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                         Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: WEDNESDAY, January 6, 1993                   TAG: 9301060307
SECTION: EDITORIAL                    PAGE: A6   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: 
DATELINE:                                 LENGTH: Short

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BOAT PEOPLE CHALLENGE AMERICA

THANKS and blessings to the Roanoke Times & World-News, and especially to staff writer Mark Morrison, for the front-page coverage Jan. 2 of the two Haitian men, LeGrand Noel and Bonhomme Nissage, who fortunately have escaped the current tyrannical, illegal, military government of Haiti. It was a joy and a sign of hope, coming as it did on the internationally proclaimed "World Weekend of Peace."

The article was honest, factual, humanistic and promoted the causes of justice and human rights for the politically oppressed people of Haiti and the boat people who represent that country. The boat people are challenging us as a nation - as Christians, as Jews, as people of God - to listen to their story, to open our hearts, to be honest and to denounce the political life of our own country. The boat people are calling us to conversion. Do we hear Noel and Nissage? Are we listening? BOB DELLA VALLE-RAUTH HUDDLESTON

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