Connecting our Conversations
Connecting our Conversations is hosted by the Presbytery of Southern New England, a regional governing body in the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.). This is our space for conversations that push the edges of our faith and help us deepen discipleship.
Connecting our Conversations
Matthew 25 Series: Intersectional Focus #1 - Militarism
In the fifth episode of the Matthew 25 series, Rev. Dr. Shannan Vance-Ocampo is joined by the PC(USA)'s Luciano Kovacs, World Mission's Area Coordinator for the Middle East and Europe, and Rev. Dr. Laurie Kraus, Director, Humanitarian and Global Ecumenical Engagement, for a discussion on the intersectional focus on Militarism, and how the Presbyterian Church can transition from charity to systemic advocacy.
Together, they explore:
- Militarism’s direct connection to poverty and the decline in resources for humanitarian and development work
- The PC(USA)’s engagement and advocacy efforts around ceasefire, military aide and Christian Zionism
- The role of the Presbyterian Church in confronting these challenges and fostering peace
Luciano Kovacs serves the national offices of the Presbyterian Church USA as the World Mission’s area coordinator for the Middle East and Europe. Most recently, Kovacs served as executive director for North America and global program director for advocacy and solidarity at the World Student Christian Federation. He also served as social justice director for Jan Hus Presbyterian Church in New York City. Before that he was Jan Hus’ assistant director, then director of homeless outreach and advocacy. During his career he has also worked at the International Turin Center in Turin, Italy and as the European regional secretary of the World Student Christian Federation. Kovacs has a “Laurea” degree in foreign languages and literature from the University of Turin. He took additional courses in history, sociology pedagogy, cultural and post-colonial studies. He continued his education at the University of Glasgow in Scotland, University College Dublin and University College London.
Rev. Dr. Laurie Ann Kraus serves the national offices of the Presbyterian Church USA as Director of Humanitarian and Global Ecumenical Engagement, in the ministries of Compassion, Peace and Justice. This work coordinates and supports holistic collaboration among the offices of disaster response, migration accompaniment, hunger and development, peacemaking and advocacy for the self-development of people (SDOP). Working alongside faith-based, civil society and ecclesial partners across the globe, this work seeks to accompany vulnerable people in the US and around the world; supporting and advocating their efforts to build sustainable and abundant communities for all, especially in times of disaster, violence, or food insecurity. Prior to her present assignment, Laurie served for 10 years as director of Presbyterian Disaster Assistance. Laurie is on the board and executive committee of ACT Alliance, a consortium of 155 world-wide disaster response, development and advocacy church and faith based organizations. She is a certified spiritual director and compassion fatigue/trauma-informed spiritual care provider.
Well, hello everyone. This is Shannon Vance Ocampo I use she and her pronouns and I serve as the general presbyter for the Presbytery of Southern New England, and this is connecting our conversations, our podcast space for conversations that push the edges of our faith and help us to deepen discipleship. The Presbytery of Southern New England is a regional governing body in the Presbyterian Church, usa. During January and February of 2025, we will be doing a special podcast series on being a Matthew 25 Presbytery. You are hearing this podcast while I am away on sabbatical and I wanted to leave something behind that would be a ministry resource for the whole Presbytery. You are hearing this podcast while I am away on sabbatical and I wanted to leave something behind that would be a ministry resource for the whole presbytery and also help us to set intentions around ministry and theology as we begin a new year. In addition to this podcast, our presbytery meetings and gatherings in 2025. We'll also focus around various themes of Matthew 25 and invite resources from around the presbytery.
Speaker 2:This podcast series is exploring all areas of Matthew 25 history, including a special episode at the beginning on the history and the theological why of being a Matthew 25 church, including a conversation in that first phrase on what intersectionality is and why it is at the heart of this ministry. For today's episode, we are going to be focusing on the Matthew 25 focus, on militarism and what that means for us as people of faith. We are talking today to Luciano Kovacs, who is the area coordinator for the Middle East and Europe for World Mission, and Lori Krause, who is the director of Humanitarian and Global Engagement, ecumenical Engagement. Your title has changed, lori about this important feature of Matthew 25 Minist. So welcome Luciano and welcome Lori. Thank you.
