On the eve of meetings between two UCC officers and the leadership of the U.S. House, Senate and, hopefully, the White House, the UCC campaign to gather anti-war petition signers reached beyond the 60,000 mark.

As of 9:30 p.m. on Tuesday (Oct. 9), the count stood at 60,082, thanks to more than 18,000 signatures that came in during the campaign's final 48 hours.

In the past week alone, the number of campaign participants almost doubled. On Oct. 3, United Church News reported that 32,112 people had signed the Pastoral Letter on the Iraq War.

Administrative staff from the UCC's Justice and Witness Ministries reported that their sole fax machine ran non-stop on Monday and Tuesday, since many churches remained busy collecting signatures and sending them in during the final days of the petition-passing effort.

The Rev. John H. Thomas, general minister and president, and the Rev. Linda Jaramillo, JWM's executive minister, will take the church's anti-war message to Congress on Wednesday morning during confirmed meetings with leadership offices of the U.S. House and Senate, followed by an attempt to deliver the same to the White House at 12:30 p.m. (ET).

As of Tuesday evening, requests from the UCC that someone from the White House's public liaison office meet with Thomas and Jaramillo, and receive the petitions, have not been granted.

"Our pledge is not to leave the gates of the White House until our message has been received or until we are arrested," wrote Thomas and Jaramillo in an email to petition signers on Friday. 

Earlier today, Thomas and Jaramillo sent a follow-up message asking that church members join in prayers for peace at 12:30 p.m. (ET) on Wednesday.

"Pray for peace in Iraq, and pray that our message of peace will be received in Washington," they wrote. "Knowing that thousands of UCC members will be joining simultaneously in prayer, as we're delivering the petitions, will be great encouragement to us."

Thomas and Jaramillo also called on supporters to make telephone calls this week to the in-district offices of U.S. Representatives and Senators.

The UCC's Pastoral Letter on the Iraq War – which calls for an immediate, deliberate and significant withdrawal of troops from Iraq – was first presented by the denomination's five-member Collegium of Officers at the UCC's biennial General Synod in June, attended by nearly 10,000 in Hartford, Conn. The 700-word statement was co-signed by all of the UCC's Conference Ministers and Seminary Presidents.

The idea to reach the lofty goal of 100,000 endorsing signatures was first announced in July.

On Oct. 3, Thomas said the "100,000 for Peace" campaign was the most successful online UCC advocacy campaign ever.

Until the "100K" campaign, the largest-ever UCC-sponsored online effort took place earlier this year when 5,500 "no more troops" letters were generated by the UCC's Justice and Peace Action Network to counter President Bush's plan to surge U.S. troop levels in Iraq.