Poverty Must Be Addressed

[NathanATX]

One reason the issue of poverty is important because it contributes heavily to crime, violence, and war. The most important reason, though, is that it causes immeasurable suffering in the lives of our fellow human beings.

Extreme poverty in not going to be solved with just one stroke of the pen, but it can and MUST be eliminated. Eliminating poverty includes, but certainly is not limited to feeding the hungry.

In Africa and in other developing parts of the world, there are several things to consider.

First, what system of government do these places have? Democracy, Monarchy, Tribal, etc? And what kind of economy do they have? Free Market, Socialist, etc. A response to poverty in a specific location must take all these things into consideration.

Second, what are that location/region's natural resources? Diamonds, oil, crops, crafts, labor, educated workers, grazing lands, tourist attractions, etc. Is the government profiting unduly from their natural resources? Are multi-national companies profiting unduly from those resources? A country with extreme poverty should not be turning over it's resources to make someone else wealthy. The resources should be used soley for the benefit of their people. The worlds' leading nations need to establish strict guidelines that control the use of the natural resouces in poverty stricken nations, i.e. Ban the sale/purchase of goods that are determined to be procured illegaly.

Finally, violence and corruption must be addressed. The cause and source of violence in specific areas must be determined and must be quickly addressed. If people are engaging in civil wars over land because they are ALL starving, feed the people and end the wars. All Aid groups must have protection from violence AND protection from corrupt governments.

Americans are not going to solve poverty by selling their comfortable homes and moving to shacks. We are going to solve poverty by making this issue a priority for ALL levels of government. We are going to solve poverty by ensuring access to quality education for all children. We are going to solve poverty by increasing the minimum wage. We are going to solve poverty by modifying/eliminating tax breaks for mega-profitable companies. We are going to solve poverty by regulating the debt industry that profits off of low income earners. We are going to solve poverty through FINANCIAL EDUCATION. We are going to solve poverty by changing our values from being proud of our "bling-bling" to being proud of how much money we have saved & invested.

Many people in America are Christian, yet we have failed to grasp Jesus' heart for the poor. We have let our political parties set the agendas for our government to be "hot button" issues like abortion & gay marriage, while our economy suffers, while our neighbors go hungry, while our parents can't afford their medicine, while our children attend awful schools. We must take back our political parties and not respond to the emotional, even religious, manipulation of the past.

As Christians, our highest calling is to "Love God and to love our neighbors as we love ourselves." Who is your neighbor? Yes, everyone in your family, circle of friends & community, but also the hungry, the weak, the uneducated, the sick, the marginalized, the broken-hearted, the poor, the minority, the outcast...

Christians, Jews, Muslims, and yes, even atheists can live out the statement to "love your neighbor as you love yourself" by promoting justice for ALL people or we can choose to be manipulated into thinking we are doing good by being political lemmings and watch as everyone around us suffers.

[Liberal Crozier]

One of the president's most trusted advisers, part of the troika led by Karl Rove, is Grover Norquist.

The theocons have a tried and tested strategy that works for them. First, they gave the national surplus to the most wealthy in the nation. In fact, this is the least philanthropic group, as a whole statistically, that this nation has ever produced among those who define themselves as millionaires or more. Secondly, they play the most malevolent shell game.

They state that they favour child protection and educative programmes, while knowing that passing a binding resolution without appropriating the funds makes them appear to the sheeple that they value children, the elderly and the most challenged among you, when they actually voted against the very programmes when enacted by the liberals when they held power. States are bankrupting as they must further erode the discretionary income of the working poor and "middle class".

They use their thinktanks to produce Orwellian language that polls effectively to make the majority vote and support the total transfer of wealth and resource to less than a few percentages of the overall population. By a few more years, the New Deal, Fair Deal, New Frontier and Great Society programmes will be replaced by the values of a second Gilded Age.

The Christian - who sees his Beatitudinal imperative in feeding the poor and clothing the naked - must impress upon those whom have an inordinate share of the wealth - to share it with their less fortunate brothers and sisters and their families. The Christian pastor must dare to speak truth to the wealthy and powerful in the pews.

Two anecdotes - most US senior citizens were able to transfer property and funds to their children without paying inheritance taxes. The majority of those inheritance taxes were paid by the most wealthy citizens of our nation. What did they do? They renamed it to the "DEATH TAX" and neglected to inform their core constituencies that this new bill would in fact produce a need for more revenue from them, since the wealthy would be exempt from these taxes.

