i preached yesterday, sunday january 1, in fairfield. in my sermon, drawing on isaiah 62:1 (For Zion's sake I will not keep silent, and for Jerusalem's sake I will not rest, until her vindication shines out like the dawn, and her salvation like a burning torch) i asked: if we are now given the surprising joy of being adopted by god on account of jesus' birth and life and death in the face of all the powers of evil in this world, then what? what, i asked, does our christmas joy have to do with our new year's resolutions? and i offered the idea that, with isaiah and the people's return from exile to a destroyed city, and their crying out to god to be faithful and make of their suffering a promised vindication shining like the dawn, so we who see the suffering of the poor in the world and are pierced through the heart when we think of children dying every three seconds from preventable causes related to poverty, we too should cry out and join god's work in bringing justice and equity to the world, or at least more than we now experience. to that end, our center is focusing our 2006 sarah smith conference on wealth and poverty. and we're going to call it 'crumbs from the table?' the creation of wealth and the persistence of poverty. it will deal in part with the sorts of issues that really came to the front of world attention in 2005 under the rubric of 'making poverty history' and the 'one' campaign. more on this to come, but attention and energy to this work is my number one new years resolution. here is the nytimes editorial from yesterday, apparently making a similar commitment.
Making Poverty History in 2006
"It was a banner year in 2005 for big speeches from global leaders about fighting third-world poverty. But if any of their promises are going to come close to being kept, 2006 must be a year of action.
The British prime minister, Tony Blair, called Africa's poverty "the fundamental moral challenge of our generation." The United Nations' secretary general, Kofi Annan, spoke of a generation that could make poverty history. President Bush twice stood on the world stage and promised to sharply increase development assistance to poor nations. He did it first at the Group of 8 summit meeting in Scotland in July, when he pledged to double aid to Africa by 2010. He did it again two months later, at a United Nations meeting in New York, where he urged that the "Monterrey Consensus," which calls on rich countries to increase their spending on development aid to 0.7 percent of gross national product, be put into effect.
And finally, at last month's World Trade Organization meeting in Hong Kong, trade ministers from 149 countries agreed to eliminate export subsidies for farm products by 2013, opening up new opportunities to farmers from poor countries who now have to compete against subsidized products. The ministers also vowed to offer technical export assistance to poor countries and to get rid of cotton export subsidies this year.
These were all very fine words. This year, it is our fervent hope that the men who stood up on the world stage and uttered them will put them into action. It is past time for global leaders to put the Millennium Development plan they hatched back at the turn of the century into real action and make poverty history. It's time to channel real money into ground-level, village-based water programs, to actually spend money on a malaria vaccine and AIDS drugs and mosquito bed nets and school feeding programs. There are ways to bypass corrupt local governments, and funnel aid directly to those on the ground who need it. It is time for President Bush to go to Capitol Hill and demand that lawmakers fully finance his Millennium Challenge Account, which is supposed to increase United States assistance to poor countries that are committed to policies promoting development. This program is a worthy endeavor, but both execution and funding have been lackluster.
Britain, France and Germany all coupled their goals of spending 0.7 percent of their gross national products on development aid with a timetable; the target date is 2015. The United States has not been so specific. (To its credit, the United States did join with six other rich countries to reach a deal to eliminate $40 billion of debt owed by some of the world's poorest countries.)
The world needs no more speeches in 2006 about global poverty. The six million children under 5 who die every year of diseases that can be easily and cheaply treated do not need more lofty goals. Nor do the 40 million young people still unable to go to school, or the 300 million Africans who lack access to clean water. The time for talking is over. Our resolution for the new year is to keep track of how many of last year's promises turn into something more than words."
Recent Comments