KAIROS Canada

KAIROS

2014 Annual Report FAITHFUL ACTION FOR JUSTICE aussi disponible en français

Message from the KAIROS Board Chair As a lawyer, I have worked on many cases that were utterly terrifying. As a clergyperson, I’ve encountered numerous pastoral situations that would cause the hair to rise on your neck. But nothing I’ve experienced was more profound than the crippling fear experienced daily by the people of the Philippines who I encountered during the KAIROS Philippine Learning Tour in August 2014. In the face of a realistic fear of extrajudicial assassinations, arbitrary detention, torture, theft of their lands, displacement, and the potential for environmental holocaust, KAIROS partners are shockingly resilient. On our last evening in the Philippines, there was a grand, torch-lit march through the streets of Pagadian City. Members of the Learning Tour – from Idle No More, CUPE, MiningWatch Canada and KAIROS – walked alongside our Filipino hosts and partners, among them the Philippine Independent Church, the Rural Missionaries of the Philippines, Protect (an alliance of church, environmental and social justice groups) and the Student Christian Movement. The march was everything that those of us in the ecumenical social justice world crave: a coming together of justice-seekers, both church and non-

Sister Babes | Photo: Allan Lissner

church, bound by the call for Jesus’ kin-dom among us. There were clergy in their vestments and teenagers in political t-shirts. Torches, candles and our liturgical symbols were as visible as the wonderful protest signs and banners. It just might be as close as I come to a foretaste of that great day for which the earth yearns. But the evening brought home another reality as well: Sister Babes, a church pastoral worker with Indigenous and non-Indigenous communities, was taken by the Philippine National Police to the bus station where she was put on a bus and told to go home. Why did they do that? Just to show that they could, that they were watching. When I think about KAIROS and resiliency, it is our partners who come to mind, be they the Maliseet or the Subanens or the Palestinians or the Cree. Some of us have been working for a very long time on the call for justice within and outside the churches. Sometimes we are disheartened by the response. Many times we’re quite sure that God must be disheartened by some of the responses we get. Some of us feel

that we are getting too old or too tired to continue. And yet we still pick up our liturgical symbols, our agents of illumination, our promises of the gospel, our protest signs and our HOPE and we march. Sister Babes still walks the hills of the rural Philippines organizing and working with the rural poor for justice. She embodies resilience in a dusty habit and with a determined face. In KAIROS, you and I embody resilience by participating in local actions, signing petitions, speaking out boldly, calling governments to account. We live resilience through prayer, in commitment to eco-justice in our personal lives, in donations which support the work of others, in watershed discipleship, in living in solidarity with the land and those who’ve respected it for millennia in this place. But the point is not that we are resilient, it is that the God in whom we place our trust is the God who made the spring flowers and gave us the Resurrection. It will ever be that we march forward, knowing as an Easter people how this story will end: Go(o)d wins. Rev. Desmond Jagger-Parsons

The members of KAIROS are: The Anglican Church of Canada, Canadian Catholic Organization for Development and Peace, Canadian Conference of Catholic Bishops, Canadian Religious Conference, Christian Reformed Church in North America (Canada Corporation), Evangelical Lutheran Church in Canada, Mennonite Central Committee Canada, The Presbyterian Church in Canada, The Primate’s World Relief and Development Fund, Religious Society of Friends (Quakers) and The United Church of Canada. 2 KAIROS 2014 Annual Report

We’re still here! November 30, 2014 marked five years since KAIROS learned that its CIDA funding had suddenly and unexpectedly come to an end. To observe this somber anniversary, KAIROS had a party! Several in fact: a large soirée at the Church of the Holy Trinity in Toronto and house parties across Canada.

Xochil Argueta-Warden with her grandmother, Susan Warden, at the Holy Trinity party. | Photo: KAIROS

Jim Hodgson, KAIROS Board of Directors | Photo: David García

It was a celebration of resilience, of the fact that KAIROS is still here, still dedicated to human rights and ecological justice, and still determined to be a faithful, bold witness for social change in our troubled world. Mostly, KAIROS celebrated the churches, donors and volunteers who make all this possible. We were humbled and inspired by the flood of solidarity videos and messages from KAIROS’ partners and friends around the world, including one from Rick Mercer! They reminded us that KAIROS is still here because mining injustice, the marginalization of Indigenous peoples, climate change, gender inequality and racism are still here. Our work is not done. We’re not going away!