Most theocon Republicans opposed FMLA or Medicare's provisions. In fact, they never wanted either to see the light of day. So the Republican Medicare Prescription plan was pure Theocon Malevolence. Most senior citizens soon realised that NO, NO, NO plan would in fact - ON ITS OWN - provide them with the medications they needed. ALL WOULD NEED TO FIND A PRIVATE SECTOR INSURANCE SUPPLEMENTAL PLAN IN ORDER TO MAKE THEIR ' THEOCON GIFT ' WHOLE.

You must speak truth as a pastor or shepherd to these greedy malevolents who feel that they are God's Elect - the soul that you save may indeed be their own.

[dewdrop_world]

For some real blood boilers, basically justifying a racist opposition to economic justice, check this out:

http://archives.umc.org/idealbb/view...ageNo=3&num=20

John 7:13's last post.

I want all of you to think back and remember. . . . WHITE America.

You remember "White America," don't you?

You didn't need to lock the doors on your house. You didn't need security bars on your windows....

I saw this today, not long after shutting up a couple of conservative liars on a different thread, at least temporarily.

http://archives.umc.org/idealbb/view.asp?topicID=630

It all reminds me of a quote whose author I don't remember -- "Nothing convinces me more of God's unending mercy than the continued existence on earth of His church."

In fact, I think I'm going to go post that over there right now. Let the fireworks begin!

James

[suzer1013]

Hopefully, I can respond more in depth to the poverty discussion soon. It is an issue I am committed to, but feel powerless to change. I have created some small change in this world, but would love to discuss the subject when I have more time. I have done some work assisting the poverty stricken in Africa, and the problem is far more complex than I can understand. Not to mention, the poverty right here in the good ol' U.S.A.

There are a couple of books Salon has reviewed recently on the problem of poverty in Africa. I'd like to read those books, if I ever get the time. (I have a stack of books to read that I never seem to get to -- I keep finding more of interest, and add them to the pile -- I'll be lucky if I get through them all before I'm 80.)

Wanted to note, also, that I just saw the racist post on the UMC boards, too, and I HAD to respond. I've tried to limit my posts there recently, but I simply could not let that one go.

Susan

[Zerbie]

Here is a charity in need of support.

http://www.karunamayi.org/charities/...hospital.shtml

Hope the link works.

Okay, according to my attempt just now, it doesn't. Go to the home page which is www.karunamayi.org. Click on "charities."

[kara speltz]

Originally Posted by NathanATX

Americans are not going to solve poverty by selling their comfortable homes and moving to shacks. We are going to solve poverty by making this issue a priority for ALL levels of government. We are going to solve poverty by ensuring access to quality education for all children. We are going to solve poverty by increasing the minimum wage. We are going to solve poverty by modifying/eliminating tax breaks for mega-profitable companies. We are going to solve poverty by regulating the debt industry that profits off of low income earners. We are going to solve poverty through FINANCIAL EDUCATION. We are going to solve poverty by changing our values from being proud of our "bling-bling" to being proud of how much money we have saved & invested.

Dear Nathan: I agree and disagree with the above statement. Gandhi said it best, I think. "Live simply so that others might simply live." We Americans consume something like 85% of the worlds resources!!!! Think about that we are less than 15% of the world's population consuming 85% of its resources. One of the great lessons of the Catholic Worker movement was to live simply. It's not about giving up things as focusing your life on what it is you really need. My life is hardly one of what has been referred to as, "Voluntary Poverty." I have all that I need. But I have been able to cut back significantly to the point where I can live comfortably on $12,000 a year. This simple living means I am not spending my time "scrambling to make a lot of money." I have time to be there for someone living with AIDS, or others in need of help.

I truly believe that the answer to violence is a commitment to living simply. When we Americans stop grabbing all the resources, we will no longer be a target of people's anger and resentment. There are many resources to this idea of living simply. Just google Simple Living and see what comes up.

Kara

[revtj]

This is an issue near and dear to my heart. I applaud the wisdom & commitment each of you brings to the conversation.

Sometimes when poverty is put in the global perspective it can be so overwhelming to ordinary western christians that we don't know what else we can do besides write a check and pray. And there's nothing wrong with that!

Just remember there is poverty right around the corner from you. There are aging people hidden away in nursing homes, ignored, sometimes abused. There are many other examples so I won't belabor the point.

One thing that bugs me persistently as a community minister commited to the struggle for equality & justice-making is how much money the religious right wastes on scaring people about us gay people while the poor and the homeless stand by ignored. Think what could happen if the billions raised by the anti-gay industry were put to gospel use, feeding the poor, housing the homeless, visiting the sick & imprisoned...