Speaker 3:Thank you, shannon, it's great to be here.
Speaker 2:Thank you. So I like to start with introductions. So whoever wants to go first, just give you a chance to introduce yourself in whatever way best makes sense for you for you.
Speaker 1:Go ahead, laurie. Everybody's looking at me, so that's fine. So I am Laurie Krauth and, as Shannon said, my present title is Director of Humanitarian and Global Ecumenical Engagement, which is kind of a complicated way of saying that. I work in the current ministry area of compassion, peace and justice and come to this work from a 30 year pastoral career in two different churches upstate New York and Miami Florida upstate New York and Miami Florida a part-time work as a seminary professor and a director of a doctor of ministry program at an intercultural multilingual seminary in Miami Florida, and then, for the 10 years prior to 2023, as the director of Presbyterian Disaster Assistance, which is our denomination's office that attends to disaster response both in the United States and globally.
Speaker 1:So the humanitarian part is encompassed in that and also in work also done in Compassion, peace and Justice, which is the work done by our Presbyterian Hunger Program, which is development work done by our Presbyterian Hunger Program, which is development, food sovereignty and food sufficiency. Anti-poverty work, which is part of Matthew 25, of course, and the work of the Office of Self-Development of People, which does small-scale development work among organizations that have not yet been able to develop any kind of a presence or an institutional coordination. This is sort of in partnership with our long-held commitment to making sure that any work that we do is based on and centered in the communities and the individuals who are most deeply affected, so particularly the work of self-development which came out of conversations about reparations some time ago in the early days of the civil rights movement was meant to provide space and access and resources for communities that had been structurally and historically excluded, so that they could begin their own work, owning their own work and producing it, not in a way that related to someone else's charity or someone else's agency.
Speaker 1:The Presbyterian disaster assistance work also includes some of the work that the denomination does with refugees, asylum seekers and migrants. So for congregations that are involved in resettlement work, immigration work or asylum sanctuary work, we choose welcome. That work is also part of this overall portfolio.
Speaker 2:Great Thanks, lori Luciano. Tell us about you and what you're up to.
Speaker 3:Sure. So hello everybody. It's great to be here. My name is Luciano Kovacs. As Shannon mentioned, I'm the Area Coordinator for the Middle East and Europe for PCUSA up for PCUSA, currently under World Mission. So I've been in this position for six years. Prior to this, I was the North American Executive Secretary for the World Student Christian Federation and also its Advocacy and Solidarity Coordinator. That's when a lot of my experience with the Middle East came about and I started getting involved in the PCUSA. When I was a mission volunteer from the Italian Waldensian Church, which is one of the partners of the PCUSA, and I spent two years as a mission volunteer in New York City at Jan Hus Presbyterian Church and then the church hired me as its social justice director. So that's how I came uh to the pcusa. Yeah, and maybe you know I'll talk more about the the work uh, in the second part of the yeah, yeah.
Speaker 2:So, um, you know, laurie, we have a lot of churches in our presbytery that are involved in immigration, refugee, resettlement um, um, iris is the organization immigrant, refugee um and immigrant services um that is in Connecticut. So we have a lot of churches that have done uh, resettlement, uh through that. Most recently we had a family from Afghanistan which um, uh stayed at our church in New Haven uh, connecticut and uh, and they've just moved out into their own place after staying in our church for a little over a year in their resettlement journey. So that's been a feature of ministry that's been important in our Presbyterian. Of course, pda has been an active partner in our Presbyterian. Unfortunately, a little over a decade ago with the Sandy Hook shootings, and that ministry is still really well remembered as being important during that time in this presbytery. So, thank you, luciano. Tell us a little bit more about some of what you're up to in the Middle East and in Europe. A little bit more about your portfolio we heard some from Laurie, but tell us about what you're up to.
