Today was a big day in Guatemala-related news. A Guatemalan judge authorized the prosecution of a leader of the Guatemalan government during the war, General Rios Montt, for genocide and crimes against humanity - something that the 1996 peace accord allowed but was still hard to imagine a few years ago - even though the current president, also a former military officer, may have been involved in atrocities. Mott is an evangelical Protestant.
Also today, Florida´s Senator Marco Rubio and a bipartisan group of U.S. senators released a new plan for ¨comprehensive immigration reform¨ that includes a ¨path to citizenship¨wherein immigrants not here with documents can gain official status - but only after more border security is implemented and those immigrants pay heavy fines and endure long waits. President Obama is expected to release a similar plan later this week. No doubt thousands and thousands of Guatemalans are in the United States are in the U.S. without documents - likely some in Kentuckiana and even more in Southern California.
Folks interested in relations between the U.S. and Guatemalan peoples will no doubt watch both possible Rios Montt prosecution and the path that any proposed immigration reform legislation takes.
- Perry
P.S. Also today came the another piece of news that may be interesting to our Guatemalan brothers and sisters. The Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) and four other U.S. Reformed denominations this week are finishing discussions with leaders of the Roman Catholic Church in the United States to recognize each other^s baptisms. That means for example that we are officially able to recognize the baptisms of former Catholics in our midst - including Spanish-speaking Catholics - without skirting the PC(USA) Book of Order. But it is possible that this new policy might be controversial with our partners if they knew about it. P
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