An Urgent Need for
Bold & Unified Action
People of faith generally agree that hunger in America is an urgent moral scandal that we must address.
Nevertheless the problem continues to grow, in our nation and in our state.
The reason we are losing this battle against hunger is not that we don’t do enough—faith communities have expanded the emergency food system hugely over the last three decades, and still provide the bulk of food assistance.
Our problem is that we are addressing the symptoms and not the cause: hunger is a political condition, the direct result of policy decisions made in Washington DC and Albany.
In 1980, only a few dozen emergency feeding programs existed in all of New York State. Now there are over 3,000 emergency feeding programs, and the problem is greater than ever.
Why? Because people in power (Democrat and Republican alike) decided to give more money to the wealthy, shrink the middle class, and make cuts in programs for the poor.
What is required is a new form of action, a movement from charity to justice, a new courage and boldness in witnessing to the powers that be that policies punishing the poor must be changed for good. That is what the Faith & Hunger Network exists to encourage and facilitate. |
Members of a Unitarian church express their faith via citizenship, raising a prophetic voice to their elected representatives