Ignatian Family Teach-in (School of Americas Vigil)

Each year a group of students and leaders travel to the School of the Americas Vigil / Ignatian Family Teach-In for Justice.  Get involved in this upcoming opportunity on November 20-22, 2009.

Click here to download Application.

About the Ignatian Family Teach-In
 The Ignatian Family Teach-In (IFT) is an annual event marking the anniversary of the slain Jesuits and laywomen of El Salvador. During this gathering of the Ignatian family, we reflect on our collective commitment to live "a faith that does justice" and rally around our Catholic call for peace. During this day we not only identify with other Jesuit schools accross the country, but join them in thinking about how we can inculcate a faith that does justice on our University of Detroit Mercy campus. 

For more information, visit the Ignatian Family Teach-In website.

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About the SOA/WHINSEC 

The School of the Americas (SOA) was founded in Panama in 1946 as a US Army training school for Latin American military personnel. The school provides training in counter-insurgency, military intelligence, infantry tactics, anti-narcotics operations, and commando operations. Based on local reaction, the SOA was removed from Panama in 1984 and resumed its operations at a new training facility at Ft. Benning in Columbus, GA. In response to repeated efforts to close the school in the US and under pressure to perform a congressional investigation, legislation was passed to close the SOA in January of 2001. During the same legislative process, however, opponents of closing the SOA preserved the mandate of the School in the naming and “opening” of a new institution called the Western Hemisphere Institute for Security Cooperation (WHINSEC). The Institute maintains the same functions as the SOA with a slightly adapted structure of oversight within the Department of Defense. In recent years, legislation has strongly resurfaced to defund the SOA/WHINSEC and sponsor an investigation that would expose the institution's past and current deeds.

Issues:

* SOA/WHINSEC graduates are responsible for some of the worst human rights abuses in Latin America.

* SOA/WHINSEC graduates include notorious dictators Manuel Noriega and Omar Torrijos of Panama, Leopoldo Galtieri and Roberto Viola of Argentina, Juan Velasco Alvarado of Peru, Guillermo Rodriguez of Ecuador, and Hugo Banzer Suarez of Bolivia, as well as Peruvian spy chief under President Fujimori, Vladimiro Montesinos. 

* Among the many human rights abuses perpetuated by SOA/WHINSEC graduates in countries throughout Latin America, the most commonly cited and high profile cases come from El Salvador, where SOA graduates were involved in the assassination of Archbishop Oscar Romero; the killings of 4 North American churchwomen; the massacre of 900 civilians in El Mozote; and the murder of 6 Jesuit priests and two Salvadoran laywomen at the Universidad Centro Americana (UCA), a Jesuit University in El Salvador, on November 16, 1989.

As a Catholic university, we will join our prayer of peace with those of others and hold vigil in front of this school which continues human rights abuses.

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To learn more about the IFTJ & the SOA check out the links below. 



School of the Americas Watch
www.soaw.org



Ignatian Solidarity Network
www.ignatiansolidarity.net

 In 2008, on our way back to Detroit, we stopped off at the Martin Luther King Museum and church in Atlanta. This provided another opportunity to think about faith that does justice.

For information on this trip please email Drew Peters (petersas@udmercy.edu).

or call the University Ministry office at 313-993-1560