GA06090

Mission in Action

Accompaniers in Colombia credited with saving lives

by Mike Ferguson

BIRMINGHAM, June 19 — Just by their presence, 22 American Presbyterian "accompaniers" have over the past two years probably saved the lives of many rural Colombians uprooted from their homes by violence or the threat of violence. But the Rev. Milton Mejia, immediate past executive secretary of the Presbyterian Church in Colombia, fears the tense situation in his country will grow even worse in the coming years.

"That's why we need the Presbyterian Church up here to double its efforts and help us to get other churches involved," he said. "The accompanier program has allowed us to affirm we're one church working for peace."

Mejia was one of a half-dozen speakers at a press conference Monday to bring attention to the importance of the accompaniers, about half of whom have good to excellent Spanish skills and all of whom are brave enough stand with brothers and sisters in danger.

"They asked us for unarmed accompaniers, and we realized we could not say no," said Anne Bristow, coordinator of Colombian affairs for Presbyterian Peace Fellowship. "Our accompaniers are learning the price that people must sometimes pay when they speak out for justice. We've developed an enormous respect for their courage in the face of arrests and death threats."
 
Accompaniers are trained before their tour in Colombia, where they stay four to eight weeks. To date they've ranged in age from 23 to 73. Some pay their own way; others are sponsored in part by churches or other groups. The program is jointly sponsored by the Presbyterian Peacemaking Program, the Presbyterian Peace Fellowship and the Worldwide Ministries Division of the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.).

A recent accompanier, Sarah Henken, who spent a month in Barranquilla in northern Colombia, said, "Simply being present is a powerful witness."

She said she never felt in danger while in Colombia. Another accompanier, the Rev. Britt Johnston, served for a time with his wife, Danna Larson, who put on Christian education workshops for displaced Colombians.

Almost 3 million of Colombia's 42 million people are displaced. They live in camps generally located outside Colombia's large cities. Many have no access to government services; Mejia said that Presbyterians' efforts to teach them how to obtain that access has made paramilitary troops suspicious that Presbyterians are siding with the rival guerillas, but Mejia called those community-organizing efforts "not the activities that have to do with guerillas."

Alice Winters, who's worked almost 30 years as a PC(USA) missionary in Colombia, said the accompaniers' presence "sends the message that [violence] will not go unnoticed. An accompanier I know said he didn't feel like he'd done anything, but just his being there says Americans care. We know what's going on, and we're watching."