November Fast Materials Focus on Haiti
Over the next 12 months, Presbyterians across the United States and in several countries will be fasting, praying, repenting and trying to discern our response to the Global Food Crisis. This month’s 40-hour fast zeroes in on Haiti and the issue of food aid. Contributions from Haitians and many others promise to make the fast a meaningful experience. We hope you will join in the fast!
Celebrating the Birth of Christ
Whose Birthday is it, Anyway?
 As the holidays approach each year we face many choices regarding Christmas, shopping, schedules and more. In addition to consumer dilemmas we are faced with spiritual dilemmas. On one hand we want to observe Advent and wait for the Christ child; on the other we want to shop and wrap and bake and run ourselves ragged with all the trimmings. Whose Birthday is it, Anyway? from Alternatives for Simple Living provides excellent resources for navigating the holidays, listening for God’s call, celebrating creatively and getting our focus back on the reason for the season. Use it in devotions at church and home, give copies to loved ones as a pre-holiday gift, or use it as a guide to shape a more meaningful holiday season. [Order copies]
Fair trade: a simple choice for a better world
 Rehima Hussein, twelve years old in this photo, is one of 15 children. She and her coffee-farming family live far from town, but thanks to the economic benefits of Fair Trade, Rehima completed high school and now attends college. PHP supports fair trade through our programs and grants. One of these grants was for $10,000 to the New York State Labor-Religion Coalition (LRC) to strengthen their Fair Trade Project. Learn more about the difference buying fair trade makes.
Responses to climate change could increase hunger
Biofuels (fuels made from plants like corn, palm oil trees and other biomass) are touted as a substitute for fossil fuels with fewer global warming emissions. But is it true? New research demonstrates that biofuels may actually increase greenhouse emissions.
Find out What's New and learn more about climate change and its impact on hunger.
Make Poverty History hot off the press
PHP has just produced with Church World Service a brand-new educational booklet with simulations, skits and worship activities on hunger and poverty. The activities relate to the Millennium Development Goals (MDG) of Hunger and Poverty, Education, Health, Environment/Water and Partners in Development. The target year for halving hunger and poverty is 2015, so don't wait. Learn how to make poverty history and order or download this resource. [Read more]
Remembering the Lessons of Hurricane Katrina
By Leslie Woods, Associate for Domestic Poverty and Environmental Issues, Presbyterian Washington Office
In January 2007, riding on a bus down St. Claude Avenue, which cuts across the Lower Ninth Ward of New Orleans, I was struck that the Lower Ninth hasn’t changed much since I started visiting almost a year ago. To my left was the neighborhood of Holy Cross, where small, respectable houses that had clearly once been lovely and well-kept homes, were slowly being gutted. To my right was utter devastation.
On my first visit, the right side of St. Claude looked like a war zone. Houses were washed away, trees uprooted, and debris littered, piled as high as the houses that no longer stood there. Read the rest of Leslie’s account
Read the Hunger Program’s special report – with photos - from New Orleans
Hunger and poverty increases in the United States
While the U.S. government can help alleviate hunger by improving and expanding the national nutritional programs, ending hunger ultimately requires broader efforts to reduce poverty in America through decent, good-paying jobs.
Toward that end, PHP supports living wage campaigns and Let Justice Roll. Learn more about Let Justice Roll and educate yourself and people in your congregation through the resources available through PHP.
The numbers are staggering. Today 37 million Americans live in a state of poverty, hunger and hardship. That's more than last year. More than ever before. But working together, we can reverse the trend. By joining with those in need, we can change the picture of poverty to one of hope. Hope comes through the Hunger Program grants and through our work with partners to collaboratively solve this problem.
Ending extreme poverty is realistic
 Photo by Dan White The world could end extreme poverty within a decade if wealthy
nations fulfilled their pledges to increase development aid,
Columbia University economist Jeffrey D. Sachs said on Jan.
17 as he presented a plan to the United Nations for achieving
that goal. To learn more, read "The End of Poverty." |