I think it's U2 Rock star Bono ( http://one.org/ )who has pointed out that we could end poverty and cure many diseases in a very short time if we tried. My prayer is that those who think the gospel is about scaring people into hating their neighbor would repent and put their resources toward the work of Christ. Imagine that!

[NathanATX]

Originally Posted by kara speltz

Dear Nathan: I agree and disagree with the above statement. Gandhi said it best, I think. "Live simply so that others might simply live." We Americans consume something like 85% of the worlds resources!!!! Think about that we are less than 15% of the world's population consuming 85% of its resources. One of the great lessons of the Catholic Worker movement was to live simply. It's not about giving up things as focusing your life on what it is you really need. My life is hardly one of what has been referred to as, "Voluntary Poverty." I have all that I need. But I have been able to cut back significantly to the point where I can live comfortably on $12,000 a year. This simple living means I am not spending my time "scrambling to make a lot of money." I have time to be there for someone living with AIDS, or others in need of help.

I truly believe that the answer to violence is a commitment to living simply. When we Americans stop grabbing all the resources, we will no longer be a target of people's anger and resentment. There are many resources to this idea of living simply. Just google Simple Living and see what comes up.

Kara

Hi Kara,
First, let me say thanks for all that you are doing with Soulforce. It was great to meet you briefly during the Equality Ride's stop in Garland, TX.

I hear what you're saying about Simple Living. I actually work helping families get out of debt & plan for their retirement. Most of the time my clients have found themselves in bad financial situations because they are trying to live beyond their income. Most don't really know what their spending lives should look like based on their income. The ones that have educated themselves about money and realize what their budget for certain items should be, find ways to justify "living large." Of course, some families' finances are spun out of control by things outside of their control, like divorce, death, disability, job loss, birth of new children, etc.

I COMPLETELY agree that we need a cultural values shift. Right now, when most people go to the car dealership, they don't ask: "What kind of car do I need? How will choosing this car/loan impact my financial future? What is the total financial impact of this car going to be and could I do anything to lessen the impact, i.e. buy a smaller/cheaper/less "cool" car?" Instead of "keeping up with the Joneses," we need to be focused on increasing our family's net worth.

I think we differ on the pursuit of wealth, though. If I am committed to living modestly, making sound purchases, not destroying myself or my family to be successful, etc., is there anything wrong with wanting & working to be wealthy? I don't think so.

I think an important part of addressing poverty is addressing the poverty mentality: The lack of hope for a better life. Not realizing there is life beyond living paycheck to paycheck. Not believing in one's abilities and ambitions. Carrying the burden of not being able to adequately provide for children or elderly family members.

I fully intend to be wealthy. I will be just as committed to my faith, to my family, to giving, to social justice, etc., as I am today... except that money will then be no obstacle to doing anything I feel led to do.

By giving people the education, the inspiration and the example they need, we can help them journey out of poverty forever.

[NathanATX]

I should add, the initial post was prompted by the religous wrong's attack on our families and churches, manipulating them to achieve unbridled political power. When, in fact, we need to be setting political agendas ourselves, instead of having them fed to us. I believe ending poverty is an incredibly urgent task that needs to be a top priority of our political agendas.

We need to take our political parties back. Get the theocons/dominionists out of our government. Prevent the government from allowing big business to profit off the poor.

[revtj]

When did we ever have a party (unless you mean circuit parties)?

Assuming you mean political parties, both of them use us as bad as the religious right does so I'm more prone to say throw them out rather than take them back.

<lipsink: 'Enough is Enough' by Donna Summer>

[Liberal Crozier]

My mother will be 92 years old exactly one and two days before I turn 60.
Yes, at 32, my mother was at the high end of the women who gave birth to the first and largest Boomer year ever. Your 42nd and 43rd presidents are ironically joining me in celebrating the big 6-0 this year.

Even the lower end of the spectrum would put these women from 75 years old to 85 years on average.

This generation was born during WWI or shortly after. They were raised by parents born in the mid to late nineteenth century and had virtues of self -reliance since the difference between wealth and poverty was significant and almost oppositional. As youngsters, some delayed or denied themselves educational or marital opportunities because of a global depression. They subsequently fought or awaited someone who fought in WWII. They married late, educated in late life, and raised children who were indulged and given all they had been denied. More, they often than not inculcated a strong faith tradition and in your grandparents' final days, they often brought him or her into the family bosom until they died.

TJ is right. They are filling nursing homes and extended care facilities modelled to provide everything from minor supervision to total care. We visit two of these nursing homes every week. Our son has so many honourary grannies and grandpas .