We’re still here, and we’re still cool! Toronto’s hip NOW Magazine Readers’ Choice Award for Best Activist Religious Group went to KAIROS for the second year running!

KAIROS was deeply saddened by the passing of our dear friend and colleague John Mihevc in December 2014. John was an integral part of the Canadian churches’ efforts and achievements in ecumenical social justice for almost 25 years. He became one of the global church’s foremost experts on economic justice and the African continent, particularly on the impacts of structural adjustment programs and World Bank and IMF policies. Most recently, John managed the Sustainability Team at KAIROS,

“Congratulations KAIROS on the occasion of you still being a thing. Not only do you still exist five years after your funding was cut, but you are thriving. That requires resilience, hard work and commitment that I’ve only really seen in certain types of bacteria. Good for you. Congratulations and keep up the good work!” Rick Mercer, CBC

working with staff to express the organization’s commitments to ecological justice on issues such as climate change and resource extraction. John’s deep commitment to social and ecological justice and the leadership and skill that he brought to his work with KAIROS and the coalitions that preceded it helped build the resilience that serves KAIROS so well today. John Mihevc, presente!

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In all the work that we have shared in partnership, KAIROS has accompanied us in our pain and walked the same path. We need more organizations like KAIROS that believe in a more humane, equitable and democratic world. —Yolanda Becerra, National Coordinator of the Organizacion Feminina Popular, Colombia

In 2014, KAIROS was privileged to journey with its partners in Africa, Asia, Latin America and the Middle East towards the vision we share of a more just world. Our Women of Courage partners continued to lead the way in Colombia, the Democratic Republic of Congo, South Sudan, at the United Nations and here in Canada.

Connecting the dots...Indigenous rights, resource extraction and gender justice KAIROS and Horizons of Friendship led a delegation of eight Indigenous

women from Canada, Guatemala, Nicaragua, Panama and the Philippines to the United Nations Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues in May. They began the critical work of sharing knowledge and strategies to protect the environment and defend collective rights as they relate to mining operations on Indigenous land. When the Forum ended, the delegates strongly recommended support for local research and monitoring of the social and environmental impacts of mining. They emphasized the need for spaces where Indigenous women leaders can continue to learn from one another and develop strategies. Answering that call, KAIROS hosted a symposium in November entitled Gendered Impacts: Indigenous Women

Ana Guadalupe Matzir Miculax, Doris Imayda Borst Chow, Flora Fermina Jimenez Ramirez, Ebinia Santos Rodríguez at the UN | Photo: Allan Lissner 4

KAIROS 2014 Annual Report

and Resource Extraction. It brought together a Member of Parliament, academics, and representatives from Indigenous organizations, churches, unions, solidarity groups, and the mining industry to hear from four representatives of Indigenous women’s organizations about the impacts of resource extraction on their communities. Once again, the participants stressed the value of such gatherings. With little support for research on these issues, it is clear that ongoing gatherings, exchanges and symposia are essential. KAIROS is committed to creating that space for Indigenous women to continue these conversations and will host another symposium in 2015.

Elana Nightingale and Anne Marie Sam at the Gendered Impacts symposium | Photo: Allan Lissner

Chantal Bilulu, Women and Children’s Program Coordinator, Héritiers de la Justice

When women are no longer silent

judicial process and assists with their re-integration to the community through capacity-building workshops and local women’s committees in rural villages.

Héritiers de la Justice, KAIROS’ partner in the Democratic Republic of Congo, operates a legal clinic in the city of Bukavu that served dozens of victims of gender-based violence in 2014.

The results have been profound – no longer seen strictly as victims, many of these women have become strong advocates for women’s rights. As well, the efforts of Héritiers de la Justice are resulting in an increasing number of convictions for sexual violence offences.

With KAIROS’ support, the clinic accompanies women through the

Organizacion Feminina Popular (OFP), Colombia In 2014, the OFP trained women to become human right advocates and created a new human rights centre to monitor and document human rights abuses. On November 25, the International Day for the Elimination of Violence Against Women, OFP launched a book, Re –parar para la Paz (Reparations for Peace) that documents its experience with the process of collective reparations for female victims of Colombia’s 30-year civil war.

