Sisters of St. Joseph of Orange - PageName: Eradicate Poverty and Hunger

Friday September 10th 2010

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Eradicate Poverty and Hunger

We promise to stand with people who are poor by seeking out and addressing critical needs, particularly in those places where our presence could make a difference, realigning our attitudes, actions and resources in accord with Gospel values, and working with others to alleviate conditions of poverty and oppression.

--Promise Statement, Chapter 2006, Sisters of St. Joseph of Orange

Did you know...?

Every 3.6 seconds another person dies of starvation, and most of those are children under the age of 5.
More than 50 percent of Africans are afflicted by water related illness. These diseases greatly weaken the strength of their victims leading to decreased productivity, inability to work, and even death.
They’ve had a substantial role in inhibiting the economic growth of developing nations, especially those in sub-Saharan Africa.
Each year 5 million lives are lost to water-born diseases.
Declining soil fertility, land degradation, and the AIDS pandemic have led to a 23 percent decrease in food production per capita in the last 25 years. In 1960, Africa was a net exporter of food; today the continent imports one third of its grain and more than 40 percent of Africans do not even have the ability to obtain sufficient food on a day-today basis.
U.S. electricity production is the leading source of our nation’s air pollution responsible for 40 percent of carbon emissions, or fully one tenth of total global industrial air pollution.
In the 1940s the average U.S. home was 1200 square feet. Today the average size is 2,300 square feet, more than a 90% increase! New U.S. homes are 26 times larger than the average living space in Africa.
20% of all illnesses in the developing world are linked to inadequate sanitation, contaminated water, improper waste disposal, malnutrition and countless other factors which are directly related to the environment and environmental degradation.
The three wealthiest people on earth have more than all of the people in the poorest 48 countries. In fact, the combined wealth of the richest 225 people on this planet have more money and resources than the poorest 3 billion people combined – half of the planet!
The United States gives only 0.15% of its total GDP in foreign aid. This is less than all other industrialized nations on earth. Moreover, the majority of our aid money does not go to the poorest nations of the world, but instead to our partners and allies the two largest recipients being Israel and Egypt.

Resources:

Change a life throught a micro loan - KIVA - http://www.kiva.org/

Confront Global Poverty - Catholics Confront Global Poverty - http://donate.crs.org/site/PageNavigator/ccgp_signup

Write a letter to your legislator - Bread for the World http://www.offeringofletters.org/

Stand Up Against Poverty http://standagainstpoverty.org/

Prayer

For Those in Poverty

God of justice and compassion,

we ask forgiveness for the widening gulf between rich and poor,
for the use of money as a measure of all things,
for the culture of self-gratification,
for the continuing disparities between those that have so much

and those who have so little,

and for the suffering of those people who are excluded from the table of abundance.

Forgive us for our focus on material goods,
and our part in the worship of economic growth
in a world where resources are limited
and where we are already using more than our fair share.

Forgive us for going along with what is easy,
for failing to come to grips with the problems of change
and to engage in the complexity of social issues.

Fill us with a living faith that we may become lively seeds of your kingdom,
continually growing in your way of love,
instruments of personal and social reconciliation,
vehicles for a new dawn when those in poverty
are welcomed to the table where compassion and justice meet.

Lord, in your mercy,

Hear our Prayer

Based on a prayer by Alan Litherland

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