Ghost Ranch '01

Ghost Ranch 2001

A report from Ghost Ranch

Crisis in Our Global Neighborhood

[8-16-01]

by Ross Kinsler

Anne Barstow has provided a later report, with some more details of plans developed during the seminar. [10-5-01]

Fifty-five people from across the U.S. gathered at Ghost Ranch August 6-13 for an intensive seminar on the looming crisis of economic globalization and militarism. The seminar was sponsored by the Witherspoon Society, the Presbyterian Peace Fellowship, and Presbyterians for Restoring Creation. The leaders were Jack Nelson-Pallmeyer (writer-theologian), Alice Winters (Presbyterian missionary to Colombia), and Rick Ufford-Chase (Director of Borderlinks in Tucson/Nogales). Many of the participants have for years engaged in justice and peace causes, and we came to the nearly unanimous conclusion that there is what we have called a "Crisis in our Global Neighborhood," and that this crisis calls for immediate, in-depth response from the Presbyterian Church (USA) and other churches and organizations.

One focus of this crisis and our response should be Colombia, where violence and death are escalating through major U.S. funding and military presence under the pretense of a "war on drugs." Another is the U.S.-Mexico border, which is also being militarized under the guise of the drug war. A third focus is the School of the Americas, which has been renamed and is in the process of being decentralized. Underlying these and many other places of conflict around the world is the primary interest of corporate-led, market-centered, economic globalization supported and promoted by U.S. foreign policy and military prowess.

The "Crisis in our Global Neighborhood" calls for wide-spread response from the Witherspoon Society, the Presbyterian Peace Fellowship, Presbyterians for Restoring Creation and many agencies of the church at all levels. This is an urgent need and an important opportunity to educate ourselves in the face of misplaced and misdirected policies and actions of our government that are allied with selfish and harmful corporate interests in the U.S. and around the world.

The Ghost Ranch seminar participants propose that our organizations engage with corresponding national, regional, and local church partners in an intensive effort to inform our constituencies and the wider public about the current consequences and future dangers of these developments and their underlying causes. Colombia and the U.S.-Mexico border call for urgent response, and they provide significant windows into global realities that people of conscience must understand.

"Crisis in Our Global Neighborhood" proposes processes of information, education, biblical-theological reflection, and action through immersion experiences in Colombia and along the U.S.-Mexico border, newsletters and information packets, protest at the School of the Americas, regional seminars, and contact with the media and government offices.

Ross Kinsler

The author:

Ross Kinsler and his wife Gloria were coworkers in mission for the Presbyterian church for over twenty-five years as theological educators in Central America. They recently retired from teaching at the Latin American Biblical University in San José, Costa Rica and now live in Altadena, California.