 November
23- New Orleans, LA |
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We
were welcomed to New Orleans by Allen Bernard (center),
State President of the Louisiana Injured Workers Union /
Educational Fund, as well as Ted Quant (right) and Sam (left),
also from the Union.
Ted
Quant spoke: "I believe that in every person, their
gut tells them right from wrong. Nobody has to tell you
when you see someone hurting, that they need help. You have
to learn not to do that. You have to be taught
to be indifferent to other people’s pain. You have
to get an education and go to college to believe that its
okay for millions of people to starve because the market
is going to take care of everything. You have to be
really really smart to look in the face of death and
destruction and violence and poverty and say, 'those people
just weren’t good enough to make it in our system,
which rewards hard work and intelligence and good moral
values. They must not have had it, otherwise they would
have something'. You have to get really really educated
to be that stupid. Its up to you to regain the truth that
your heart and gut tells you.”
Mire
este sitio en espanol.
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Allen
Bernard spoke: "I’m an injured worker. I was hurt
down on the river here working for Domino Sugar. I had to
have both ends of my shoulders removed. You’d think
that when you get injured on the job, you get taken care of-
but its just the opposite. You become a liability to the insurance
carriers. That in itself was a political education to me.
Through all that pain and suffering we formed the Louisiana
Injured Workers Union- to deal the hardships and suffering
of workers injured on the job." |
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Pictured
here are Nathanial & Yvette Jones. Brother Jones is the
CEO of New Orleans Church of Christ Christian Outreach Ministries
Yvette Jones. He said: “I’d just like to say thank
you for loving God's children throughout the country and world.
Our problems are similar. If we each do our part, we can have
a better world.”They generously hosted us at their Church
Center.
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.
Andreia
Borges Ferreira (middle) of the Landless Workers Movement
(MST) told us a little about her struggle: "I live
in Brazil in a camp that is part of an agricultural community
that forms part of the Landless Peasants Movement (MST).
There are another 1,500 communities like mine in Brazil.
This is a community that we have made through the struggle
of the people. So where there once was a large tract of
land with just one owner, we the people came in and occupied
it.
The
wealth and the richness of Brazil stay in the hands of a
few. Brazil is a champion in inequality – in infant
and mother mortality. People die from diseases that we’ve
already found cures for.
So
out of 27 states in Brazil, the MST is organized in 23 of
them. And so it was born in 1984 as a way to confront how
the poor people were unsatisfied with their life conditions.
In the church also played a strong role in the constitution
of this movement. Also the union movement, especially in
the rural areas, helped to build this movement. So thru
these 18 years of struggle, we have had many victories .
We now have over 250,000 families taking land in the rural
areas. Thru this occupation over 7 million hectares of land
have been reclaimed in Brazil."
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"Chita"
holds Miriam while her mother Maragaret makes sandwiches
for the lunch break.
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The
group poses for a picture before the Freedoms Riders begin
their tour of impoverished areas of New Orleans, LA |
Allen and Ted
from the Louisiana Injured Workers Union took us on a reality
tour of New Orleans. This lot was once home to the St. Thomas
Housing Projects. Only five housing units remain. The City
of New Orleans has been working with developers to build
a new Wal-Mart and upscale housing units on this lot. At
least fifty residents of the St. Thomas Housing Projects
were left homeless.
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A painting
of the St. Thomas Housing Projects now hangs on the wall
at Hope House. This is the same view as the photo on the
left. This shows what the projects used to look like.These
are the same projects featured
in the film "Dead Man Walking"
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Brother Don and
Sister Lillian of Hope House talk about the organization’s
role in the community. Hope House has been providing transitional
housing, educational, emergency assistance services, etc.
to New Orleans’ poor for the past thirty years.
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Sister Lillian
of Hope House listens as Ms. Morales explains the purpose
of the New Freedom Bus Tour.
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The New Freedom
Bus Tour delegation poses with the Hope House folks.
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The
Freedom riders bow their heads in prayer before the evening
meal--homemade gumbo!
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Daily
Prayer for the New Freedom Bus Tour
The Rev.
Noelle Damico, Catalyst, School of Theology, University
of the Poor
Saturday, November 23
God of Power and
Possibility, we pray that you would continue to make a way
for us to get the truth out about human rights violations
in our own country. We give you thanks for every person who
is telling their story. We give you thanks for every person
who is assisting in documenting human rights violations. We
remember and grieve the pain, death, and diminishment we have
experienced at the hands of government agencies, the streets,
our workplaces, schools, and hospitals. In this sacred act
of remembering, telling, and writing we offer our pain into
your hands, that it might be transformed into a powerful testimony
of truth that will help win economic human rights for us,
for our children and for our children’s children after
us. Amen.
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About
the Campaign 
