Hungry. And surrounded by food

Jenny Sharrick

August 3, 2015

I have a very complex relationship with food. I absolutely love it. My favorite food changes almost daily because there are so many incredible ones from which to choose. So many flavors to experience within a short life. But often food does not love me. Or perhaps, a better way to explain it is that my body does not love food. You see, I have an intestinal disorder called Crohn’s disease. It means that portions of my 22 feet of small intestines can become ulcerated (like a bunch of open sores, but on the inside) and inflamed. Crohn’s disease, along with ulcerative colitis, is part of a group of diseases known as Inflammatory Bowel Disorders (IBD), which affect 1.6 million Americans.¹

Personally, I don’t like to draw attention to my illness and generally I give a non-committal non-answer when people ask how it affects me: “I have good days and bad days; but I’m always hopeful for more good than bad.” It’s hard to talk about an illness that is invisible to everyone else. It’s even harder to talk about an illness when it presents with the symptoms of Crohn’s. And sometimes, I would just rather pretend that my body is healthy and that nothing is wrong. But the reality is that it always affects my body and sometimes it means I’m in excruciating pain when I eat.

But the worst part of all is not the lack of food. It’s the lack of fellowship. We encounter Christ at The Table. And we encounter Christ around our tables at home with friends, family, and new acquaintances. When we want to “catch up” with others, the first instinct is to grab lunch, ice cream or go for coffee. Without the ability to eat, it becomes nearly impossible for fellowship, communion, and emotional support.

Crohn’s can be so isolating. I can find ways to sneak in enough calories to survive until tomorrow with easily digested foods such as pureed baby food or nutritional shakes, but it’s harder to find ways to sneak in authentic time and experiences with friends that don’t end up exhausting me further. It’s hard to find those moments to say “I really need to be in fellowship with you, but I can’t continue to pretend like going out for Indian food isn’t the worst idea I’ve had all week. Can we just sit here on my couch and chat without any refreshments?”

I spend a lot of my life thinking about various aspects food. My favorite de-stressing activity is to bake any and all desserts (I’d be lying if I didn’t say I also love eating desserts, too!). I’m always in search of a good recipe on Pinterest. I am on my synod’s “(anti-) hunger team” within the ELCA. My congregation is involved in anti-hunger ministries including a food pantry and a food co-op. My research focus for my Masters in Public Health (MPH) is rural food insecurity. I even come from a long line of food-growers. Some day I will inherit one and a half farms in Nebraska (although truthfully I know very little about the actual process of growing food other than what I’ve gleaned from my unsuccessful ventures in gardening and what I’ve heard about the process of farming around the dinner table growing up). The thing I’m most looking forward to when I return home to Nebraska is my weekly bag of vegetables, fruits, cheeses, eggs, honey and freshly baked bread from local farmers and producers.

Even after all that thinking and reflecting on different aspects of food, I still struggle daily with what it means to come to the T(t)able and not be able to eat, regardless of the reason.

Food is everywhere. It’s engrained in my life and also in yours. It’s in the news (the newest fad diets, research about what we should or should not eat, advertising campaigns about food), and it’s in our homes and most places we visit. It makes sense. Food is literally life-sustaining. But now, more than ever, I can recognize how much fear and anxiety food can cause for people.

I have never been without access to enough food. I’ve been lucky enough to be food secure my whole life. I’ve always known that I can find food. But I can resonate with the 49 million people in the United States who are food insecure.² Even more so with those who are food insecure and have IBD, an eating disorder or a food allergy.

I am often also hungry for the communion with others that comes from breaking bread, salad and casserole around the table.

Sometimes “feeding the hungry” also includes those of us who would give anything to be seated with you, but can’t. Can’t because of allergies. Can’t because our psychological relationship with food is disordered, for example, by anorexia, bulimia, or other eating disorders. Or can’t because of tiny pockets of inflammation that we don’t like talking about.

We are often surrounded by a sea of food but still drowning in our inability to eat any of it.

Jenny Sharrick is the 2015 summer intern with Constituent Engagement with ELCA World Hunger.

¹ http://online.ccfa.org/site/PageServer?pagename=TS_homepage

²http://www.feedingamerica.org/hunger-in-america/our-research/map-the-meal-gap/child-food-insecurity-executive-summary.html?referrer=https://www.google.com/

Water-Related Activities for Youth

Anna Smith

ELCA Walk for Water

Do-it-Yourself Track Experience ELCA World Hunger

This guide features all the information necessary to recreate the interaction Walk for Water track in your own community or congregation.

Local/ Personal Context:

Community Mapping Pg. 6. Produced by Polaris Institute.

A lesson that gives youth the chance to explore water in the place they call home and create a local context by mapping out the water resources in their surrounding area.

Lesson Plan: ‘Thirst‘ Written by Terri Carta. Produced by PBS.

This is a discussion guide to supplement the hour long documentary Thirst. Although the full video is currently unavailable online, this guide is an important learning and activity resource. It touches on themes of water privatization and The Commons. The guide features a mock town hall meeting activity surrounding the city council, citizens and water supplier’s role in privatization issues.

Water Bingo Pg. 7. Produced by Polaris Institute.

This game allows youth to interact with each other by filling out spaces with information like “has heard of or been to a protest to protect water,” or “has had to boil or filter their water for it to be safe enough to drink.”

Water Footprint Calculator Made by National Geographic.

An online, interactive resource that allows people to calculate much water they consume based on a variety of factors such as their home, diet and energy consumption.

