[In this work]… the 40-year veteran urban minister “takes the gloves off” and argues that much of Americans’ charitable giving “is either wasted or actually harms the people it is targeted to help.”

The reason is that the “compassion industry” is “almost universally accepted as a virtuous and constructive enterprise,” but its “outcomes are almost entirely unexamined.” Years of charitable giving at home and abroad, Lupton contends, have made barely a dent in reducing poverty and often encourage dependency. Toxic Charity offers some statistics, but more stories, as evidence that both our philosophy and practice of charity are frequently misguided.

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John C. Green’s intellect has earned him a reputation as one of the nation’s experts on the political landscape.

His heart has moved him to be a faithful volunteer in the food pantry at an inner-city ministry that is dedicated to feeding the hungry, caring for the sick, nurturing children and strengthening families.

“I’ve always been interested in helping the hungry,” said Green, director of the University of Akron’s Bliss Institute of Applied Politics. “My religious values teach me that we are to provide for those without the basics in life, and food is one of those essentials.”

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Pope Benedict XVI prayed that a summit of the leaders of countries with the world’s largest economies would find ways to overcome the current economic crisis and promote real development.

At the end of his weekly general audience Nov. 2, the pope issued a special appeal to the leaders of the G-20 nations scheduled to meet Nov. 3-4 in Cannes, France.

“I hope the meeting will help overcome the difficulties, which — on a global level — block the promotion of an authentically human and integral development,” the pope said.

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How rich is too rich for food stamps? The answer depends on where you live.

In Michigan, if you have $5,000 in liquid assets or a car or truck worth more than $15,000, you’re probably out of luck under new rules launched this month.

Earlier this month, the state of Michigan began asking residents about their assets ”” homes, cars, stocks, bonds, even lottery winnings ”” in addition to income when they receive benefits from the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, the formal name for food stamps.

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Members of the Episcopal Diocese of Pittsburgh are in a race where the winners are people who otherwise would be hungry.

Twenty-two of the 31 parishes in the diocese, assigned to one of two teams, have been competing in the diocese’s Race Against Hunger. The teams earn points as they host food drives, educate the public about hunger and food sources, cook at soup kitchens and repack food at the Greater Pittsburgh Food Bank in Duquesne. The points are symbolic, serving only to spur volunteers on in a friendly competition.

“It’s outreach. We’re reaching out beyond the walls of our own church, our own parish, so we are taking care of people within the Western Pennsylvania diocesan area,” said Judy Rosensteel of North Versailles, a member of All Souls Episcopal Church.

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Prompted by civil liberties groups, a taxpayer-supported homeless shelter in the nation’s capital will no longer require its clients to attend religious services.

“We’re pleased that the D.C. government will no longer be supporting such religious coercion,” said Arthur Spitzer, legal director of the Washington, D.C., branch of the American Civil Liberties Union.

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The theme chosen for the Day: “Food Prices: From Crisis to Stability,” invites us to reflect on the importance of the different factors that can give people and communities essential resources, beginning with agricultural work, which must not be considered as a secondary activity, but as the objective of every strategy of growth and integral development. This is still more important if we keep in mind that the availability of foods is increasingly conditioned by the volatility of prices and sudden climatic changes. We observe at the same time a continuous abandonment of rural areas with a global decline in agricultural production and, hence, in food reserves. Moreover, spreading everywhere, unfortunately, is the idea that food is just one more merchandise and, hence, also subject to speculative movements.

It cannot be ignored that — despite the progress achieved up to now and the hopes based on an economy that increasingly respects the dignity of every person — the future of the human family is in need of a new impulse to overcome present fragilities and uncertainties. Although we live in a global dimension, there are evident signs of the profound division between those who lack daily sustenance and those who have many resources, using them often for ends other than food and even destroying them. Confirmed thus is that globalization makes us feel closer but not brothers (cf. Caritas in Veritate, 19). Because of this, those Christian values inscribed in the heart of every person and which have always inspired his action must be rediscovered: the feeling of compassion and humanity toward others and the duty of solidarity and commitment to justice, must again be the basis of every activity, including those carried out by the international community.

