wfn.org | Concern for children draws United Methodists to U.N.

[NewsDesk <NewsDesk@UMCOM.ORG>]

May 9, 2002       News media contact: Linda Bloom7(212) 870-38037New York
10-21-31-71BP{218}

NOTE: Photographs of Bishops Leontine T.C. Kelly and Marshall L. "Jack"
Meadors Jr. and Hannah Meadors are available at
http://umns.umc.org/photos/headshots.html online.

UNITED NATIONS (UMNS) - The crises facing children around the world
influenced the United Methodist Council of Bishops' decision to launch the
Initiative on Children and Poverty.

That concern also is the focus of the General Assembly Special Session on
Children, meeting May 8-10 at the United Nations. The nongovernmental
observers include two retired United Methodist bishops, Leontine T.C. Kelly
and Marshall L. "Jack" Meadors Jr., as well as Hannah Meadors, a consultant
for the initiative and wife of the bishop. 

The special session was called to review gains and losses for the world's
children during the past 12 years, since the United Nations first set
specific goals to improve children's lives. The session also is working on a
new list of goals.

"This is not just a special session on children. It is a gathering about the
future of humanity," said U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan at the session's
May 8 opening. "We are meeting here because there is no issue more unifying,
more urgent or more universal than the welfare of our children. There is no
issue more important."

Children are active participants in the session and are being allowed, for
the first time, to speak officially to the U.N. General Assembly. A
Children's Forum also met just before the special session.

On the morning of May 8, Kelly listened to a girl from Ghana tell how
refugees need education and a future to look forward to as well as food and
shelter. A youth from Uganda described how young people there had gathered
the courage to ask the government to stop recruiting children as soldiers.

One youth, Mrs. Meadors said, wisely predicted that when history becomes
less important than the future, the world will begin to solve its problems.

"What I think we have not done in the past is learn how to listen to the
children," she explained. "I would like to applaud this session for doing
that."

Diane Felder, a fifth-grade teacher from Alabama attending the special
session as a representative of the Women's Division, United Methodist Board
of Global Ministries, agreed. "A lot of the problem comes because we don't
listen," she said.

United Methodist bishops have invited children to speak to them as they have
continued their work on the Bishops' Initiative on Children and Poverty. The
initiative is encouraging all levels of the church to help meet the
spiritual and practical needs of children and the poor.

At their May meeting, the bishops pledged support for legislation in
Congress that would increase funding for child care and the Head Start
program and extend health care coverage to 9 million uninsured children.
They also agreed to spend June 12 in Washington lobbying for that cause. 

Before its conclusion on May 10, the U.N. special session is expected to
adopt a document titled "A World Fit for Children," promoting access to
health care and a quality education; protection against abuse, exploitation
and violence; and a continued fight against the worldwide infection of
HIV/AIDS.

"We are determined to respect the dignity and to secure the well-being of
all children," the document says. "We reaffirm our obligation to take action
and to promote and protect the rights of each child - every human being
below the age of 18 years, including adolescents."

The Convention on the Rights of the Child is considered an important
document to achieve such goals, and Bishop Meadors said he hopes the session
will create "an enthusiasm and commitment" among United Methodists to
persuade the U.S. government to ratify the convention. The United States and
Somalia are the only countries that have not ratified the 1989 treaty.

A new UNICEF campaign, "Say Yes for Children" is another important avenue of
action "that the church and all society can latch on to," Meadors added.

The "Say Yes for Children" movement started with children themselves, noted
Levi Bautista, an executive with the United Methodist Board of Church and
Society, which made arrangements for the United Methodist delegation.
Inaugurated last year, the campaign lists 10 priority actions to change the
world on behalf of children and has won the support of more than 94 million
people, mostly children and youth.

As a follow-up to the special session, delegation members will help Board of
Church and Society staff develop materials focusing on children and poverty
for United Nations Sunday, which occurs this year on Oct. 27.   

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United Methodist News Service
Photos and stories also available at:
http://umns.umc.org