I have had writer’s block for the past two Thursdays. Really, really bad writer’s block.  Tonight, I finally figured out why. I’ve been taking in a lot of articles, blogs, videos, etc. for the past couple of weeks that have all slightly informed me while mostly resulting in my asking more questions. So at the moment, I feel about the furthest thing from an expert on just about any of the subjects that I have been pondering. None the less, I think they are fascinating. So, should you be interested, I am inviting you to join in my pondering. Below, I have provided passages from some of the most interesting pieces I have run across in the past few weeks. They are part of a larger story, so please feel free to click through in order to read or watch them in their full context. From portraits of US hunger to water conservation and African entrepreneurship, here they are:

(1)  A two part series from NPR highlighting a family in Pennsylvania’s struggle to make ends meet on the table. http://n.pr/dailyfighttofindfood

“For example, the Williamsons have a garden behind their apartment in downtown Carlisle. They grow lots of healthy food — zucchini, peppers and Brussels sprouts. But when Alex was thirsty after a walk, his mother gave him a plastic water bottle filled with orange soda.

Elaine Livas, who runs Project SHARE, the local food pantry, says she sees it all time.

‘A gallon of milk is $3-something. A bottle of orange soda is 89 cents,’ she says. ‘Do the math.’

Livas says low-income families might know milk is better for their kids, but when it comes to filling a hungry stomach, a cheaper high-calorie option can look pretty good.”

(2)  New York City gets smart with their water. http://bit.ly/smartwatertracking

“The smart water industry isn’t nearly as developed as the smart energy sector, where a slew of companies are scrambling to grab a piece of the market. Still, as anyone who has been stuck in an area without fresh water can tell you, water use is just as important as energy consumption. And eventually, startups and established companies alike will start paying attention.”

(3)  From a blog I stumbled across thanks to a colleague – thoughts on Africa, entrepreneurship and questions of how to better help our brothers and sisters abroad. http://bit.ly/entrepreneurshipinethiopia

“Outside of direct relief aid and some of the amazing health and education research and development, much (perhaps most) of what is done in the developing world through non-profits and NGO’s, could actually be accomplished through a business model, even if it would be harder to raise investment funding. Instead, someone begins selling tax subsidized and donor subsidized water pumps in Africa, because it is easier to raise the funding through tax deductible donations rather than through the rigors of proving out the business model for investment dollars, with the great result of increased deployment of inexpensive water moving technology in the developing world to aid rural farmers, but the negative results of (1) killing the market for future indigenous entrepreneurs attempting to sell water pumps at a profit and (2) locking a potentially valuable distribution channel in a non-profit, making it difficult for other for-profits to use.”

(4)  One billion people are obese or overweight and one billion people are hungry – so let’s look into the global food system. http://bit.ly/globalfoodsystem

I am a firm believer in ELCA World Hunger’s work both in the US and abroad. I also am a firm believer in learning from people in all sorts of organizations so that I can bring back a well-rounded understanding of hunger and poverty. I found this TED talk from Ellen Gustafson, co-creater of the “FEED bag” to be both informative and inspiring.

I hope you’ve found at least one of these stories interesting enough to keep reading beyond this post. Please feel free to comment below and share your opinions on the articles. Again, they are just for provoking your thoughts and interests (and are not meant to convey ELCA World Hunger policy on particular issues.) Thanks for reading, and for caring about issues of hunger and poverty.

Lana Lile

In February of 2008, I decided to stop eating animal products. In the two and half years since then, I have embraced a whole foods, plant-based diet. I have also answered some form of the question “What are your reasons for being vegan?” more times than I can possibly count. To be honest, I think that many times I have done a poor job presenting my reasons, which I believe can be attributed to a combination of my changing and growing convictions about veganism and a hesitancy to speak out in fear of being thought of as crazy, judgmental, or pushy in regard to my vegan habits.

In light of this, I want to use this platform to speak to why I am vegan without being condemning or abrasive. I am certainly not articulating a position on behalf of the ELCA. It is not my aim to offend, convert, or say that what I believe is the one right way. (My parents operate a hamburger restaurant and I still get along with them!) In my experience many people are very interested in my lifestyle, and I’m simply hoping to express my reasons for it while being informative and respectfully challenging.

The very first reason I started experimenting with a vegan diet was for my personal health. I firmly believe that eating a whole foods, plant-based diet is the healthiest way to live, and that I am avoiding cancer, heart disease, obesity, diabetes, autoimmune diseases, and other health problems that have been associated with the overconsumption of animal products – all animal products, not just meat. Eating vegan makes me feel energized and healthy. I learned to eat new fruits and vegetables, a greater variety of whole grains, and enjoy food more. I care for myself through the choices I make about what to eat, and honoring my body is a central aspect of my faith.

