Just Generosity: A New Vision for Overcoming Poverty in America

Ron Sider displays a thoughtful commitment to the cause of justice for the poor from a thoroughly biblical perspective. . . . This is a book we have needed for a long time.

—Roberta Hestenes, former international minister-at-large, World Vision

Dispels the myths about poverty with facts and replaces pious rhetoric with practical action.

—Wesley Granberg-Michaelson, general secretary,

Reformed Church in America

Sider has added another poverty-fighting book to the evangelical arsenal.

—Jim Skillen, executive director, Center for Public Justice

Bold and daring proposals that are also practical and comprehensive. This is a must-read volume for all Christians who are concerned about overcoming poverty in a rich nation.

—J. Deotis Roberts, research professor of Christian theology,

Duke University Divinity School

Ron Sider effectively engages the crucial economic and moral question of our times: how can our poor and marginalized participate in the American Dream? . . . His book not only makes this case but also provides useful examples of how to transform these problems.

—J. McDonald Williams, chairman, Trammel Crow Company

Lively, readable, and believable. . . . A convincing and workable answer to the question, what should we do?

—Harvey Cox, Thomas Professor of Divinity, Harvard Divinity School

How refreshing! Ron Sider’s book emphasizes the importance of both private and public responsibility in ending poverty. . . . Ron gets the balance right and then shows us how we can make a difference.

—Tony P. Hall, former U.S. Congressman (D-Ohio)

Sider’s call for a holistic comprehensive framework is worthy of protracted consideration by those who would be faithful to the Jesus who had a special affection, ministry, and identification with the poor.

—Joan Brown Campbell, former general secretary,

National Council of the Churches of Christ in the USA

Also by Ronald J. Sider

Rich Christians in an Age of Hunger

Karlstadt’s Battle with Luther

Christ and Violence

For They Shall Be Fed, editor

Completely Pro-Life

Preaching about Life in a Threatening World

Non-violence: An Invincible Weapon?

Cup of Water, Bread of Life

Living like Jesus

Good News and Good Works

The Scandal of the Evangelical Conscience

JUST

GENEROSITY

A New Vision for Overcoming Poverty in America

SECOND EDITION

RONALD J. SIDER

© 1999, 2007 by Ronald J. Sider

Published by Baker Books

a division of Baker Publishing Group

P.O. Box 6287, Grand Rapids, MI 49516-6287

www.bakerbooks.com

Printed in the United States of America

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means—for example, electronic, photocopy, recording—without the prior written permission of the publisher. The only exception is brief quotations in printed reviews.

                Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Sider, Ronald J.

        Just generosity : a new vision for overcoming poverty in America / Ronald J. Sider. —2nd ed.

            p.  cm.

        Includes bibliographical references.

        ISBN 10: 0-8010-6613-1 (pbk.)

        ISBN 978-0-8010-6613-9 (pbk.)

        1. Poverty—United States. 2. Poor—United States. 3. Distributive justice—United States. 4. United States—Social conditions. 5. United States—Economic conditions. 6. Economics—Religious aspects—Christianity. I. Title

        HC110.P63S524 2007

        362.5'80973—dc22         2006036041

Unless otherwise indicated, Scripture is taken from the Revised Standard Version of the Bible, copyright 1952 [2nd edition, 1971] by the Division of Christian Education of the National Council of the Churches of Christ in the United States of America. Used by permission. All rights reserved.

Scripture marked NCV is taken from the New Century Version®. Copyright © 1987, 1988, 1991 by Word Publishing, a division of Thomas Nelson, Inc. Used by permission. All rights reserved.

Scripture marked NIV is taken from the HOLY BIBLE, NEW INTERNATIONAL VERSION®. NIV®. Copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984 by International Bible Society. Used by permission of Zondervan. All rights reserved.

Scripture marked NRSV is taken from the New Revised Standard Version of the Bible, copyright 1989, Division of Christian Education of the National Council of the Churches of Christ in the United States of America. Used by permission. All rights reserved.

