Remembering The Hungry Beyond World Food Day

Rwandan farming woman - UN Photo/Fred Noy

World Food Day is observed on October 16 each year.  It is a single day in Hunger Awareness Month that reminds us of global food scarcity, and resulting hunger crisis. While “hunger rights” are brought to our attention today, what happens after today is even more critical. How does your church address global poverty, world hunger and the growing food crisis?

So Jesus said, I was hungry and you gave me no food, I was thirsty and you gave me nothing to drink ..(Matthew 25:42)

And they objected, answering, Lord when was it we saw you hungry or thirsty?

I mean come on. How could we forget if we encountered the Lord? Surely, we’d remember that. And if the Lord would ever return now and invited himself to our house for a meal we’d never turn down such a request. In fact, no matter how busy we are we’d seek him out and badger him until he grew weary and agree to come sup with us.

We’d break out all the chinaware we have been saving for just this occasion. We’d serve the finest most scrumptious meal ever, and we’d start preparing early so that we don’t keep Jesus waiting. After all, this is royalty coming!

Fruits and Vegetables

Oh yes, back to the question. Lord how could I have missed you? Hungry? Thirsty? Never! I would never do such a thing. Without any anger, only sadness on his face Jesus replied, You did. You overlooked me completely. Many times. For I am ever before you in the hungry around the world, especially in Asia, the Pacific, and Africa…

Jesus’ answer is a reminder of the Mission to which we have been called. But, but, but Lord they argued, surely you aren’t blaming us for the millions of hungry people in the world? And what can I do anyway? I’m only one person! We are just one church!

According to Feeding Minds, Fighting Hunger

The overwhelming majority of the undernourished are in developing countries, which account for 95% (798 million) of the undernourished; 34 million people in countries in transition and 10 million in industrialized countries are estimated to be undernourished. At the regional level, Asia and the Pacific account for three-fifths (505 million) of the world’s undernourished; India alone has 214 million undernourished people. Almost one-quarter (198 million) of the undernourished are in Sub-Saharan Africa, which is also the region with the highest proportion of its population undernourished.

Many of us are so comfortable with the kind of theologizing that teaches us that Jesus died, rose from the dead, and is coming again. That’s it. We ‘get saved’ and we go to church. We worship and we wait for his coming again. We are OK. So there is no need to be concerned about the needy in the world.

On the other hand, some are seized with ‘evangelistic fervor’ and a passion to ‘save souls’. It is all about preaching repentance to the lost  “Third World natives”. [You know, it never fails to irritate me to hear 'missionaries' in this day an age calling people 'Third World natives'. For those who do not know, it is demeaning!!]. This mentality usually accompanies concern about ‘souls’ not a whole human being.

Drought - UN Photo/Martine Perret

So issues of global poverty, hunger, diseases and inequities in the distribution and consumption of the world’s resources hardly registers on their evangelistic radar. Social justice as an essential part of the church’s mission mandate, is still taking sometime to catch on especially among very conservative Christians.

Essential to the church’s mission, is the kind of love for our neighbours that make us concerned not only about ‘souls’ but about a whole being and the needs of those who hunger for food and clean water in the global south.

To that I’d say, start by becoming ‘conscientized’. Allow your social consciousness to be opened to the harsh realities of people outside of your neighborhood and your country. Even better, start paying attention to the hungry and homeless in your neighborhood and then you’d be better able to consider what is happening in the rest of the world.

If you haven’t been doing so, now is the time to develop a keener social consciousness of the conditions of your sisters and brothers across the world. They are not just ‘them’ out there. They are the ones in whom Christ dwells – as the hungry, the destitute, the oppressed and powerless. They are the ones to whom we have been sent to announce the Kingdom of God as breaking into their real, lived, depressing conditions.

So World Food Day ends, but our mission to the needy continues. An organization called World Hunger suggests the following ways to take action:

* Influence public policy to support the world’s poorest peoples – For me it is not enough to send off tons of Food Aid to starving people, when chances are your country is engaging in unfair economic and trade policies that guarantee that the hungry will stay hungry and become more and more dependent on hand outs!

* Contribute financially to reducing hunger and poverty -  While it is, in general, not possible to support individual poor families, it is possible to contribute to organizations that do support poor people.

* Work directly with the poor- ‘Adopt’ as in provide assistance to a poor family, or their family members such as children in need of food (even a warm meal at school!), health care and better educational opportunities; look out for needy persons in your neighborhood and stop thinking that poor people are all lazy people who do not want to work!

So what are you doing now and what more can you do from your little corner of the world?

Do share your thoughts with us.

Peace,
Marvia

Read – Why The World’s Poorest Women Are Chronically Hungry