Two board members of the General Board of Global Ministries, The United Methodist Church, who recently joined other Methodists at an ecumenical encampment on the Puerto Rican island of Vieques say that their experiences have only strengthened their resolve and support for the Methodist advocacy campaign on the island.

"I went, I prayed, I protested," said Susan Smalley of Alaska. "Now the real work begins. I must continue to uphold my brothers and sisters in Vieques through prayer and advocacy."

Sandy Wilder of Austin, Texas, said her role in the act of civil disobedience a first for her was in finding the courage "to add my one small voice to the thousands of voices that have prayed, sung, wept, and protested over the years that not one more shot be fired, not one more bomb be dropped on Vieques."

The two board members joined several staff members of the General Board of Global Ministries and three members of the Puerto Rican Methodist Church from January 21 24 at the Christian Camp for Ecumenical Obedience. They provided Methodist representation at the camp, one of 10 encampments that have been established to protest the continued U.S. military presence on Vieques.

What makes the camp unique is that it provides a pastoral presence for the ongoing civil disobedience campaign that has garnered wide support among Puerto Rico's faith community as well as Puerto Rican society as a whole.

Bishop Juan Vera of the Methodist Church of Puerto Rico had asked that a representative of the UMC be present during the Methodists' turn at the camp.

Protests against the U.S. military have a long history on the island, but have taken on new urgency since April 1999, when two military bombs killed David Sanes Rodriguez, a civilian security guard. His death triggered the protests that have brought into sharp focus the long and troubled relationship between the U.S. military and the residents of the small island a relationship that Smalley and Wilder say is most apparent in the island's staggering contrasts.

Said Wilder: "I have never visited a place so lovely. I have [also] never visited a place where I stumbled on military shells among the seashells."

"From the hills one can see both incredible beauty and incalculable devastation," said Smalley. "A toxic, crater-filled 'dead zone' is minutes from beaches where coconuts have floated in, taken root, and begun the reclamation process."

Having experienced for themselves the spirited struggle against the US military, the two GBGM board members said they had no doubt that this unusual work of Methodist mission on Vieques combining protest with prayer is right and proper.

Wilder said the issues of Vieques are a kind of microcosm of issues crucial to the work of the church today, ranging from issues concerning the environment to militarism to environmental racism.

"God responds, indeed," she said, "but only as I and others are part of that response – so that God's justice might come."

April 26, 2000