Poverty kills. It kills 300,000 children every day.
Is not this the fast that I choose: to loose the bonds of injustice, to undo the thongs of the yoke, to the let the oppressed go free, and to break every yoke?
Isaiah 58, NRSV
It shortens, injures and thwarts the lives of more than 1 billion people struggling to survive on less than $1 U.S. a day. At present 11 children under five die of hunger-related causes every minute, and about 800,000,000 people suffer from chronic or acute hunger. In our prosperous world, more than 1 billion people are denied the right to clean water and 2.6 billion people lack access to adequate sanitation. Over 100,000,000 children worldwide do not have access to education.
Biblical and Theological Context
"The United Methodist Church, as a covenant community to God's justice, must work toward a just global economy." (2004 Book of Resolutions, "Economic Justice for a New Millennium," ¶206.)
"We call for The United Methodist Church to develop effective public policy strategies and educate the constituency on hunger issues." (2004 Book of Resolutions, "The United Methodist Church, Justice and World Hunger" ¶205)
We call "for the achievement of the United Nations Millennium Development Goals, which set targets for 2015 in the areas of basic education, infant and maternal mortality, clean water supplies and poverty reduction throughout the developing nations." (2004 Book of Resolutions, "The United Methodist Church, Justice and World Hunger," ¶205)
"In spite of general affluence in the industrialized nations, the majority of persons in the world live in poverty. In order to provide basic needs such as food, clothing, shelter, education, health care, and other necessities, ways must be found to share more equitably the resources of the world."; (Social Principles, ¶163.E)
Scripture reference: Isaiah 58:6-8
What GBCS is Doing
Promoting the United Nations Millennium Development Goals: Goals agreed upon by leaders of nations in 2000 to eradicate extreme poverty and hunger; universal primary education, gender equality, HIV/AIDS and malaria, child mortality; and environmental sustainability;
Urging Fair Trade: Policies and trade rules that reduce poverty; protects workers, small producers and farmers, and the environment; and allows poor developing countries to protect their industries;
Advocating for Effective Development Assistance: Reform of U.S. foreign aid programs with poverty eradication as its major goal; and
Advocating for Debt Cancellation: Provide debt cancellation to more poor countries.
A litany was approved to be added to the Social Principles in an effort to make the United Methodist Social Creed more accessible for use during worship.
This is the fifth session of a five-week study that contains short Scripture reading, questions for group reflection and action, facts on the state of the global poor and congregational prayers.
This is the fourth session of a five-week Bible-based study on the world’s poorest people and our response to alleviate systemic suffering. We invite you to devote a few weeks to studying “A New Year in God’s World.”
This is the second session of a five-week study that contains short Scripture reading, questions for group reflection and action, facts on the state of the global poor and congregational prayers.
This is the first session of a five-week study that contains short Scripture reading, questions for group reflection and action, facts on the state of the global poor and congregational prayers.
Downloadable Resources
Eradicating Global Poverty: A Christian Study Guide on the Millennium Development Goals
If the poor will always be with us, why should we eradicate extreme poverty? Because we can, experts say. Humanity has the means to end worldwide poverty in our lifetime. The real question is, will we do it? This study guide was designed by the National Council of Churches USA to tackle these and other pressing issues. The book costs $7.95 plus shipping and handling.
Faith in Action: Working Toward the Millennium Development Goals
Religions for Peace produced this toolkit to help religious communities work toward the UN Millennium Development Goals: eradicating extreme poverty, achieving universal primary education, promoting gender equality, reducing child mortality and hunger, and combating HIV/AIDS and other diseases. Find out more at Religions for Peace.
United Nations Millennium Development Goals
The eight Millennium Development Goals (MDGs), which range from halving extreme poverty to halting the spread of HIV/AIDS and providing universal primary education, all by the target date of 2015, form a blueprint agreed to by all the world's countries and all the world's leading development institutions. They have galvanized unprecedented efforts to meet the needs of the world's poorest. This Web site lists the goals and ways to get involved.
ONE: What If... What if by 2015 extreme poverty was eradicated? This resource guides you through the Millennium Development Goals and discusses ways for individuals and communities to end hunger, poverty and disease around the world.
Links
50 Years is Enough Network
50 Years Is Enough: U.S. Network for Global Economic Justice is a coalition of more than 200 U.S. grassroots, women's, solidarity, faith-based, policy, social and economic justice, youth, labor and development organizations dedicated to the profound transformation of the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund.
Bread for the World
Bread for the World is a nationwide Christian movement that seeks justice for the world's hungry people by lobbying our nation's decision makers.
Christian Aid
Christian Aid works in 50 countries, helping people regardless of religion or race to improve their own lives and tackle the causes of poverty and injustice.
