The Atlanta-based United Methodist Church’s General Board of Global Ministries is calling for the immediate release of three missionaries, including one from the United States.
Tawanda Chandiwana from Zimbabwe, is being held at the Bicutan Detention Center in the Philippines. The others are free but their movements are limited, said spokesman Dan Curran. Adam Shaw of Brunswick, Ohio, and Miracle Osman of Blantyre, Malawi, have experienced repeated difficulties getting the documents they need to leave the Philippines.
Thomas Kemper, general secretary of the United Methodist Ministries in Atlanta is currently in the Philippines.
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Curran said the three have spent time in Atlanta during training.
The Council of Bishops of the UMC and the General Board of Global Ministries have launched a worldwide campaign to call public attention to the plight of the three missionaries.
Chandiwana and Osman are Global Mission fellows, young adults between the ages of 20 and 30. They are sent by the UMC to serve for 20 months in ministries such as peacebuilding, creation care, human rights advocacy and social work. Many Filipino young adults are part of this program.
Shaw now serves there as a global missionary with the UMC.
There is an online petition calling for their release.
The Council of Bishops called upon Methodists to pray daily at noon, for the three missionaries.
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Chandiwana was taken into custody on May 9, 2018, while attending a training seminar at the Mindanao Peacebuilding Institute in Davao City. He was charged with overstaying his visa, although he had initiated the process of having a missionary visa changed to a tourist status since he was nearing the end of his 20-month missionary term.
Osman’s passport was confiscated while she was applying to extend her tourist visa and waiting for her missionary visa to be approved.
Shaw has been informed that an order to leave is imminent but it has not been served.