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A draft of a report to be released next month calls for the creation of a statewide office in Pennsylvania to oversee the representation of poor people in the criminal justice system, concluding that the current system “labors under an obsolete, purely localized system, a structure that impedes efforts to represent clients effectively.”

Although the draft, 151-page report is highly critical of the current state of indigent defense in the commonwealth — Pennsylvania is the only state that provides no funding to defend the poor — it suggests that the statewide office incorporate the current county-by-county structure of the public defenders’ offices.

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The crisis is deepening for some of the 13m East Africans worst-hit by one of the most devastating droughts in 60 years, aid agencies have warned.

World Food Day is being marked nearly three months since the UN declared a famine in parts of the Horn of Africa.

But people in Ethiopia, Kenya, Somalia, and the newly-formed Republic of South Sudan remain in desperate need of food, water and emergency healthcare.

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The Vatican is calling particular attention to the dire circumstances of the peoples of the Horn of Africa, in particular Somalia, who have been facing a severe drought and food crisis since July.

The press office published an informative noted on the “Efforts and Commitment of the Catholic Church in the Horn of Africa,” which is issued in conjunction with a press conference held today by the Pontifical Council Cor Unum on the plight of several East African countries.

Presented in a question-and-answer format, the note summarized the situation in countries such as Somalia, Kenya and Ethiopia: “A severe drought, conflict and lack of governments have led to massive numbers of people going hungry.

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Pope Benedict XVI asked the international community to continue aid to the drought- and famine-stricken Horn of Africa and asked individuals to offer prayers and donate money to help save the millions facing death.

“I invited everyone to offer prayers and concrete aid for their many brothers and sisters so harshly tried, and particularly for the children, who die in that region each day because of sickness and a lack of water and food,” the pope said Oct. 5 at the end of his weekly general audience.

Read it all.

At a food pantry in a Chicago suburb, a 38-year-old mother of two breaks into tears.

She and her husband have been out of work for nearly two years. Their house and car are gone. So is their foothold in the middle class and, at times, their self-esteem.

“It’s like there is no way out,” says Kris Fallon.

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The ranks of America’s poor swelled to almost 1 in 6 people last year, reaching a new high as long-term unemployment left millions of Americans struggling and out of work. The number of uninsured edged up to 49.9 million, the biggest in more than two decades.

The Census Bureau’s annual report released Tuesday offers a snapshot of the economic well-being of U.S. households for 2010, when joblessness hovered above 9 percent for a second year. It comes at a politically sensitive time for President Barack Obama, who has acknowledged in the midst of a re-election fight that the unemployment rate could persist at high levels through next year.

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[There are] 21 participants in the Mother-to-Mother program, an initiative made possible through a $70,000 grant from the Sisters of Charity Foundation of South Carolina. The 12-month project targets high- poverty, unemployed mothers who do not have a high school diploma and in many cases test below the eighth-grade level in reading or math.

The goal is for them to earn a GED and WorkKeys certificate, which is an assessment that measures real-world job skills.

“We want to move toward this program model for everything we do,” said Eileen Chepenik, the association’s executive director.

Read it all from the front page of yesterday’s local paper.

In June, 14.6% of the U.S. population relied on food stamps. Food stamp rolls have risen 9.5% in the past year, though recent months show the pace of growth is slowing.

Mississippi reported the largest share of its population relying on food stamps, more than 21%, though that included some disaster assistance. One in five residents in New Mexico, Tennessee and Oregon were also food stamp recipients.

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Genna Saucedo supervises cashiers at a Wal-Mart in Pico Rivera, California, but her wages aren’t enough to feed herself and her 12-year-old son.

Saucedo, who earns $9.70 an hour for about 26 hours a week and lives with her mother, is one of the many Americans who survive because of government handouts in what has rapidly become a food stamp nation.

Altogether, there are now almost 46 million people in the United States on food stamps, roughly 15 percent of the population. That’s an increase of 74 percent since 2007, just before the financial crisis and a deep recession led to mass job losses.

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(The figures are from May, the most recent available).

No fair clicking until you make your answer.

