the gift that keeps on giving...

by Mike Batell - Faith Outreach Organizer in Minneapolis

Interesting, the things you stumble upon when you’re just trying to kill some time.  So I was in DC’s Union Station waiting for my train back to Minneapolis…..I know, a whole ‘nother story, maybe for another time.  Anyways, in the bookstore right next door, I started flipping through a copy of former President Clinton’s new book “Giving”.  As I’m paging through, all of a sudden the words “Bread for the World” jump out at me.  In his chapter entitled, “What About Government?”, he gives high praise to the work of Bread:

As Clinton writes on pages 188-189:

An “important anti-poverty advocacy group is Bread for the World, a bipartisan faith-based group with 58,000 members, including three thousand churches.  Bread for the World writes nearly 250,000 letters to Congress every year on behalf of initiatives to reduce poverty, hunger, and AIDS in the world’s poorest countries.  For the last two years, it has supported President Bush’s proposal to change the way American food aid is delivered.  Current law requires all aid to be in food grown in the United States, with three-fourths of it to be shipped on US flag vessels.  Rising energy costs, complicated logistics, and administrative costs now consume more than 60 percent of our main food aid program….Canada and Europe have been moving away from shipping their own food to Africa and Asia in favor of giving cash to buy food in developing countries closest to places with severe hunger problems.  That buys more food, gets it delivered more quickly, and helps poor farm economies….President Bush has proposed doing the same thing with 25 percent of US food aid.
            Unfortunately, farm groups and even some charities opposed the idea at first and for two years it’s gone nowhere in Congress.  Bread for the World hasn’t given up.  It has already converted some of its opponents and will keep trying….If you agree, you should contact Bread for the World and offer to help."

Way cool!  To give your voice and the gift of citizenship to Bread and those facing hunger and poverty, visit our TAKE ACTION page.

To give a financial offering to Bread, visit our giving page.