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CRLN and 5 other co-sponsoring organizations–Center for Immigrant Progress, Centro Romero, Chicago-Cinquera Sister Cities, Chicago-Guatemala Partnership, and Concern America–are raising funds for education, health, and community organizing projects in Latin America and in immigrant communities in Lake County. Help us support scholarships for rural Indigenous students in Guatemala and El Salvador, health promoter trainings in rural and Indigenous or Black communities in Colombia, PPE for health professionals in El Salvador, voter registration and issued education in immigrant communities in Lake County, IL, and funding for those who must renew DACA work authorization at exorbitant new rates.

 

In these times, we have dreamed up a new way to participate in this annual event! This will be a decentralized Pedal for Peace, and we also have opened it up to people who run or walk. It is more flexible–choose your date within the next month to participate! Finally, we will all gather online to celebrate the results of our collective action.

 

September 12– October 11, you get to choose the day to bike, run, or walk the distance of your choice.

  • Alone or with family/friends
  • On a bike path, neighborhood streets, park, or exercise bike
  • Send a photo of yourself in your biking location holding a sign with the name of the location (neighborhood, bike path, etc.) appearing in the photo to shunter-smith@crln.org. to share with other participants.

 

October 18, 4-5 pm: Online Zoom program to celebrate our united efforts to empower our communities in Illinois and Latin America. We will send out the link to you on the day of the event. While we cannot gather at this time, we can celebrate the way we remain connected by our global hearts and similar missions.

 

You can raise funds online using social media tools or you can use a paper pledge form to collect checks (contact shunter-smith@crln.org for a pledge form or if you have questions). Whichever method you choose, sign up to join one of the teams to raise funds at charity.gofundme.com/pedal-for-peace-bike-in-your-barrio

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In light of the coronavirus pandemic and the CDC’s recommendation to suspend public gatherings for the next eight weeks, the April 10 Good Friday Walk for Justice, “Hope Rising in Courageous Community,” will take a different form this year.

Even though we cannot gather downtown and march together, WE CAN STILL PRAY!  We will honor this 40th Anniversary Good Friday Walk for Justice by publishing our Prayer Booklet online at walkforjusticechicago.com. We encourage you to pray this modern-day Way-of-the-Cross on Good Friday in the safety of your homes with the members of your households.

The Prayer Booklet will be posted sometime after March 25, the deadline for receiving prayers from the groups who are planning each station. CRLN will write Station 4 this year. In the meantime, you can visit the link above to read more about this year’s theme and to find a donation button if you would like to sponsor the event.

During this extended period of social distancing, the need for “Hope Rising in Courageous Community” is more important than ever.  Please share this resource widely, and take heart in the words of author and poet, Alice Walker, who reminds us that “Human sunrises are happening all over the earth,” and that the work to “bring peace, light, compassion” to this world shines on.

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45 bikers rode the Lakefront Bike Path on Sunday, September 30, and collectively raised over $20,000 in pledges! The proceeds will be divided among a number of projects: scholarships for students in Guatemala and El Salvador, trainings for health promoters in Colombia, legal aid and training for campesinos in Honduras fighting for land rights, and community organizing funds for tenants rights in Chicago. Co-sponsors Autonomous Tenants Union, Chicago-Cinquera Sister Cities, Chicago-Guatemala Partnership, Concern America, and La Voz de los de Abajo organized teams of bike riders, along with CRLN, to seek funding for these projects.

Thanks to all who biked, pledged to bikers, designed the t-shirts, volunteered at the event, or brought food for the fiesta!

Here are some photos of from the event:

    

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2019 Pedal for Peace Bike-a-thon

Beneficiary groups and project descriptions

To donate to Pedal for Peace, click on the name of any group. Donations will be divided equally among the groups. 

Chicago Religious Leadership Network on Latin America (CRLN)  

Founded 30 years ago, CRLN builds partnerships among social movements and organized communities within and between the U.S. and Latin America.  We work together through popular education, grassroots organizing, public policy advocacy, and direct action to dismantle U.S. militarism, neoliberal economic and immigration policy, and other forms of state and institutional violence.  We are united by our liberating faiths and inspired by the power of people to organize and to find allies to work for sustainable economies, just relationships and human dignity. Because CRLN has dedicated restricted funds for travel scholarships and for the support of human rights defenders, Pedal for Peace donations will go for general operating support of our regular programming.

Contact person: Sharon Hunter-Smith, shunter-smith@crln.org

 

 

Chicago-Cinquera Sister Cities  

Cinquera, El Salvador, is a small community of around 3,000 people in the central part of the country.  In 1992, Cinquera, which had been abandoned during the horrific civil war, was repopulated after the peace accord.  Chicago-Cinquera Sister Cities has been working with a progressive community organization, the ARDM, for many years.  This year, the ARDM has again designated Pedal for Peace donations for scholarships for five college students who are majoring in computer science, agricultural engineering and education.  The donations will cover their enrollment fees, tuition, transportation, food and housing.  During and upon completion of their studies, the students have made a commitment to live in and work on behalf of the Cinquera community and to support the scholarship program for future students.

Contact personJim Hoover, jimmyishere@hotmail.com

 chicago-cinquera.org

 

Chicago-Guatemala Partnership  

Saq Ja’, Guatemala, is a rural Mayan community of around 50 families located in the western highlands.  The community was destroyed in 1981-82 during the Guatemalan civil war, many survived in the wilderness for years and returned to resettle their lands after the Peace Accords in 1996.  After much hard work, they succeeded in building a primary and middle school to educate children through 9th grade.  The Chicago-Guatemala Partnership, which has accompanied the community since 1999, will again designate this year’s Pedal for Peace funds toward support for the middle school and scholarships for those going on to higher levels of schooling. In addition, money may be used to support a school trip to the ruins of an ancient Mayan city at Tikal to learn about their Mayan history and heritage.

