International MESJ?

This note was posted on the website of Mormons for Equality and Social Justice: Call for Submissions: Taking MESJ International On June 1, 2005, a Dutch language website called MVG-Mormonen voor Vrede en Gerechtigheid (Mormons for Peace and Justice) will be launched by Robert Poort, contact person for Las Vegas MESJ and a native Dutch speaker. The new website will have a similar appearance as the MESJ web site, so it can be easily identified as a sister organization of MESJ. Several individuals on the MESJ email list live outside the United States. Yet so far in its brief history, MESJ has been a heavily U.S.-centered organization. The June 2005 issue of Anxiously Engaged will have a special focus on the questions: How might MESJ better support Latter-day Saints committed to social justice outside the U.S.? How might the organization's perspective become more global in scope? All readers of this newsletter, but especially those who live outside the U.S. or who are not U.S. citizens, are invited to sibmit their thoughts to jcduffy@hotmail.com. Please put "Anxiously Engaged" in the subject line. This is a tough one. I know plenty of Mormons in England and from my mission in Austria who were interested in social justice, but they simply attached their loyalties to established non-Mormon charities and groups. In a sense, they don't need MESJ. That said, I would have loved to have seen a "Mormons Against War" banner at the anti-Iraq War protests in London. So, my advice to MESJ is to simply open up a space on their website to allow international Mormons to post their thoughts. With greater exposure, perhaps more members and chapters will follow.