Come gather with friends from 6:00-8:00 p.m. on Monday, February 8, at the premier showing of the newly-produced documentary A Foundry for Conscience: Four Decades of the Thomas Merton Center. John Detwiler, a local videographer and member of the Thomas Merton Center, has created this historic memoir about the Thomas Merton Center’s impact on both the local and global communities over the past 38 years.

The screening will be held at St. Andrew’s Lutheran Church (304 Morewood Avenue, Shadyside), and the film will be followed up with a brief presentation on what’s currently happening at the Center. Food and drink will be provided, and admission is $5.

For more information, call the Center at 412-361-3022.

In the aftermath of the G-20 Summit in Pittsburgh and the accompanying police repression, brutality, and assaults on Constitutional rights, many activists – both long-time and new – have come together to create a broad-based campaign for justice and accountability. The campaign includes
activists from the Thomas Merton Center, the Pittsburgh G-20 Resistance Project (PG20RP) and IndyMedia, along with students from the newly formed campus group called WHAP (What Happened At Pitt), and residents of Pittsburgh’s African-American community, which has struggled for years
against police brutality.

Motivating these citizens and activists is the feeling that if they fail to push back against attacks on their rights, everyone will continue to lose those rights.

The group’s points of unity so far: supporting the constitutionally protected rights of all who were arrested and harassed before, during, and after the G-20 Summit; actively support the legal defense of all G-20 arrestees; demanding that all confiscated property be returned – in particular records (such as videos) and recording devices (such as cameras) seized at that time; demanding independent investigations in who made orders, who followed orders, who didn’t follow orders, and who had authority to engage in harassment and arrests; and demanding accountability of all political, civil, and security officials who perpetrated, participated in, or were complicit in harassment and arrests.

The group is carrying out these points on in several ways. They are organizing fundraisers for the arrestees’ legal defense and providing courtroom solidarity by attending the hearings of arrestees, asking that
arrestees’ charges be dropped and publicizing speak-outs and forums about G-20 police repression. Experienced activists are also assisting arrestees by explaining the legal process and their options to them.

Accountability and justice can take several forms, including civil suits, prosecution of police who brutalized people, dismissal or impeachment of public officials who were complicit in rights violations, and changing policy towards our right to protest. But the first step to getting justice is to find out
the truth. On October 20, the Citizen Police Review Board (CPRB) held the first of two planned public forums to get community input on the behavior of the police during the G-20 Summit in Pittsburgh.

A few people defended police behavior. One claimed that her “rights were violated” by a young protestor who ran into an alleyway behind her house, although she made no allegation of violence or disorderly conduct by the protestor. Another speaker thanked the police for not allowing protestors to march into the Strip District, claiming that the protestors would have damaged mom-and-pop shops there. She did not mention, however,
that the city had publicly announced a protest zone that they had set up in the Strip.

Dozens of speakers reported on police brutality, repression of Constitutional
rights, false arrests, and mistreatment of detainees. Francine Porter, a registered nurse and leader of the Pittsburgh chapter of Code Pink, reported on medical injuries that several people suffered at the hands of the police. She said that they didn’t receive medical attention while being detained. She
also spoke out against the sexual harassment that several prisoners suffered while under detention. Dan McCloskey, a member of a Lawrenceville writers collective, said that he was harassed by a large contingent of shotgun-wielding police in his backyard, which they did not have his permission to
enter.

One Hood community organizer Paradise Gray criticized riot police who trapped people peacefully assembled in Schenley Plaza on September 25. While the police called it “hammer-and-anvil,” he called it “more like sledgehammer and ants.” Naomi Archer stated that after the 2003 Free Trade Area of the Americas (FTAA) summit in Miami, that city’s Citizens Review Board concluded that the city had been turned into a police state.

Archer denounced the systemic attacks on protest organizers’ rights in Pittsburgh, including her own harassment at the hands of police as she tried to set up camp in Schenley Park for the 3 Rivers Climate Convergence. WHAP member Keith DeVries denounced police who targeted journalists, confiscated film and damaged cameras.

Throughout and after the G-20, the police, district attorney’s office and some
judges have attempted to criminalize protestors. I witnessed an illustration of this when my lawyer asked the assistant district attorney to withdraw misdemeanor charges against me, since charges had been withdrawn or dismissed for several others arrested with me. My lawyers said that the
assistant DA told him she wouldn’t drop the charges “Because you’re you,” – that is, a protest organizer. But ultimately, in a hearing before the magistrate judge, charges against me were dismissed due to lack of evidence of any wrongdoing.

