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June 11, 2007

Kirkpatrick joins ecumenical leaders urging end to ban on Cuba travel

by Evan Silverstein

LOUISVILLE — U.S. Christian leaders, including the Rev. Clifton Kirkpatrick, stated clerk of the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) General Assembly, are pressing the Bush administration and Congress to end current restrictive bans on travel to Cuba, calling on the House and Senate to support related bipartisan legislation now in both houses.

     In a June 7 statement issued to Senate and House members, executives of Church World Service, the National Council of Churches, and 11 of the largest mainline U.S. Christian denominations — including the PC(USA) — urged lawmakers to co-sponsor and support the Freedom to Travel to Cuba Act of 2007 (S721) and the Export Freedom to Cuba Act of 2007 (HR 654).

     On June 14, church-based policy advocates will meet with House and Senate members and staff to further press for passage of the bills, which would end restrictions on travel to the island nation for all U.S. citizens.

     The faith coalition’s statement emphasized that any Cuba travel legislation enacted by the 110th Congress should be broad enough to end the restrictions on religious travel by national, regional and local church bodies and ecumenical and interfaith organizations.

     Kirkpatrick said the faith leaders are deeply committed to encouraging removal of the travel restrictions for churches and spurring greater interaction between the Cuban and American people, believing it’s in the best interest of all concerned.

     “I think the core issue is that one of the deep commitments that the American government and the U.S. churches have shared from the beginning is greater religious freedom and greater wellbeing for the churches,” Kirkpatrick told the Presbyterian News Service on June 11. “So it seems really difficult to understand why the U.S. government is trying to place so many roadblocks in the way of people from the churches in this country being able to visit and support the churches there or Christian leaders in Cuba being able to join us in common ministry here.”

     The statement protested current U.S. policy, saying, “National and regional denominational bodies and religious organizations are now eligible only for very restricted licenses.”

     For the past two years a Treasury Department policy interpretation has limited these kinds of religious organizations to one trip per quarter and the number of travelers in any delegation is restricted.

     Citing a long, shared history of relationship, interaction with and support of Cuban church partners, the American faith leaders say the recent re-interpretations of U.S. travel regulations and the resulting limitations “are unfair and inappropriate, restrain religious freedom and reflect undue governmental interference in the exercise of religion.”

     John McCullough, executive director and CEO of Church World Service, of which the PC(USA) is a member, says, “It's a policy that has substantially restricted our ability to work with our ecumenical partners in Cuba on matters of spiritual and communal support.”

     McCullough also said the restrictions “have inconsistently limited religious travel by the broader church organizations, while readily approving more frequent visits by individual church congregations.”

     By comparison, in the two years before the new restrictions were enacted, the National Council of Churches (NCC), which represents 45 million American Christians, took 33 delegations to Cuba. If the NCC applied for a license now, it would be limited to four trips per year.

     Last year 17 Senators and 105 members of the House of Representatives wrote letters to then-Treasury Secretary John Snow expressing concern about the new restrictions on religious travel. The religious leaders say Congress now has the opportunity to remove them.

     Other signers of the ecumenical statement include: the Rev. Robert W. Edgar, general secretary, NCC; Presiding Bishop Mark S. Hanson, Evangelical Lutheran Church in America; the Rev. Stan Hastey, executive director, Alliance of Baptists; the Rev. A. Roy Medley, general secretary, American Baptist Churches USA; the Rev. Stanley Noffsinger, general secretary, Church of the Brethren general board; the Rev. Cally Rogers-Witte, executive for Wider Church Ministries, United Church of Christ.