Global Context:

Lesson: Village Voices Pg. 24. Produced by The Water Project.

This is a simulation which gives youth an insight into solutions to water crises from various perspectives: Geologist, Climatologist, Public Health Officer or Village Elder.

Race to Development Water & Hunger Toolkit. ELCA World Hunger.

This activity is a simulation which informs youth about the difficulty to obtain water daily faced specifically by women. They will go through a variety of tasks listed on situation cards.

Tragedy of the Water Commons Produced by Water.org.

A lesson guide that introduces youth to The Tragedy of the Commons by using an interactive, visual representation. This resource also helps youth connect The Tragedy of the Commons to the global water crisis.

Creating and Building:

Build Your Own Watershed Produced by U.S. Environmental Protection Agency.

This activity allows youth to learn about the importance and creation of watersheds while also discussing the pollution issue watersheds are facing.

Mock Muck Produced by Water.org.

In this activity, youth will attempt to purify dirty water using various techniques.

Way to Flow – Water Irrigation Written by Jaimie Schock. Produced by TryEngineering.

Irrigation is a very crucial component of water issues around the world as it helps farmers sustain their livelihood. This activity gives youth the opportunity to learn about irrigation systems by designing and creating their own.

Discussion and Advocacy:

Water and Society: Day Two Pg. 5. Produced by The Water Project.

This guide includes a game to introduce youth to what a commodity is and leads into a discussion/ debate about if water is a human right or a commodity.

Waters of the United States: Enforcing the Clean Water Act Produced by ELCA Advocacy. Coupled with the resource-Writing to Public Officials

These resources can be used to encourage youth to get involved with water-related advocacy.

Final Reflection Resources:

Becoming Changemakers Made by Polaris Institute.

This is a great resource to help youth generate ideas and examples of action that they can take with water crises.

Closing and Action section of Water Toolkit.

This can be a really helpful reference to give ideas for future involvement with water issues.

Water, Holy Water (Must fill out information before downloading). Produced by Creation Justice Ministries.

This resource has information about various topics surrounding water, but also gives ideas for creating a water themed worship service.

Anna Smith is an ELCA World Hunger intern working with Hunger Education this summer. She is currently a student at Concordia College in Moorhead, Minn.

Humanity and hunger

Anna Smith

If you see some brother or sister in need and have the means to do something about it but turn a cold shoulder and do nothing, what happens to God’s love? It disappears. And you made it disappear. – 1 John 3:17 (The Message)

This past week, I was able to head to Wrigleyville, a Chicago neighborhood, to witness the Chicago Blackhawks’ Stanley Cup victory celebration. Throughout the night I observed a great number of unsettling scenes unfolding. One in particular that deserves reflection occurred on the way home via public transit. I was transferring trains and walked through a tunnel among the sea of boisterous fans. Up ahead, someone caught my eye. There was a man sitting on the side of the tunnel. As I moved closer, I noticed he had signs made of cardboard. The two I remember said: “$1.00 for my daughter to eat,” and “$1.00 for the Blackhawks.” The man was sitting there, holding a cup and staring at the wall across from him. My attention was quickly drawn away from him by the several fans shouting, “GO HAWKS!” I saw that every one of these people were walking straight by this man without sparing a dollar or even acknowledging that he was there. In particular what resonated with me about witnessing this occurrence is that most of us had probably spent dozens of dollars already that night on food, drinks and victory merchandise. Admittedly, I, too, fell victim to the pressure of my surroundings and continued to walk by this man just like everyone else. I spent the rest of my train ride home attempting to process what I saw and how I am called to respond as a Christian.

As I reflect on this, what first comes to mind is a late-night discussion I had while studying abroad in India last fall. We were discussing the practice of untouchability, an attitude based on the belief that certain people are “impure” that translates into a variety of behaviors, norms and physical acts. People in the Dalit community, with whom I spent my time, are most often considered “untouchable.”

During that discussion someone posed the question, “Does untouchability happen in the United States?” After a brief moment, we listed several examples, such as avoiding the “bad part” of town and sidestepping people who appear to be homeless.

What I witnessed that night – and, frankly, more often than not when I see people facing hunger on the street – looks a lot like untouchability. There is a sense that the person on the side of the road is unclean, unsafe or unworthy of our attention.

The Bible proclaims that we are ALL created in God’s own image. As Paul writes in his letter to the Romans, “So in Christ, we, though many, form one body, and each member belongs to all the others.” As Christ commands, “Love your neighbor as yourself.” As Martin Luther wrote in “Freedom of a Christian,” “Therefore, we should be guided in all our works by this one thought alone – that we may serve and benefit others in everything that is done, having nothing before our eyes except the need and advantage of the neighbor.” And we as Lutherans speak of the model of accompaniment, or walking in solidarity with and among our brothers and sisters of all walks of life. How do we practice this outside of our church walls or away from planned mission trips or service events? What does it mean for us to recognize each person – every person – as the very image of God?

Reflecting on that experience on my way home, I wish I wouldn’t have followed the crowd. This wasn’t a matter of not giving a dollar, but rather the inner feeling that I, too, had ignored the humanity of the man with the signs. What would it look like for us to go from ignoring the person, to offhand giving and finally, beyond this, to really seeing the image of God in our brothers and sisters? How does our choice to give or not to give reflect our belief that God has created us in God’s image and marked us as God’s own? Maybe that means giving a dollar, or maybe it means asking a person his name or listening to her story. Maybe it means recognizing even those whom society deems “untouchable” as people worth knowing, worth listening to and worth seeing.