The G20media.org web portal has been created to serve as a comprehensive information clearinghouse for members of the media and as a centralized hub for organizations and individuals wishing to work with the media in the context of the G-20 Summit happening in Pittsburgh in September.

Information found on this site includes events and activities to voice dissent around the G-20 Summit, contact information for the organizers and spokespeople for each of these activities, and alerts and releases from the participating organizations. Also found on this site are links to recent news coverage of the G-20 Summit and responses from organizers.

For more information, check out www.g20media.org or contact us.

This community event will specifically focus on art as a form of grassroots activism and a means of fostering strength from within the neighborhood as opposed to promoting growth via gentrification. Our ultimate goals are to promote visibility and sustainability through the arts and to create an all-inclusive space, defined by a variety of social and artistic perspectives.

For more information, call the Center at 412-361-3022 or e-mail Jessica.

On Wednesday, July 15, the Thomas Merton Center’s newly-formed Outreach & Community Sustainability Committee is meeting at 7:00 pm at the Center. This committee will work to build ties with people in the greater Garfield-Bloomfield area, promote grassroots community stability and growth (as an alternative to gentrification), and offer the Center as community space. Current plans include renovating the Center’s library and planning a Thomas Merton Center art event and open house.

For more information, call the Center at 412-361-3022 or e-mail Jessica.

Organizing around the upcoming G-20 Summit in September is well underway. The next meeting hosted by the Thomas Merton Center will be on Tuesday, July 7, from 7:00 – 9:30 pm at East Liberty Presbyterian Church (116 S. Highland Avenue, East Liberty), where we will discuss what lies ahead. Come join with others from Pittsburgh’s peace and social justice community as we discuss what this economic summit will mean for both Pittsburgh and the world, and how we can work together to make it as educational an event as possible.

For more information, call the Center at 412-361-3022 or e-mail us at g20@thomasmertoncenter.org.

By now, we’ve all heard that Pittsburgh will be hosting the upcoming G-20 Summit in September. There will be a meeting on Saturday, June 27, from 9:00 am – 12:00 pm at First Unitarian Church of Pittsburgh (605 Morewood Avenue, Shadyside) to talk about what lies ahead. Come join with others from Pittsburgh’s peace and social justice community as we discuss what this economic summit will mean for both Pittsburgh and the world, and how we can work together to make it as educational an event as possible.

For more information, call the Center at 412-361-3022 or e-mail us at g20@thomasmertoncenter.org.

Hello folks,

Melissa, Miles, and Leah, the current TMC staff, will be traveling to Trappist, Kentucky over the July 4th weekend to visit the Abbey of Gesthemani!  This is where Thomas Merton, our Center’s namesake, spent a large part of his life and where he is buried.  We are going for a bit of a retreat and to learn more about the abbey and Thomas Merton.

Contrary to popular belief, we are choosing to go on this trip of our own free wills, and bringing two friends with us!  Also, this trip is being funded by our own money, from our pockets, NOT by the Thomas Merton Center, although the TMC may make a donation to the abbey.

If anyone has suggestions on what we might want to pay attention to at the abbey or if anyone has questions they’d like answers to concerning the abbey, let us know.

Also, note, the Center will be closed on Friday, July 3 and Monday, July 6, in observance of our trip as well as the national holiday.  Enjoy yourselves!

-TMC staff

Sunday, June 14     10:00-4:00

Pittsburgh anarchists and anti-authoritarians are invited to participate in a planning meeting to form an anti-authoritarian working group to resist the G-20 in September. The working group will take responsibility for:

• providing a mobilization infrastructure on the ground in Pittsburgh
• circulating information and propaganda to build hype for the protests
• reaching out to activists across the country who are interested in resisting the G-20
• creating a space for the formation of an action framework

At the meeting, we’ll explore our individual and collective goals, come up with points of unity, begin to develop working groups, establish an organizational process, and chart out the start of our work-plan for the next four months.

If you plan on participating, please RSVP to 412g20temporary@gmail.com and we’ll send you details on the meeting location.

In the meantime, please think about taking some steps to make our time together as useful as possible. You might want to:

• meet with your respective groups to develop an internal consensus on what you want to see come out of anti- G-20 organizing and how you want to participate
• look back at some helpful resources on processes and approaches to Summit organizing
• think about how you personally want to participate in a broad mobilization infrastructure
• talk about your personal goals, hopes, and dreams with your comrades
• share ideas and spread energy
• look at your calendar and examine your other commitments so that you can come to the meeting with a clear idea of how much time and energy you’re going to be able to commit to this mobilization process over the next several months