wfn.org | NCC STATEMENT ON PENDING WELFARE REFORM LEGISLATION

[CAROL_FOUKE.parti@ecunet.org]

National Council of the Churches of Christ in the U.S.A.
Contact: Carol J. Fouke, NCC, 212-870-2252
Internet: carol_fouke.parti@ecunet.org

NCC7/31/96

Statement of Rev. Dr. Albert M. Pennybacker
Associate General Secretary for Public Policy
National Council of Churches
July 29, 1996

Let me begin by commenting on a curious exchange between Archbishop
Weakland of Milwaukee and Gov. Thompson of Wisconsin.  The archbishop wrote
an op-ed piece calling into
question the Wisconsin Welfare Reform plan and its impact on the poor.  The
governor responded by suggesting the archbishop needed to spend more time
with the Bible and what it says about "responsibility."  What the governor
failed to understand that this responsibility the Bible talks about is
exactly our responsibility for one another!  That is what the Archbishop
clearly understands.  It is not a good idea to challenge a clergyman on the
basis of the Bible!

So, let me say a word about the Bible's teaching.  For instance, Jesus'
parable in St. Matthew's Gospel where the final judgment is not in terms of
the prayers we offer or the budget we balance but in terms of the poor and
the abused and the abandoned.  "... In as much as you have done it unto one
of the least of these..."  Most of us can complete that verse.

Or the words of St. Paul that I hope Governor Thompson will note: "Bear ye
one another's burdens and thus fulfill the laws of Christ" - the law of
caring for one another at the heart of all scripture.

In an industrialized, capitalist, varied and popular society, religious
people, along with all people of faith and good will, have seen government
as a vehicle of caring - an instrument of compassion - a way of providing
for the common good, especially a way of undergirding and supporting those
who know poverty, or cannot provide for themselves or one another "the
poor" who, as every capitalist knows, we have among us and will have among
us always (as Jesus affirmed).  Religious faith at its best brings our
common values and our commitment to the well being of all to the exercise
of the powers of government.  The issues are not finally philosophical or
political but moral, especially here.

The so-called welfare reform legislation (and we all support reform as the
National Council's resolution available today confirms) is not reform.  It
kills the "safety net" of public provision and compassion - and puts
endless numbers - millions, largely women and children - into needless
agony.  As our General Secretary has said, "Abandoning the poor - I would
add, creating more misery and poverty for them - is not the way of an
America we want."

Taking food provisions away?  Removing care for 300,000 disabled children?
Excluding legal immigrants among us - who should be welcomed, and
especially so, since they are largely people of color?

And even those who might work?  No one wants to encourage indolence but
this current bill is a welfare "Catch 22".  Those ill equipped - by lack of
education or training, or perhaps heritage or even lacking of will - can't
find work in a society that has higher and higher skill expectations. So
they can't make it - and we act to punish them by taking what meager
provisions they have.  Is this the sort of country we want to be?  A
country of meanness and greed where "happiness" belongs only to me - or a
country of generosity and sharing, where "happiness" is what we want for
all - the universal "well-being" which is God's intent?

Let me speak not only to Congress and legislators and members of the
Administration, including the President.  Let me speak to members of our
churches, men and women of faith: we are fair and caring people, not mean
and greedy.  It is now urgent that you speak the caring you feel.  Flood
those who represent you with letters.  Insist on changes in the legislation
so that it expresses our compassion for those who suffer, especially the
children.  Call for a veto by the President until we get it right!  Our
President has stood strong.  Support him in standing strong again - make a
veto possible.  And silence those political voices that want to make the
President's guardianship of the vulnerable become a political liability
instead of an American mandate rooted in the will of caring people.

As the National Council's General Secretary has said, "Our nation is more
than the sum of its
states... The moral vision that claims us - all of us together - has led us
to craft a society committed to providing for and protecting the poor, the
vulnerable, the children, the elderly, the stranger in our midst..." In
another passage of Scripture there is a warning: "that anyone who causes
one of these little ones to stumble..." (and this legislation does exactly
that: it causes the little ones, regardless of age, to stumble)...it is
better that a millstone be placed about his neck and he be cast into the
heart of the sea."

It is not a casual warning.  This legislation is a stumblingblock.  We can
do better! It needs to be repudiated - blocked - vetoed - by those we lead.
As a compassionate and responsible society, we need to insist on it!

Or the millstone will belong to us all.