The proclamation of the Good News and the salvation in Jesus Christ have been spoken and presented thru history in so many different ways. Today, I dare to suggest to you that God might require us to be in places in which we have never been and to do things which we have never done.

The continuing conflicts around the world call us to be bolder in our mission engagements. Not only must we advocate for an end to wars and conflicts, but we must also work for the elimination of the weapons of destruction. We must be about those things that make for peace. We must be about eliminating poverty, racism, and injustice.

Over the weekend the war continued unabated in Yugoslavia. NATO's bombing moved closer to civilians and we remember with pain the "accidental" bombing of the column of refugees last week. Thousands of Kosovars continued to flee across the borders into Albania and Macedonia. Most of them made it safely across the borders with no earthly goods left; but on the other side were children and their grandparents blown up by landmines a grim reminder that landmines have not disappeared. At this meeting some of you will get a chance to discuss our concerns about the escalating conflagration and participate in developing ideas for action by our Board. But, today, I would like to explore the possibility of our Board focussing on a new area for mission engaging some of our energies and finances on helping rid this world of landmines and becoming involved in demining.

A focus of the mission of the church is on hope for life in Jesus Christ and on the struggle for a better quality of life. Demining is an opportunity for us to make the environment safer for all people who are endangered daily by landmines all over the world. For several years, the General Board of Global Ministries, through the leadership of the Women's Division, understood part of its mission to participate in the International Campaign to Ban Landmines and alerted United Methodist Women in the USA to urge the United States government to sign and ratify the Convention on the Prohibition of the Use, Stockpiling, Production and Transfer of Antipersonnel Mines and on their Destruction. On March 1, 1999, 65 of the 134 signatory countries had ratified the convention and the new International Treaty entered into force. This convention has come into force more quickly than any other major treaty in history. The countries which have ratified it will be held to its terms which include demining, destruction of stockpiles, and prohibition of transfers, use, and production.

The United States has neither signed nor ratified the convention, even though it was President William Clinton who in 1992 became the first world leader to call for a ban on the use of anti- personnel landmines. President Clinton now says that "landmines are needed to protect American security".[ I might add parenthetically, that President Clinton announced that he had directed the Pentagon to stop using anti-personnel landmines by the year 2003, or by 2006 in Korea. However, this ban will not apply to the US Gator, Volcano and MOPMS anti-personnel mines which are "smart mines" but have been renamed "explosives devices." By recategorizing these landmines as "explosive devices," the USA will be able to use the existing one million of these mines anywhere in the world and will be able to produce and export as many of these mines as it desires in the future.]

Our concern is mission. Our concern are the imperatives of the gospel which compel us to care for all of God's people and for the creation. In our understanding of the biblical texts it should be clear that the God of love is a God who would accept no violence who accepts none of our fancy weapons nor the simpler devices such as landmines and who does not accept our arguments that our common security is enhanced because of them. Wars utilize many different kinds of weapons but when landmines are used, the suffering continues long after the conflict has ended. Time and time again children, women and men accidentally step on unexploded mines as they walk to work or to market while playing in the back yard.

Anti-personnel mines kill an estimated 800 people and maim 1,200 persons each month. Children below the age of 15 years make up 30-40% of mine casualties. There are an estimated 119 million landmines scattered over 71 nations. In many nations, there is no record of the places where landmines have been placed and in many instances mines have moved. In deserts mines move constantly with the sand. In disasters such as in Nicaragua mines move with the earth and waters to different places and sometimes were brought them together to create an even greater danger. We do know that landmines have been deployed around water treatment plants, main roads, centers of economic commerce, transportation hubs, places which make it difficult or impossible for there to be proper agricultural development and at borders. Indeed the fear of landmine pollution is often sufficient to prevent the use of land that eventually turns out to have been cleared of mines.

The cost of an anti-personnel mine may be as low as US $3-10. While two to five million landmines are laid every year, only about 100,000 are being removed at a cost of $300 to $1,000 per mine. At this rate, the United Nations estimates that there will be 139 million anti-personnel mines in place by the year 2000.

The efforts to clean up landmines already in the ground are futile while they continue to be placed twenty times faster than they are being removed. Landmines are inexpensive and far too readily available. It is estimated that there are 300 million stored in warehouse s awaiting sale and deployment.

Our concern is the people, including the members of our churches, in Macedonia and Kosovo and Albania; it is the people being martyred in Angola and Mozambique and Algeria; it is the thousands of God's people whom we serve which require us to look at a ministry and a program in the arena of demining. Sri Lanka, Abkhazia in the Republic of Georgia, Somalia, the Democratic Republic of Congo, Columbia, Algeria, and Angola, Kosovo, the borders of Macedonia and Albania are places in which mines are still being laid today.

The Board of Global Ministries has had a program in Bosnia for some years. Less than five feet from the fence in the yard of our youth hostel, there is stretched that ever famous and well- known yellow ribbon with the letters spelling out the words: "DANGER, CAUTION, MINED AREA." Then there is the large lettered sign reading: "MINE FIELD NOT CLEARED." It is this situation, and countless others, which causes us to have to move into a program such as this one. It is the mission station, at Quesua, where was once one of the finest hospitals in Africa, and where there once had been over 85 substantial buildings including a church sufficiently large to seat well over 3000 people and a seminary, that calls us to become operative not only in the campaign to ban landmines, but to go one step further and work for the removal of landmines.

It is estimated that 1,000 technicians would require 33 years to clear Bosnia and Croatia alone. The given is that one person can only clear 20 to 50 square meters per day, using hand- clearing techniques and very crude mechanical equipment.

For humanitarian purposes, technologies are needed which indicate where lands are cleared of mines, so these lands can be put back into use as rapidly as possible.

In addition, in many nations, and especially the war-torn ones, the cost of landmine removal is so high that there are not resources available to remove the mines.

The medical consequences involved in the explosion of undetected landmines are devastating. These consequences carry enormous social and economic implications. For example, the Board is engaged in a church development program and in agricultural development as well in Cambodia. However, it is clear that the economic development of Cambodia is heavily dependent upon the speed at which the mines can be cleared.

In Somalia, a place in which only recently one of our staff lost her life, much of the territory is covered by over one million mines. Mines are deliberately laid by government troops to disrupt the economy and debilitate the opposition. Millions of dollars of aid will be required for us to develop our church property, as a result of the presence of landmines.

The longstanding relationship which the Board of Global Ministries has in terms of work to eradicate hunger and to reduce its impact on people has a very direct relationship with programs directed toward the removal of landmines. Where one is not able to work the soil, and in those places where one's livelihood is gained through farming, the presence of landmines is devastating to life and sustenance. We must reclaim the land.

The urban crisis in developing nations is impacted by landmines because those in rural sections of their nations can no longer remain. To those who have been forced to flee to the cities, demining is urgent.

Our concern is for God's love for persons and care for the environment. There must be a strong and significant interest in the landmine removal initiative; an initiative which is to begin on the properties of our churches to enable them to become better servants for community health and development.