With delegates to the Interfaith Summit on Africa, John L. McCullough (center) presented some of Africa's most pressing issues to the Congressional Human Rights Caucus on Capitol Hill. Photo: Rick Reinhard Photography

THERE CAN BE NO PARALYSIS WHEN IT COMES TO INJUSTICE

Friends, Church World Service celebrates 60 years of service this year. While the number 60 often sparks thoughts of retirement, I believe we are putting in motion a more vital vision than ever before. With the Africa and Gran Chaco initiatives, the Water for All campaign, and the CWS-sponsored Interfaith Summit on Africa, a lot of exciting and indeed life-enhancing work is underway. Adding to the excitement, in this issue of SERVICE we debut our Best Gifts catalog. Through it, I invite you to explore ways to give gifts that are more meaningful via alternative gifts made in honor of family and friends.

The year 1946 was a time of great change, great need, and great opportunity. The war was over, rebuilding beginning. Across the great Midwest there was an outpouring of goodwill as farm families and communities stepped up to share grain with hungry neighbors in war-torn Europe. Church World Service was born. Soon CWS Friendship Food Ships were traversing the Atlantic with blessed regularity. And soon, U.S. farmers made it possible for us to help neighbors across the Pacific, as well.

Our friends in the Heartland weren't paralyzed by the need they saw overseas -- as you, our friends, aren't today. They knew that innocents suffer immensely both during war and in its aftermath. They responded with their hearts and their hands.

As the years passed, CWS became more than a relief agency: We became a development partner to hungry people around the world. This spring I was privileged to be the first CWS executive director to visit our Dominican partner, Servicio Social de Iglesias Dominicanas (SSID), which was established by CWS in 1962. Today, SSID is a major provider of development services in the Dominican Republic. For agencies like CWS and SSID, involved in the vital business of changing lives, there can be no neutrality or paralysis when it comes to matters of injustice -- which was the message I shared with our Dominican partners, a message with which they and our partners the world over resonate.

Another area of CWS ministry that took shape in the late 1940s was our service to refugees. Since 1946, CWS has helped more than 450,000 refugees begin new lives in the United States. One of them was Erika Heppner -- a four-month-old babe in arms when her parents Gerhard and Margot came to the U.S. as refugees from Germany. They had fled the Russian army as it took over East and West Prussia. CWS secured First Presbyterian Church in Fairbury, Illinois, as the young family's sponsor. Gerhard found work as a bricklayer. "I was the first one in my family to speak fluent English," recalls Erika, now a teacher in Queens, NY. "I thank the church for all they did for us," says Erika, commenting that growing up in Fairbury, population 3,500, "really gave me a sense of place. We stayed there 25 years. My mother is buried there, and I'm still in contact with people there. It's still home."

Family. Community. A future filled with hope. That's really what the ministry of Church World Service is all about -- has been for 60 years and will be for the next 60 years -- as we continue a tradition of help… and a legacy of hope.

Yours in service,

Rev. John L. McCullough
Executive Director and CEO
Church World Service