We discussed this in yesterday’s Adult Sunday school–KSH.

Religious leaders say they are exploring short and long term strategies for communities to end reliance on food aid in Africa, as relief organizations continue to minister to thousands suffering from drought and famine in the Horn of Africa.

The worst drought in 60 years is affecting more than 12 million people in Kenya, Ethiopia, Djibouti and Somalia. Its epicentre is Somalia, where tens of thousands are fleeing to refugee camps in Kenya and Ethiopia.

“We would not only want to work on the immediate needs, but we are thinking, because this is becoming a chronic problem, we have got to see the root causes and fight it,” Archbishop Ian Ernest of the Indian Ocean Province and the chairman of the Council of Anglican Province of Africa told a news conference on Aug. 10 in Nairobi after a meeting of Anglican archbishops.

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Kathy had been out of the job market for about 25 years””instead staying home with her three children””when everything fell apart….

Kathy isn’t alone. In some communities surrounding Edison, 27 percent of the population lives below the national poverty level.

For Kathy and many others, a church in nearby Highland Park offers a unique solution. A Better World Café, one of a handful of “pay-as-you-can” restaurants in the United States, provides clients with good meals and job training, among other things. Hosted at the Reformed Church of Highland Park, the idea for the restaurant was hatched in 2009 in a group working to meet local needs.

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“Every day we are seeing more and more heartbreaking news about the drought and famine in Somalia and the eastern parts of Africa. We see millions of people being forced from their homes, leaving behind what meager possessions they had, and walking for days over rough terrain,” wrote Archbishop Dolan and Bishop Kicanas.

“There are parents whose little children have died, and children who have been orphaned. They are suffering from hunger, thirst, disease, and drought,” they said. “It is a humanitarian crisis that cries out for help to Christians throughout the world. The Holy Father, on several occasions, has asked Catholics to respond generously to the desperate needs of our brothers and sisters in East Africa.”

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In Somalia, 3.2 million people — by some estimates almost half the East African country’s population — are in need of “immediate life-saving assistance” and another 11 million in the Horn of Africa have been affected by the region’s worst drought in 60 years, according to news reports and the United Nations.

Famine and conflict have driven hundreds of thousands of Somalis across the nation’s borders in search of asylum and assistance, with some 400,000 inhabitants at Dadaab, the largest refugee camp in the world, located in northeastern Kenya, according the U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees.

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From here:

God, our refuge and strength,

we pray for the people of Somalia and the Horn of Africa

as they face drought, famine and hardship.

Bring near the day when wars shall cease

and poverty and pain shall end,

that earth may know the peace of heaven

through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen

Ecumenical faith leaders in Africa today launched a Call to Action and Appeal for the people affected by famine in the Horn of Africa.

The move came after a two day meeting in Nairobi led by the Council of Anglican Provinces of Africa and involving the All Africa Council of Churches the Lutheran World Federation, WCC-EHAIA, FECCLAHA, LWF, OAIC, WSCF, EAA, ACT Alliance and World Vision, brought together by the Anglican Alliance for development relief and advocacy.

As the first Africa regional ecumenical and interdenominational gathering in response to the food insecurity and humanitarian crisis, the group paid tribute to the heroic work of the humanitarian agencies, churches and others who had saved millions of lives working in difficult circumstances to meet the needs of people fleeing drought, famine and war.

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Anglicans are to meet in Nairobi next week to launch an appeal and advocacy campaign on the food crisis sweeping East Africa.

The meeting which will bring together primates and bishops from the worst hit areas, comes as the UN announced a deepening of the famine in southern Somalia.

The meeting is being organised jointly by the Council of Anglican Provinces of Africa and the Anglican Alliance for development, relief and advocacy, through its Africa facilitator, Emmanuel Olatunji.

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(Here the founder of a Catholic Worker house describes their work in an area of stark inequalities[:])

It is the best of times and the worst of times in Oklahoma City. Our perception of how we are doing depends on where we are in the great economic scheme of things. If you are in the oil business, you are riding high. Driven by the strong prices for energy, Oklahoma’s oil sector is spending money lavishly, most notably on the new 50-floor skyscraper headquarters of Devon Energy in downtown Oklahoma City. The city is investing nearly $750 million over the next few years in its central core.