As I experienced the health benefits of a vegan diet, I began to learn a lot more about a vegan lifestyle’s impact – an impact that goes way beyond myself. I’ve committed to veganism as a way of life for the long term because I believe it promotes justice for all of creation: other people, the environment, and animals. I cannot personally reconcile eating meat knowing that 1.02 billion people in the world are undernourished, and, while I realize this is not a direct equation, much of the water and grain used to raise animals for food could be used to nourish humans instead. I learned that eating is an environmental act, and came to understand some of the harmful environmental effects of farming and producing animal-based food, including more pollution and land and water use. Now that I have been vegan for two plus years, I am simply not comfortable with the idea of eating animals, or anything that comes from an animal. It doesn’t feel right. This stemmed from a general uneasiness about the impact of factory farming and slaughterhouse policies on the quality of animal life. Also, I’ve learned startling things about food production and distribution, science, industry, medicine, and the government that raise numerous justice issues and further convince me of my commitment to veganism. I’ve “become aware,” as L. Shannon Jung writes in Sharing Food: Christian Practices for Enjoyment, “of the chain of human labor that leads to our tables – from those who cultivate good seed (or not), practice ecologically responsible agriculture (or not), harvest, sell, and package food equitably (or not), and distribute its costs in a sustainable way (or not)” (114).

Before I became vegan I was able to largely ignore food – its quality and how it got to my table. Becoming vegan helped me to remember and be conscious of the fact that food is a gift from God. I realized that my nourishment depends on a widespread community beyond myself.

This summer I’ve had the opportunity to look at a lot of different hunger resources to inform my work at ELCA World Hunger. A few quotes in a publication called Just Eating: Practicing Our Faith at the Table, by Advocate Heath Care, Church World Service, and the Presbyterian Hunger Program, speak to my reasons for being vegan:

“Setting limits that fit our values is a part of eating well.”

“To eat well is to consider not only your own body’s needs but also the needs and weaknesses of others.”

In summary, I am vegan out of care for myself, other people, other creatures, and creation. I love being vegan. I don’t see it as an ascetic lifestyle; I believe it is a lifestyle of abundance and I love food more than ever. I have found that eating vegan is not as hard as many people think it would be, but diverting from the mainstream in eating does not come without challenges. One of the biggest challenges for me has been the impact on my experiences of social and communal eating. But maybe that will be material for a later post. I will wrap up now though this topic as a whole is far from exhausted. I am more than willing to expand on my thoughts, provide more information about my sources, and take others’ ideas into consideration. Thanks for reading!

Julie Reishus

One thing we at ELCA World Hunger try to study and teach others about is the root causes of hunger. I have been keeping up with Jubilee USA’s blog, and have been thinking a lot about one root cause of hunger in particular: debt. According to Jubilee USA, an organization that works for debt cancellation for impoverished countries, “Today international debt has become a new form of slavery. Debt slavery means poor people working harder and harder in a vain effort to keep up with the interest payments on debts owed to rich countries including the US and international financial institutions (IFIs)…”

In order to get a better picture of how debt to rich nations and IFIs affect the lives of those in poverty, I did a little research. Many countries that are in debt have millions of people in poverty. Many of these people did not benefit from the money that was loaned to these countries. Much of the money was used to fund development projects such as dams and coal burning factories which did little to make the lives of the poor better and left the environment damaged. Often times this is due to corruption and unfulfilled promises within the government. While the loans many times did not reach those in poverty, they are the ones forced to “bear the burden of repayment.” Countries who owe money are constantly making payments on the interest from these loans, which draws money away from funding things like health care, education and food security. Kenya provides an example of this. According to Jubilee USA, Kenya’s 2005/2006 budget dedicated 22% of government expenses to their debt. This amount of money was equal to Kenya’s budgets for health, roads, water, agriculture, transportation and finance expenses. Debt Payments slow down social and economic development that could be essential to helping people out of poverty. Debt cancellation is important because it can allow economies to grow to meet people’s needs (University of Iowa Center for International Finance and Development).

After learning more about debt, I became curious about Jubilee USA’s name, and stumbled on the theological basis of debt relief. Leviticus 25 talks about the “Year of Jubilee” occurring every seven years in which all debts are cancelled and all slaves are freed. Verses 36-37 state “If one of your countrymen becomes poor and is unable to support himself among you, help him as you would an alien or a temporary resident, so he can continue to live among you. Do not take interest of any kind from him, but fear your God, so that your countryman may continue to live among you. You must not lend him money at interest or sell him food at a profit.”

