the manta Assembly," predicted Patricia B. Valentine, the vice-moderator of the Committee on Local Arrangements (COLA), which represents the Presbytery of the James.

The manta mania began when a Virginian attending last year's General Assembly in Denver showed Valentine a multicolor tote bag and suggested that it might be just the thing for the 2004 meeting in Richmond.

Valentine liked the idea from the beginning. Not only was the manta item attractive and colorful - it also represented a Presbyterian mission in Peru.

Presbyterians Ruth and Hunter Farrell began working in Lima, the capital, in 1998, devoting their time, imagination and faith to campaigning for freedom and social justice for the needy people of Peru. They were among the organizers of Grupo Mano, a cooperative of five seamstresses in Lima who make manta products for sale in the United States.

Grupo Mano is one of several such artisans' co-ops in Peru, all part of a larger constellation of economic-development and political-action organizations, the Joining Hands Network. The group includes 15 Peruvian churches, non-governmental organizations and community groups trying to improve the lives of Peru's poorest people.

The Grupo started as "a dream and a simple prayer request," missionaries Ruth and Hunter Farrell wrote in their Christmas letter in 2003. "An innovative and remarkably successful 'Fair Trade Bridge' has been built, linking eighty Peruvian artisan families who were living on less than one dollar a day with a growing network of churches in the United States."

Families from Peru and the central Andes Mountain region now earn twice or three times as much as before, the Farrells wrote, and the artisans - most of them indigenous women, many mobility-impaired - also benefit by having their dignity restored. This is all possible, they said, because "fair trade seeks justice, rather than charity, for the poor."

One woman from the mountains told the Farrells that the program enabled her for the first time to feed her children properly and access adequate medical care for her family.

Grupo Mano products are sold in the United States through fair-trade events sponsored by Presbyterian churches and other organizations.

The Global Marketplace at this year's Assembly will feature Peruvian mantas and other fair-trade products from around the world.

The traditional Peruvian manta is made of alpaca wool, but those available at the Assembly are made of acrylic fiber, and thus are washable.

About one ton of tote bags were shipped from Lima to Richmond this spring. The bags, specially designed for the General Assembly, are broad and deep, lined with cloth, and have a rigid bottom and pockets inside and out. Carrying straps made of webbed fabric loop around the bottom of the bag to accommodate the commissioners' workload.

The theme of this year's 216th Assembly, "That All May Have Life in Fullness," is from the Gospel of John. Valentine said the mantas embody the theme.

"The essence of being Presbyterian is the centrality of scripture and the sacraments of Baptism and Communion," she said. "The faith exhibited in those two elements is extended by outreach and mission." She said mission projects like Grupo Mano and the Fair Trade Bridge - in Peru and in other countries around the globe - advance the cause of justice by helping the poor achieve economic self-sufficiency.

"It was the goal of our Committee on Local Arrangements to include a mission component in our hospitality and worship," she said.

The Presbytery of the James, the division of the church acting as host to the General Assembly this year, came to view the mantas as a key element of planning for the nine-day event. "It has been one of the great driving enthusiasms of this whole effort," Valentine said. "When we say 'manta,' everybody gets excited. This is transforming activity."