Speaker 3:Sure. So basically, together with a team of regional liaisons and other mission co-workers, we're looking after the partnerships in the Middle East and Europe, and we do this also with colleagues like Lori and other in CPJ and in other ministry areas of the PCSA that are whose work is connected in some ways to the Middle East and Europe, and one of so. We interact with partners on a daily basis. We bring the partners concerns to the PCUSA as well as to our grassroots partnership networks.
Speaker 3:Constituents, our a lot of our work, inform the advocacy work that has been done in Washington DC and at the UN and so on and so forth. So it's a multiple way of working with partners and constituents on issues that are relating to the Middle East and Europe. And since we are discussing militarism today as we progress in the podcast, I'm going to focus on the two devastating wars that are affecting the Middle East and Europe at the moment. Part of my portfolio is also at the moment. Part of my portfolio is also so I've been coordinating the work of Christian on Christian Zionism in the PCSA and together with other colleagues we've been also engaging with ecumenical global partners on this particular issue, such as the World Communion of Reformed Churches.
Speaker 3:I'm also, I've been also co-facilitating the Militarism Working Group which I guess the reason I'm here today is partly because of that and the LGBTQIA plus working group of the PCSA working group of the PCSA, and, like many other staff, I'm involved in different areas of work that pertain to what we do with partners in the Middle East, such as the Migration Roundtable that Lori is also part of.
Speaker 3:Early this year, in January, my office organized a conference in Rome on the topic of people on the move, and so we brought partners from the Middle East and Europe, and also partners from other denominations, to share best practices and work on issues of migration, but also to really center the conversation around voices of migrants and refugees themselves, and refugees themselves, because that's one of the things that is very important to do to give a platform to those who are affected by forced migrations and, very often because of conflicts and wars, to speak on their behalf, rather than those of us who are working on certain issues to speak on their behalves, rather than, you know, those of us who are working on certain issues to speak on their behalf. So these are some of the things that I've been involved in.
Speaker 2:Thank you, and let's talk a little bit about militarism. I think it might be helpful just to you know. Throw out, for those who are listening, a working definition. What's the working definition of militarism that we use in our work in the Presbyterian Church and you know why does it. You know what. You know why be engaged in militarism, why does it matter as part of Matthew 25 ministry? I know it's in the overture and everything that started all this off, but for those who are listening, some of the sort of why behind all of this, the work around militarism.
Speaker 3:Should I start?
Speaker 2:Yeah, sure, whoever.
Speaker 3:Well, I mean the PCSA, you know, through the General Assembly, has spoken about militarism. You know, for many, many, many years as a work has been around peacemaking, human rights, drone warfare, the investments, as well as how we are supporting our partners who are affected by militarism in their regions. If you know, one of the working definitions of militarism is that militarism is a system of beliefs, political priorities and economic investments, and so it's a system that support a disproportionate level of expenditures on weapons as well as military aid, as opposed to focusing on human needs and social needs. And actually it's very interesting because every time that we talk about militarism and military aid and you know we're going to talk about military aid that the US is giving to.
Speaker 3:Israel in its wars, the more money is for equality of people and marginalized populations. And because the Matthew 25 has three major foci and three intersectional emphasis. If we look at all the six, the other five aspects of the Matthew 25 vision and ministry, it's clear that militarism is interconnected with all of them. So you know the increase in poverty around the globe is directly connected to militarism. You know how the climate and ecology are being affected. You know is a direct consequence of militarism, and so on and so forth.