Scripture marked TNIV is taken from the Holy Bible, Today’s New International Version™ Copyright © 2001 by International Bible Society. All rights reserved.

All royalties from this book are being donated to charitable causes.

To

friends and neighbors

in North Philly and Germantown

who have taught me so much

Contents

Foreword by Charles W. Colson and John J. DiIulio Jr.

Preface

Acknowledgments

Introduction

Part 1 Poverty amidst Abundance

1. What Does Poverty Look Like?

Part 2 A Holistic, Biblical Vision for Empowering the Poor

2. A Biblical Foundation

3. A Comprehensive Strategy

Part 3 Implementing the Vision

4. If I Work, Can I Earn a Family Income?

5. Broken Families and Rising Poverty

6. Does Justice Include Health Care for the Poor?

7. Quality Education for Everyone

8. Could Welfare Empower the Poor?

9. Other Important Issues Affecting the Poor

Part 4 The Generous Christians Generation

10. We Can End the Scandal

Afterword by Eugene F. Rivers III

Notes

Bibliography

List of Organizations

Foreword

The Least of These, the Rest of Us

Iwas hungry and you gave me food, I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink. . . . I was in prison and you visited me. . . . Truly I tell you, just as you did it to one of the least of these who are members of my family, you did it to me (Matt. 25:35–36, 40 NRSV). Whoever is kind to the poor lends to the Lord (Prov. 19:17 NRSV). Listen, my beloved brothers and sisters. Has not God chosen the poor in the world to be rich in faith and to be heirs of the kingdom that he has promised to those who love him? But you have dishonored the poor" (James 2:5–6 NRSV).

We Americans enter the twenty-first century and the new millennium as the most economically prosperous people in the history of the world. By any historical, comparative, or cross-national measure, we Americans enjoy unprecedented private affluence and enormous national wealth. Despite huge gaps in income and high concentrations of wealth, most poor Americans today are better housed and better fed and own more personal property than average Americans throughout much of this century.1 In the light of history, there is a pardonable excessive optimism in the claim that, at least for present-day America’s least of these, the problem of poverty, defined as material scarcity, has been solved.2 There is, however, no denying that, even today, a significant minority of Americans still struggle to survive under economic conditions that the vast majority of us would consider impoverished and find intolerable were we suddenly forced to trade places with them.

To be sure, America’s poverty problem has been, if not solved, then reduced since the mid-1960s because Americans have done ever more to honor the poor. Each year, the country’s civil sector, led by the nation’s religious charities, congregations, and community-serving ministries, provides billions of dollars in cash assistance and social services for the poor. For example, the average big-city urban religious congregation, during the course of a year, provides over 5,300 hours (or 132 weeks) of volunteer support to needy people, and a total of about $144,000 a year in community programs that primarily serve the poor.3 The public sector’s federal-state anti-poverty programs for children and families (food stamps, Medicaid, and other programs) provide billions of dollars annually in cash assistance and social services for the poor.4 Thanks to those efforts, by 1996 only 14 percent of all families with children were in poverty (over a third fewer families in poverty than would exist without government aid);5 and in the year 2002, all persons age nineteen and younger were eligible if in need for publicly financed health care.6 Most hopeful, as a result of recent changes in federal law, it is possible that in the first decades of this new century we will witness greater cooperation between government and faith-based social-service delivery and anti-poverty efforts.7

We also honor the nation’s poor by recognizing that most poor adult Americans are decent, law-abiding citizens who, if given half a chance, will choose work over welfare.8 Amid a tremendous national economic boom, and with new welfare-to-work laws being implemented in most states, the total number of people on welfare in America fell from 14.1 million in January 1993 to 8.9 million in March 1998 (a 37 percent decline), with many states reporting promising trends in the percentages of former welfare recipients who are finding jobs.9 Between 1994 and 1998, the welfare rolls in thirty of the largest American cities declined by 35 percent.10