Church World Service
Founded in 1946, Church World Service is the relief, development, and refugee assistance ministry of 35 Protestant, Orthodox, and Anglican denominations in the United States. Working in partnership with indigenous organizations in more than 80 countries, CWS works worldwide to meet human needs and foster self-reliance for all whose way is hard. This Web site contains curriculum on various social justice issues.
FIAN International
FIAN International is a human rights organization that works to enable people to feed themselves with members in all parts of the world. There is enough food for everyone, now and in the future. FIAN International defends the right of ordinary people to feed themselves in dignity.
Food First
The purpose of the Institute for Food and Development Policy - Food First is to eliminate the injustices that cause hunger.
Global Campaign for Education
The Global Campaign for Education promotes education as a basic human right, and mobilizes public pressure on governments and the international community to fulfill their promises to provide free, compulsory public basic education for all people; in particular for children, women and all disadvantaged, deprived sections of society.
Global Trade Campaign
The global campaign, Trade for People - Not People for Trade, works to build a movement of people within the churches and church-related organizations to promote trade justice. The campaign does this by calling for recognition of the priority of human rights agreements over trade agreements.
Jubilee South
Jubilee South is a network of debt campaigns, social movements, people's organizations, communities, nongovernmental organizations and political formations. The Jubilee South network aims to develop and strengthen a global South movement on the debt. The network has members from over 40 countries from the regions of Latin America and the Caribbean, Africa and Asia/Pacific, representing 85 anti-debt groups.
Jubilee USA Network
Jubilee USA Network is an alliance of more than 80 religious denominations and faith communities, human rights, environmental, labor, and community groups working for the definitive cancellation of crushing debts to fight poverty and injustice in Asia, Africa, and Latin America.
ONE Campaign
The ONE Campaign is an effort by Americans to rally Americans - one by one - to fight the emergency of global AIDS and extreme poverty. ONE is students and ministers, punk rockers and NASCAR moms, Americans of all beliefs and every walk of life, united to help make poverty history. The General Board of Church and Society is a member of the ONE Campaign.
Oxfam International
Oxfam International is a confederation of 13 organizations working together with more than 3,000 partners in more than 100 countries to find lasting solutions to poverty, suffering and injustice. With many of the causes of poverty global in nature, the 13 affiliate members of Oxfam International think they can achieve greater impact through their collective efforts.
Sojourners
The organization's mission is to articulate the biblical call to social justice, inspiring hope and building a movement to transform individuals, communities, the church, and the world.
The U.S. Interfaith Trade Justice Campaign
The U.S. Interfaith Trade Justice Campaign, in partnership with religious institutions, mobilizes and facilitates an active engagement of faith communities in educational activities, policy advocacy and Fair Trade efforts, so that global trade and investment policies promote economic and social justice, human development and ecological sustainability.
United Methodist Committee on Relief
UMCOR is the humanitarian relief and development agency of the United Methodist Church. For 65 years UMCOR has responded internationally to natural or human made disasters - those interruptions of such magnitude that they overwhelm a community's ability to recover on its own.
United Nations Millennium Campaign
The Millennium Campaign informs, inspires and encourages people's involvement and action for the realization of the Millennium Development Goals. An initiative of the United Nations, the campaign supports citizens' efforts to hold their government accountable to the millennium promise.
We claim all economic systems to be under the judgment of God no less than other facets of the created order. Therefore, we recognize the responsibility of governments to develop and implement sound fiscal and monetary policies that provide for the economic life of individuals and corporate entities and that ensure full employment and adequate incomes with a minimum of inflation. We believe private and public economic enterprises are responsible for the social costs of doing business, such as employment and environmental pollution, and that they should be held accountable for these costs. We support measures that would reduce the concentration of wealth in the hands of a few. We further support efforts to revise tax structures and to eliminate governmental support programs that now benefit the wealthy at the expense of other persons.
In spite of general affluence in the industrialized nations, the majority of persons in the world live in poverty. In order to provide basic needs such as food, clothing, shelter, education, health care, and other necessities, ways must be found to share more equitably the resources of the world. Increasing technology, when accompanied by exploitative economic practices, impoverishes many persons and makes poverty self-perpetuating. Therefore, we do not hold poor people morally responsible for their economic state. To begin to alleviate poverty, we support such policies as: adequate income maintenance, quality education, decent housing, job training, meaningful employment opportunities, adequate medical and hospital care, and humanization and radical revisions of welfare programs. Since low wages are often a cause of poverty, employers should pay their employees a wage that does not require them to depend upon government subsidies such as food stamps or welfare for their livelihood.
