Blog Action Day 08 - Poverty
Today is Blog Action Day! What is Blog Action Day you ask? It’s the one day a year when bloggers come together as one voice and blog about one issue.
This year’s issue is poverty. I thought it would be hard for me to find a personal point of reference to blog about that wasn’t as obvious as world hunger. It only took a second to reflect over my own upbringing and remember the stories told to me from friends and family.
I was raised in the inner city of Phila. and though my neighborhood wasn’t impoverished, it was considered the hood. Or, if you want to be PC, low-income. We didn’t always have the latest, top of the line anything, but we were never hungry or without a roof over our heads. I do remember walking up Woodland Ave. to the government issued truck and standing in line to receive our portion of peanut butter, cheese and butter. I didn’t see it as being poor, but as needing assistance from time to time. It was something that almost everyone in the neighborhood had, at one time or another, done. Everyone worked, but sometimes there was more month than there was money.
Fast forward to my adult life, when I go back into these same neighborhoods, I am so saddened and struck by the level of poverty that has settled into them. Abandoned houses, vacant lots, discarded trash and cars litter block after block. The same neighborhoods that used to have small businesses lining the avenue, mom and pop stores on every corner or home-based shops of some kind. I think about my years growing up and how we were free to be anything we wanted. Now, when I asked a few children in elementary school what they wanted to be when they grew up, a blink look comes across their faces and they really have to give it some thought. The question of environment stays in my mind.
I’ve also gone out with a grouped of folks from church to feed and minister to the homeless. This wasn’t done during banking hours, but rather from 12 am - 6am. I was told to really touch and help the people who need it; you need to go where they are at times when others won’t. The experiences were very eye opening. Especially when you learn that the face of homelessness/poverty is not what you may think it is. It may be the well dressed man next to you who is going on a job interview, or that child who is always so outgoing and well put together.
We, as a society, need to stop thinking that poverty is a 3rd world issue when so many Americans are without basic necessities. Sometimes the help needed is in your own backyard saying hello to you over that morning cup of coffee. There are so many ways we can help. We just need to be willing to stop looking the other way.
Here are a few things I thought anyone could do to help:
- Volunteer at a food bank.
- Volunteer at a soup kitchen.
- Start a soup kitchen at your church.
- Start a clothing (ministry) drive at your church and give them to those who need it.
- Take a meal to a family you know is in need.
- Help an elderly neighborhood not have to choose between medicine and grocery. Buy their groceries for them.
- 88 other ways you can get involved…
What are some ways you are lending a hand up?
Tags: blog action day
