Shortly before noon, on Good Friday (April 2), a group of us gathered at the West Steps of the U.S. Capitol to commence the Economic Way of the Cross. Sponsored by the Religious Working Group on the World Bank and the IMF (RWG), this year's Economic Way of the Cross focused on international debt. We proceeded to 14 stations (such as the Justice Department, the Labor Department, the Treasury Department, and the World Bank) to commemorate the burdens of the impoverished in U.S. society and societies around the world, and to highlight the complicity of these institutions in creating those burdens.

Over 200 participants carried white crosses which bore the names of impoverished countries, their population, and the amounts of their debt burdens. The Economic Way of the Cross wound its way to the IMF headquarters where seven activists collected the crosses from participants of the Economic Way of the Cross. The seven activists - Marie Dennis, of the Maryknoll Office for Global Concerns; Susan Thompson of the Columban Justice & Peace Office (a member of the Steering and Management Committees of the 50 Years Is Enough Network); John Mateyko of Campaign for a Moral Economy; Rev. Doug Hunt of Church Center for Sustainable Community; Scott Wright of EPICA; Sister Janet Gottschalk of the Medical Mission Sisters; and Rev. Phil Anderson a Lutheran Minister from Minnesota - then lay the crosses in front of the doors of the IMF and themselves stood or knelt in front of the doors.

It was a profound act of solidarity. And it was a powerful and emotional scene which did not conclude until 5:00 p.m. when the seven were arrested and loaded into a police van. It was another four hours before the seven activists were finally released by the police. I believe we will look back at these courageous acts of civil disobedience as a time when the tide turned, yet again, in the struggle for and debate about debt cancellation for impoverished countries. It is acts such as these that give me hope and hearten those who live and die under the yoke of IMF and World Bank-imposed structural adjustment programs (SAPs) and on whose backs debts are serviced.

The last 18 months have been devastating for the world's poor and working people — from the financial crises in Indonesia, Thailand, & South Korea, to North Korea's devastating famine, to Brazil and Russia's economic woes, to sanctions- harried Iraq, to hurricane-devastated Nicaragua and Honduras, to war-ravaged Sierra Leone, Zaire/Democratic Republic of the Congo, and now Yugoslavia! One has to look far and hard for signs of hope.

On Good Friday, hope was alive and well amongst us as we walked the Economic Way of the Cross and as those seven made a stand outside the IMF's main entrance. Activist-historian Howard Zinn exhorts us to consider how differently we would perceive our world if the evening news daily reported that “35,000 children died today from curable and preventable diseases - instead of how the Dow Jones industrial average performed. I try to remind myself of this 'UNICEF' fact every day, but often I forget to remember. But more often than not I remember. I remember because when I get frustrated, tired, disgusted, or even just in a place or mood when I ask myself why I/we struggle for justice the answers often include this 'UNICEF' fact.

I remember because I have two nephews in Kenya, ages five and four-and-a-half, whose health, education, food security, future, and heritage are at stake. We must remember because millions of children have died and will die because of debt and SAPs. We must remember because in the last 20 years, since the advent of SAPs, the poor and working peoples of the world have paid and continue to pay with their lives, livelihoods, and their futures as the World Bank, the IMF, and G-7 governments insist on implementation of SAP conditionality. And in remembering we must act. Act to name the oppression. Act to name our complicity in the structures of power that perpetuate a global economic system that specifies that the poor must die and the rich and their wealth must be protected at all cost. Act to end this system. Act for justice.

1998 was a bumper year for the investor/speculator - the IMF bailed out bankers and risky investors in East Asia on the backs of the poor and the U.S. Federal Reserve bailed out Long Term Capital Management of New York. Also in 1998 the poor starved and died in streets of Indonesia; children were orphaned and abandoned in South Korea; and over 12 million other children died from curable and preventable diseases.

But it was also in 1998, that Pinochet was brought to justice. It was in 1998 that the Multilateral Agreement on Investments was halted by popular pressure. And it was in 1998 that over 70,000 people formed a human chain around the G-8 Summit in Birmingham, U.K. in a united and powerful call for debt cancellation. In a statement written for the Economic Way of the Cross, Marie Dennis states ". . . we have done our homework on economic policy reforms and listened with care to our partners in the South about the impact of debt and debt-driven structural adjustment programs in their lives; we have written letters and participated in respectful dialogue and high levels discussions in the IMF, the World Bank, the U.S. Treasury; we have plunged into the legislative debate - and we will continue to do all of these things. But now we must do more."