Speaker 1:If I could add, displacement of communities, both internal displacement and actual full-on refugee. That has gone on from before 2015 to somewhere around 30 to 40 million people on the move to over 100 million people on the move now since the inception of the war in Ukraine, kind of starting this escalation actually with the war in Syria and then continuing with the onset and continuation of the war in Ukraine and also the conflict in Gaza that's now extended into southern Lebanon. That is not even providing even the most basic level of protection for humanitarian aid workers, for the UN, for refugee camps and for people who are being forced to go back and forth in Palestinian territories and throughout Palestine and that's a direct consequence. That poverty, that displacement, that inability to have a life that is sustainable and worth living and free from want and fear, is directly a consequence of militarism and, in many cases, of Christian Zionism and Christian nationalism.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and at the end of that, you know that chapter in Matthew 25 where Jesus says you know, you know, when did we see you? You saw me when you visited me when I was in prison. You saw me when I was, when you visited me when I was sick, when you cared for me, when you fed me when I was hungry, when you clothed me, when I was naked Right, and so so much of this direct work that our partners and we do in these places that might feel very far from places in the United States where, you know, people are in these incredibly horrific and destitute situations brought on by war. And so that would be, you know, for me some of the reason why we would want to be concerned about issues such as militarism, because it really, when you get to those really basic things in Matthew 25, right around poverty and around destitution, all of those things go up when you're in situations like that, and the trauma and the breaking of communities, whole countries, you know, as we're seeing in Gaza right now, you know there's not one part of Gaza that's not, you know, completely broken at this point.
Speaker 2:I also remember years ago I went on behalf of the PCUSA on a delegation to visit US military bases that were being placed in various parts of Columbia, where my husband's from and where I've engaged in work over the years. And Luciana, you brought up this environmental piece that folks may not realize. But US bases overseas are exempt from environmental regulations, environmental impact studies, things like this. And then high incidences of sexual violence against children and women in places like this All of these issues, interconnected around sort of war-making militarism, should be areas of incredible and deep concern for us as people of faith, because these things are really oppositional to what we call life abundant or what we call new life.
Speaker 3:And what is interesting, shannon, is, actually I did some research on this particular aspect. Recently there's a report from Brown University and Brown University is excellent at producing reports on everything militarism and in this report they estimated that since the invasion of Afghanistan in 2001, the US military has emitted 1.212 million metric tons of greenhouses. And so, and you know, the yeah, the carbon dioxide emissions of the US military only is just huge.
Speaker 1:Yes, I was going to add about the military base piece that you know there's. I was in a meeting with Global Partners a couple of weeks ago in Fiji, which also has direct impact from militarism, as do accompanying island nations the Marshall Islands, the Solomons, tuvalu, vanuatu, all of those affected by nuclear testing and by US military presence to this day, including the climate impacts of reducing landmass because of the rising seas and also because of the impact of the nuclear testing history in the region. I was going to add that some of the global partners were talking about how, you know, it's popular to think that the US has withdrawn military presence in terms of having permanent military bases on allies' soil allies' soil. But the fact of the matter is, you know, it was very well known that the US had sort of started to draw down and close some of the air bases in the Philippines and yet in the recent years of sort of escalating tensions and shifting geopolitics, that presence has actually crept back in, and so the idea that we're not having military bases occupying other countries is not accurate at this point. And in the Philippines alone there's a growing sort of US military sort of stable presence that's shaped around the idea of supporting allies and watching critical areas of military unrest, perhaps with Russia, or concerns about North Korea or concerns about, maybe, China, but those are sort of a renewed and renewing expression of at least US militarism. That's kind of a very old model of occupation that we had tried to move away from for some years.
Speaker 1:And then one other thing that I was thinking of particularly, luciano, when you were talking about the European work and partners a direct impact of militarism in the humanitarian sector is that. So Luciano mentioned working strongly with World Community of Reformed Churches. Both of us have intersection with the World Council of Churches and I hold some work, a significant body of work, with the ACT Alliance, which is a group of 155 faith-based councils of churches, global churches and faith-based response organizations that do advocacy or humanitarian work or disaster work or development work. And we just met in General Assembly, which we do every six years in Indonesia two weeks ago and almost all of that. So the balance is that Global South partners implement and decide what's needed in their areas through fora.
Speaker 1:So there's an Israel-Palestine-Middle East forum, there's a Ukraine forum, there are fora in South America all over there are four in South America all over but most of the funding happens from global north partners like churches in our presbyteries who donate to Presbyterian Disaster Assistance or somewhere else for us to support these large-scale responses that are multi-relationship, multi-denominational, and many of the partners in Europe, many of the national entities in Europe.
