontation. Unfortunately, past and present leaders of the National Council of Churches (NCC), the Rev. Joan Brown Campbell and the Rev. Robert Edgar, have failed to provide the former and have eagerly compounded the latter.

The NCC’s shameless political posturing is well documented, has long been challenged by The Layman, and is frequently noted by others. Cal Thomas observes that the NCC consistently “runs a financial and theological deficit.” The NCC’s lack of moral leadership is most troubling because it would deny to Elian the constitutional protection of due process.

Last December, the INS/Justice Department placed Elian in the temporary care of his Miami relatives, allowed the filing of a political asylum petition, and said his custody should be decided by the state courts. There, Elian’s fate would be determined by the family law principle of “best interests of the child.”

But Commandante Castro, no respecter of due process, seized upon Elian’s plight for jingoistic gain. Without interviewing Elian, or his Miami relatives, the NCC leaders rushed to judgment by chartered jet, funded high-profile lawyering, and promoted the public relations campaign to return Elian to Cuba by executive fiat.

Emboldened by escalating public support for “a father’s right,” the INS/Justice Department reneged on its commitment to an asylum petition and due process in state court for Elian. The inexcusable covert armed raid on Easter weekend should and could have been avoided through conciliation and mediation, which the NCC should have been advocating. Its failure to support mediation has been a significant contributing cause of the problem.

NCC’s secularized political agenda
Throughout this unfortunate saga, the NCC’s secularized political agenda of shaping U.S. foreign policy has precluded it from providing authentic witness to the gospel of Jesus Christ. It has failed to model what Jesus would do if this little child had come to Him. Sister Jeanne O’Laughlin, the Dominican nun, has given us that example. Her openness and compassion to all sides, fairness, grace under pressure, heartfelt prayer, and consistent urging of mediation have demonstrated love in action – the ministry of reconciliation to which all Christians are called.

The NCC not only failed to model reconciliation, it undercut such ministry by its activism. I am ashamed that the PCUSA continues to be the largest contributor to the political activities of the NCC. Individual Christians are free to support the NCC, just as they do other causes. But it is just plain wrong for any church, particularly the PCUSA, to misuse the funds of the faithful to support the NCC’s political agenda.

Commissioners to this year’s General Assembly have the power to take the NCC off the life support of PCUSA funding, allowing the NCC’s moral bankruptcy to cause its unlamented death. By contrast, Church World Service will survive without the albatross of the NCC, and CWS’s many good works will deserve our continued support.
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