Get a sneak peek at Obama’s 2015 trade agenda

Maryknoll missioners have witnessed the ways that harmful trade agreements have destroyed the livelihoods of small farmers in Mexico, limited access to life-saving medications in Chile, and increased mining and oil exploitation throughout the Americas. One of the most heartbreaking examples was a lead smeltering plant in La Oroya, Peru that caused lead poisoning in 1,000 children. When asked to remediate the situation, the company sued for lost profits under the U.S.-Peruvian free trade agreement.

As the president and a new Congress get back to work, renewing the undemocratic “Fast Track” trade authority and adopting two harmful trade agreements negotiated in the dark by big money are at the top of the agenda. Learn more about these bills and how they will harm our neighbors in the global south in a webinar, “Building an economy of inclusion through fair trade,” January 20 at 3pm Eastern. Sign up here.

Maryknoll is co-hosting this webinar – focused on the 2015 trade agenda and what people of faith can do – just hours before President Obama’s State of the Union address. Sign up for the webinar here.

Exodus 20:4 reminds us, “You shall not make for yourself an idol, whether in the form of anything that is in heaven above, or that is on the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth.” Pope Francis cautions that our global economic system is now centered on an idol called money. We can let go of this idol by working against trade policies that allow corporations to profit at the expense of God’s creation and most marginalized people. Learn more during the January 20 webinar.