Speaker 1:Most of their work is not done by an entity like USAID, it's actually done by the church expression of the humanitarian and development work. So each of the countries in Europe get back donor funding and state funding to hold billions of dollars in some cases, depending on the size of the country and their capability To do humanitarian response in places that are afflicted by a disaster or have a strong development need or an advocacy need. And because of the increase of militarism and the scale up around Ukraine over the past few years, particularly for our European partners, money for regular humanitarian work that's not designated to a certain area has strongly declined and with the rise of sort of more conservative or extremist-leaning, right-wing-leaning governments in some parts of the EU, actually the money has declined for international response at all. So those are really directly linked to global militarism and to the concern over global security in the regions and it directly affects our ability to see those who are impoverished, to see those who are displaced, to see those who are unhoused and to respond to them in a significant way.
Speaker 2:Thanks, lori. The context is just incredibly important to understand, and I think also how much of a web it all is for us as we engage with partners. I know that the two big global hotspots that have been in the news a lot have been, of course, the conflict in the Middle East, the war in Gaza, of course, southern Lebanon, and then also what's going on in Ukraine the war in Ukraine Not to say that there aren't other areas around the world but I know that those two places, luciano especially, are in your portfolio of work, and so I'm wondering if you could say a little bit about where the PCUSA is showing up in those two places and what our work and our advocacy looks like there.
Speaker 3:Sure, Sure, sorry, I was trying to unmute myself. Yeah, I mean, let me start by saying that the war in Gaza is a direct consequence of the concept of militarism. The US government has been providing $3.8 billion to Israel every year, but since the beginning of the war in Gaza, it has increased this military aid dramatically. And we are talking about, you know, thousands of Palestinians who have died. You know 15,000 children only in Gaza. You know a good number of children in Lebanon as well. There are also other consequences, such as the banning by the Israeli government of Amra, the United Nations Work Refugees Agency, which is basically criminalizing humanitarian aid. And you know, and what we have defined in one of our overtures, sbcusa, especially the one on the Gaza conflict, the Gaza siege, sorry, collective punishment and torture inflicted on a whole population. And you know, let's not even talk about, you know, the million of people who have been displaced and the hospitals that have been, you know that have suffered damage, the fact that polio has returned to Gaza after 25 years and that the Israeli army is one of the most sophisticated armies in the world that has been waging this war. But in terms of PCSA's engagement, as you know, pcsa has been active on this issue ever since 1948, issue ever since 1948, which is the year which our partners defined an akba or catastrophe and recently a lot of our work has focused on promoting a ceasefire in Gaza. Actually, a lot of letters were signed and sent through the Office of Public Witness in Washington DC on a ceasefire, but also on putting pressure on the US government to stop sending military aid to Israel.
Speaker 3:We've also been working on Christian Zionism and how Christian Zionism is basically a vehicle to support, being promoted by extreme right-wing evangelicals in the US.
Speaker 3:But it is something that pervades all the Christian churches, whether they are conservative or liberal. They are conservative or liberal. And if, on the one hand, christian Zionism has these, the most extreme version of Christian Zionism envisions the so-called Armageddon, right. So the idea that at some point, the whole territory, from the river to the sea, is going to be occupied by Jews and then Jews will have to convert to Christianity or perish, right. So it is an apocalyptical way of looking and the other side of the metal of settler colonialism. But there's also a softer Christian Zionism which involves every, you know, every church, because in some ways there's this confusion about how the state, the current and modern state of Israel are similar to the biblical Israel, which is obviously not the case, and so one of the overtures that the PCUSA produced at the last General Assembly was on confessing our complicity with Christian Zionism, and so this is a very important work that the PCUSA has been doing and, of course, we've been supporting our partners both in Gaza, as well as in the West Bank.
Speaker 3:So and that's been also a great collaboration between my office and PDA.
