The Episcopal Peace Fellowship Palestine Israel Network issued this Press Release Monday January 28 reporting that the Diocese of North Carolina passed a resolution urging Executive Council action on Palestine/Israel church policy. Received via email:
Winston-Salem, North Carolina – A week after longtime Episcopalian advocates for justice in Palestine released a letter urging the Episcopal Church’s Executive Council to better pursue equality in the Middle East, the Diocese of North Carolina passed a resolution advocating the same policies at its annual convention.
The Martin Luther King, Jr. Day letter – signed by church leaders like Edmond and Patti Browning, Bonnie Anderson, Desmond Tutu and eight others – can be read and supported at epfnational.org/PIN. Since the letter’s release over 300 Episcopalians from 54 dioceses have supported the Episcopal Voices of Conscience Prophetic Challenge to the Executive Council.
“As hopes for a peace with justice for the peoples of Palestine and Israel increasingly hang by a thread, it is critical that the Episcopal Church act on its extensive and long-standing policies. These include not only interfaith dialogue and education, but the actions raised in the letter and our diocesan resolution,” said Donna Hicks, a member of the Episcopal Peace Fellowship’s (EPF) Palestine Israel Network (PIN) who was a delegate to the January 25-26 North Carolina diocesan convention.
The diocesan resolution – filed in December 2012 – calls on the Executive Council to accomplish two things directed by past General Convention resolutions by June 2013 – call on Congress to investigate whether U.S. funding to Israel is being used to deny basic rights of Palestinians living under occupation and determine what investments the Church holds that support the infrastructure of the Israeli Occupation. The full text of the North Carolina diocesan convention resolution also is on the EPF PIN website.
On Palestine and Israel
Resolved, that the Diocese of North Carolina calls the Executive Council to act on the 77th General Conven- tion’s Resolution A015 re-affirming the 70th General Convention Resolution A149 which “require(s) the State of Israel to account to the Government of the United States for all aid to Israel…in compliance with the Foreign Assistance Act” by sending it to Congress with a request to hold hearings to determine that no U.S. funding is being used to deny basic human rights of Palestinians living under occupation, and asks Council to report on its actions to the whole Church by June 2013.
Resolved, that the Diocese of North Carolina asks Executive Council to act on the policy established by Execu- tive Council in October 2005 and determine, through its committee on Corporate Social Responsibility, what investments the Church holds that support the infrastructure of the Occupation and what shareholder actions are contemplated to implement that policy, and asks Council to report its findings to the Church by June 2013.
Submitted by Ben Hatley and the Rev. Lawrence Womack.
Explanation: This resolution is meant to call attention to existing policies of General Convention and to urge the Executive Council to oversee all Episcopal Church policies on the Israeli/Palestinian conflict as the whole Church prays, yearns and witnesses for a just peace for all the people of the Holy Land.
for more information contact:
Palestine Israel Network
Contact – Donna Hicks