Susan Ellison
Casilla 9383
La Paz, Bolivia
Email: Susan Ellison
Email: Susan Ellison 2

Susan will be in the United States on interpretation assignment from May 1 to August 1, 2005. To invite her to speak in your church, see her contact information on the Mission Speakers page.

Susan Ellison was appointed in 2001 to be companionship facilitator for Joining Hands Against Hunger in Cochabamba, Bolivia. She works with the Network of Organizations and Churches Working with Indigenous People in Bolivia. After three months of language study in Cochabamba, Susan moved to La Paz.

"Joining Hands Against Hunger" (JHAH) is an initiative of the Presbyterian Hunger Program, which has pilot projects in eight countries (Cameroon, South Africa, Lesotho, Egypt, Palestine, Peru, Bolivia, India). JHAH seeks to identify the local and global causes of hunger by working with grassroots organizations in each country. A unique feature of JHAH is that the hunger network in each country will be linked to the PC(USA) via a partnership with a PC(USA) presbytery. Thus, the term "companionship facilitator" to describe the work that Susan will do, helping the Presbytery of San Francisco be a companion to the groups that form the Network of Organizations and Churches Working with Indigenous Peoples in Bolivia.

"In Bolivia," writes Susan, "I will be working with a network of eleven organizations that are working against hunger in their country, though often from different perspectives, such as examining the causes of poverty, or working on gender/justice issues, the environment, community and economic development, indigenous rights, and youth organization, among others."

(Photo Album)

Letters from
Susan Ellison

• March 2005
• January 2005
• September 2004
• February 2004
• October 2003 (4)
• October 2003 (3)
• October 2003 (2)
• October 2003 (1)
• September 2003
• April 2003
• February 2003
• December 2002
• September 2002
• August 2002
• July 2002
• June 2002
• April 2002
• March 2002
• October 2001

Susan’s interest in Bolivia began in the summer of 2000 when she spent a a month working with street children in Cochabamba and teaching English in a women’s prison. While writing her senior honors thesis, Susan spent seven months in Santiago, Chile, exploring the collapse of that country’s popular movement. While in Chile, Susan was a student at Catholic University and worked in an after-school program for adolescent girls, teaching sexual education and working on issues of family violence and self-esteem.

Her experiences in Latin America helped Susan to a critical understanding of how aid programs often work. "Throughout Latin America," she writes, "and in much of the ‘two-thirds world,’ development projects, aid programs, and other forms of ‘help’ often happen with little input from local communities and their leaders." Susan intends to listen to the indigenous people before taking action. "For me, faith is a part of everyday life," she says, "and so my sense of mission is not easily divided into spiritual and earthly matters. Whether I advocate for just economic policies or work toward the health and wholeness of all of God’s children, I feel I do ministry. I feel called to work towards a just world, and I believe that in doing so I am working to achieve God’s kingdom here on earth."

Susan graduated summa cum laude from Washington University in 2000 with a bachelor’s degree in cultural anthropology and Spanish. During the year following her graduation, she was a young adult intern with the Social Justice Program Area of the General Assembly Mission Council of the PC(USA) in the Office of Health Ministries.

Susan is a member of Highland Presbyterian Church in Louisville, Kentucky.

Birthday: December 8