It is important to keep in mind how international debt affects our neighbors around the world and to do what we can to keep them “living among us.” Poverty is complex, and debt is one of the many factors that influence it. To take action or to learn more about Jubilee USA’s work, visit www.jubileeusa.org

-Allie Stehlin

I’m on vacation. I’m having a great time. And it’s surprisingly sustainable.

Sustainable travel or green travel are expensive-sounding terms that imply vacations in exotic places like Bhutan or Costa Rica, places with jungles or peaks or dangerous rivers, places you fly to (earning fistfuls of carbon-offset credits) to do a dash of volunteering and engage another culture, preferably with a competent indigenous guide. In short, something other people do—other people with a whole lot more money.

The sun sets over the meadow

No jungles here. My brother and I only drove up to South Lake Tahoe to spend the week at a family member’s unrented rental house. It was a cheap – okay, make that free – opportunity to hang out in the mountains in exchange for a little midsummer cleaning.

The big surprise has been how the car has stayed put as we have explored Tahoe’s greatly expanding bike trails and public transportation system.

Like many cities, South Lake Tahoe is working on sustainability. As it implements a sustainability plan designed to “increase its livability and prosperity, reduce the ecological footprint of its residents and improve human and ecological health,” it is beefing up “increased mobility options” to “reduce dependence on the automobile.”

The trolley waits for us at the South Y Transit Center

Their work shows. One day we biked to Camp Richardson and Fallen Leaf Lake on safe, quiet roads and separate paths, loading our bikes onto a water taxi when we traveled back to town. We spent another day swimming, hiking, and exploring the Emerald Bay area thanks to the BlueGo #50 bus route and the summer-only “Nifty 50 Trolley.” The $5 all-day bus pass meant we didn’t have to compete with thousands of other people for the few parking spots along Highway 89.

Every evening I have walked along the beautiful Upper Truckee Marsh, a 513-acre wetlands restored by city and state agencies in order to filter out nutrients and pollutants that threaten Tahoe’s clear blue water. During the day I have walked past heavy equipment operators upgrading the stormwater management system—part of South Lake Tahoe’s plans for “infrastructure that improves water and air quality.”

Just about the only stated sustainability goal I haven’t seen much evidence of is local food. As the city’s plan says, “Climate and elevation make local food production a challenge.” So do tourist expectations of abundant, gambling-subsidized meals. And I confess, I enjoyed every last non-local, non-organic, completely unsustainable bite of the ample Forest Buffet at Harrah’s Stateline!

I didn’t expect to live sustainably at Tahoe. In fact, I was thinking, oh well, we’re driving there and back, and this is the land of the RV and the jet ski, so for a week, I’ll just set aside my own practices and enjoy what’s available, and maybe we’ll drive the recycling back home. What a delight to discover that South Lake Tahoe is going more than half way to meet me, doing the hard work of envisioning, planning, and setting up systems that make it easier for people to live or visit sustainably.

So, entirely by accident, I ended up taking my principles with me on vacation. You can do it on purpose. Where are you vacationing this summer? How are you getting there? Can you avoid flying, and drive or take the train instead? When you get there, what kind of systems can you participate in to avoid driving, generating waste, polluting or overusing water, and overconsuming local resources?

Do your research ahead of time, because alternatives may still be “alternative” and underpublicized. I had to work to find the Nifty50 Trolley schedule, in part because, with only one an hour, the transit system really can’t handle a big passenger load. It’s a great first step, but it will take many more riders and lots of publicity to make it grow.

If you can’t find any alternatives to the tried-and-true, to individual transportation, to unsorted garbage, to chain-store purchases, then you can spend your vacation politely asking for them. Create the demand.

May all of our vacations help nurture another community’s sustainability goals along with our own commitments, so that sustainable travel becomes the way all of us go on vacation.

Anne Basye, Sustaining Simplicity: A Journal

I wanna be Your hands
I wanna be Your feet
I’ll go where You send me
I’ll go where You send me
I’ll be Your hands
I’ll be Your feet
I’ll go where You send me
I’ll go where You send me
And I try, yeah I try
To touch the world like You touched my life
An I’ll find my way
To be Your hands

–Audio Adrenaline, Hands and Feet

I hear the phrase, “being Christ’s hands and feet” a lot. I imagine you do too. I hear it at church, when I talk with my friends, and in popular Christian music. I read it in books and on blogs, and I’ve used it myself. I feel like today the idea of being Christ’s hands and feet in the world is very trendy, especially for the social justice-conscious crowd. The context I see it show up most in is in relation to serving those who are poor and needy.

