wfn.org | [ENS] Historic religious gathering sees unique opportunity to end

["Matthew Davies" <mdavies@episcopalchurch.org>]

Wednesday, September 14, 2005

Historic religious gathering sees unique opportunity to end global
poverty

By Matthew Davies

ENS 091405-1

[Episcopal News Service] A consultation of international religious
leaders
delivered a consensus statement to the United Nations on the eve of its
60th
annual General Assembly in New York, reaffirming support for the
Millennium
Development Goals and calling for increased collaboration between
churches
and governments to augment their work for the poor.

The September 13 statement, titled "A Call to Partnership: Communiqué
from
the Consultation of Religious Leaders on Global Poverty," declared that
"one-sixth of the world's people still fight daily for survival under
the
crushing burden of extreme poverty" and urged governments to take
concrete
steps towards creating a just society, building partnerships, promoting
accountability and transparency, canceling debt, increasing development
assistance, and supporting peace-building through security. [The full
statement can be found online at:
http://www.episcopalchurch.org/3577_65547_ENG_HTM.htm]

An interfaith service of music and prayer, held at Washington National
Cathedral September 11, marked the beginning of the three-day
Consultation
and inaugurated the cathedral's Center for Global Justice and
Reconciliation, headed by the former secretary general of the Anglican
Communion, the Rev. Canon John L. Peterson.

"People have gathered for this service from around the globe and from
different religious traditions," said the Very Rev. Samuel Lloyd, dean
of
the cathedral. "And they've come together for one purpose: to seek by
the
spirit of God to galvanize the nations of the earth to end the
devastating
poverty that besets a billion of our brothers and sisters across this
planet."

A unique moment

Speaking at the service, Griswold described the U.N. meeting as a
"unique
moment" and one that gives people of faith a special mandate. "Now is a
moment for people to come together across national boundaries and
religious
affiliations," he said, "to contemplate how the work of reconciliation
can
be lived out in our lives."

Introduced by Griswold, former U.S. secretary of state Madeleine
Albright
said that when she served as the U.S.'s permanent representative to the
U.N.
nothing made her prouder than to sit behind a sign that read simply
"United
States." "Nothing disappoints me more now than to have that label
attached
to policies that fail to reflect the generosity and compassion of the
American people," she said.

Albright also criticized the United States' proposed revisions to U.N.
poverty-reduction strategies, suggested by John Bolton, the U.S.
ambassador
to the U.N., in August.

A religious delegation that included Peterson and Archbishop Njongonkulu
Ndungane of Cape Town met with U.N. deputy secretary general Madame
Fréchette and Jean Ping, president of the general assembly, on
September 13.
"[Fréchette and Ping] were very responsive to the communiqué,"
Peterson
said, "calling on the church to do everything they can to enable this to
happen."

'A powerful message'

Alex Baumgarten, international policy analyst at the Episcopal Church's
Office of Government Relations, accompanied the religious delegation to
New
York. "Particularly at a time when the U.S. government is urging the
international community to back away from the Millennium Development
Goals,
this unprecedented unity of religious leaders sends a powerful message
that
the goals represent humanity's best option for ending the scandal of
poverty
in our time," he said.

Jeffrey Sachs, director of the Earth Institute at Columbia University
and
special advisor to U.N. Secretary General Kofi Annan, delivered a
lecture at
Washington National Cathedral prior to the interfaith service September
11..
"The voices of the poor ... are telling us they want to survive," he
said..
"That they want their children to survive. That they want their children
to
be healthy enough and have enough food so that they can sit in a
classroom
... rather than being trapped in a world of disease, despair and
violence."

Three years ago, Annan asked Sachs to pull together a network of leading
scientists and development practitioners from around the world to assess
what could be done in order to meet the Millennium Development Goals.
The
results focused on issues such as malaria, tuberculosis, HIV/AIDS, safe
drinking water, urban slums, access to essential medicines, hunger,
gender
equity, schooling, the mobilization of science and technology,
international
trading system and environmental sustainability.

"What we found indisputably was that these goals are achievable, because
in
every area, whether it's feeding people in Africa, fighting malaria,
helping
people with AIDS to stay alive, there are practical, proven, low cost
interventions that can accomplish the tasks," Sachs said.

Sachs, who visited 14 African countries this summer, explained that the
U.S.. government has not responded adequately to crises such as malaria.

"The amount we're spending for 750 million Africans struggling for
survival
.... is $3 billion total. That's 3 cents out of every $100 of our
national
income," Sachs said, noting that the U.S. government had previously
committed to giving 0.7 percent of its gross national product as
official
development assistance in the Monterrey Consensus of March 2002.

"I think we have to act if our government will not," Sachs said. "We
have to
find ways to rise to this challenge, to make commitments and to take
action."

On September 12, Sachs helped launch Millennium Promise, which "aims to
be
an open, broad partnership of like-minded people who say it's time for
leadership through action." Details about Millennium Promise can be
found
online at: http://www.millenniumpromise.org.

At a September 13 news conference, Ndungane explained that there are a
billion people who live on less than a dollar a day and 120 million
children
who can't go to school. "That is not only scandalous, it is immoral, it
is
evil," he said. "Therefore we have committed ourselves to being in
strategic
partnerships with various NGOs in seeking to end hunger. Our
mobilization as
faith communities and civil society would enable us to achieve this
goal."

-- Matthew Davies is staff writer and web manager of Episcopal News
Service..

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