Anna Smith is an ELCA World Hunger intern working with Hunger Education this summer. She is currently a student at Concordia College in Moorhead, Minn.

Exploring: Community Organizing

Raymond Pickett

In this series of posts, we will take a closer look at some of the areas of work ELCA World Hunger supports domestically and internationally. Previously, we looked at relief, education and advocacy. This week, we take a look at community organizing, and we welcome guest blogger and New Testament expert Dr. Raymond Pickett. Dr. Pickett is an ordained Lutheran pastor and Professor of New Testament at the Lutheran School of Theology at Chicago. In addition to several articles and book reviews, he is the author of The Cross in Corinth: The Social Significance of the Death of Jesus and is a contributor to the multi-volume Fortress series entitled A Peoples’ History of Christianity, published in November of 2005. He also did the new SELECT DVD New Testament Introduction course with two other ELCA seminary professors.
What Is Community Organizing?

Building relational power to transform communities!

Community organizing is a strategy and set of practices to build relational power with a view to bringing about social change that improves the quality of community life. The primary goal of community organizing is to connect with people around their values and passions in ways that engender collective public action. In community organizing, issues follow relationships. The foundation of community organizing is the relational meeting, which is a one-to-one conversation focused on learning the gifts, interests, energy, and vision of the person you are talking with. The aim of one-to-one conversations is to build relationships that motivate people to participate in public life.

As individuals, the social and economic issues that diminish the quality of our common life can be overwhelming and lead to a sense of futility and powerlessness that prompts people to withdraw into private life. Community organizing brings people together around their shared interests to form bonds of mutuality and accountability that empower them to take action to improve their communities.

Historically community organizing has worked with existing communities, especially faith communities, to effect social and political change by focusing on specific issues of concern. The ELCA has a longstanding involvement in congregation-based community organizing. One way to think about community organizing is as a practical strategy for enacting the church’s mission “to bear witness to God’s creative, redeeming, and sanctifying activity in the world” (ELCA Constitution, Chapter 4.01). Some congregations use the practices of community organizing to get know their neighbors and become more involved in their communities.

Congregations that are involved with community organizing also frequently discover that it is an effective way to identify and train leaders, and also a process for developing a relational culture within the congregation. Working with community organizing networks and partnering with others for the sake of God’s justice in the world is also a way of becoming a more public church empowered by the Spirit to effect transformation in the world.

Roots of Community Organizing

Throughout Scripture God is depicted as the One who creates, and first and foremost what God creates is a people, a community, that embodies in their life together the divine reality. Scripture in all of its diversity presupposes the existence of a covenant community that God calls into being and liberates from slavery. It is a community of people defined by relationship with a God who is experienced as loving, merciful and just. The Torah provides a vision for how to structure the life of the community, and the prophets hold those in power accountable to this vision that is predisposed to its most vulnerable members.

From the beginning to the end of Scripture God raises up leaders who faithfully embody God’s purposes for the covenant community. In the Gospels Jesus is anointed by the Spirit and empowered to “to bring good news to the poor … proclaim release to the captives and recovery of sight to the blind, to let the oppressed go free” (Luke 4:18). In his Galilean ministry Jesus was leading a social movement to renew community life. In addition to restoring to community people on the margins of Israelite society such as “sinners and tax collectors”, Jesus also addressed the physical and material needs of colonized people who were disenfranchised by imperial policies and practices.

A good example of community organizing in the Gospels are the meals and feeding stories which presuppose hunger as a constant reality in peoples’ lives. The sharing of meals was part of Jesus’ program to restore, from the bottom up, a society fractured by urbanization and commercialization. In Mark 6:30-44 and 8:1-10 the appetites of five thousand and four thousand people respectively are satisfied by the multiplication of the loaves and fishes. While these stories serve to declare God’s abundant provision in the midst of what looks like scarcity, they also highlight underlying structural issues of unjust distribution of resources.

Jesus goes to Jerusalem as a prophet to address issues of poverty and exploitation in Galilee by performing what community organizers call an action in the Temple where he cites Jeremiah’s Temple sermon as he confronts the Jerusalem aristocracy: “‘My house shall be called a house of prayer for all the nations’? But you have made it a den of robbers.” Power brokers in Jerusalem attempted to stop the movement Jesus started by crucifying him, but the movement continued when his followers encountered the risen Jesus.

The earliest documents in the New Testament are the letters of Paul written in the 40s and 50s of the first century. Paul’s letters portray someone who is establishing counter-cultural communities by building relationships in the public square with people from varied backgrounds. In other words, he was a community organizer.

A thread which ties the story of God’s people together in the First Testament with its continuation in the Gospels and Paul is the command to love God and to “love your neighbor as yourself” (Lev 19:18; Mark 12:28-31; Romans 13:8-10). One way to imagine community organizing is as a practical approach for getting to know and loving our neighbors.

Examples of Community Organizing

The Organizing for Mission Cohort is a national network of pastors and leaders in the ELCA who are using the arts of community organizing in creative ways to develop and re-develop communities of faith by building relationships with people from diverse backgrounds who may be reluctant to go to a traditional church but who yearn for a connection with God and others and want to make a difference in their communities.