Speaker 2:And that's been also a great collaboration between humanitarian aid and also on, you know, ending issues around violence, what shows up in communities, so that the work is still very, very much gospel work, very focused very tightly on the way of Jesus, on the gospel of Jesus, and also very, very tightly focused on not just ecumenical work with our partners you know who might be, you know from the World Alliance of Churches or Reformed Churches, the World Council of Churches but even interreligiously and paying attention so that we don't show up and engage in something like Christian Zionism, which is really quite anti-Semitic, you know, and that we show up with respect for our partners and also really engage in that work in thoughtful ways.
Speaker 2:So it's incredibly important to remember that, because I think there is just so much sort of noise and commentary out there, but when we really dig down and look at what we're actually doing, nothing that we're doing is in any way not grounded in a deep theology and in deep thoughtfulness and a real hewing to our tradition and who we are as Christians and as Presbyterians. So I think that's the other piece that's so important, because oftentimes there's a lot of noise around these things here in the United States, or maybe not even an understanding of the why behind what we do. Luciano, I don't know if you want to say a few things before we close here about Ukraine or about some of that work. I know we're recording this podcast just a little bit before Thanksgiving and of course that's back in the news again this week.
Speaker 3:I mean we've been talking this week that a thousand days have passed since, you know, the invasion of Ukraine had been absolutely dramatic and catastrophical for so many people. So many people have been killed and wounded and displaced, a sign of ending of this war. Just a couple of nights ago, a school dormitory in the Sumy region of Ukraine was bombed by the Russian, killing 10 people, including a child. So, again, you know, the war affects so many people and each person has a story behind. I was reading that, according to Save the Children, about 500,000 babies have been born during these 33 months of war, during these 33 months of war, and so you know what is the future for these kids is really. And now we're looking at some decisions that have been made. You know Joe Biden's decision to allow Ukraine to use the missiles and the future and nobody knows what is going to happen immediately organized a counterattack, upgrading the Russian Federation's nuclear doctrine to allow the use of nuclear weapons.
Speaker 3:Rather than seeing an end through diplomatic means to this war, we military spending in the EU. So in some ways, the EU which was, you know, and you know I was born and grew up in Europe, so for me the formation of the EU was a dream of peace, with justice on the continent and also in partnership with other states and countries, and in fact a lot of those dreams have been disappointed to many of us. But right now again, even in the EU, social spending is cut and military spending is growing. Just yesterday there were two meetings in Warsaw and Brussels. Warsaw and Brussels, where some European countries, including the United Kingdom, which is not part of the EU anymore, spoke for the first time in favor of European bonds to finance the military industry and therefore strengthen European participation in the arms race. So the consequences of this war on militarization into the future are really, really huge.
Speaker 2:Yeah, thank you for that.
Speaker 2:I think these are, you know, these are very, very detailed explanations, but incredibly important for us to consider as people of faith how we show up, how we connect with our elected officials, how we talk in our congregations and also how we really consider, you know, how we project ourselves out in our communities and what we talk about.
Speaker 2:So I hope that, as we've, you know, listened to this conversation today, for those of you who are listening, this has been, you know, probably out of the seven podcasts for this series, the most technical and in-depth, but I hope that it really, you know, helps us to begin to think about some of these issues in really serious ways, and especially as we enter into a new year with so much on the horizon for all of us in 2025. So I want to, you know, draw us to a close, and one of the things I've asked previous podcast guests, as we've closed, is what's something in your area of work that's giving you great hope um and uh invites you towards that idea of hope, and what's something that is still, uh, bedeviling you right or potentially causing some outrage, um and uh. So I just want to give each of you an opportunity to share a little bit about that as we, um, as we bring this conversation to a close. Uh, lori, what's bringing you hope and what's worrying you?