Still, as Ronald J. Sider reminds us in this new, important, and provocative book, let no one suppose for a moment that we live in a post-poverty America. Yes, welfare caseloads are down dramatically, but state welfare caseloads are increasingly concentrated in minority big-city neighborhoods that the rest of society has left behind.11 Yes, more formerly dependent adults are working, but there is yet a rising tide of child-only welfare cases, children being raised by grandparents or other relatives because their parents are in jail, are on drugs or have lost custody as a result of abuse or neglect.12 Yes, recent rates of black poverty are the lowest ever recorded, but about 1 in 5 black children still lives in high-poverty neighborhoods where there are fewer resources for families, fewer jobs, fewer successful role models . . . , more schools with lower academic achievement, and a greater exposure to crime, drugs, alcohol, and violence.13 Both of us know this to be true because we encounter it daily in our ministries.

Sider, nationally known as the president of the Philadelphia-based Evangelicals for Social Action, is a politically progressive yet steadfastly prolife evangelical Christian who has spent much of his adult life living and working among and on behalf of the poor. Over the years, and despite the differences of public policy vision and theological understanding we have with him, each of us has gotten to know Sider as a brother in Christ and to admire him as one who practices what he preaches about the biblical imperative to serve the poor.

For decades, Sider has argued forthrightly that prayers and spiritual deliverance, not programs and social service delivery, must be ever at the heart of Christian anti-poverty efforts. Are we not naive, he asked in 1974, if we suppose that evangelical social activists will be any more effective than were liberals unless we totally immerse our concern and activity in prayer to the Father? In short, the first agenda item for evangelical social activists in the seventies is prayer.14 Twenty years later, he lamented that the Christian churches and ministries most engaged in meeting people’s material needs seldom get around to explicitly inviting people to Christ. People do not come to Christ automatically. They come to Christ when the people who serve them also long to share their dearest treasure, Jesus Christ the Savior, and there- fore regularly pray for and watch for opportunities to encourage people to believe and obey Him.15 Evangelism, Sider insisted once again in 1997, is central to social change. Nothing so transforms the self-identity, self-worth, and initiative of a poor, oppressed person as a personal, living relationship with God in Christ.16 In 1999, he recounted stories of churches leading people to Christ and ministering to the needs of hurting people. I long for the day when every village, town, and city has congregations of Christians so in love with Jesus Christ that they lead scores of people to accept him as personal Savior and Lord every year—and so sensitive to the cry of the poor and oppressed that they work vigorously for justice, peace, and freedom.17 Just Generosity: A New Vision for Overcoming Poverty in America is primarily a work of public policy analysis rather than of theological exegesis or of Christian apologetics. Just the same, in this book Sider rightly acknowledges that helping the poor requires both a spiritual and a structural response. His policy-oriented yet deeply Christian perspective on poverty in America is bound to challenge readers of every religious, political, and ideological persuasion. As he writes on page 105, Especially in the case of persons caught in a destructive environment that makes misguided decisions about drugs, sex, school, and single parenthood extremely easy, religious conversion is important. An inward transformation of values and character produces a radical transformation of outward behavior. While secular agencies and government programs cannot bring about such transformation, evidence clearly indicates that faith-based programs can and do.

As Sider explains, poverty is not the lone or leading cause of America’s other social ills, and poverty is often the consequence of an individual’s own morally myopic life choices (for example, dropping out of school, experimenting with illegal drugs, having sex outside of marriage, abandoning one’s children). Yet, from the streets of north central Philadelphia to the streets of south central Los Angeles, there is no denying what he terms America’s poverty amidst abundance. Each of us would debate or disagree with certain of his empirical analyses and policy prescriptions. In the end, however, we are at one with Sider in his recognition that the problem of poverty in America is not merely economic but existential, not merely social but spiritual.

Whatever our worldly understanding of America’s poverty problem, whatever our favorite public policy remedies, Sider’s book reminds us that there is no way for us Christian citizens of the Great Republic to honor our faith should we dishonor the poor, no way for us to share his love should we shirk responsibility for the needy in our very midst. How does God’s love abide in anyone who has the world’s goods and sees a brother or sister in need and yet refuses help? Little children, let us love, not in word or speech, but in truth and action (1 John 3:17–18 NRSV).