TOP: OFP workshop | Photo: KAIROS BOTTOM: Photo: KAIROS


The power of prayer...and women in South Sudan Agnes Wasuk is the Coordinator of the National Women’s Program of the South Sudan Council of Churches. Her nation is the world’s youngest, created in 2011, but still affected by violence that erupted in late 2013.

As she helps to bring peace to South Sudan, Agnes is confident that prayer is a powerful antidote to the debilitating challenges facing her country. Ian Thomson, KAIROS’ Africa Partnerships Coordinator, describes Agnes’ work: From her cramped office in the capital city of Juba, Agnes is building a women’s movement for peace — in part by encouraging women to gather monthly and pray for peace. In this predominantly Christian country, organizing a monthly prayer group has been an effective way of bringing

women together across ethnic lines. Prayer, in this case, is a collective act of conscience. Every month as the women gather, the men and boys of the community are reminded that peace is possible and reconciliation is the answer. In 2015, Agnes plans to extend the reach of the women’s program to the city of Malakal where thousands of families have been forced to flee their homes due to the conflict. KAIROS believes that resilient women in the churches, women such as Agnes, are key to helping establish a lasting peace in South Sudan.

I am glad KAIROS is still here because the world is badly in need of peace and justice and KAIROS is a sign that Canadians still believe in peace and justice. —Father Rex Reyes, General Secretary, National Council of Churches of the Philippines Canadians from coast to coast demonstrated the truth of Father Rex’s words with their enthusiastic participation in KAIROS events and campaigns throughout 2014.

Truth and Reconciliation Draw the circle wide The final National Event of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission of Canada (TRC) drew thousands of people to Edmonton in March to learn from firsthand testimony the inter-generational impact of Indian Residential Schools. KAIROS was there, drawing the circle 6


wide by facilitating the vital presence of young adults, women and new Canadians. The events that KAIROS co-sponsored in Edmonton focussed on key elements of its work and network – the intersection of issues affecting Indigenous peoples, migrant and faith communities; the role of Indigenous women in healing and reconciliation; and watershed discipleship with its focus on ecological justice and human rights. The KAIROS Prairies North network offered a statement and a quilt as a Gesture of Reconciliation. In their statement, they expressed sorrow and shame along with the hope “...that our nation, through this difficult process of reconciliation, can be restored into one whole and vibrant community,

respecting all its parts.” The KAIROS young adult delegation of Elyse Brazel, Jesse Root, Kaitlyn DuthieKannikkatt – members of KAIROS Circles – and Elizabeth Kessler, offered reflections on solidarity, wisdom, surviving and thriving throughout the event, which KAIROS shared through its website and social media. At the end, they wondered: “Given that this was the final TRC National Event, the KAIROS young adult engagement team asks the question: What’s next? How has the ongoing process of truthtelling informed the path forward for reconciliation? To echo the words of Justice Murray Sinclair, Chair of the TRC, ‘If you thought the truth part was hard, reconciliation is going to be a lot harder.’”

Rosa Andrews and Burt Williams (Lil’wat Nation) lead the St’at’iyemcBlanket Exercise for teachers in Langley, BC | Photo: KAIROS

KAIROS supporters from the Prairies North region offer a Gesture of Reconciliation at the TRC Edmonton event. | Photo: Karen Peterson KAIROS 2014 Annual Report 7

The Blanket Exercise The Blanket Exercise is one of KAIROS’ most important contributions to the work of bringing about the reconciliation that Justice Sinclair talks about. This interactive workshop uses blankets to recount the history of the relationship between Indigenous and non-Indigenous peoples since the arrival of the Europeans in Canada. It has been used thousands of times in schools, churches and communities and its reach and impact expanded even further in 2014. Looking ahead to the close of the TRC in June 2015, KAIROS stepped

up its training of Blanket Exercise facilitators. Dozens of new facilitators, many of them Indigenous and nonIndigenous youth, fanned out across the country. In the Ottawa area alone, that resulted in nearly 100 Blanket Exercise events. Local and specialized versions of the Blanket Exercise were created with KAIROS’ assistance. A Newfoundland version was piloted in October and Louisa Bruinsma, a member of the KAIROS Board of Directors, created an English as a Second Language version. KAIROS collaborated with teachers and students from the Lil’wat Nation in British Columbia to create a version that speaks to

the history of their territory. The Assembly of Seven Generations, an Indigenous youth-led organization in Ottawa, began using the Blanket Exercise in their training sessions. KAIROS celebrated when the British Columbia Teachers’ Federation made the Blanket Exercise part of the training for all teachers responsible for Aboriginal Education programs and ensured the exercise was available in all districts. With demand for the Blanket Exercise steadily increasing, KAIROS will continue in 2015 to build a network of facilitators and allies in diverse communities across the country.