In their book Exploring Ecclesiology, authors Brad Harper and Paul Louis Metzger write, “Just as God ministers in the world through his two hands – the Son and the Spirit – we are his hands and feet through our union with Christ in the power of the Spirit. As the body of Christ, the church…goes out to the world, serving as Christ’s hands and feet” (246). As right as this sounds, I would press the authors, and anyone else who ascribes to this belief, to be a little more critical of it and cautious about what this metaphor might mean.

I believe the idea of being Jesus to others, of being his hands and feet, is problematic. It’s problematic because in truth, we are not. We are not Jesus to those who are poor. In a sense those who are poor are Christ to us; they are people who are hungry and displaced and oppressed who we must love. Jesus said whenever we serve the least of the members of his family we serve him, not that we are him when we serve.

By claiming to be the hands and feet of Christ we can edge into the dangerous territory of placing ourselves on the center stage and claiming we have Jesus’ redemptive power. It can tempt us into thinking the church will only survive through our efforts and if we are faithful. It can give us the impression that human deeds could take the place of God’s action. Instead we have to realize that we are not necessary for the salvation of the world, though we are called.

At the same time as I express this caution, I wonder at how my concern squares with the notion that we are the body of Christ – with Christ as the head and specific body parts ascribed to us – found in Scripture. Ephesians 1:22-23 says, “And he has put all things under his feet and has made him the head over all things for the church, which is his body, the fullness of him who fills all in all,” and Romans 12:4-5 reads “For as in one body we have many members, and not all the members have the same function, so we, who are many, are one body in Christ, and individually we are members one of another.”

Maybe the point here is on our inter-connectedness, and how as the people of God we rely on one another to be whole, rather than on us being Christ to others. I continue to think through this, and hope you will too.

Julie Reishus

“If we have no peace, it is because we have forgotten that we belong to each other.” –Mother Teresa

I am a big fan of quotes and this is one that is particularly powerful to me. It is one that keeps me motivated to work for worldwide justice. It reminds me why it is important that I think about others when I make lifestyle choices each day. It is a quote that reminds me that I am connected to each and every human being on this planet.

First, I want to reflect on the word “peace”. In college I am pursuing a minor in Peace Studies, so I’ve thought a lot about what this word means. One aspect of peace that I have learned in my classes is that there are two different kinds of peace. One is negative peace, which sounds bad but it really just means an absence of war and violence. The other is positive peace which is a little more comprehensive. Positive peace includes anything related to justice: social, racial and economic, gender, environmental, etc. In a document from the University of Hawaii, Professor R.J. Rummel states, “This is not only peace from violence, but also peace of mind.” The quote serves as a reminder to me to work for justice, to work for creating a worldwide “peace of mind.”

 “We belong to each other” also resonates with me. Although we tend to divide humankind by race, religion, nation, geographic location, class and caste, I believe we are all neighbors, no matter how far away we are from each other. Simply because we are all human beings, we need to take care of each other. But more than that, we are all connected – even if it doesn’t feel like it sometimes. For example, I know that personally, on a day-to-day basis, I don’t notice the effects of climate change. However, this is not the case everywhere. While I was in India, I talked with a tribal village that truly relied on the land. Their water supply came from the local river, they relied on plants and animals around them for food, and much of their livelihood came from the surrounding forests. As we talked to them, they explained how in recent years, life has gotten more difficult. The river is drying up and the forest is disappearing. Performing their daily tasks is getting harder and harder. These people, who lived in a manner much more sustainable than I do, were suffering in part because of the actions of others around the world. They asked us if God was punishing them for something. My connection to strangers halfway across the world has never been clearer to me than at that moment. My actions and habits can affect others.

“If we have no peace, it is because we have forgotten that we belong to each other.” This is a quote I turn to again and again for inspiration and motivation. Are there anymore quote lovers out there? What quote helps you on your road to justice?

My mother loves to bake; from fruit pies to Swedish pastries her two ovens provide the best parts of Holiday meals. Ever since I can remember, one of my favorite recipes of hers has been Beech Bread. Until last week I always thought that this was another one of those recipes passed down from cookbook to cookbook, like the rye bread recipe my great grandfather brought over from the Åland Islands. It turns out, however, that this isn’t the case at all! After college one of my mom’s first jobs was at our local health department. One of her co-workers was a nutritionist who taught local women involved in the WIC (Women, Infants and Children) Program recipes for affordable nutritious foods, and this is where her recipe came from. So it turns out that my yummy, moist and rich childhood Beech Bread isn’t a family recipe at all!