As literally hundreds of studies have documented, persons in the custody of the criminal justice system as well as crime victims are disproportionately drawn from low-income populations, especially poor and minority urban populations. In joyful truth and action, the mission of Prison Fellowship is to exhort, equip, and assist the body of Christ in its ministry to prisoners, ex-prisoners, victims, and their families, and to promote biblical standards of justice in the criminal justice system. In Sider and his new book, we recognize a sharp mind and a kindred Christian spirit dedicated to showing how the rest of us can and should serve the least of these.

Charles W. Colson is founder and chairman of the board of Prison Fellowship (PF), a syndicated radio commentator, author of fifteen books, and winner of the 1993 Templeton Prize for Progress in Religion. John J. DiIulio Jr., a PF board member, is Fox Leadership Professor of Politics, Religion, and Civil Society at the University of Pennsylvania, senior fellow of the Manhattan Institute and the Brookings Institution, and winner of the Kershaw Award of the American Association of Policy Analysis and Management.

Preface

Living among the poor and the lower middle class in North Philadelphia and then the lower Germantown section of Philadelphia for the last thirty-nine years has shaped this book in far more ways than even I understand.

My wife, Arbutus, and I have joined our neighbors to shut down a drug house a few doors up the street. We have added locks and helped organize our block to help residents feel more secure.

We have watched moms and dads do battle with their drug addiction for the sake of their kids. We have held those children in their pain as mom or dad let them down. We have cheered on dramatic transformation rooted in spiritual conversion, and we have watched helpless while others lost the struggle.

We have listened with sadness and resentment as members of our church looked in vain for a job to help them care for their family. We have muttered in anger as cancer suddenly overwhelmed a hardworking and temporarily jobless, and therefore, uninsured fellow elder in our church with $100,000 in medical bills that he knew he could never pay.

We have watched in amazed admiration as some fought incredible odds to obtain an education and a decent future. And we have puzzled over others who seemed paralyzed by inner doubts and invisible demons, unable in spite of encouragement and support to make what seemed like normal efforts at self-help.

We have walked with our two sons as they almost single-handedly integrated an inner-city public school, talking through their struggles and eventually transferring them to a much more integrated public school. We have also worked hard to help found a private Christian high school in North Philadelphia so struggling families would have an alternative to failing public schools.

We have labored long at crossing racial barriers, growing inner-city churches, and fostering holistic community development. We have worked furiously, prayed frantically, failed frequently, despaired sometimes, and, thank God, on occasion succeeded. We have learned enough to know that overcoming poverty requires more than youthful idealism and a few good ideas—even from my best books.

Since I am an evangelical Protestant (of a distinct Mennonite and Wesleyan flavor), my first instinct has always been to ask what Jesus and biblical revelation have to say to present problems. I believe passionately that the Scriptures, faithfully interpreted and lived, can provide the vision and motivation to dramatically reduce poverty in this richest nation on earth. That is why biblical exploration is central to this book—and why I hope evangelicals will be among the first to wrestle hard with its content.

At the same time, I welcome and expect many readers from a wide variety of other traditions. I am deeply grateful for the many people of goodwill from other religions who are searching for better ways to empower the poor. To a large extent, the framework I work with here is one that anyone committed to a broadly Judeo-Christian understanding can embrace. It is certainly one that Christians generally share.

I know, of course, that different Christian communities approach the Bible in somewhat different ways. A mainline Protestant or a Roman Catholic would not write chapter 2, A Biblical Foundation, in exactly the way this Anabaptist, Wesleyan, evangelical (teaching at a Baptist seminary) has. At the same time, in my many years of dialogue and cooperation with Catholic, Orthodox, and mainline Protestant Christians, I have regularly found that starting with a biblical foundation is a good way to build common ground. After all, we all believe that God has spoken uniquely and authoritatively through the Bible.