We are all Water Keepers KAIROS’ Reconciliation in the Watershed program draws attention to the intersecting themes of Indigenous rights and ecological justice and connects KAIROS members and network more deeply to their own watersheds. In September, the KAIROS group in Fort Qu’Appelle, Saskatchewan released a powerful report that dovetails with this program. We Are All Waterkeepers: A call to action to restore the Fort Qu’Appelle watershed covers the impacts of agri-business, the commodification of water, and urban water demands on this highly stressed watershed, and describes how an alliance of First Nations, faith and community groups, and environmental organizations is working to address them. 8


KAIROS made Reconciliation in the Watershed the theme of its display and presence at the Truth and Reconciliation Commission National Event in Edmonton in March. It connected with the Indigenous group, the Keepers of the Athabasca, and helped to facilitate their participation in the As Long As the Rivers Flow watershed-related conference in Fort McMurray in May. As part of its contribution to a growing, continent-wide movement for watershed discipleship, KAIROS released a new Reconciliation in the Watershed workshop in July that has been widely used by the KAIROS network.

Photo: Rev. Stuart Mennigke

KAIROS Executive Director Jennifer Henry and Program Manager Ed Bianchi with Archbishop Desmond Tutu at the conference, As Long As the Rivers Flow: Coming Back to the Treaty Relationship in Our Time in Fort McMurray, Alberta in May. After the conference, Jennifer and Ed visited Fort Chipewyan to follow up on the church and Indigenous leaders’ delegation to the tar sands that KAIROS organized in 2009.

Open for Justice Thanks to the Open for Justice campaign, 90,000 Canadians, including many in the KAIROS network, took action in 2014 in support of Canadian mining

accountability overseas. As well, there were more than 65 meetings with Members of Parliament in ridings across the country. KAIROS organized a Learning Tour to the Philippines in August to explore the issues being raised by the Open for Justice campaign. The participants saw for themselves the urgent need for Canada

to act: “Nothing prepared us for the level of fear expressed by those in the villages and communities in the Philippine Zamboanga del Sur region that we visited,” stated KAIROS board Chair Desmond Jagger-Parsons in an op-ed in the Hill Times. “The fear was ever present, consuming and at times overwhelming.” Desmond shares more of his reflections of the tour on page two of this report.

Solidarity with First Nations Child and Family Caring Society A landmark case before the Canadian Human Rights Tribunal is shining a light on the federal government’s inequitable provision of welfare services for First Nations children on-reserve. The First Nations Child and Family Caring Society and the Assembly of First Nations filed a complaint against the federal government in 2007, alleging that Canada’s treatment of on-reserve children amounts to discrimination on the basis of race and ethnic origin.

Society, KAIROS hosted a solidarity evening for the Caring Society in October 2014, on the eve of final arguments before the Tribunal. Leaders and representatives from all of KAIROS’ member churches were there, along with the Chair of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission, Justice Murray Sinclair, other Indigenous leaders, educators and representatives from civil society.

In solidarity with Cindy Blackstock, Executive Director of the Caring

The Tribunal’s decision is expected in 2015.

Cindy Blackstock (TOP), Justice Murray Sinclair (BOTTOM) | Photo: Amnesty International

Solidarity with Partners in Middle East immediately went out to KAIROS partners in the region and the communities they support.

KAIROS staff Connie Sorio and Rachel Warden | Photo: KAIROS

KAIROS reached out to its network, inviting messages and prayers of solidarity. Within a few days, more than 60 heart-felt messages and prayers arrived from across the country.

