Exodus From Hunger (16 page)

Since 2006, top leaders from all the families of U.S. Christianity have been meeting once a year. Their loose association, Christian Churches Together (CCT), is the most inclusive organization of Christian bodies in U.S. history, and their main topic of conversation has been poverty in America. The group includes Catholics, Orthodox, historic Protestants (such as Methodists and Presbyterians), evangelical and pentecostal Protestants, African American churches, and interdenominational organizations such as Bread for the World.

The evangelical Protestant leaders were the ones to propose that the early CCT discussions focus on U.S. poverty. Whether Protestant or Catholic, liberal or conservative, many church leaders have become convinced that our nation and its churches are doing less than we should to deal with poverty in our communities.

In the past, there were sharp division between churches that emphasized evangelism and others that emphasized justice for poor people. But the CCT discussions suggest this division may be fading. The CCT leaders agree that churches must be about sharing the gospel of Jesus Christ, and also that conversion must lead to helping poor people, including advocacy. These leaders have spoken out together about domestic poverty issues to the press and to White House officials.

At the CCT meeting in 2010, Bread for the World reported on how churches have responded to the increase in poverty caused by recession. During the financial crisis year of 2008, charities in general suffered a decline in giving, but religious congregations and food banks both reported increases in giving. Many denominations and local churches, across all the varieties of Christianity in the United States, increased assistance to people in need in their communities.
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Latino churches are likely to be a growing force in advocacy for poor people. One of my proudest achievements was preaching in Spanish at Templo Calvario, an Assemblies of God megachurch in Orange County, California. About five thousand people, mostly under age thirty, worship at Templo Calvario every Sunday. I can speak decent Spanish, but a pentecostal congregation expects a preacher to be spontaneous and to pick up speed toward the end of the sermon. I did pretty well for a Lutheran, and the good people at Templo Calvario were tolerant. They even appreciated my efforts to dance a bit during their praise songs.

Their pastor, Daniel de Leon, added a little sermon of his own to my sermon, and his words made it clear why Latino churches of all stripes are open to involvement in advocacy on hunger-related issues. “Hunger is something we know,” Daniel said. “Please stand up if you have ever had to go without food.” About a third of the congregation stood up. “We’re going to take up a collection for Bread for the World now. But this is for hungry people, so if you don’t have enough food at home, take five or ten dollars out of the plate.”

The people of Templo Calvario contributed enough to provide for some immediate needs and sent me away with sixteen thousand dollars for Bread for the World.

Jewish and Muslim groups have also become more involved in advocacy for hungry and poor people, often working together with Christian groups. Over the past few years, Bread and the Alliance to End Hunger have helped MAZON (“mazon” is the Hebrew word for food) and American Jewish World Service develop education and advocacy materials on hunger. The Jewish Council on Public Affairs has become active in changing the politics of hunger and poverty in America. Bread and the Alliance have also worked with Muslim leaders. We have helped develop materials that go out annually to more than five hundred thousand U.S. Muslims to encourage help and advocacy for hungry people during Ramadan.

Bread for the World has organized two big interfaith convocations on hunger at the Washington National Cathedral. Seldom in U.S. history has the top leadership of such a diverse array of religious leaders come together, and thousands of people participated. These interfaith events grew out of a suggestion from MAZON. Muslim groups have been eager to join with Christians and Jews against hunger, partly as a way to counter the suspicion and discrimination U.S. Muslims have suffered since the 2001 terrorist attacks. African American, Latino, and Native American religious leaders have participated; so have Buddhists and Sikhs. These convocations have been a significant religious experience for some of the religious leaders themselves.

Meanwhile, the Democratic Party has been working to improve its connections with the religious community, focusing on religious concern about poverty. The majority of the people who go to religious services regularly vote Republican, and Christian conservatives have organized themselves as a force within the Republican Party. But after the Republican sweep of 2004, many Democratic politicians took to expressing their faith and talking about God and poverty. Changes in the voting patterns of churchgoers contributed to the election of President Obama and a Democratic majority in Congress in 2008.

Our last three presidents have all provided some leadership on poverty issues. President Clinton managed to reduce poverty in the United States, thanks mainly to good macroeconomic management and his expansion of the Earned Income Tax Credit. Toward the end of his time in the White House he focused on global poverty, which has become a driving passion for him at the Clinton Foundation.

When George W. Bush was running for president, he said we should focus on those parts of the world in which the United States has interests. He then listed all the regions of the world except Africa. Nobody expected him to propose major new programs of foreign aid. Yet U.S. aid to Africa quadrupled during the Bush administration.
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The United States also offered African nations new openings for trade. President Bush did more for Africa than any U.S. president before him.

What accounts for his strong leadership on African issues? He is personally concerned, and he also came to see that freedom from disease and misery is related to his deep commitments to human freedom and national security. Bush’s Africa policies also benefited from good advisors and strong support from members of Congress of both parties.

I had a chance to talk with President Bush during his last month in office. My wife and I are members of Christ Church in Alexandria, Virginia. George Washington was a member there, and many presidents have visited. When President and Mrs. Bush visited, I told him about some of the people I’ve met in Africa who are alive today only because of his push to get AIDS medicine to Africans. “It’s been a labor of love,” he said. He looked to the altar in the front of the church. “That’s why we did it.”