In the last 10 years, hunger has increased 40% in Missoula, Montana. The Missoula Interfaith Collaborative Hunger Initiativeis building a network of 15 congregations to coordinate 15 food drives, producing 45,000 pounds of food. This network is also working together to raise community awareness about the root causes of hunger. Lastly, organizing people who utilize the food bank and people in congregations, MIC will build an advocacy network in preparation for the 2015 Montana State Legislature. The MIC Hunger Initiative is supported in part by ELCA World Hunger.

Transportation is a critical foundation to preventing hunger and food insecurity in Jefferson City, Missouri. A lack of evening and weekend services creates major obstacles to people getting to work and to other important services, including community education programs. The congregations involved in Jefferson City Congregations Uniting want to help improve access to transportation for Jefferson City residents who are transit-dependent, especially those who are elderly, disabled or poor. By working with the City Council to create a task force of community stakeholders, including transit riders, they will help develop creative solutions to expand public transportation in Jefferson City. This project is supported in part by ELCA World Hunger.
The ELCA World Hunger blog is edited by Ryan P. Cumming, program director for hunger education. He can be reached at Ryan.Cumming@ELCA.org.

Welcome to ELCA World Hunger’s 2015 Summer Interns!

This summer, ELCA World Hunger welcomes three new interns to our team at the churchwide office!

Anna Smith- Hunger Education
Hello! My name is Anna Smith. I come from the town of Osceola, Wisc. I am will be a senior this fall at Concordia College. I am studying Global Studies-Development and Psychology. This upcoming year will be busy for me as I serve as the Social Justice Coordinator for Campus Ministry Commission and the Co-Service Lead for Better Together Interfaith Alliance. A fun fact about me is that I actually spent my first year of college in San Antonio, Texas, at Trinity University.

I have always been passionate about social justice issues but that really came to the forefront of my life after I spent the fall of my junior year on the Social Justice, Peace, and Development Program in India. We intensively studied class inequality, food insecurity, and the implications of war, among other things. It was during my time in India I saw the world’s great need for justice and I committed my life to working towards that in every way I can. That commitment along with my deep Lutheran faith is what led me here this summer.

I have spent the past three summers of my life working at Luther Point Bible Camp in Grantsburg, Wisc. I am looking forward to this summer and finding new ways to live out my faith in a different environment. I love the big cities and I foresee enjoying living in the Windy City very much so. Although I haven’t been to Chicago since I was in Elementary school –way back when Willis Tower was still the Sears Tower. I can already tell my time here will be one filled with adventure, learning and spiritual growth!

Jennifer (Jenny) Sharrick- Constituent Engagement

Hi everyone, I’m Jenny! I am so absolutely thrilled to be the newest constituent engagement intern. In my life outside of Chicago, I am a master’s in public health student at the University of Nebraska Medical Center in Omaha, Nebraska. My concentration is focused generally around Maternal and Child Health, but my specific passion areas are domestic rural food insecurity and hunger, as well as reproductive health and comprehensive sexuality education. My undergraduate education focused on biopsychology and religion. Then I took a quick detour to medical school, before landing in the amazing field of public health.

My call is somewhere in the intersection of medicine, ministry, and justice. And while I am still discerning exactly what that means for the future, continuing my work with ELCA World Hunger seemed an appropriate fit.

My work within the Church has been varied, but bountiful. I have served as an intern in a parish for youth and young adult ministry and Campus Ministry Associate for Nebraska Lutheran Campus Ministry at Hastings College. I have also been on my synod’s hunger team for several years now. Additionally, I am a member of the ELCA Young Adult Cohort which went to the United Nation’s Commission on the Status of Women this past March.

Service learning and volunteering have been integral to my background (my Dad is so proud to say that my very first meeting with a service organization was within a week of my birth). This has taken on various forms over the years. One organization I am especially proud to be associated, offers free chlamydia and gonorrhea testing and treatment as well as reproductive health education to inmates in the county jail (unfortunately the county where I currently reside has an epidemic associated with both of these STIs). While that likely doesn’t sound all that appealing to many of you, the men and women I have met have had a profound impact on my life and have taught me much more about life than what I’ve learned in the classrooms of medical school and public health. Empowering and educating people to make the best health decisions for themselves has truly become a passion of mine because of this.

In my spare time, I love spontaneous dance parties and going on adventures whilst wearing my sequined fanny pack. My seven-year-old goddaughter likes to tell everyone that my favorite color is “glitter” and I have a special affection for beautiful shoes.

Ben Brown- Fundraising

Hi my name is Ben Brown, and I am the ELCA World Hunger Fundraising Intern and I will also be working some with the ELCA Malaria Campaign. I am a rising senior year at Wittenberg University in Springfield, Ohio in the fall studying
Religion and Political Science. I come to Chicago after spending the spring semester studying in Washington, DC with students from other Lutheran colleges where I interned with the Lutheran Volunteer Corps (LVC) as the Public Policy and Fundraising Intern. When not at Wittenberg, I call Indianapolis home.

I am passionate about issues of social justice, specifically hunger and food justice and the ways in which faith can play a role in that work. At Wittenberg I spend my time in Weaver Chapel with Campus Ministries and in the community through my work in our community service office. Through my experiences in Springfield’s community gardens and Promise Neighborhood and with Wittenberg’s CROP Walk I have come to learn a lot about the realities of hunger and the ways communities come together to end it. In the future I hope to pursue a career in advocacy, but first hopefully a year with one of the many service-year programs, like LVC!

For fun I have recently discovered a love for the Indy 11, Indianapolis’ soccer team. I also really love eating and look forward to exploring Chicago by way of its food.

