Rev. John Thomas Urges Torture Ban at Press Conference
Rev. John Thomas, UCC General Minister and President, joins other faith leaders in a November 12, 2008, press conference. The faith community is urging President-elect Barack Obama to sign an executive order banning torture as one of his first official actions in office. Leaders are also calling on the new Congress to establish a Select Committee to investigate the use of torture since 9/11.
"The use of torture by the United States in recent years, and our refusal to renounce its use, has diminished us as a nation not only in the eyes of our own citizens, but in the eyes of the world...There could be no clearer signal of our intention to reclaim the religious and moral values that have historically informed our nation's character than for President-elect Barack Obama to make as one of his first acts the issuing of an executive order declaring that 'the use of torture and cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment against prisons is immoral, unwise, and un-American.' " -- Rev. John Thomas. (Anti-torture witness and banner hanging outside First Congregational Church, UCC, Memphis, TN)
Join the Campaign
Urge President-Elect Obama to Ban Torture
Torture is the worst agony that one human being can inflict on another. Whether physical or psychological, torture is destructive of the human spirit for both the tortured person and the torturer. As people of faith, we believe that each human being is made in the image and likeness of God. When someone tortures another child of God, they torture Christ.
The Conference Ministers of the New England Region (Maine, New Hampshire, Vermont, Massachusetts, Connecticut, and Rhode Island) in a May, 2008, Pastoral Letter call on the “clergy and members of United Church of Christ congregations in our six New England Conferences, to join with us in this witness to abolish US-sponsored torture.”
The Connecticut Conference adopted a Resolution against torture in 2006 as did the New Hampshire Conference in June 2008.
These conferences and other individuals, congregations, associations, and conferences within the UCC are joining the National Religious Campaign Against Torture (NRCAT) to work to end U.S.-sponsored torture. UCC General Minister and President, Rev. John H. Thomas, endorsed the campaign, as have many other religious leaders.
