i. d. a.! news notes Published by the United States Committee of the International Defense and Aid Fund for Southern Africa P.O. Box 17, Cambridge, Massachusetts 02138 December, 1982 Telephone (617) 491-8343 CANON JOHN COLLINS concerned about apartheid. He was particularly interested in America, for here he sensed a growing consciousness of the evils of 1905-1982 apartheid and a desire to do what can be done to support those The death of the Reverend Canon L. John Collins on December who oppose it. This faith in America caused him to establish our 30, 1982 in the 78th year of his age has brought to a close a great American Committee and to support it to this day. His clerical life of creative service for God and the world; and we, associated colleagues thought him egotistical, intolerant, and a bit fuzzy on with the work of the International Defense and Aid Fund for the niCeties of doctrine. His secular critics thought him "soft" on Southern Africa, have been deprived of our founder, President, the "hard" issues of our times. But there are countless sons and and guiding force. That there is a Defense and Aid Fund today daughters of Africa, exiled or imprisoned, who weep at word of and an ever growing world-wide consciousness of the evils of his death, for they know that in John Collins they have lost an apartheid is due to the Christian outrage, organizational skills, incomparable friend and advocate. I join them in their sense of loss and personal charisma of John Collins. and give thanks to God for the life of his servant and my friend. Ralph Waldo Emerson once said that an institution is but the lengthened shadow of Rev. Peter J. Gomes a man. And so it was with John Collins. President, lOAF-USA Those of us around the world in Defense and Aid may have been drawn to this work by the urgency and righteousness of our "Do Not Forget This" cause, but we were sustained and by Dr. Allan Boesak stimulated in that cause by the example of The following is excerpted from a speech delivered by Dr. Allan Boesak our leader. His passionate advocacy for on November 14, 1982, before the National Council of Churches in New human justice, his grand impatience with York, and broadcast on the Voice of America. Dr. Boesak is the leader of the petty and parochial, his nonconformity in the midst of the South Africa's Sendingkerk and the head of the World Alliance of Anglican establishment, and his contagious charm in the midst of Reformed Churches. bad temper made him a figure larger than life, the sort not often In South Africa it is clear that individual human rights and the seen in this age of the blandly good-intentioned. human rights of communities do not matter. It is clear that the I first met Canon CoIlins here in America in 1979 when he Christian standards that the government says it must uphold by came to receive an award at the U.N. and to pay a visit to our staying in power, and byenlisting the aid of Western governments offices in Cambridge. He was a splendid "Spy Print" of a man from Western Christian countries-that these with glorious white hair and that sense of casual authority for standards apply to whites only. For in Cape which the English are noted. He also had a whimsical sense of Town, where I live and work, the raids on the humor which often cloaked his penetrating analysis of human poor people in Nyanga and Langa and Guguletu character. He could regale with wonderful stories: of his days at and Crossroads continue. In the last five weeks Cambridge, as a young academic and theologian, as Chaplain-in­ over 1700 people have been rushed unseemly ordinary to King George V, and as an activist army chaplain in through the courts, caught in the myriad of laws W.W. II. Although his interests were nearly all international, his that no one can understand anymore ... The heart was in his thirty year career as a canon residentiary of St. pain of the people does not matter. The suffering Paul's Cathedral in London. Here was a setting worthy of the of the children does not matter. The suffering of man: magisterial yet strangely intimate, at the heart of the mothers does not matter. The breaking up of throbbing metropolis, and yet belonging to a kingdom beyond family life does not matter. The government has this one. To hear him preach, to see him administer the written to my synod to defend the security laws as an essential sacraments, to watch him banter with choristers, vergers, continued on page 2 sidesmen, and the like, was to see in some sense where this man of profoundly secular commitments got his power. Ms. Mankekolo Mahlangu Ngcobo, a member of the lDAF He wasalways a controversial figure and was neverfashionable Speakers Bureau, will give a talk at the Harvard University Science in the chilly-polite circles of the English establishment. But he had Center, 1Oxford St., CambridgE', Mass., at8PMonSat., March19. the great satisfaction, not given to many of us, to live to see the Ms. Ngcobo, a member of the Soweto Committee of Ten and a vindication of those causes to which he committed his life and founding member of the Azanian People's Organization, was ministry nearly forty years ago: nuclear disarmament and racial detained under the South NricanTerrorismAct in 1978and held for 21 days in solitary confinement. She will speak on her work within justice in Southern Africa. When he founded the International the anti-apartheid and Black Consciousness movements. The IDAF Defense and Aid Fund in response to the outrageous treason trials Women's Committee cordially invites you to attend. in South Africa in 1956, not many outside of Africa were "Do Not Forget This" continuedfrompagel participation in the decision-making structures of my country. It Christian action, for which the government is proud to take means that the hollleland policy of the government-which is, I responsibility. We have written back and we have said: The think, maybe the most objectionable and immoral aspect of the government does not understand what Christianity really means. whole policy of separate development-will continue. The war in Namibia has become a divine mission. The State We must continue to say: This is evil. We must continue to say: President, speaking on October 5 last year, said that the onslaught This is un-Christian. We must continue tosay that this is inhuman, against South Africa is an onslaught against the Kingdom of God. we must continue to say that we will withstand this, we will fight The Chaplain General Reverend van Zyl said in a television inter­ against this as long as God gives us strength. view that the war in Namibia is a holy war for the sake of the Constructiveengagementmeans that the SouthAfricangovern­ Kingdom ofGodandfor the sake ofWestern Cllristiancivilization ment is beinggiven the kind ofconfidence that it shouldnever have in South Africa. Anything, but anything, goes, for it is in the name had. It means that they know the deaths in detention can continue of Jesus Christ, itis in the name of the Christ of theCross, and of his and there will not even be a protest ... In South Africa, when Father and of the' Holy Spirit that these things continue ... Steve Biko died, the CarterAdministration immediately launched Resistance is not only subversion, it has become suicidal, as the the kind of complaint that the South Africans could not ignore. inquest into the death of Neil Aggett has just proved. Between 1977 and 1982, no one had died in detention. This year In this situation, we must ask ourselves: What does it mean already three have died. Six have been admitted to psychiatric when people talk about constructive engagement? For black wards in hospitals because they have been made zombies by those people-I do not knowwhat it means for the people of the Admin­ people who tortured them. And I give you three guesses where the istration in Washington-for black people it means blatant new methods, the sophisticated methods of torture would come support for the policies of the government. It means support for from. This is the kind of situation we are talking about when we sham constitutional proposals which must carry the label of say to people in America: Please. Do not forget this. Continue to reform. It means that the so-called Coloured and Asian people be in touch wifh brothers and sisters in'South Africa so that you may now become junior partners in the white set-up in South can understand what it means when your government supports Africa, whilst the African people in my country will continue to the government of SouthAfrica. Forus, it is not a question of sums live without any meaningful rights and without any meaningful of money only. It is a question of life and death. no more than a desert mirage. He is rueful then: BAD DREAMS byJulieMiller I wanted to live outside history. I wanted to live outside the history that empire imposes on its subjects, even its lost subjects. I never Waiting for the Barbarians, by J.M. Coetzee, Penguin Books, $3.95 wished it for the barbarians that they should have the history of the paper, 156 pp. empire laid upon them. No one, least ofall a magistrateina repressive country, canremain morally separate from his society. The central illustration of this truth occurs when the magistrate attempts to become the lover of an imprisoned barbarian woman.