Interfaith leaders urge protection of federal poverty assistance

[Worldwide Faith News <wfn@igc.org>]

Interfaith leaders urge protection of federal poverty assistance

> Written by Wire Reports
> July 15, 2011

Representing a growing movement of Americans
concerned that the Administration and Congress
are enacting a budget deal that will place an
undue burden on the poor "while shielding the
wealthiest from any additional sacrifice,"
leaders representing the Christian, Jewish and
Muslim faiths today launched a new campaign to
encourage policymakers to maintain a robust U.S.
commitment to domestic and international poverty programs.

Inspired by a common spiritual conviction that
God has called on all Americans to protect the
vulnerable and promote the dignity of all
individuals living in society, the interfaith
coalition is aiming to protect those struggling
to overcome poverty in the U.S. and abroad and to
exclude programs that protect people in poverty
from the budget deficit debates.

More than 25 heads of communion and national
religious organizations, including UCC General
Minister and President the Rev. Geoffrey A.
Black, are spearheading an 18-month faith-based
public policy campaign to urge Congress and the
Administration to exempt programs that assist
at-risk families and children in the U.S. and
abroad from budget cuts. The campaign will
consist of high-level meetings with policymakers,
a Washington fly-in of religious leaders and
daily prayer vigils among other actions.

The daily prayer vigils are being held on the
front lawn of the United Methodist Building (100
Maryland Avenue, NE, Washington, DC) near the
U.S. Capitol Building where the UCC's Justice and
Witness Ministries Washington office is housed.
Led by a different religious organization each
day at 12:30 p.m. EDT, the prayer vigils will
continue throughout the White House led budget negotiations.

To kick-off the campaign, the religious leaders
sent urgent letters this week to President Obama,
Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) and
Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.),
House Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio), and House
Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) stating
that "People who are served by government program
? those who are poor, sick, and hungry, older
adults, children, and people with disabilities ?
should not bear the brunt of the budget-cutting burden."

The religious leaders wrote, "We share our grave
concern and dismay that the ongoing conversations
and negotiations regarding our nation's budget
may yield an outcome that places individuals and
families struggling with poverty at risk of even
further hardship while shielding the wealthiest
in our nation from any additional sacrifice."

In addition, the religious leaders, writing as
the heads of numerous U.S.-based religious
institutions and faith-based organizations that
have worked for decades in conjunction with
federal programs to combat domestic and foreign
poverty, made it clear that religious groups
would be unable to make up the difference in
funding if the government further cuts or
eliminates programs for society's most vulnerable
populations. The interfaith leaders warn that
without a sustained federal commitment to
federal- and state-run assistance programs,
religious organizations and Houses of Worship
while doing their best to help, cannot be the
sole support for the country's most vulnerable in
their most pressing times of need.

In

<http://www.ucc.org/news/pdf/Obama-let-07-13-11final.pdf>letters
to President Obama and Congress, the leaders
further explained that "Houses of worship and
communities of faith cannot meet the current
need, much less the increased hardship that would
result from severe cuts in federal, and
consequently, state programs. We need the
public-private partnership that has for decades
enabled us as a nation to respond to desperate
need, both human and environmental."

> The campaign was announced today via a
> teleconference featuring the Rev. Canon Peg
> Chemberlin, President, National Council of
> Churches and Executive Director, Minnesota
> Council of Churches; the Rev. Gradye Parsons,
> Stated Clerk of the General Assembly,
> Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.); Rabbi Steve Gutow,
> President, Jewish Council for Public Affairs; the
> Rev. John L. McCullough, Executive Director and
> CEO, Church World Service; Sister Mary Hughes,
> OP, President, Leadership Conference of Women
> Religious; Dr. Sayyid M. Syeed, National
> Director, Office for Interfaith & Community
> Alliances, Islamic Society of North America; and
> the Rev. J. Herbert Nelson, Director of Public
> Witness, Presbyterian Church USA.

During the briefing, Syeed, the National Director
for the Office for Interfaith and Community
Alliances at the Islamic Society of North
America, spoke first about our responsibility to
stand up for those who cannot speak for themselves.
He said, "It is our religious duty as part of the
faith communities to convey our concerns about
the problems of the budget cuts that will
directly impact low income individuals and the
dispossessed. We are asking for a budget that
should be just and equitable. It is our Islamic
duty because this is one of the pillars of Islam."

Gutow, president of the Jewish Council for Public
Affairs, added, "To hurt the poor by trying to
balance the budget or lessen the debt is a little
bit ridiculous." He went on to say, "We were
known by our founders as a city on a hill with a
light of justice that emanated forth and we
cannot and we must not be any less than who we are."

> Parsons, the Stated Clerk of the General
> Assembly, Presbyterian Church USA, was very
> poignant in his warning that cuts to domestic and
> international poverty programs would have a
> devastating impact not only on individuals and
> families facing economic hardship, but houses of
> worship across the country that have worked in
> conjunction with federal- and state-led economic
> assistance programs for decades.

Parsons said, "Churches alone cannot fill in the
gap if the government's social safety net is
taken away. While doing their best to help,
there's not enough capacity in all those churches
to meet the gap that would happen to if the
government was to abandon tradition and, the
fundamental role of providing a basic floor to
give people the basic human needs of food, shelter, and health care."

Sister Mary Hughes OP, President of the

Leadership Conference of Women Religious noted
that "Because of the lag in current funding,
homelessness is up 15 percent in my state. There
are usually one or more children involved in each
[homeless] family. There are faces associated with budget numbers."

> Chemberlin, President, National Council of
> Churches, said "Extreme politicians are
> threatening to stop Medicare and Social Security
> payments, stop paying our men and women fighting
> overseas, plunge even more Americans into
> unemployment, and completely abandon the poor,
> only so that they can maintain a few tax loopholes for the richest American s."

The interfaith coalition's campaign was summed up
by McCullough, the Executive Director and CEO,
Church World Service. He said, "While we don't
know what may be the final outcome of the budget
discussions between the President and Congress,
proposed cuts by Members of the House of
Representatives to humanitarian and development
programs are drastic, irresponsible, and fail to
recognize the detrimental life and death
consequences to vulnerable people recovering from
disasters and living in poverty worldwide."