Press release - Sabbath Year in 2007

Inspired by the Jubilee vision of liberation and fullness of life for all, people of faith and conscience around the world are calling their political leaders to observe a Sabbath Year in 2007, seven years after Jubilee 2000.

“The Sabbath Year is an opportunity to reflect on the progress made to date in canceling the debts of impoverished countries and to highlight the unfinished agenda that must be accomplished to achieve true Jubilee debt cancellation,” said Neil Watkins, National Coordinator of the Jubilee USA Network. “Working with partners across the globe, the 2007 Sabbath Year will be a critical time to work for right relationships.”

In 2007, the Jubilee USA Network will join with other people of faith and conscience to educate, organize, and mobilize to work for the jubilee vision of right relations between people and nations and an end to unjust debt and global poverty. Specific activities will include a delegation to the World Social Forum in Nairobi, Kenya in January, observing the halfway point to the 2015 Millennium Development Goals, advocacy at the June G-8 summit in Germany, site of the initial Jubilee 2000 commitments, and a national rolling fast to call for a hearing in Congress on the JUBILEE Act, which would provide debt cancellation for many more nations that need it.

In launching the Sabbath Year, Jubilee USA Network stated:

“Seven years after the beginning of the new millennium, we live in a world that is seriously out of balance. The global gap between rich and poor continues to grow. During the 2007 Sabbath Year the world will reach the half-way point to the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs), global commitments that would cut extreme poverty in half by 2015. Despite these commitments, we are nowhere near meeting the goals. In Sub Saharan Africa for example the percentage of people living in extreme poverty has increased steadily from 1990 until today.

“Some of the money needed to meet the MDGs can be generated from aid, but new infusions of aid cannot be effective until the drain of debt payments is stopped. Pouring more aid into impoverished countries without debt cancellation is like trying to fill a bathtub with the drain open.

“In addition to its current impacts, the origins of the debt are unjust. A large portion of debt is odious or illegitimate, accrued under oppressive regimes or on unfair terms. During the Cold War era, loans were often made more for ideological and political reasons than for reasons of assisting development or addressing human needs. As people of faith and conscience we must ask, “Why should the people of the South endlessly pay for bad loans that never benefited the people?”

“In light of the Jubilee message of salvation, redemption, deliverance and liberation, debt burdens that prevent countries from meeting the most basic needs of their people cease to be merely a financial concern for a few and become a spiritual concern for all of us. To advocate and educate for debt cancellation in solidarity with the people of the world’s impoverished countries is one way we can participate in God’s Jubilee.”