But this is a tale of two cities. Just a dozen blocks from the glamour of bio-engineering research institutes, I tried to get a health department inspector to condemn a rented house which had no heat, no electricity, no running water, no hot water, and in which the sewer was clogged. The tenant is a disabled man whose neighbours allow him to use their bathroom. The inspector called the landlord, but two months later there was still no hot water and the sewer was still blocked.

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– It took 32 days for Fatima Mohammed to make it from her drought-racked farm in Somalia to the relative safety of a sprawling refugee settlement in northeastern Kenya. There were days, she recalled, when her children were so thirsty that they could not walk and the men in her family would ferry them ahead, returning to carry two more children in their arms.

Fatima Mohammed told Catholic News Service that her family had lived through drought before, but that support from aid agencies helped them survive until the rains returned.

“This time, al-Shabaab won’t let them in,” she said, referring to the Islamist group that controls portions of Somalia. “So when our animals started dying, our only choice was to stay and die ourselves, or else start walking for Kenya.”

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Centre 454 has long been associated with the Anglican Church. The group provides social services to the homeless, helping them with everything from dental appointments to applying for financial programs. They offer a cup of coffee and a place for those living on the streets to socialize when shelters are closed during the day.

For a quarter of a century, the centre was housed at the St. Alban’s Anglican Church and had its own entrance at 454 King Edward St….

An internal rift with the Anglican Church led to the centre being summarily dismissed from the parish, and its home has been at a decidedly dismal storefront on the east end of Murray Street.

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George Krowska traveled to Myrtle Beach this spring after a relationship went sour.

He had been staying in a Colorado shelter for a couple of months, the first time in his life the 62-year-old Army veteran was homeless. But in Myrtle Beach, he was abandoned, he said.
Krowska has a heart blockage that qualifies him for disability benefits and requires a certain proximity to a VA hospital, so he hitchhiked to Charleston. At the Ralph H. Johnson VA Medical Center, he received treatment, learned about Crisis Ministries, the area’s homeless shelter and got a bus pass.

The former construction worker is living off of $923 a month, but cannot work because of his heart. More than two months into a maximum 90-day stay, he said he’s growing worried about where he’ll go next.

Read it all.

From here:

Owning Poverty: A Transformational Spiritual Journey
This course takes a Christian spiritual formation approach to the exploration of the crushing human poverty experienced in our world today. A theology of poverty requires a posture and epistemology of poverty of spirit. Until poverty is taken into ourselves, it is not a truth we can really know, although we might acknowledge it as an undisputed fact or recall statistics of injustice in our world. As poverty is allowed to engage us internally, our mode of engagement with the poor shifts from distant empircism and observation, to identification and incarnational compassion. As we engage hands, heads, and hearts in this course, our desire is that participants will come to better understand poverty (spiritual and physical poverty, their own poverty and others) and experience God’s heart and blessing for the poor. We want students to internalize biblical truths to facilitate Kingdom transformation in themselves and the world.

The segment description is as follows:

The U.N. will airlift emergency rations this week to parts of drought-ravaged Somalia that militants banned it from more than two years ago. The foray into the famine zone is a desperate attempt to reach at least 175,000 of the 2.2 million Somalis whom aid workers have not yet been able to help.

Tens of thousands already have trekked to neighbouring Kenya and Ethiopia, hoping to get aid in refugee camps. Responding to the Horn of Africa crisis, the Jesuit Refugee Service has also announced plans to step up ongoing work for Somalis in Ethiopia and Kenya.

Lydia O’Kane sat down with Father Peter Balleis SJ, International Director of JRS and Communications Co-ordinator James Stapleton.

Speaking about severity of the situation Father Balleis says, “ The crisis or so it looks like a new crisis is a chronic crisis. For years and years Somalia is at war, not all parts but a central part and the Somali population are leaving the country as refugees”.

James Stapleton adds that some aid agencies are reporting that they have never seen a crisis on this scale before.

Listen to it all (a little over 14 minutes).