I am really excited to be with ELCA World Hunger this summer and hope to learn a lot and grow while I’m here!

An Earth Day Reflection

Gina Tonn

April 22, 2015

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How do you honor God’s creation? Part of my spiritual practice is being a morning person, to honor the light by greeting it early, allowing the new dawn to fill me with the spirit. Each new day is an opportunity to continue the work we are called to do, refreshed and renewed through sleep and new light. I sense hopefulness of morning; I am filled with hope for the world, in our ability to create positive change, for there to be more people fed and nourished each day. I have confidence in the abundance of God’s creation; I see the divine in everything the sun touches.

Even as I honor God’s creation in my rising, I often take the earth and God’s gifts for granted in my living. I confess to being a lesser steward of the earth than I am called to be. I confess to my crimes against the environment – both things done and left undone out of laziness, convenience and self-centeredness. I confess to ignorance about where my food comes from and how it’s grown. I confess to ignoring future degradation for the sake of present quality of life.

My actions contribute to climate change. Climate change disproportionately affects people who live in vulnerable conditions, who experience poverty and hunger. As we observe Earth Day this week, let’s not only recommit to changing our attitudes and actions toward the earth and resources, but also to changing our attitudes and actions about food security, production and access around the world.

This year, the Earth Day Sunday Resource [1] produced by Creation Justice Ministries, formerly the National Council of Churches Eco-Justice Program, asks “How does food production and consumption impact the climate? How does climate change affect growing and accessing food? How are we sharing communion with God, one another, and all creation?”

In the ELCA Social Statement Caring for Creation: Vision, Hope and Justice, our church corporately confesses that we arenot in communion with all creation because of our alienation from God and creation, through captivity to sin. We proclaim God as creator of the earth. We live and work within a scientific world. Divinity and science need not be at odds. As Caring for Creation suggests, “In our time, science and technology can help us to discover how to live according to God’s creative wisdom.” In the United States today, use of science and technology to protect and honor creation is often controlled and dictated by our government. One way we can encourage and participate in ways our government takes action on climate change is through ELCA Advocacy. Other ways to get your congregation involved in caring for creation can be found through Lutherans Restoring Creation, an organization supported in part by grants from ELCA World Hunger.

But caring for creation cannot only be scientific and political; care for the earth is a profoundly spiritual matter.[2] So I will continue to honor God’s creation by rising with the sun and by looking for the divine in the beauty of the earth. I will also work to love God’s creation by mitigating my environmental footprint, better stewarding resources, and accompanying my neighbors near and far who are most susceptible to climate change because of food insecurity. Earth Day is not only an opportunity to celebrate and renew our commitment to environmental sustainability, but also to renew our love for neighbor, as we too were made of earth.

Gina Tonn serves as Program Assistant for Education and Constituent Engagement with ELCA World Hunger through a placement in the Lutheran Volunteer Corps.

[1] Have you anything here to eat? includes resources and ideas for worship and congregational life such as liturgy, prayers, discussion questions, and action steps.

[2] Paraphrase from Caring for Creation, “Even as we join the political, economic and scientific discussion, we know care for the earth to be a profoundly spiritual matter.”

Mahdi’s Story – Kakuma Refugee Camp, Kenya

Gina Tonn

The Kakuma Refugee Camp in northwest Kenya is host to 180,000 individuals,[1] more than 100,000 of whom are children. Since its establishment in 1992, the camp has become home to refugees from South Sudan, Sudan, Burundi, Ethiopia, Somalia and the Democratic Republic of Congo. Grants from ELCA World Hunger, in partnership with the Lutheran World Federation Department for World Service (LWF-DWS) Kenya-Djibouti Program, help to support programming for children in the camp.

A March 2015 update from the Kenya-Djibouti Program states that the core of its work in Kakuma for the coming year will focus on education, child protection and community services. ELCA World Hunger is directly supporting the Anti-Child Labor Campaign project for 2015. The Anti-Child Labor Campaign will focus on increasing advocacy capacity through trainings for community-based organizing within the Kenyan host community and working to improve school environments with in the Kakuma Refugee Camp. The campaign seeks to offer children protection and support by increasing access to education for children who have been subject to child-labor violations throughout Turkana West District and within Kakuma Refugee Camp. According to the LWF DWS Kenya-Djibouti Program website, the organization is committed to protecting the rights to life, survival and development of children who call the Kakuma Refugee camp home.

Mahdi Riek Khor is a South Sudanese refugee, Kakuma resident, elected community leader, Child Protection Community Development Worker, aspiring politician, and only 23 years old. Thanks to the LWF Kenya-Djibouti Program, we are able to share his story with you:

Mahdi says, “Me, one day, if God is willing, I want to be a politician. As a politician I will maintain peace. I will be transparent, I will consider different cultures and I will accept being corrected. As a politician, I will consider any human being as a somebody.”

In December 2013, Mahdi became the first secondary school graduate in his family and was returning home to Bentiu to see his mother after 13 years apart, when violent hostilities disrupted his journey. ‘Fighting reached Unity State on the 19^th of December. I remember it. There was a lot of destruction – guns, killings, arbitrary arrests, rape of women and girls. I had to come to Kakuma for safety.’

Mahdi is one of more than 45,000 people to reach Kakuma Refugee Camp, in north western Kenya, since December 2013 – among almost 2 million South Sudanese people to have become displaced inside or outside the country in the same period: ‘Life is a struggle in Kakuma. I can’t meet my basic needs. I am providing for 9 nieces and nephews. I don’t have good shelter, I’m not comfortable in the environment, there are no televisions to watch the news and learn about the world. Now the only world I know is inside Kakuma.’