My years of academic study and activist engagement have taught me two other things. First, you have to know more than biblical norms, and second, you must dare to specify concretely what should be done. The Bible does not say a word about whether we should raise the minimum wage or adopt a particular proposal for universal health insurance. We must combine solid, sophisticated socioeconomic analysis with normative biblical principles of justice if we are to formulate wise, effective social policy.

I have also learned—sometimes from painful personal experience—that good Christians don’t always get their politics right. Not only are they sometimes dead wrong, they are regularly in vigorous if not angry disagreement. Some conclude that Christians ought to abandon all attempts to make concrete policy suggestions based on biblical faith. We should just stick to general biblical principles. But everybody favors justice in general. It is only when one dares to suggest that perhaps biblical principles require public policies that strengthen two-parent families, implement universal health insurance, make divorce far more difficult, and enforce a living wage that one becomes helpful to real people trying to figure out how to vote and speak to their politicians. At that point, too, of course, one becomes controversial. Good Christians disagree about those things.

Knowing all that, I have nonetheless presumed to include in this book not just as careful a discussion of biblical norms as I can manage, but also (even though I am a theologian) careful grappling with the best socioeconomic data available from both liberals and conservatives. And then I have even dared to spell out a concrete set of proposals for a new social policy that I truly believe could dramatically reduce poverty.

Do I think you are morally degenerate or un-Christian if you disagree with my specific proposals? Not at all. But please don’t call me names. Just explain clearly to me how the normative biblical framework I spell out is not adequately scriptural, or that I have misread the socioeconomic data, or that my combination of the norms and the data to arrive at concrete conclusions really does not follow from the norms and the data.

Above all, remember that I by no means claim the same authority for these three levels of discussion. I would want to make the strongest claims for the biblical framework, although I am painfully aware that this finite, imperfectly sanctified Christian seriously misunderstands parts of the Bible. I would, of course, gladly correct any distortions if I knew where they were because my deepest desire is unconditional submission to Jesus Christ and Scripture.

I offer my socioeconomic analysis with still more qualification. I am not a trained economist or sociologist, although I try hard to listen to the best data, even when it challenges my prejudices.

I want my readers to view my specific policy proposals still more tentatively than my sketch of the biblical framework and discussion of the socioeconomic data. Until others help me see why the specific proposals are misguided, however, I will work hard to implement them, because God probably knew what he was doing when he asked finite, imperfect sons and daughters to be his stewards in shaping societies that feed the hungry, clothe the naked, and heal the sick. Together, let’s figure out how to do that more justly and more wisely in this new century than we have in the past.

Acknowledgments

Every book is a cooperative effort. In this case, however, an unusually large number of people have made significant contributions.

Without Patricia Bauman and the Bauman Foundation, this book never would have seen the light of day. The generous support of the Bauman Foundation made possible a two-year process, bringing together approximately twenty scholars to ask one basic question: If this society chose to empower the poor in the United States, what would a successful, comprehensive agenda look like? The result is the scholarly volume titled Toward a Just and Caring Society: Christian Responses to Poverty in America, edited by David P. Gushee and published simultaneously with the first edition of this more popularly written book, Just Generosity.

To all of my colleagues who wrote the scholarly articles for Toward a Just and Caring Society and thereby provided invaluable research for the present book, I say a special thanks: Stephen Charles Mott, Stephen V. Monsma, James Halteman, Ashley Woodiwiss, Kurt C. Schaefer, George N. Monsma, Timothy Slaper, Clarke E. Cochran, John E. Anderson, Charles L. Glenn, John D. Mason, Helene Slessarev, Joseph A. Maciariello, Stanley W. Carlson. Thies, and David P. Gushee. My good friend Dave Gushee worked long and superbly administering the project and editing the scholarly volume.