Domestic poverty has always been a higher political priority than global poverty. But while interest in global poverty surged during the Bush years, there was no comparable increase in political interest in domestic poverty. We still get no help from rock stars on issues that are important to poor people in the United States.

Yet our Alliance to End Hunger polls document strong and growing concern among voters about domestic hunger and poverty. About three-quarters of voters favor spending additional tax dollars on federal hunger programs to end child hunger in the United States. Voters are aware that many people have been driven into poverty by the nation’s economic problems, through no fault of their own.

When we discussed the Alliance’s polling results with former president Bill Clinton, he said that the important question for a politician is what single issue will most determine the choice of voters. So in one poll we asked, “Thinking about the next time you vote for Congress or U.S. Senate, what one issue do you view as the most important to you in deciding your vote?” Top issues were health care, taxes, and the economy. But 7 percent of voters said the issue that would sway their vote would be hunger and poverty. That’s more than opted for the environment or immigration. Most of the voters who said hunger or poverty is their decisive issue had relatively low incomes. Many were African American or Latino.

Measured by press coverage, poverty was discussed more than three times as much in the 2007–2008 presidential campaign as in the 2003–2004 campaign.
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Then-senator Obama spoke much more about poverty than Senator McCain, and that helped Obama win the election. Obama proposed programs to end child hunger in this country by 2015 and to cut poverty in half within ten years. He also promised to help achieve the Millennium Development Goals, partly by doubling U.S. foreign aid and making it more effective.

But hunger and poverty were not leading campaign issues for either presidential candidate. Belmont University in Nashville hosted the second presidential debate. Belmont is a Christian university, and they invited me to preach at an ecumenical prayer service before the debate. I noted that there had been no mention of poverty in the first presidential debate: “The candidates have expressed so much concern about the middle class that I checked my Bible. I thought maybe the Lord must have said, ‘Whatever you do for the struggling middle class, you’ve done it unto me.’” I stole that line from John Carr, who works for the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, and repeated it in radio interviews that reached 20 million people. I was pleased when, during the last debate, Obama mentioned that his family relied on food stamps when he was a boy.

Since coming to power, President Obama has continued to talk about struggling Americans, and he has not abandoned his specific promises to hungry and poor people in this country and worldwide. In fact, his actions for poor people have been more ambitious than his rhetoric. President Obama’s commitments open the door to expanded efforts to reduce hunger and poverty, but he cannot realize these promises without help in building congressional support among both Republicans and Democrats.

In our system, the president, more than anyone else, sets the nation’s agenda of political discussion. When President Bush proposed strengthening development assistance, it made sense for advocates to support and shape the president’s proposals. President Obama has made more ambitious commitments to hungry and poor people in the United States and worldwide, and it makes sense for advocates—whether Democrats, Republicans, or independents—to push the administration and Congress to shape those commitments into effective action.

W
e are at a pivotal point in the history of poverty. Economic turmoil has driven many more people into hunger and poverty. But the clear need for national change, an increasingly significant movement against hunger and poverty, voter attitudes, and the commitments of our current president give us a political opening. We may be able to achieve policy changes that will help people in need and set a path toward ending hunger and poverty. At a minimum, faith-grounded activists can make the future better for hungry people than it would otherwise be.

This chapter outlines an agenda for policy change. It explains four issues that are important to hungry people and on which breakthroughs are possible. The chapter then discusses the hunger and poverty dimension of high-profile issues our nation is likely to be debating. The chapter ends with a section on what we need to do to seize the opportunity we now have to change history for hungry people.

During his campaign for election, President Obama promised to end child hunger in America by 2015 and cut U.S. poverty in half. The Obama campaign issued a solid plan to end child hunger. It rightly includes three elements: stronger national nutrition programs, more effective community efforts, and policies to reduce poverty. I want to hold him to those promises, translate them into effective programs, and help him secure the necessary support from Congress. There is a long tradition of bipartisanship in responding to hunger.

The federal government maintains three large nutrition programs. The largest is the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP). It is complemented by the Women, Infants, and Children Program (WIC), which provides additional, appropriate food to infants, children, and their mothers. School Meals is the third area of nutrition assistance: school lunches, school breakfasts, after-school, and summer programs. Our national nutrition programs are effective instruments for reducing hunger, and we can go a long way toward ending child hunger by making the most of them.

Congress is updating policies regarding these programs. The administration has asked Congress for an additional $1 billion a year to get food to vulnerable children and fund improved nutrition in school lunches, and Bread for the World members are urging their members of Congress to help make this happen.

The Obama campaign statement on child hunger also talks about enhancing the impact of community efforts to help hungry people. More than sixty-three thousand charitable agencies provide food to hungry people.
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They are on the front lines, meeting the needs of desperate people.

Most of these programs are small, and their funding is always a challenge.

But the many organizations that deal with hunger in a community can have a bigger impact if they cooperate and think strategically. They can figure out what needs to happen over a period of years to reduce and perhaps end hunger in their communities. The national nutrition programs aren’t fully utilized (for example, only two-thirds of people eligible for SNAP apply), so community efforts can tap into available federal funding. Food charities can help people enroll in SNAP, insist that their local schools provide breakfast for low-income children, and organize summer feeding programs. Community leaders can also spot ways to coordinate federal, state, and community programs to take full advantage of available resources. When people who provide assistance have a chance to think together about systemic solutions, they almost always decide to expand and improve what they do to advocate for policy changes at the city, state, and national levels.