Wednesday, June 18, 2014

General Assembly 3

Monday all three food-justice overtures I was following made it through committee and will be sent to the main General Assembly body on Wednesday for the final say.  Please read my previous post "General Assembly 1" for more info.  Here are a few details.

Overtures 09-09 and 09-11 on the first 1,000 days of a child's life, and promotion of the principle of food sovereignty were sent to the committee on social justice (committee 09).  This committee also considered more controversial subjects like 2 overtures related to gun violence (09-01 on Reducing Gun Violence and 09-07 Preventing Gun violence) and one calling for further study on the church's stance on abortion, which I watched the open hearing arguments for.  The food-related overtures passed with relative ease.

There was no argument about the 1,000 days campaign, everyone pretty much agreed that nutrition for infants should be a priority.

The food sovereignty overture raised some questions.  One person didn't do his homework and asked about the definition of food sovereignty.  He feared it messed with our relationship to God, who is sovereign. Sometimes I forget that not everyone is as well versed as I am with these food terms like this that have been widely used since 1996.  There was a small change to the overture where they removed the clause about returning land from land grabs to original owners.  This was made in part due to confusion on how far back in history would the church push for land restoration (Native Americans and Europeans), and fear that the larger assembly would make it an issue about Israel and Palestine referring to land being returned to the owners.  They removed this language entirely in hopes it would not confuse the larger body who has the final say and keep it limited to food which is important.

In committee 15, the Committee on Immigration and Environmental Issues held an open hearing on overtures 15-01, 02, and 03.  One being fossil fuel divestment, 2 is consideration of the precautionary principle and sustainable development that I was watching, and 3 was affirming the stance of an Oregon group looking for a study on some coal projects in the area. During the open hearing anyone who signed up before the end of the day Sunday could speak for or against the overtures.

One wrench that got thrown in the socket was on the precautionary principle overture, one lady advocating  for the abortion study overture in the social justice committee spoke in favor of the precautionary principle because it would allow "careful consideration" of things that may cause harm to human life, which she interpreted as abortions.  Meaning the church might consider changing the current policy on abortion by forbidding it all together because it caused "harm to human life".  Another person argued that supporting the term "sustainable development" might suggest abortion as birth control in some rural villages in the developing world.  These seemed so far beyond the overture I didn't think anyone saw it coming except one other lady from the morning hearing on abortion spoke in favor of the overture.  She asked the committee to make sure they considered wording that did not suggest the precautionary principle would apply to abortion.  It was a mess.  Eventually it passed with a few amendments added, but this goes to show how crazy and literal people take this when they have an agenda in mind.

 That was weird because the precautionary principle as defined in the overture was specifically speaking toward new technologies, chemicals, and goods introduced to the market.  Following the overture, the church would advocate that these things be tested to show their safety and level of harm to consumers rather than the current system of putting something out on the market, and then keeping it there until it is tested to be unsafe.  It puts precaution over profit for new emerging technologies, toxins, and GMOs, and really doesn't speak to abortion which was definitely covered by the social justice committee. But when someone's got an agenda, they do their homework and they look for loopholes.

The two on food justice were passed with a more than 75% majority so they will be lumped together with other bills and overtures with such a majority in committee and voted on together on Wednesday.  The Precautionary Principle overture passed with a 60 something percent majority and will be voted on by the larger assembly on its own.  We should know by Wednesday if they pass the plenary session and become real.

On Tuesday I sat through the Environmental committee on the question of divestment from fossil fuel companies.  Stay tuned for more details.  That one was tough to sit through.

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