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The Scourge of Poverty. Poverty. Latin word paupentas : pauper or poor Poverty: the lack of means to provide for material needs and comforts. Being blessed with so much wealth implies much duty to use it wisely: avoid waste share abundance
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Poverty • Latin word paupentas: pauper or poor • Poverty: the lack of means to provide for material needs and comforts
Being blessed with so much wealth implies much duty to use it wisely: • avoid waste • share abundance • reform political, social, and economic structures to help the poor
Poverty • The gap between the rich and poor is widening and the gap between the rich and poor nations is also widening
3 types of Poverty 1. Poverty of the Soul 2. Poverty of the Spirit 3. Material Poverty
THREE TYPES OF POVERTY 1. Poverty of the soul – Present when people lack purpose in life – a sense of hopelessness • Many times found in wealthy people who look to meaning in worldly goods • They make gods out of goods like wealth, possessions, power, prestige, beauty, sex • Material objects/status/power, etc. hold higher value than relationships • NEGATIVE
Servant Love 2. Poverty of the Spirit
3 Types of poverty, cont’d 2. Poverty of the Spirit • Total dependence on God • Source of total humility – calling us to express gratitude to God by sharing our talents, gifts, and wealth with others, especially the neediest • Out of love, we are moved to share our blessings with the truly poor. • It compels us to fight for justice. • Our values focus on our neighbor. • POSITIVE
3. Material Poverty • Material Poverty – lack of sufficient material means to meet basic human needs • Lack of sufficient means for survival: sufficient food and water, healthcare, housing, clothing etc. • Chronic unemployment or jobs that do not offer enough to sustain oneself or one’s family • Often have no one to count on for help • Negative
Poverty • Being voiceless and powerless in politics and economics to change the conditions • It means being vulnerable to the terrible consequences that accompany poverty • Broken homes • Drug addiction • Unplanned pregnancies • Crime infested neighborhoods • Chronic fear
Biblical Strategies • Sabbatical: the 7th year where land was not farmed, debts were forgiven and slaves let go • Jubilee: Every 50 years where land was returned to its original owner • Both were efforts to keep balance and equality among the tribes of Israel
Primary Cause of Hunger • The primary cause of hunger is Poverty. • Duh. • Why is it important to say it? • What else could it be?
Catholic Social Teaching & Poverty • It’s our job to create structures that support the most vulnerable in society.
Through prayer and the Eucharist… • We are transformed by love, to love others.
Our top priority for alleviating poverty? Education!
Welfare Reform • The Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act. • 1996 legislation that hurt the poor
Catholic Organizations that fight poverty: • Catholic Campaign for Human Development: “a hand up, not a hand out” • Catholic Relief Services: Founded by the U.S. Catholic Bishops to provide relief for those in poverty around the world. • Catholic Charities: “attorney for the poor,” an advocate for America’s most poor and vulnerable.
Dorothy Day “The mystery of the poor is this: That they are Jesus, and what you do for them you do for Him. It is the only way we have of knowing and believing in our love..”
The Global Village If we could shrink the earth's population to a village of precisely 100 people, with all the existing human ratios remaining the same, what would it look like? How many would be… • ______ Asians • ______ Europeans • ______ Africans • ______ From the Western Hemisphere • _____would be female _____ would be male • _____would be non-white _____would be white • _____would be non-Christian _____would be Christian • _____would be heterosexual _____would be homosexual • _____people would possess 59% of the entire world's wealth and all would be from the United States.
_____would live in substandard housing _____would be unable to read_____would suffer from malnutrition _____would have a college education _____would own a computer
Global Village • If we could shrink the earth's population to a village of precisely 100 people, with all the existing human ratios remaining the same, it would look something like the following: There would be: • 57 Asians • 21 Europeans • 14 from the Western Hemisphere8 Africans • 52 would be female 48 would be male • 70 would be non-white 30 would be white • 70 would be non-Christian 30 would be Christian • 89 would be heterosexual 11 would be homosexual • 6 people would possess 59% of the entire world's wealth and all 6 would be from the United States.
We are a global village • 80 would live in substandard housing 70 would be unable to read50 would suffer from malnutrition 1 (yes, only 1) would have a college education 1 would own a computerWhen one considers our world from such a compressed perspective, the need for mutual support, acceptance, understanding and education becomes glaringly apparent.
Drug Testing of Welfare recipients?www.aclu.org • Random drug testing of welfare recipients is fiscally irresponsible: • The average cost of a drug test is about $42 per person tested,[8] not including the costs of hiring personnel to administer the tests, to ensure confidentiality of results and to run confirmatory tests to guard against false positives resulting from passive drug exposure, cross-identification with legal, prescription drugs such as codeine and legal substances such as poppy seeds.
Drug testing, continued • Another way to measure the cost is by counting what it costs to “catch” each drug user. Drug testing is not used by many private employers because of the exorbitant cost of catching each person who tests positive. One electronics manufacturer, for example, estimated that the cost of finding each person who tested positive was $20,000, since after testing 10,000 employees, only 49 tested positive. A congressional committee also estimated that the cost of each positive drug test of government employees was $77,000, because the positive rate was only 0.5%.[9] • Mandatory drug testing is an ineffective means to uncover drug abuse.
What do you think? • An Oklahoma study found that a questionnaire was able to accurately detect 94 out of 100 drug abusers. The questionnaire was also useful in detecting alcohol abusers, something drug tests fail to accomplish.[10] • Louisiana passed a law in 1997 requiring drug testing for welfare recipients. However, a task force set up to implement the law found more limited drug testing of individuals identified by a questionnaire to be more cost-effective than mandatory drug testing.[14] Alabama decided against drug testing because it found that focusing on job training programs was a more effective method of moving individuals off of welfare.[15]