As ELCA Advocacy urges support for a strong Child Nutrition and WIC Reauthorization Act in 2010 that increases access, expands participation and improves nutrition standards, I thought I would share a recipe that continues to be an important morsel of my life today. Admittedly, the recipe is nearly 30 years old, so I have no idea if it has recently been in use in health department classes or the WIC program, but I do know that it tastes just as good as ever…in fact, I just finished a slice!

BEECH BREAD (a “quick” bread)

3 cups buttermilk or sour milk*

3 cups whole wheat flour

3 cups enriched all-purpose flour

1 teaspoon salt

3 teaspoons baking soda

1 cup molasses

1 egg, beaten

*to make sour milk, add 1 Tablespoon vinegar or lemon juice per cup of regular milk. Let sit 5 minutes.

Directions – Combine flours, salt and soda. Mix well. Add buttermilk, molasses and beaten egg to the dry mixture. Blend together well. Let stand in bowl for 20 minutes. Pour batter into 2 greased and floured pans (about 9”x5”x3”). Bake at 375 degrees for 60 – 75 minutes.

Enjoy!

Lana

Last week one of the items of “Top Hunger News” featured on Bread for the World’s blog was this video, recently released by NPR, explaining the unintended impact that giving away free food has had on the local economy in Haiti.

In the aftermath of January’s devastating earthquake in Haiti, post-disaster relief is creating a new kind of problem for businesses there. The massive influx of food aid has altered the price of rice, throwing the delicate balance in Haiti’s food supply chain out of whack and threatening to collapse the country’s rice market. – Bread blog

I watched the video and with its implications on my mind, throughout the week had conversations with different people and read more on the topic of food aid, like this article about outside organizations overwhelming Haiti’s local aid economy.

Last week I blogged about Enough: Why the World’s Poorest Starve in an Age of Plenty. The questions and wonderings and conversations I had surrounding food aid were piqued in part by one of the chapters, “Who’s Aiding Whom?” focusing on Nazareth, Ethiopia in 2003. The authors write of Jerman Amente, an Ethiopian farmer and grain trader who “shook with anger” when he saw American food intended for starving Ethiopians pour into the country, while homegrown Ethiopian wheat, corn, beans, peas, and lentils “languished untouched” (86). Kedir Geleto, the manager of a grain-trading operation in Ethiopia, says in the chapter, “American farmers have a market in Ethiopia, but we don’t have a market in Ethiopia…We don’t oppose food aid. When there’s a deficit in the country, of course we need it. But when there’s plenty of food in the country, then it’s unbelievable” (87).

I’m relatively new to this conversation about food aid. While I certainly had a sense that not all aid is equal, and that very well-meaning people with good intentions can actually cause harm, the past few weeks have been the first time I truly gave these ideas more than a passing thought. With just a little digging I found a wealth of opinions and information that help me be better informed and more respectfully critical. Here’s my question: who else is new to the conversation about food aid and what have you been learning? How about veterans? What should we know?

Julie Reishus

As I was doing research for a paper I am writing on gender and development, I ran across an intriguing definition of the word poverty. Through my classes in college and my work at ELCA World Hunger I have done a lot of thinking about big issues related to poverty, but seldom do I sit down and think about what the word actually means. I decided to do some investigating on how others define poverty and here is what I came up with.

Merriam-Webster’s online dictionary defines poverty as “the state of one who lacks a usual or socially acceptable amount of money or material possessions,” “renunciation as a member of a religious order of the right as an individual to own property,” “debility due to malnutrition,” and even a “lack of fertility”! Besides the last part, this definition covers a basic view of what poverty is, not having money or property or enough food to eat.

Next, I looked up a more concrete way of defining poverty. According to the World Bank, the international poverty line, as of 2005 defines poverty as living on less than $1.25 a day. Domestically, the United States Department of Health and Human Services poverty guideline for a four person household in 2009 was an annual income of $22,050 or below. According to the CIA World Factbook, Israel views poverty as living on $7.30 a day or less, and Mexico bases their definition of poverty on the amount of food one has. 

The definition I ran across in my research comes from Charlotte Wrigley-Asante in the Norwegian Journal of Geography. She argues that poverty is more than lack of income, but also incorporates “lack of dignity and autonomy and vulnerability.” She states that poverty is “the uneven distribution of life changes and experiences” and that “poverty is equated with deprivation and lack of social power.” She also includes vulnerability to “risks, shocks and stress and the inability to deal with them without sustaining damaging loss” in her definition of poverty.

Now that I have shared what I found, I want to hear what you think! What is poverty? Lack of money? A specific number? Being deprived of human capabilities? How would you define poverty?