Posted on 09/23/2005 8:36:08 AM PDT by WestTexasWend
Rev. Jim Wallis says hurricane exposed 'social disaster' of poverty |
The Rev. Jim Wallis has been advising the Democrats to make poverty their central issue for years, but he says now they're starting to pay attention because Hurricane Katrina exposed disparities in New Orleans to a shocked nation.
"Sometimes it takes a natural disaster to expose a social disaster," Wallis said. "The waves of Katrina washed away cities and people, but they may also wash away our public denial of how many people in the country are poor."
Wallis, the editor of Sojourners magazine and author of "God's Politics: Why the Right Gets It Wrong and the Left Doesn't Get It," spoke to more than 200 people at El Buen Samaritano Episcopal Mission in South Austin on Wednesday night. He also addressed about 100 seminary students and graduates Thursday morning at the Seminary of the Southwest's 2005 Blandy Lectures.
Since the 2004 presidential election, Wallis has been on a "movement tour" through 50 cities, trying to create a progressive alternative to the Christian right and inject heart into soul-searching Democrats.
In the process, he has become one of the leading national commentators on faith and politics. His book has sold more than 200,000 copies, and he says he's met face-to-face with 80,000 people on the road.
"Some Democrats have said to me since Katrina, 'We may finally get our voice back,' and I hope they do," Wallis said. "They have an opportunity to provide leadership. If the Democrats don't start talking about poverty now, the party will die, and it will deserve to. This is a moment of trans- formation."
Wallis worries about how Bush will pay for his reconstruction plan.
More than 25,000 people already have signed Sojourners' online "Katrina pledge" to not only help evacuees but to pressure legislators to oppose paying for the recovery with budget cuts.
"Budgets are moral documents; they show what we value most," Wallis said.
Jennifer Webster, spokeswoman for the Republican Party of Texas, said President Bush is handling the Katrina response appropriately by aggressively tackling poverty.
"President Bush is the first one really addressing the issue since the New Deal with incentives, motivations and a helping hand," Webster said.
Wallis has his own brand of evangelical activism.
He says the Bible makes more references — about 3,000 — to helping the poor than any other topic, and Republicans get voters to ignore this moral issue by scaring them with wedge issues such as abortion and gay marriage. He thinks that the war in Iraq is immoral, and he wants more focus placed on the environment.
Most of all, Wallis believes that political change can only happen through social movements with a strong spiritual foundation. He points to abolitionists, child labor law reform, women's suffrage and the civil rights movements as examples.
"It's movement-building time now," he said. "We are preaching, training and organizing. We are linking people together and building a network that impacts politics and the culture."
The Bible most certainly does make such references--to VOLUNTARY efforts to helping the poor.
LIBERALISM is the social disaster and cause of poverty.
Dems solutiuon? Another 7 trillion ought to finally rid us of poverty. It will work trust us!
Shouldn't the Title read:
"Democrats Seek to Dance on Graves of Katrina's Victims"
I've said this for years: The Government should not be in the business of charity work.
That is the job of our churches and faith-based initiatives.
Thank you for listening.
The Bible asks the INDIVIDUAL to help the poor. When the government steps in, it takes away the personal resposibility Jesus has placed on each soul to help those in need. We can ignore because "government" will help.
Government is not a charity. We are not allowed, as Christians, to say, "we gave at the office". According to the Bible, it is the church, defined as the body of Christ unified in Him, who is to help the poor. Along with individual acts of goodness.
Interesting to see an outright exhortation to take craven and cynical advantage of a natural disaster.
>>"Sometimes it takes a natural disaster to expose a social
>>disaster," Wallis said.
Yes....a welfare disaster.
Hilarious headline. I had to double check to make sure it wasn't satire. No fooling.
It's the MO of the National Socailists the International Socialists & 3rd Way...
An interesting tug of war...
What the good reverend fails to realize is that the Democratic party's efforts for the poor are about buying their votes, not helping them out of poverty...
"You controlled Congress and fought poverty for forty years."
"Clearly, poverty won and you lost."
Sheeesh - speaking of stuck on stupid.......
Personally, I could have used a "barf alert."
Katrina exposed the consequences of what happens when Democrats are in charge. If our history of social experimentation that began with the Great Society under LBJ has taught us anything, it's that welfare only succeeds in creating an underclass of economically dependent people who forget how or otherwise refuse to take care of themselves. The 'rugged individual' has been replaced with the 'frail collectivist' whose only claim to social or economic competence is the right to vote.
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