When violence and military action broke out in Israel and Palestine in July, our thoughts and prayers

KAIROS partners responded gratefully to this gesture of solidarity:

From Omar Haramy of the Sabeel Ecumenical Liberation Theology Center: “What a wonderful idea and initiative. Truly there is no stronger force than the power of love and prayer. We are very fortunate for our partnership and friendship with KAIROS.” The Department of Service to Palestinian Refugees wrote: “Thank you for the messages of solidarity, which give us the chance to see the light despite the dark world that we live in. Keep us in your prayers.”


2014 Publications

Policy Briefing Paper Building Reconciled Relationships

KAIROS produced four Policy Briefing Papers on issues of economic and ecological justice and two publications in 2014: an Advent resource entitled Building Reconciled Relationships, and Indigenous Wisdom: Living in Harmony with Mother Earth, which explores the ways the ancestral wisdom of the Indigenous peoples of the Americas can guide us.

KAIROS Advent ReSOuRce 2014 Revised Common Lectionary Year B

IndIgenous wIsdom: Living in Harmony with Mother Earth KAIROS: Canadian Ecumenical Justice Initiatives www.kairoscanada.org/advent

Peoples’ Social Forum The Peoples’ Social Forum gathers together individuals and civil society organizations that want to transform Canada as it exists today. KAIROS led two well-attended workshops at the Peoples’ Social Forum in Ottawa in August. One focussed on the Blanket Exercise and the other on the new KAIROS publication, Indigenous Wisdom: Living in Harmony with Mother Earth. KAIROS also co-presented a workshop on the Open for Justice mining justice campaign.

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KAIROS in the News

Spirited Reflections

KAIROS enjoyed a dramatic increase in media coverage in 2014, including more op-eds, letters to the editor and blogs by KAIROS staff and volunteers. The Letterto-the-Editor program generated 24 printed letters that voiced concerns regarding KAIROS’ priority issues. KAIROS also launched the KAIROS Witness blog on rabble.ca, generating ten blogs by program staff on their travels abroad and reflections on timely issues.

KAIROS published weekly theological reflections in 2014 from a diverse set of authors from its member churches and networks. These reflections were usually based on weekly Sunday lectionary texts and grounded the work of KAIROS and its national readership in an ecumenical, biblical social justice perspective.


KAIROS Financial Highlights January 1 – December 31, 2014 TOTAL REVENUE $2,222,923

RESERVE FUND

TOTAL EXPENSES

$5,160,740

$2,411,087

Member denominations

Sustainability

General fund

Religious communities

Dignity and Rights

Justice fund

Individuals and groups

Network & Movement Building

Capital fund

Grants to Southern partners

Grants to Southern partners

Other - sales, interest, etc.

Administration and Fundraising (includes investment management expenses)

2014 audited financial statements available on request.

Thank you! KAIROS is very grateful for all the donors whose generous support made possible the work described in this report. In addition to its churches, religious communities and individual donors, KAIROS would like to thank these institutional donors for their generous grants:

• Basilian Human Development Fund • Bruyère Fund (Grey Sisters) • Campbell Webster Foundation • Carranza LLP, Toronto • Charity Alive Fund, Sisters of Charity, Halifax • D.A. Stinson Foundation • Echo Foundation • Filles de la Sagesse • N.A. Taylor Foundation • Ontario Public Service Employees Union Social Justice Fund

• • • • • • •

Public Service Alliance of Canada Social Justice Fund Scarboro Missions The Segelburg Trust St. Stephen’s-Broadway Foundation United Food and Commercial Workers Canada Unifor Social Justice Fund Women’s Inter-Church Council of Canada

Project Coordinator: Siobhan Rowan / Writers: Cheryl McNamara, Siobhan Rowan / Design and layout: Cathy Vandergeest, www.gawck.ca Cover: The quilt pictured on the covers of this report was designed by Evelyn Martin and sewn by Irene Vanderkloet, both of Edmonton. It was placed in the Bentwood Box at the Edmonton National Event of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission in March 2014, following a Statement of Reconciliation by the KAIROS Prairies North region. The design reflects KAIROS’ Blanket Exercise and the northern lights in the KAIROS logo. KAIROS 2014 Annual Report 11

KAIROS: Canadian Ecumenical Justice Initiatives 310 Dupont Street, Suite 200 Toronto ON M5R 1V9 416-463-5312 | 1-877-403-8933 www.kairoscanada.org