Despite this, Mahdi is among 90 refugees who work with LWF as Child Protection Community Development Workers, working to prevent and respond to child protection issues across the camp’s population of 101,000 children. In Kakuma IV, the camp’s newest area, the team is supporting children with various protection concerns: children separated from their parents and family, children who have experienced or witnessed notable violence, children vulnerable to sexual exploitation and abuse – most of whom have lost everything and need much more than agencies can provide. ‘Child Protection work is very, very hard,’ Mahdi says. ‘It’s the working environment, going door to door, walking very far when the condition is too hot. We have a problem with promises. We want to help but we can’t always fulfil [needs], so some people see us as an enemy. They think we are lying.’

Refugees working to protect children in their own camp communities show courage and commitment. The work is challenging, resources are limited and cultural practices often conflict with the rights that workers are trying to promote. Mahdi considered the question of why he continues with the work. ‘I want to encourage children… Life has many challenges… it is my responsibility to help protect people. These cases, when you can resolve a situation, reunite a child with their family. I reunited two children with their parents and the children were most happy. They were so, so happy. That’s why we do the work.’

It is easy to imagine Mahdi as a very successful leader in the future. ‘Here in Kakuma, we hope that opportunity will come. Kakuma teaches us to live in a hard situation but I see now that I have met people here I would not have met outside. You can learn from different nationalities – their culture, their attitudes, we can learn from them.’ And in the meantime, Mahdi is working hard to support children in Kakuma – considering every child as a somebody.

ELCA World Hunger is proud to be a part of LWF Department of World Service’s ongoing commitment to education and development for children, and protection of rights and wellbeing for all children at Kakuma and around the world.

Madhi’s profile written and provided courtesy of the LWF Kenya-Djibouti Program.

Gina Tonn is a Program Assistant for Education and Constituent Engagement with ELCA World Hunger through a placement in the Lutheran Volunteer Corps.

[1] UNHCR, February 2015

Welcome Elyssa Salinas – Program Assistant for Hunger Education!

Elyssa Salinas

Please welcome our newest colleague in ELCA World Hunger – Elyssa Salinas!

Hello! I’m Elyssa Salinas and I’m thrilled to join ELCA World Hunger as the program assistant for Hunger Education! Currently I’m finishing my Masters of Divinity at the Lutheran School of Theology at Chicago, and I will be graduating in May! I’m originally from the Chicago area, growing up in Oak Park and Des Plaines. I attended Valparaiso University and pursued a degree in theatre, enjoying roles such as Lady Bracknell in The Importance of Being Earnest and Sir Toby Belch inTwelfth Night. Also in college I began to develop an interest in gender studies and performance poetry.

After graduating in 2012 I decided to take the advice of one of my professors and give the East Coast a try, so I decided to attend the Lutheran Theological Seminary at Philadelphia as a Fund for Leaders scholar. While there I got a job with a nonprofit organization that worked with families dealing with home instability in connection with a diverse pool of faith groups in the area. This experience provided me with an opportunity of engaging my faith with social issues I felt (and still feel) strongly about.

Throughout my time in college and seminary I spent four summers working near Santa Cruz, California, at Mt. Cross Ministries, a Lutheran camp set in the Santa Cruz Mountains. Mt. Cross gave me a chance to experience the West coast and engage with youth, where every day was about seeing God through their eyes.

Throughout my discernment process in Philadelphia I found that my call was not what I expected, and so after two years I decided to transfer back home to Chicago and pursue a call in teaching. I’m happy to be home and close to my family while I continue to follow my path in education. This Fall I will start my Ph.D at LSTC in systematic theology and sexual ethics, where I plan to focus on body/sex shaming and how to embrace our bodies as God embraces each of us, as children of God’s abundant love. I am an advocate for positive body image, and I challenge myself and others to see each of us as God sees us, beloved and beautiful.

Poetry has been a vehicle to explore my own challenges with body image and my identity as a Latina. I have been performing poetry for the past few years at various open mic performances in Philadelphia and Chicago along with using poetry as part of my academic career. Currently I’m working on a book of poetry from the point of view of biblical women, especially Old Testament women such as Hagar, Dinah and Jael.

Fun Facts about Elyssa!

I was a competitive public speaker for 7 years!
My favorite movie of all time is Beauty and the Beast, and I love Disney! My mother is the only person to beat me at Disney trivia.
I got my first poem published this year in Thinking Theologically!
My CTA commute always entails a book and I’m always looking for more to read!

Faith, Hunger & Justice: The ELCA Young Adult Cohort at the United Nations Commission on the Status of Women

Gina Tonn

March 24, 2015

Looking at a picture of the ELCA Young Adult Cohort, one might think we look like quite the random conglomeration of people – 3 men, 12 women; 13 young adults, 2 not-quite-as-young adults; 5 ELCA networks. What brings this group together, particularly around the United Nations Commission on the Status of Women (UN CSW) and gender justice?

