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President Obama Speaks Out on Behalf of Sri Lanka Journalist May 3rd, 2009
President Obama supported detained journalist J.S. Tissainayagam in Sri Lanka in his May 1st speech on World Press Freedom Day. He spoke of those “…who face intimidation, censorship, and arbitrary arrest – [who are] guilty of nothing more than a passion for truth and a tenacious belief that a free society depends on an informed citizenry.”
Mr. Tissainaygam has been held for over a year, on charges that are widely believed to be without substance.
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April Action Alert: Support the Border Security and Responsibility Act of 2009 April 28th, 2009
Join the National Week of Lobbying on the Border Wall
This week, April 27- May 1, dozens of concerned citizens and faith groups are visiting Washington, DC, to build support among Members of Congress for H.R. 2076 – the Border Security and Responsibility Act of 2009. Last week, Rep. Grijalva introduced this bill in the House of Representatives. If passed, the Bill would restore the rule of law to the borderlands, and protect communities, national parks and other federal lands – as well as significant wildlife habitat – from the unintended consequences of our nation’s border policy.
The damage that border walls have caused is alarming. To date, infrastructure has been built across more than 600 miles of our shared international border with Mexico. Walls have separated families, caused damaging floods and erosion, and fractured habitat and migration corridors vital to wildlife that has been pushed to the brink of extinction.
Your members of Congress can stop construction of the Border Wall and help mitigate the damage done, but they need to hear from you today.
Civilians Bear the Brunt of War in Sri Lanka April 28th, 2009
Conditions are grim in the tiny strip of coast in northern Sri Lanka where tens of thousands of civilians are trapped between the warring LTTE and Sri Lankan Army forces. Lack of food, water and medical supplies coupled with daily bombardment by heavy artillery have made this area a living hell.
UN sources have estimated that 6,432 civilians have been killed since January 20 of this year while another 13,946 have been wounded. This does not include all the bodies that are lying by the roadsides. We have received reports that today, numerous people were killed while 1,374 were injured and admitted to two hospitals. A health clinic was bombed killing people in the injured patient’s ward.
International calls to both sides to stop the fighting have fallen on deaf ears. The ICRC has been able to evacuate some 4,000 people in recent weeks, mostly severely wounded by Army bombing, but many more have been unable to get out, forcibly detained as a human shield by the LTTE. Civilians, as young as 12, have been forcibly conscripted by the LTTE in a desperate effort to fend off the military advance.
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Oblates Work with Parishioners to Save Mortgages April 27th, 2009
John Lasseigne, OMI is a priest at Mary Immaculate Catholic Church in the Southern California community of Pacoima, where one in every nine homes is in some stage of foreclosure. He says the people in this community were targeted by predatory lenders and given loans they never should have qualified for.
Fr. Lasseigne and others at Mary Immaculate, has been working with One-LA, a community organizing effort in Los Angeles, to help parishioners re-finance problematic mortgages.
CNN recently did a story on this effort. Watch the video…
Protect the Poor While Caring for God’s Creation April 22nd, 2009
As Americans celebrate Earth Day by leaving our cars at home or volunteering to make the world a greener place, the Catholic Church is making a distinctive contribution to the climate change debate.
A newly unveiled Catholic Climate Covenant calls for action to protect the poor AND care for God’s Creation.
This unprecedented initiative asks Catholics “Who Is Under Your Carbon Footprint?”
The Catholic Climate Covenant asks the nation’s 65 million Catholics to connect their religious values with care for the Earth, to learn how climate change affects poverty-stricken regions, and to lobby legislators on behalf of the poor.
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