Support Life, Support NISGUA (Network in Solidarity with the People of Guatemala)

An old friend from NISGUA reached out to ask me to help fundraise this year—the organization’s FORTY-FIFTH year. I recently returned from Palestine, doing work similar to what I’d done in Guatemala: standing with genocide survivors, supporting the dangerous work they’re doing to protect their children, their land, and their way of life. In Guatemala, everyone I met had lost someone to the genocide; in Palestine, too, every person had lost something, someone unbearably precious. As anyone who has loved knows, it’s our connections—to our family, our land, our friends, our God—our connections, our relationships are why we fight and who we fight for.

Forty-five years is brief compared to the intergenerational organizing in traditional communities in Guatemala and Palestine (and elsewhere), but in the context of a U.S.-based solidarity organization, NISGUA is as good as it gets. I’ve seen it for myself, I know the people involved. It’s based not just on ideologies such as solidarity and reciprocity, but also, on a deeper level, it’s heart-based. NISGUA is based on real relationships and real love. (Which is why, when someone I have a real connection to asked me personally to fundraise, I said yes wholeheartedly.)

Truthfully, I don’t know why I, of all people, have had the honor of experiencing, in both places, this connection to and love of land—which is to say connection to family, way of life, religious traditions. I don’t know why I was given the gift of being fed from the liquid gold that is the heart of each place. The thick, rich and bittersweet olive oil of Palestinian olive trees, connecting me to the land of Jesus (born in Bethlehem, Palestine), to the first and oldest stories I was ever told and that, when I eat it at home now, puts me right back on that ground in the grove, dipping into hummus laced with oil, again a traveler fed by the ancient hospitality of desert people. And the protein-rich, lime-enhanced, hand-slapped masa; each kernel placed in the damp earth by hand, the tall corn stalks, the sound of dry husks at harvest, the yellowish dough sitting in its bowl, and the fire-hot tortillas thick as my hand that have staved off starvation and famines for centuries on the land—the Americas—where I have lived my whole life. The people I’ve come to know in Guatemala and Palestine, truly, are a gift I don’t feel myself worthy of.

All I know is that the more open I am and the more connections I have with individuals in both places the more desperate I am that they must live. Live on the land that they know and love (if they so choose), and in the traditions of their family members and ancestors who were killed and shouldn’t have been killed—in both cases (because there are many kinds of connections) with guns, training, and tanks that my country helped to pay for. Destroying people and their way of life is not where I want my money to go. I would like my energy—in the form of money, in the form of running from masked men throwing rocks, in the form of planting the three sisters or poppies in my little community garden plot—to go towards life. It’s why I am a monthly donor to NISGUA. It is why, when I made my will before going to Palestine, I designated NISGUA as a beneficiary. It is why I feel a lightness in my chest when I offer you the chance to put some of the energy you have towards life as well and, if it feels right to you, to donate to NISGUA, the Network in Solidarity (for forty-five years) with the People—real, everyday people—of Guatemala.

In love and solidarity, as always,

Chris

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Estoy recaudando fondos con NISGUA durante May Match — una campaña donde cada donación se duplica hasta el 31 de mayo.

Durante 45 años, NISGUA ha acompañado a comunidades Indígenas y liderazgos de base en Guatemala en su lucha por justicia, territorio y dignidad. Hoy, ese trabajo es más urgente que nunca.

Desde la defensa del territorio frente a proyectos extractivos hasta el acompañamiento a sobrevivientes del genocidio y la protección de personas defensoras de derechos humanos, este trabajo depende de la solidaridad colectiva.

💥 Cada aporte se duplica — tu impacto es el doble.

Si puedes, te invito a sumarte. Cada aporte cuenta!