Contact person:   Mary Naftzger, maryandbob.n@sbcglobal.net 

 

Concern America (C/A)

The Pedal for Peace Bike-a-thon will support C/A’s community-centered health and leadership program in rural Afro-Colombian and Indigenous communities in the isolated and war-torn Chocó region of Colombia, providing primary health care services to 20,000 people previously without access to such services. This innovative and successful model, known as Health Promoter Practitioners (HPPs), engages the most valuable resource in every village–the people themselves. With a depth of knowledge, skills, and ability to provide health care comparable to the work of nurse practitioners in the U.S, HPPs are able to meet 80% of the community’s health care needs. This year, the program will build its own HPP-run clinic training center and dormitories for course participants, a huge step! Funds received from Pedal for Peace will help equip the new program center.

Contact  person:  John Straw, jstraw@concernamerica.org

 

 

La Voz de los de Abajo   

La Voz de los de Abajo has worked in solidarity with campesino and indigenous organizations in Honduras for nearly 15 years on community radio projects, human rights accompaniment and support for initiatives by small farmers and their organizations. Since the coup in June 2009, it has also organized multiple delegations from the U.S. to Honduras to provide human rights accompaniment to the organizations and communities resisting the coup.  2019 Pedal for Peace funds will be sent to the National Center for Rural Workers (CNTC), which provides legal and organizational accompaniment to thousands of campesinos struggling for land reform. In addition, funds will be used to support Garifuna health and educational initiatives.

Contact personVicki Cervantes, vickicervantes@yahoo.com

 

 

Autonomous Tenants Association  

The Autonomous Tenants Union (ATU) engages in grassroots organizing alongside tenants, leveraging the power of tenant unions to halt evictions, keep rent affordable, and preserve our community through advocacy and education. We recognize that our struggle for housing justice is deeply connected to other struggles, which is why we collaborate with organizations around the city to mutually support one another in our growth. Currently ATU is part of the Lift the ban campaign that is trying to repeal the provision at the state level that prohibits rent control to be implemented in any municipality. ATU is collaborating on this coalition and, if achieved, it will open the door for more campaign organizing around passing a rent control ordinance in the city of Chicago, which will impact tenants across the city for years to come.

Contact person: Antonio Gutiérrez, gutierrez.atu@gmail.com

 

 

 

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Vigilia de Dia de los Muertos / Day of the Dead Vigil

OCAD & CRLN invite you to attend our annual vigil to honor those who have lost their lives to the deportation system. This year has been the deadliest yet, with 12 people dying under ICE custody across the country. Join us as we commemorate Day of the Dead with pan de muerto and coffee as we work to highlight the inhumane and accountable practices that characterize ICE/DHS.

This year we are demanding:

An investigation into the 22 deaths that have occurred in immigrant detention centers since Oct 1, 2015. We demand these investigations be made public by December 1, 2017.

On a local level, we are demanding the immediate release of Wilmer Catalan-Ramirez who has wrongfully and violently detained on March of this year and who has dire medical needs that should allow for his release.

OCAD & CRLN les invita a asistir a una vigilia para honrar a quienes fallecieron bajo custodia de ICE este año. Este ha sido el año mas mortal en record, con 12 personas fallecidas dentro de los centros de detencion de inmigrante. Unase a nosotrxs para celebrar el dia de muertos con pan de muerto y cafe y al mismo tiempo para trabajar y traer atención a las practicas inhumanas que caracterizan a ICE/DHS.

Este año estamos exigiendo:

La investigacion de las 22 muertes que han ocurrido en centros de detencion de inmigrantes desde Oct 1, 2015. Exigimos que estas los hallazgos se hagan publicos a mas tardar el 1ro de diciembre, 2017.

Desde el ambito local, exigimos que se libere inmediatamente a Wilmer Catalan-Ramirez quien fue injusta y violentamente detenido en marzo de este año y quien requiere cuidado medico especializado.

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La 72 Home and Refuge for Migrant People announces a screening of Migrant

Crossing, a film that documents the lives of migrants who cross Mexico from Central

America and the work of La 72.

Ramón Marquez, executive director of La 72 and expert on migration issues in the

southern Mexico/Northern Triangle region, will present a Q&A session immediately

following the screening.

Located approximately 30km from the Guatemalan border in Tenosique, Tabasco and

next to the rail line migrants use to cross Mexico to the US, La 72 houses and serves

approximately 13,000 migrants and refugees from Central America every year.

Currently, more and more migrants are soliciting asylum in Mexico. La 72 serves a

significant number of LGBTQ persons and unaccompanied minors each year as well.

Tenosique is one of only three towns in Mexico with a permanent UNHCR presence,

and La 72 serves a strategic focal point for institutions such as Doctors Without Borders

and Asylum Access.


La 72 Website:




la72.org


Migrant Crossing Trailer:




Ticket Information:




https://www.tugg.com/events/migrant-crossing


Price

: $11


Date & Time:

Tuesday, November 14, 2017 6:30pm–7:42pm


Location:

Regal Webster Place 11

1471 W. Webster Ave, Chicago, IL, United States, 60614

Film followed by Q&A session with Ramón Marquez, Director of La 72

8pm, Kibbitznest, 2212 N. Clybourn, Chicago

Suggested donation to La 72: $20

Event Date:

Tuesday, November 14, 2017 –

18:30

to

19:45

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