Many of these individuals never met a same-sex family before they met ours.
We provided them with love, and consistent companionship for a time certain every week for several years now. You may ask if they wished to discuss our family in theocon contexts. The answer is no, because we were too busy creating life examples of love of neighbour as deeply as ourselves.

Many had theocon pastors and many were manipulated during voting periods. Several of these men wanted to exclude us from their support system. Have you ever seen women of my mother's generation respond to our kind of mutual lovefesting? I understand that one particular strident clergy person of the AG denomination had several of our surrogate mom and grannies with a few men for good measure actually escorting the man out of their presence.

We have also been instrumental in bringing Boomer children and Gen X grandchildren to the home for weekly meals and playfests. Yes, playfests. Who taught my generation to play, anyway?

Although circumstances and conscience have brought me into an episcopi vagantes reality, as a Christian we are still called to the principal vocation of laity.

Poverty manifests itself far beyond the lack of a sufficient income to pay for anything but survival goods and services, or less. Poverty of spirit and a bankrupt soul are often more fixable than finding disposable income that you may not have. There is also poverty of commitment and compassion from our legislative, judicial and executive elected officials who forget to provide for the common welfare of its citizenry, while most assuredly paying for a "defence" whose true mission is the destruction of the planet and its perceived enemies.

[tdogg]

Originally Posted by revtj

When did we ever have a party (unless you mean circuit parties)?

Assuming you mean political parties, both of them use us as bad as the religious right does so I'm more prone to say throw them out rather than take them back.

I agree! IMO, it's all about the money whether Rep or Dem. $$$

So...maybe it's time to start a new political era - the GLBT party (or whatever we want to call it). Let those of us with political aspirations rise to the occasion and see what can be done to 'overthrow' the politicans of the day. Maybe that's when we will finally see some victorious progress in our fight for equality. Complicated, expensive, time consuming - very possibly necessary to get to where we want to be.

Any aspiring politicians out there?????

[NathanATX]

The Colbert Report on Poverty & Class Warfare (satire)
http://movies.crooksandliars.com/CR-...assWarfare.wmv

[Lydia]

Originally Posted by tdogg

I agree! So...maybe it's time to start a new political era - the GLBT party (or whatever we want to call it).

I don't aspire to politics, but I'd support this idea.

[Zerbie]

Originally Posted by kara speltz

I have all that I need. But I have been able to cut back significantly to the point where I can live comfortably on $12,000 a year.
Kara

How the *$%! When I was earning that, I was going into debt just trying to work on my career. My rent was $400/month, I had 2 pair of shoes, I owned no CDs, no gadgets, my computer was a gift and so was my car (seeing as mom & dad sold it to me used for only $500), and I was going into the red just eating, sleeping, working, and trying to get the career going. Sometimes I didn't pay the rent til the third week of the month (made my roommate pay up front and wait til I could scrounge up my half.) HOW in the world are you not doing the same right now??????

[Vortex]

Thank you Nathan for bringing up this important issue, a few of my thoughts on the matter.

Competitive situations guarantee winners and losers. We learned this from our earliest age playing competitive sports. When you apply this to economics though the ramifications are far greater, the result is the ‘haves’ and the ‘have nots’.

If the above statement is true the following ‘solutions’ will NOT end poverty.

Progressive Tax System: Redistributing wealth or the ‘Robin Hood Approach’ fails to address the reasons behind inequality of wealth in the first place, we are a consumer driven competitive society, so it stands to reason that the wealth would eventually redistribute itself. If all the wealth in the U.S. was redistributed evenly for everyone and the same economic system was kept, the inequalities of wealth observed prior would eventually return over time.

Charity/Social Programs: Same situation as the above, the redistribution of wealth. ‘Magic Bullet’

Education: Ahhh, here is the answer everyone clings too to solve all our problems, as they should though because it is very important. However let’s say everyone in the U.S. magically received the same education and was equally as smart as everyone else. The job structure in our country is one of pyramidal hierarchy, in other words there are very few of the higher paying jobs at the point of the pyramid, and a lot more lower paying jobs at the base. Not to mention there are a finite number of jobs in the first place and we are all competing for them. Now having equal education would in fact make us better able to compete with each other, but ultimately there would be winners and losers as in all competitive situations, resulting in unequal distribution of wealth.

I should point out that I support all of the prior points, but for the purposes of this post I am only pointing out that I do not think any will end poverty under the current economic system.


