“The three richest people in the world own assets that exceed the combined gross domestic products of the world’s poorest 48 countries,” according to the United Nations Development Report.
“Among the 4.4 billion people who live in developing countries, three-fifths have no access to basic sanitation,” says the same source.
Even within the United States, the gap between rich and poor has continued to widen, so much so that many Americans see it as a serious threat to our national well-being.
Among the various advocacy groups that are working to change the situation, a relatively recent one, “Call to Renewal,” stands out. This network sees inequality of resources as a religious and spiritual issue, and wants to change the injustice that condemns so many people to poverty while the financial assets of the rich continue to grow fatter.
At a recent meeting in Washington, D. C., “Call to Renewal” assembled 500 faith-based groups from 40 states, along with state directors of human services and some mayors, to plan strategy along a broad front.
I recently heard Jim Wallis, the national convenor, explain the motivation of “Call to Renewal.” About poverty among children and working adults in America, he says, “The politicians are hungry for an answer to these problems; they don’t have the answers.”
“We are not presenting just a liberal political agenda,” he explains. “Neither the liberal nor the conservative agenda has worked.” Instead the group is proceeding on a spiritual project which flows from the Judeo-Christian ethic as expressed in the Bible.
The real issue, Jim Wallis insists, is wealth and the way it is structured in this country; it’s a distribution problem. Others agree with him, among them the distinguished historian James McGregor Burns who call it “the greatest moral issue of our time.” To Jim Wallis it is “the 900 pound gorilla in every room.”
The prophets of the Hebrew Bible were eloquent on the subject of this kind of injustice. Amos, for example, railed against the way the rich people of his day took advantage of the poor. And yet income inequality is much greater in modern America than it ever was in ancient Israel.
In the Gospels Jesus spoke about wealth and poverty more often than almost any other subject. In fact, biblical scholars point out that one out of every sixteen verses in the New Testament deals with the topic.
So the churches and other faith-based groups have a large stake in responding to the issues of social justice. In response to Call to Renewal, leaders from across the churches’ spectrum – – Catholic, Evangelical, Black and mainline Protestant – – have all joined the effort.
One of the main challenges of Call to Renewal is getting beyond the leaders to church members. How to get this project on to the agenda of church congregations is the organizing issue. Jim Wallis claims that “the churches have never mobilized around poverty as they are doing now” but it has not yet become clear how far this initial effort will take them.
As a person who has seen many different advocacy groups come and go through the years, I must temper my enthusiasm for new ones that come along. What encourages me about “Call to Renewal,” however, is its insistence on spirituality as the driving force for change.
Without that deep foundation, advocacy groups often wither on the vine and dry up. But if Call to Renewal brings to the table a deep spiritual commitment it could develop the lasting power necessary to bring about desperately needed change.
The founders are encouraged by the recent Washington meeting because they saw not only a commitment to social change on the part of the 800 people who took part, but they heard testimony that people’s faith had been nourished by their activity on behalf of the poor.
A roster of outstanding speakers suggests the drawing power of the movement. Among those who addressed the meeting were Secretary of HUD Andrew Cuomo, Rev. Eugene Rivers of Boston, and Father Bryan Hehir, acting dean of Harvard Divinity School.
Emily Dossett, a divinity school student who took part in the meeting, recently reported on her experience. What impressed her about the discussions was “the balance between vision and practice.”
If Call to Renewal is to make the difference it hopes to achieve, that balance will be crucial. The situation it wants to change is complicated and deeply ingrained in the marketplace; to change it will require much know-how and staying power.
Richard Griffin