The ELCA networks from which individuals come to the ELCA Young Adult Cohort include the Justice for Women Program, Young Adult Ministry, Strategy on HIV and AIDS, Young Adults in Global Mission alumni and ELCA World Hunger. All of these groups bring their respective priorities and goals to the cohort, but more importantly, each of us comes to the table with a commitment to and interest in the intersection of faith and justice. Gender justice, or rather gender injustice, is prevalent in the work of each of these networks. As the ELCA World Hunger network, we are aware that hunger and poverty disproportionately affect women and their children. Anthony Mell shared this example from a session hosted by The Hunger Project in Bangladesh and the UN Zero Hunger Challenge in his post on the ELCA Young Adult Cohort blog:

In Bangladesh family life it is typical for the husband and other men to be given a larger portion of food relative to the rest of the family. This simple patriarchal cultural norm has profound consequences. Because of the state of poverty in which most Bangladeshi families live, the extra food taken by the husbands leads both their wives and their children to malnutrition. The injustice does not end there. The children also often suffer these nutritional deficiencies during key periods of cognitive development, the negative results of which can greatly affect them for the rest of their lives.

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Women’s equality and empowerment are prerequisites for development and eradication of hunger and poverty. Through the ELCA Young Adult Cohort and our presence at the UN CSW, ELCA World Hunger connects with other faith-based groups and non-governmental organizations (NGOs) committed to relief, advocacy, sustainable development, and grassroots organizing around the issues of hunger and poverty.

From my perspective, playing double-duty as cohort member from the ELCA World Hunger network and an ELCA World Hunger staff person, one of the most impactful aspects of the trip was witnessing and experiencing the ways in which the spirit of ELCA World Hunger’s message and mission touches people. The ELCA Young Adult Cohort did not only attend sessions; we also hosted several events. Over 100 members of the New York and New Jersey attended a “Meet & Greet” to learn about the cohort and its networks. We brought young people of faith together for conversation about justice and culture. We created space for dialogue about the church’s role in perpetuating and ending sexism and gender-based violence. Through all three of these events, and in all our interactions, I witnessed the spirit of our work to remain even as the specific content or presentation style varies to fit the setting. I believe this spirit endures because our work is firmly and clearly rooted in our identity as the church.

The ELCA Young Adult Cohort engages at the intersection of faith and justice. We also engage with the building up of young leaders in our church. These words shared during the March ELCA World Hunger Network Webinar by cohort member, seminary student and Hunger Leader Jessica Obrecht capture the connections between faith, work with ELCA World Hunger and membership in the ELCA Young Adult Cohort, and development as a leader in the church:

As I am new to the World Hunger network, it was really stark to me how connected World Hunger and the experience at the Commission on the Status of Women was…If we truly want to eradicate poverty and hunger we really need to empower women and look at how women are oppressed in different ways and the reality that 1 in 3 women has experienced gender based violence. We need to look at how that affects not only our economy, but how we function as a world interpersonally.

The fact that so many young adults participated in the experience raises the question: How do we empower young adults and pass the torch? As we listened to men and women speak about how we need to work together in the world, it was powerful to feel that we are at the table and that we are welcome to become leaders as well.

While the presentations and information sessions I attended during the UN CSW were fascinating and energizing, the time I spent with my fellow members of the ELCA Young Adult Cohort was inspiring and gives me so much joy and hope to be part of our church and have the privilege to be part of a group of convicted and passionate leaders for justice.

I will end my comments about the experience and takeaways of the United Nations Commission on the Status of Women here, and allow the words of my peers shared on the ELCA Young Adult Cohort blog during and after the UN CSW witness to the change ahead – within the church and around the world.

As a church, how do we measure gender justice? At the very least, we need sex-disaggregated data about our leadership, members, communities, institutions, and the lives the church touches. We also need qualitative data to understand how women, girls, and LGBTQ persons are viewed and valued in all areas of ministry and church life. It is assumed that having females in leadership roles or educating girls will lead to empowered women….In Bible studies and other spiritual formation, may we learn to directly address detrimental inequalities in our hearts, families, churches, communities, and world. We need to partner with others to build gender justice. Gender experts emphasize that gender is found in all sectors of life and that complicated gender issues – such as gender-based violence – must take a multi-sectoral approach. This means you can look for or assess gender in EVERY context! – Crystal Corman – Young Adults in Global Mission Alumni

Men are needed to break this silence, and the first thing to do is to become aware, a problem can’t be solved if you don’t even know it exists. – Richard Adkins – Young Adult Ministry & Strategy on HIV and AIDS

I am a youth, children, and family minister within the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America. I have returned home inspired with a renewed commitment to not only exemplify what it means to be a Christian feminist, but to be an active participant in creating a church culture that speaks about and practices taking up the cross. Within my sphere of influence, I wish to live out a theology of the cross by naming the reality and pervasiveness of sin as it is exemplified in the oppression of patriarchy and acts of gender-based violence. I will continue to recognize Christ in our midst, who bears the wounds of death, but is no longer fettered by death. I will remember the grace of the cross; that it is not our will or perfect abilities that will change the oppression of this age, but the transformative power of Christ within each of us. It is the power of Christ that strengthens us to step forward together, speak out against the reality of sin, practice forgiveness, and live remembering that the kingdom of God is among us. – Casey Cross – Young Adult Ministry

I am reminded that patriarchy is a pervasive, systemic, and viciously subtle force. It moves us and in us in ways that we struggle to conceptualize and combat. However this is not meant to be defeatist. Rather it has served to me remind of the diligence and creativity required to overcome these obstacles. Simply put combating patriarchy cannot be a part time job. – Anthony Mell – Justice for Women Program

I get overwhelmed as I learn more about the realities of women and girls in the world. And then Jesus puts it in perspective: “‘You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind.’ This is the greatest and first commandment. And a second is like it: ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself.'”(Matthew 22:37-39) – Fern Lee Hagedorn – Justice for Women Program

I understand that my sisters all around the world are being raped, beaten, oppressed, silenced and ignored every single day. I understand that this problem is not just somewhere else, it is in my own country, my own state, city, community, and church. And I have a seat at this great table, amongst great minds, warm hearts, and beautiful souls. What an honor, what a privilege, what a joy, and what a responsibility that holds. – Jessica Obrecht – ELCA World Hunger & Young Adults in Global Mission Alumni

Gina Tonn is a Program Assistant for ELCA World Hunger Education & Constituent Engagement through the Lutheran Volunteer Corps. She graduated from St. Olaf College in Northfield, MN with a BA in Economics and Religion in 2014. She lives in Chicago, IL with four other Lutheran Volunteer Corps members.