Solution: Well if the above hasn’t completely depressed you and you’ve made it this far, how can we go about solving poverty? I hope you’re sitting down for this. An end to all competitive economic practices in favor of a more mutualistic collectivist approach to resource sharing on a global scale. In other words instead of us all competing over Earth’s finite resources( and they are finite) we instead share resources equally. In order for this to functionally be successful though it will take a fundamental change in how we value things. Nate made some very good points, we are a society that is very materialistic, and obsessed with acquiring wealth, perhaps if we began to place as much value on other things( say human beings for instance) we could also learn live together peacefully along with solving poverty. Now this is a very abridged version of a solution, I will be happy to expand it further for anyone interested.


P.S. If anyone can come up with a solution in which under a competitive situation there are no losers, I would like to hear it.
Other areas of research related to philosophies on poverty and competitive situations:

Egalitarianism
Collectivism
Game Theory
Prisoner’s Dilemma


Vortex

[revtj]

Vortex, your post reminds me of the perennial argument over Jesus' words to Judas after the woman annoints him with expensive perfume. Judas complains that the perfume could have been sold to help feed the poor and Jesus is reported as replying, "The poor you shall always have with you, but the Son of Man is with you but a short while."

Historically, christians of most flavors have taken this to mean there will always be poor people because God ordained it. The next logical step was/is, God ordained it so christians would have someone to show charity towards and thus manifest the love of Christ in the world. The conclusion has been to forget the poor because Jesus said we'd always be burdened with them, and besides, the passage shows clearly you should give God your best, not the poor. End result: a theology of condescension which, paired with imperialism, is used to justify war, genocide, and theft of land & property.

Hmmm...can christians do any better than this? A few are trying but they aren't leaders in the church or the nation right now, so we've entered this period of regression which is widening the gap between rich and poor, and may very well destroy the planet.

Nathan, et. al., we turn our hopes & prayers to your generation!

[we now interrupt this thread for an important announcement from the president: We're Going to Mars!]

[NathanATX]

Originally Posted by Vortex

....Nate made some very good points, we are a society that is very materialistic, and obsessed with acquiring wealth...

I think what really causes the harm is that most people are obsessed with aquiring the appearance of wealth. For instance, if we were more concerned about becoming wealthy, we wouldn't drive $40,000 cars, we'd drive the base model Toyota Corolla that sells for $14k. (I realize many would be thrilled to have a Corolla.)

We care too much of what others think of us.

We get way too much of our sense of value & worth from the things we have and the successes we've reached.

Our financial freedom is absolutely essential. It brings peace of mind, freedom to choose, and the ability to follow your heart when responding to someone's need.

For me, wealth is not about "lifestyles of the rich & famous." It's about having the freedom and the ability to live my life to the fullest.

[tdogg]

In California, $12k per year would barely pay apartment rent for a small one-bedroom in a decent (not great) community. There are rural areas where you might get by on $12k, but it would cover rent, utlities and some food. Virtually impossible here.

Living simply is a matter of relativity. It's very different to the person who makes $24k a year, and then to the couple who together make $100k, and then to those who are worth millions and even billions of $$. My partner and I live in a very modest small older home, we don't have a lot of extras although I do have the luxury of owning a horse (to me it's almost a necessity, but wouldn't be understood by most people who don't have the 'horse disease'), we each have a car and we have some pets. We also have a lot of family that we help out. There aren't a lot of extras, but we enjoy trips here and there and have season tickets to the local WNBA team. There are a handful of charities to which I regularly contribute, but
I would be hard-pressed to give any of the above up so extra money could be given to causes.

But there are other ways to contribute - they take time, energy, willingness, these things are almost harder to give up than our money. And then, just imagine what we could do about poverty if we weren't spending billions on the Iraq war??? Not that the country would, but we could. If living off $12k works for someone, I think that's great. If it doesn't, that's okay too. The real tragedy is for anyone, no matter how much money they are living off of, to live their lives as if these issues and problems don't exist, and that it isn't their concern or responsibility, to live with the issues completely out of their thought process. We must all be aware that the issues exist and determine what we are willing and able to devote to those issues, and then stick with it.

[Vanessa White]

Living simply has me thinking on this issue quite a bit. I am in the process of creating a new living arrangement for myself, after my relationship ending, and needing a place big enough for myself, and our daughter when she is with me. The idea of seeking out a new living space has me revisiting the concept of living more simply, because I feel like my life has become cluttered with "things" that I have invested money in that could be better spent in other ways. My daughter already values helping others that need it with her time and her commitment (she collected toys last year at Christmas for children in the New Orleans area) and she enjoys and feels good about doing it. I hope to keep that light alive of that type, and to also expand upon it by lightening our load, so that our future can financially be secure to be able to help others, maybe in an expanded way. We also educate our students on campus here in NE PA. about helping others by sponsoring service trips each year, within and outside of the country, to help others to rebuild homes, and hope.