During this time of heightened awareness of the Holy Land, the California-Pacific Conference Holy Land Strategy Group has provided resources to inform, inspire, and mobilize us for effective advocacy and action.
The resource page introduces the following ongoing initiatives:
PREACH & PRAY PALESTINE
For Advent 2023, we encourage pastors and laity to discover the annual program “Preach Palestine” from our partners in Friends Of Sabeel North America (FOSNA).
This initiative encourages us to include Palestine/Israel in our Advent services and other activities in our churches in a great variety of ways: with sermons, songs, prayers or litanies, group studies, children’s stories, and more. See the wonderful collection of resources by scrolling all the way down the page at this link.
Contact our task force for help in bringing this seasonal program to your church. If you are participating, please let us know!
APARTHEID-FREE CONGREGATIONS
United Methodists have worked with an interdenominational coalition of faith groups in North America to create and lead this campaign that is growing into a national movement. It was inspired by the emerging consensus among the international human rights community that Israel’s treatment of the Palestinian people amounts to the crime of Apartheid. Learn more about that here.
In taking the pledge, we ask ourselves and our communities to take a public pledge against all forms of racism, bigotry, and oppression, including against racist discrimination, Islamophobia, antisemitism, and xenophobia in our own communities.
We seek to educate ourselves and our communities about the devastation of Palestinian lives under military occupation, settler colonialism, and apartheid, and about the connections between settler colonialism, racist oppression, and the cult of security in Palestine/Israel and in North America.
Inspired by the anti-Apartheid movement that toppled the Apartheid regime in South Africa, we are building an anti-apartheid movement and encourage faith communities and all communities of conscience to step away from any and all support to Israeli apartheid, occupation, and settler colonialism.
See the campaign at https://apartheid-free.org/.
Cal-Pac Holy Land Strategy Group’s leadership is involved in developing this campaign nationally. Contact us to discuss how to bring this justice campaign to your congregation. We are ready to help you every step of the way, from learning and teaching about conditions in Palestine/Israel, to taking the pledge and exploring how to fulfill it in ways that would fit your congregation.
UNITED METHODISTS FOR KAIROS RESPONSE (UMKR)
Our task force works closely with the independent caucus United Methodists for Kairos Response (UMKR), a denomination-wide justice movement, and we would recommend visiting their website for resources, campaigns, and more at https://www.kairosresponse.org.
Learn more by clicking the button below.
