In November 2001, I went to my first ever School of the Americas (SOA--now WHISC) protest. It was a truly amazing event. Two weeks later I delivered a small reflection of that event at First and Second Church in Boston. As promised in the reflection I went back again in 2003. It's something that we should all be concerned about. When I presented it, I had a glass of water in front of me, and at certain points in the sermon when I said “Presente,” I would dip my hand into the water in front of me and drop a drop in plants in front of the podium as a memorial offering.

On November 18, I regretfully could not be at the installation ceremony for Rev. Stephen Kendrick. That's because I had somewhere equally as important to be.

Two hundred UU youth and young adults were on-hand in Columbus, GA to participate in the protest against the School of the Americas (SOA). In operation since 1944, the SOA is a school within Ft. Benning that train police and security officers throughout Latin America in combat, counter-insurgency tactics and psychological warfare. The lessons learned are then wrought upon the civilian populations often with horrific results.

My group, 14 UUs from Madison, WI, took part in the funeral procession—the first of two waves of people that march up to the gates of the fort. At the head of the march, Father Roy Boirgoise led black-cloaked and face-painted performers to the foot of the gates and staged a die-in. At the stage built for the protest, singers faced the crowd and sang the names of the victims-people killed or "disappeared" by graduates of the SOA. The school's nearly 60,000 graduates range from notorious dictators like Manuel Noriega of Panama, Leopoldo Galtieri of Argentina, and Hugo Banzer Suarez of Bolivia, to lower-level graduates that have participated in human rights abuses including the assassination of Archbishop Oscar Romero and the El Mozote Massacre of 900 civilians in El Salvador. Each person in this sea of protesters had a white wooden cross in hand, and as the names were sung we raised them and responded "presente" to invoke the spirit of that person here and bear witness. Each cross was inscribed with the name of a victim and their age; mine bore the name Versnica Pirez Oylati from Mexico, age unknown. Presente.

As I stood in this mass of people, it occurred to me that this almost didn't happen. In light of the September 11 attacks, the town of Columbus fought to prevent the march altogether-a first in the 11-year history of these protests. With the terrorist attacks also came the worry among us that attendance would be drastically smaller this year. The first protest 11 years ago was a hunger strike by 13 people, led by Father Boirgoise, after it was discovered that soldiers trained at the SOA killed six Jesuit priests. This year 10,000 people marched to the gates of Ft. Benning, the largest crowd in the history of the protests according to both organizers and city police. Two small victories in an 11-year struggle to fight an atrocity.

The specter of September permeated the march in other ways. Many of those in attendance, like myself, felt that it was even more necessary to go to Ft. Benning. There were signs that incorporated the attacks in their protest message. One said "Terrorists R' U.S." Another one had the quote "'We must shut down all known terrorist training camps' -George Bush." On some of the crosses were added names for those killed at the World Trade Center; mine bore the name Manuel Asitimbay, age 36. Presente. Whether in Latin America or one of the 110 floors in NYC, every name represented a victim of terrorism.

With record crowds came a true "interfaith" gathering: Catholics of various orders, Christians, Protestants, agnostics, atheists, socialists, veterans, student activists, elder radicals, artists, dancers. All here for a common purpose: to say "Nunca Mas! NO more!" To urge the government to close this school once and for all. Due to the crush of people, it took an hour before my group was able to move towards the gate. In that time more names were read. Though the names were important, I focused on the ages. 90 years old... 35 years old... 70... 42... 66... 18. And there were more children. 14 years old... 10 years old... 6 years old... 5 years old... and when you thought the ages couldn't go any lower: 3 years old... 2 years old... 9 months... 6 months... 3 days old. Presente.

My Madison friends and I wound our way up Ft. Benning Road to the gates. In past years, you were able to cross the thick white line that marked the foot of the fort and walk onto the base. This year, after the attacks, an 8-foot-tall chain-link fence topped with barbed wire was built to close the base, effectively keeping us out We all put our crosses in the links of the fence as a memorial to the dead and disappeared. One of my friends gave me a black ribbon, much like the AIDS ribbons, to pin onto the fence. Some, in a show of civil disobedience, sneaked through the woods around the fence and made it onto the base anyway. After my pilgrimage to the gates, I gathered with my group again and we made our way back down Ft. Benning Road, past the other marchers.

Now why would I miss an important moment in our church's history to attend such an event, one that even a friend of mine said "won't change anything." What does this have to do with my faith. Simply put, for me this is faith. It is my faith in action. One of the few pro-Unitarian jokes I've heard says, “Christians have it a lot easier than UUs. All Christians have to do is believe in Christ; we have to live like him.” In my opinion, if we are to be true to our faith, we have to act upon our principles. More importantly we have to act when those principles are being violated, and especially when such a violation brings harm to others. Such violations call for direct action of some kind, and I don’t mean contributing money to a cause. It’s too easy to write a check and expect others to do the work and feel that you’ve accomplished something. Money is good, but it is material, not spiritual. Nor is it personal. If the principles of our faith are to mean anytihng at all, we need to be there to bear witness when it happens and defend them when others willfuly trample on them.

I hope there won't be a march next year; the vote in congress to close the school lost by only 10 votes last year and keeps getting closer each year (write your congressional representative to see how they voted). But if the school remains open, I will be down in Columbus, GA once again next November to raise my voice in protest. And if so, I expect to see a lot more of you there with me.