Join us for a Candlelight Vigil to Welcome Refugees and Oppose US War in the Middle East, this Thursday, Dec. 10 (International Human Rights Day), 5:30 pm at Park Street Station on Boston Common.
Also be sure to join us at Jobs, Justice and Climate: March and Rally for New England’s Future, Saturday, Dec. 12, 1-3pm at the Parkman Bandstand on Boston Common. This event is a great example of the kind of intersectional organizing that we advocate!
We’re planning a screening of Naomi Klein’s new film, This Changes Everything’: Capitalism vs. the Climate, Sunday, January 10, 5-8:30 pm, at the First Church in Cambridge and cosponsored by First Church’s environmental stewardship task force. Stay tuned for details.
Last month MAPA brought together 300 people and 49 cosponsoring organizations for “Building SustainableSecurity” on November 21. (If you missed it, the video is worth a look, are the still photos.) The conference focused on the links between extreme inequality, racism, climate catastrophe, and the global insecurity that our nation’s hegemonic policies have created. It charted the outline of a new peace movement — one which opposes US wars and militarism in a way that is linked to the U.S. people’s agenda of economic security, public education and health care, a welcome for immigrants and refugees, and an end to mass incarceration and police violence. We have notes and sign-in lists from many of the 15 workshops that were held, and will use them to move the organizing forward.
Also in November, we gathered 170 activists at “A New Day? Organizing to Change US Policy onIsrael and Palestine“. The meeting broke up into Congressional District groups; all 9 districts in our state were represented, and each appointed conveners to carry the work forward. Districts 4, 5, and 8 have already scheduled their follow-up meetings! Video and stills of this conference are coming soon.
It takes money to build the peace and justice movement! Our year-end fund appeal should arrive in your mailboxes this week for Boston and Cambridge people; this week or next week for those farther out. Thanks to envelope stuffers Barb Boltz, Maryellen Kurkulos, David Zackon, Sylvia Gilman, and Susan Redlich, who put it out in record time! Please make a tax-deductible donation this month to Massachusetts Peace Action Education Fund, and/or renew your membership for 2016.