Speaker 1:I know the list is long that, first of all, I know that many, many congregations and individuals in Southern New England Presbytery have supported the humanitarian responses in Israel-Palestine, in Southern Lebanon and in Ukraine generously, and I think one of the things that gives me hope. Besides, let me say thank you for the care and the attention and the turning away from more local and serious concerns to broaden the care and the extension of love and support to the world. I think one of the things that's giving me hope is the fact that we are learning as Presbyterians that that charitable response or humanitarian response is only one of an incredibly linked way that we can show up with justice and with impact in the world. Once upon a time, people who wanted to give to charity or who wanted to give to humanitarian response would say, well, we don't want to hear about politics, we don't want to get involved in advocacy, we don't want to do the Washington office, we just want to, you know, bring things so that people can find shelter and have enough food and, you know, rebuild their lives after something catastrophic has happened. But it's really true that you can't sever those things and the fact that the Presbyterian Church has learned that, that they understand that giving just a humanitarian gift, without attending to systemic advocacy, without looking at the global issues that cause these disasters and these conflicts to be so catastrophic in their impact on humanity and on our common wealth in the world is wonderful.
Speaker 1:And the fact that the Presbyterian Church does this, that we have local partnerships across the world, that we have a strong humanitarian response that that's linked with other people around the globe, and we don't do that without speaking to our own government and speaking in connection with the UN, and trying to do this work systemically in a way that brings response and relief with justice and with a better understanding of how we can be a more unified world community. That constantly gives me hope, even though it feels a lot like we're just sort of chipping away at endless needs, but that we now see the linkages of those things and we're trying to do unified, systemic response is incredibly rewarding and emotionally strengthening, I think, to all of us who do this work. You said something that is bedeviling and I think that we're just that we're going into a season of of looking internally. It seems so much worse for people who really need our solidarity and it's nonsense. Our sort of self-preoccupation with these games is nonsense and it's very bedeviling.
Speaker 2:Thanks, Laurie. Luciano, what's on your mind?
Speaker 3:Yeah, you know, I've been, I've been for, you know, for some time. Middle East and what is happening in Ukraine, and so on and so forth, have really upset my ability to understand what hope would even mean, and so sometimes I prefer to use the word inspiration. And you know Laurie was talking about, you know, our partners. I get inspired by a lot of the work that is being done by our partners, as well as by a lot of, you know, peacemaking and justice-seeking grassroots movements around the globe. I know that I mean for myself.
Speaker 3:You know I was in my 20s in the 1990s and there was so much young in that decade what the fall of the Berlin Wall meant, and also the movement to counter what at that time was called globalization right, globalization right. And so the hope that was coming from the global South and that we would, you know, definitely come together as a global community to, you know, smash injustice. And then the 2000s came, and it was not just September 11th, but it was actually July 2001, which started repressing the global, the anti-globalization movement, which, in my opinion, had brought about so much hope. And so I think that I find inspiration and some hope in the work that is possible to be done by local movements, local congregations, partners, social justice movements and so on and so forth, and I do believe that the PeaceUSA is intersecting, both domestically and globally, with so many individuals and organizations that are doing, you know, the God-given work of peace with justice, and so this is what continues to inspire me and motivate me to do the work that I'm doing.
Speaker 2:Thanks, luciano. I want to thank both of you for being with us today to talk about some of these things, and I hope we'll put some notes in the podcast notes links to PDA, links to, luciano, your work. I also know that there was a great webinar that was done, a series on sort of one by the PCSA, and then also we shared the Christian Zionism one around the Presbytery. That was done over the summer months. So thank you both so much for your work, for your ministry. I know that, uh, you both represent some of the hardest pieces of our national work and, um, also sometimes the most traumatizing pieces of our work, and so, just, uh, I want to especially say thank you to both of you and uh know that you are so much in our prayers. Your ministry and as a Presbytery, we're really glad to be supportive in the ways that we can, and also continue to grow in our understanding as we move forward into this new year. So thank you both so much for being part of connecting our conversations today.
Speaker 1:Thanks for reaching out. Shannon and for the Presbyterian's interest, and it's nice to have some quiet moments to talk about things that are often just urgent actions that we're all taking and to reflect on the larger impact and context of it. So appreciate the chance to sit with Luciano and you about this.
Speaker 2:No problem.
Speaker 3:Thank you so much, shannon, and we're grateful for this opportunity.
Speaker 2:Thank you.