World Water Day – March 22, 2015

Gina Tonn

How many times a day do I turn on the faucet in the kitchen or bathroom to fill a glass, wash my hands, brush my teeth, or fill a pot with water to cook pasta? How many times a day do I flush a toilet? How many times a day do I stop and think about the privilege of my easy access to clean, potable water? The answer to the former questions is “many,” the answer to the latter is “too few.”

This Sunday, March 22^nd is World Water Day. This year’s World Water Day also marks the conclusion of the UN-Water’s Decade for Action “Water for Life.” Last week, while in New York City with the ELCA Young Adult Cohort attending theUnited Nations 59^th Commission on the Status of Women (UN CSW) I took some time to explore an exhibit in the entrance hall of United Nations Headquarters commemorating the progress of the Decade for Action and looking ahead to the unmet needs for water access and sanitation around the world that call for action in the future.

Knowing I would have the opportunity to share both my experience at the UN CSW and call attention to World Water Day through the ELCA World Hunger blog, I made sure to pick up the exhibit brochure and snap some photos of the exhibit on my phone. Now, a week removed from the throes of the UN CSW and my perusal of the “Water for Life: Voices” exhibit, I realize that my experience in New York, the opportunity to research and promote World Water Day, and my position with ELCA World Hunger aren’t just happy, coincidental life experiences, but that working for gender justice, water rights, and solutions to hunger and poverty are inextricably linked. Women bear much of the burden for collecting water for their families in Sub-Saharan Africa and other areas of the world. The many hours women and girls spend collecting water are hours not spent in school or participating in economic activity, earning money or growing food to feed their families, or contributing to their community.

Over the summer, thousands of youth will converge on Detroit, Michigan for the 2015 ELCA Youth Gathering. ELCA World Hunger’s Walk for Water at the gathering has a goal to raise $500,000 through fundraising efforts, to be matched dollar by dollar through the gift of very generous donors. If we meet our goal, $1 million of water-related projects will be funded around the world. You can read about ELCA World Hunger’s Walk for Water, including the types of projects the initiative will fund, fundraising ideas, and statistics about the water crisis, at www.ELCA.org/walk4water.

A point that was raised frequently at the UN Commission on the Status of Women is that, too often, when we throw phrases like “internationally” or “around the world” out into conversation, we forget that the United States is included. At UN CSW this was usually in regards to oppression and discrimination against women; no nation in the world, the United States included, has succeeded in establishing gender equality in legislation, in sentiment or in practice.

The same is true of the water crisis. Because of the effects of climate change, failing economies, or corporate negligence, there are people in the United States who would answer the questions I posed at the outset of this post rather differently. In fact, right in the ELCA Youth Gathering’s backyard are people experiencing the effects of a water crisis – the Detroit water shut-offs. Ryan Cumming, Director for Hunger Education, drew attention to this problem back in August in his post “Myths and Realities about Water Shutoffs in Detroit.” Water shutoffs continue to loom in Detroit, even as the city and suburbs justapproved an increase in water utility rates.

As Lutherans, we proclaim that all people, all around the world, are created in the image of God, are privy to equal rights and protection and inherent dignity. Gender justice affirms that no one should suffer discrimination, oppression, or exploitation on account of their sex or gender. Working to end hunger and poverty affirms that we live in a world of abundance that has been perverted by broken relationships and greed. The Water for Live: Voices Exhibition brochure voices invites visitors to the exhibit to add their voice to those featured because “humankind is notable for its rich diversity; yet we are all the same in our need for water and sanitation.”

This World Water Day, I invite you to add your voice with mine in prayers for strength for my sisters around the world who walk for water each day and the mothers who struggle to feed their families, prayers of rejoicing for the progress made during the Decade for Action and potential impact through ELCA World Hunger’s Walk for Water, and mindful prayers of thanksgiving for the life-giving gift of water…

We pray for people who don’t have access to clean water to drink. We pray for people who must walk long distances to collect water. We pray for people, especially children, who face disease and death because of unclean water. Lord, in your mercy, Hear our prayer.

We pray for areas of our world impacted by drought and chronic water insecurity. Lord, in your mercy, Hear our prayer.

We pray for areas of our world that are impacted by frequent floods, severe storms and other natural disasters. Lord, in your mercy, Hear our prayer.

We give you thanks that through water and the Holy Spirit you give us new birth, cleanse us from sin, and raise us to eternal life. Lord, in your mercy, Hear our prayer.

Amen.

Prayer & Litany for World Water Day written by Pastor Annie Edison-Albright of Redeemer Lutheran Church in Stevens Point, Wisconsin.

Gina Tonn

Program Assistant, ELCA World Hunger

Lutheran Volunteer Corps