Several groups of people provided much-appreciated feedback on an early draft of the manuscript. Mary Jo Bane and Richard Parker from the Kennedy School of Government and Jim Wallis and Brent B. Coffin from the Center for the Study of Values in Public Life spent several hours one spring afternoon at Harvard providing invaluable critique. Tom Atwood, Deanna Carlson, Jennifer Marshall, Robert W. Patterson, Bob Morrison, and Alan Crippen provided lunch and very stimulating discussion of the manuscript at the Family Research Council in Washington. Bread for the World’s president David Beckmann and seven of his colleagues (Jim Riker, Joel Underwood, Kim Wade, Lynette Engel-hardt, Elena McCollim, Alice Benson, and Barbara Howell) read various chapters and offered probing questions and suggestions during a lively exchange at their office. My active participation with Jim Wallis, Duane Shank, and many other good friends in Call to Renewal has also contributed significantly to my developing thought and provided a setting to hammer out some of the concrete policy proposals.

A large number of scholars and friends commented on one or more of the various chapters and/or provided suggestions: William Lockhart, Rick Chamiec-Case, Amy Sherman, Paul Gorman, David Richardson, Lawrence K. Jensen, Wesley Nord, Wendell Primus, Phyllis Bennett, Andrea Beck, John E. Stapleford, Cathy Brechtelsbauer, Diana R. Garland, Art Simon, Dwight Ozard, Janis Balda, John L. Carr, Don Hammond, Harry A. Dawkins III, and Janet E. de Young.

For help on the second edition, I want to thank George N. Monsma, Rebecca Blank, Heidi Unruh, D. Eric Schansberg, Julie Brewer, Dave Gushee, Clarke E. Cochran, Amy Sherman, Mary Nelson, and Stanley Carlson-Thies.

I owe a special debt to John J. DiIulio Jr., who has become a special friend and treasured colleague. Even in a frantically busy schedule, he found time to offer counsel on almost everything connected with this book, including a critique of the manuscript. John, a very special thanks.

I am especially grateful for the people who agreed to let me tell their stories or helped point me to the stories of others: Ron Tinsley, Bob George, Wayne Gordon, Mary Nelson, Onita Styles, Brian Mast, Skip Long, Nefretiri Cooley, Carl Holland, Kathy Dudley, Maria Rodriguez-Winter—and those who remain anonymous.

A special word of appreciation to my friends at Baker Book House. It was publisher Dwight Baker’s personal interest in the things I have felt called to write about that sealed my interest in publishing with Baker Books. Bob Hosack has become a friend and much-appreciated partner in all the details of bringing a book to press.

For twenty-eight years, Eastern (now Palmer) Seminary has provided a supportive friendly home base for my ministry of teaching, writing, lecturing, and organizing. This and many other books I have written would have been much more difficult if not impossible had I not enjoyed supportive understanding of the many demands on my time. To President Wallace Smith, Dean Elouise Renich Fraser, Eastern University President David Black, former presidents Scott Rodin and Manfred Brauch, and faculty colleagues, I say a special thanks.

For thirty-two years, Evangelicals for Social Action has played a central role in my life. Without ESA’s outstanding staff, this book and so many things I do simply would not be possible. For almost a decade Cliff Benzel, ESA’s executive vice president, was an invaluable partner and very dear friend as God has allowed us to work closely together. The sacrificial gift of his wisdom and talents to the ministry of ESA will be forever appreciated. To all my other colleagues at ESA, past and present, I express appreciation for your partnership in this book and much more.

My research assistants, for the first edition, Merid Seifu and Joan Hoppe-Spink, were faithful in tracking down a host of pesky details. On the recent edition my Wilberforce Research Scholars Robin Weinstein and Peter Sensenig and my Ayres Research Scholar Regina Downing provided masterful help updating statistics and other data. They were also helped by the research of several other graduate assistants: Jokotade Agunloye, Jean Paul Tiendrebeogo, and Chris Tappan. Many thanks to them all. Naomi Miller, my gifted secretary/administrative assistant for twenty-two years, not only demonstrated her near flawless mastery of my original handwritten text as she typed and retyped the manuscript for the first edition but also managed to continue her friendly, highly competent management of much of my public life.

To my wife, Arbutus, with whom I have now shared not only forty-five wonderful years of marriage but a mutual passion to share God’s concern for the needy, I say thank you, darling, for all the ways you have encouraged my ministry and brought joy to my life.

None of the above are responsible for the mistakes that remain in this book, but they certainly have helped me avoid and/or repent of many that would otherwise be present.

Introduction

What would it be like to live in the United States on $19,806 a year? In 2005, that was the poverty level for a family of four. In the richest nation on earth, 37 million people struggle to survive at or below this level.

Try to imagine what your family, or the family of four you know best, would need to give up to exist on $19,806 a year.

Begin by selling your house and moving to a modest two-bedroom apartment ($625 a month including heat). No more study, rec room, bedroom for each child, second bathroom, backyard, or porch. If you are willing to live in a lower-income, multiracial neighborhood, you might be able to buy a small house.

Next, sell all your cars. You don’t have a garage anyway. You can get around on public transportation, or perhaps you can afford an old car, if you have a friend who can make necessary repairs and you purchase only liability insurance. Either way, you will be able to spend only $58 a week on transportation.1

Forget about being in fashion. New clothes each season are unthinkable; Nike sneakers are out of the question. If you visit the local thrift store for most things, buy sturdy shoes, and use winter coats for several years, you can probably get by on $469 per person per year.

You will no longer be able to afford to eat at restaurants. You will have to figure out how to avoid hunger and stay healthy on just one dollar and a quarter per meal for each person.

No more regular telephone calls to Grandma, other relatives, or friends in other cities. Your telephone budget is just $36 a month. And be sure to turn off the lights when you leave a room because you have only $60 a month for all utilities not included in your rent.

Let’s look at the totals.

Table 1

Living at the Poverty Level

   (Family of Four)

What is the total? $19,807. The 2005 poverty level was about $19,806, so you do not even have a dollar for a call to Grandma once a year on her birthday.

Notice what this budget does not include. No household appliances, no vacations, no toiletries, no birthday or Christmas gifts, no recreation, no visits to the dentist, no private health insurance, no donations for church, no child care, no movies, no travel outside the city, no private music lessons, no sports equipment for the children. Poor people, of course, do have some of these things. However unthinkable from a middle-class perspective, somehow they manage to spend less on some of the other items or receive help from family, friends, or church.

Any volunteers? No, I don’t mean for three years of graduate school while you prepare for a secure middle-class livelihood. I mean year after year with little hope for improvement. That’s what millions of our neighbors struggle with in our affluent nation.

Life at the poverty level is tough. In addition to scraping by financially, poor people feel excluded from the community. Many poor people face terrible schools, widespread crime, and a lack of quality health care. More than 45 million persons in the United States do not even have health insurance.

That’s the bad news. But the bad news gets even worse when we realize that many of our best people in public policy now acknowledge that they do not know how to reduce poverty and the related escalation of single parenthood, inner-city crime, and failing urban schools. At the end of a powerful book outlining the inadequacy of U.S. social policy of the last several decades, Senator Daniel Moynihan confesses: "The problem . . . is that no one has a clue as to what it would take for public policy to be sufficient."2 Both the liberal and the conservative policies of the past few decades have failed to solve the problem of poverty in the richest nation in the world.

The good news is that both liberals and conservatives seem ready to try something new. Both sides seem eager to explore a holistic approach that enables people of deep religious faith to contribute what they do best to solving social decay and poverty. In the media, in Washington think tanks, and in the halls of Congress, religion is suddenly in. Religion’s role in public policy is one of the hottest topics at Harvard’s Kennedy School of Government.

In both 2000 and 2004, both the Democratic and Republican presidential candidates said they were committed to strengthening the role of faith-based programs in overcoming poverty. Soon after taking office in 2001, President George W. Bush launched a very visible faith-based initiative. It is no longer surprising, as it was on June 1, 1998, to find the leader of an inner-city faith-based organization on the cover of Newsweek. The caption? God vs. Gangs. Inside, Newsweek reporters related the remarkable story of how Boston’s TenPoint Coalition had dramatically reduced gang violence through a combination of prayer and faith in action in the streets. Just perhaps, the story suggested, God, religious transformation, and people of faith can succeed where several decades of government programs have failed miserably.

Is that good news? Certainly not