Food and Faith
About this blog
Food and Faith is a blog of the Presbyterian Hunger Program.
Recent posts
- Taking the Time to Make Food Sacred
- Announcing New Hunger Bible Study from PHP!
- Farm Bill Debate Renews!
- Power on our Plates
- Addressing the root causes of hunger
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- Take Action Now (110)
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Taking the Time to Make Food Sacred
TRY this: place a forkful of food in your mouth. It doesn’t matter what the food is, but make it something you love — let’s say it’s that first nibble from three hot, fragrant, perfectly cooked ravioli.Now comes the hard part. Put the fork down. This could be a lot more challenging than you imagine, because that first bite was very good and another immediately beckons. You’re hungry.
So begins an article called "Mindful Eating as Food for Thought," which challenges us to not eat like the Cookie Monster.
And in case you haven't yet done the Just Eating? curriculum, one of the sessions is all about food as a sacred gift from God. You can download it for free here. Look for Unit 1 on Food Sharing as Sacramental...
And if you've never tried a food meditation, here are the simple instructions for a Raisin Meditation!
February 1, 2012
Announcing New Hunger Bible Study from PHP!
The Presbyterian Hunger Program is pleased to announce the publication of a new PHP Bible Study. Written and compiled by PHP Staff, with contributions from PHP Partners, RELUFA (Cameroon) and MPP (Haiti), this is a one session study reflecting on the biblical call to work as partners with people who have been made poor in order to address hunger and its causes. Early feedback from participants reflect favorably on the approach of this study. One user commented that they felt “the scripture choices will be good ones for helping to interpret this message. You take familiar scriptures and tie them with new questions.” This study focuses specifically on the examples of two stories that come from PHP’s Joining Hands ministry, Haiti and Cameroon.
The accompanying Bible Study website has information for delving even deeper into some of the central themes. The study is available from PDS (#25432-11304) or by visiting www.pcusa.org/hunger/biblestudy to download the electronic version and see the accompanying materials. Our prayer is that by using this study our reflections and action contribute to God’s glorious vision for how we treat one another in a world that grows enough food for all of God’s children.
January 13, 2012
Farm Bill Debate Renews!
Photo credit: Shawn Poynter
Steph Larsen is on staff at the Center for Rural Affairs. Here she is leading a workshop at the National Rural Assembly in St. Paul, MN
"Under current law, if one big corporation farmed the entire country, the U.S. Department of Agriculture would pay 60 percent of its insurance premiums on every acre."
Sounds crazy, right? Yet this is reality and illustrates the way our food and farm policies give a hand up to the largest farms, while small-scale family farmers are largely neglected. The article below (excerpted) from our partner, Center for Rural Affairs, points to the kinds of changes needed in the 2012 Farm Bill (yes, it should be called the Food and Farm Bill). Read what is important to our neighbors in rural areas of the country.
December 27, 2011
Power on our Plates
When my daughter was in kindergarten, she would inspect her friends' strawberries at lunchtime. “No no, you don’t want to eat that,” she would solemnly inform them. “It’s not organic. It might have yucky chemicals on it.”
Yucky chemicals indeed. Studies continue to pile up showing how pesticides on food can be harmful, especially to children's health. As we head into the home stretch of the holiday feast season, I've been thinking hard about the powerful ripple effects of our food choices. Turns out, what we eat matters. A lot. (from Pesticides Action Network's "Power on our plates")
It does matter because "you are what you eat" is not an allegory; it is literally true. The substances that pass between your lips become your very own skin, muscle, cartilage, ligaments, nails, bones, blood, lymph and cerebral spinal fluid. Not to mention your organs, nerve cells and the two dozen digestive enzymes that break down food.
Take, for example, my daughter's now-favorite veggie, spinach: USDA found residues of 48 pesticides on their official samples. Of these, 25 are suspected to interfere with human hormones, eight are linked to cancer, eight are neurotoxins and 23 are toxic to honeybees. Yucky. Knowing all this makes the organic spinach from our local farm taste especially good.
Unlike pre-WWII food, today's food typically delivers one or more poisons to our cells because industrial farming, and its chemical dealers -- Monsanto, Bayer, Syngenta, BASF, Dow, Dupont and others -- are at war with weeds and pests. But many pests keep winning as they develop resistence. Ever more toxins are needed. Children are most effected because they eat more fruits and vegetables and are more sensitive. But it is often when we are adults that the long-term effects hit us.
What to do?
1) First, educate yourself by finding out what's on your food (you can search by food item or pesticide)2) Second. Consider joining Pesticides Action Network; becoming a PCUSA Earth Care Congregation and joining Presbyterians for Earth Care.3) Third. Thank the next farmer you meet who is engaging in sustainable and organic practices and buy their last bunch of kale!
November 21, 2011
Addressing the root causes of hunger
The Presbyterian Hunger Program has provided more than $100 million in financial support to effective groups in the U.S. and overseas since it was established in 1969. The five below are just a few of these initiatives, which are alleviating and striving to address the underlying causes of hunger.
Alabama Arise
Arise members speak out on income tax threshold
In response to a new report citing Alabama's high income tax on the poor, a Huntsville TV station turned to Arise members for comment. Dale Clem, pastor of Monte Sano United Methodist Church and an ACPP board member, and Dick Hiatt, executive director of the North Alabama Food Bank, an ACPP member group, voice their concerns about Alabama's upside-down tax system in this news clip. View news video here. Read ARISE news release here.
Alabama Arise is helping low-income families build a future with individual development accounts (IDAs). Under guidelines set forth by federal Assets for Independence Act of 1998, participants can get a “double match” for up to $2000 they save in an IDA. For $2000 put into the IDA they can get $6000 for a downpayment on a home, college education or starting a small business. What a great way to help others help themselves out of poverty. Alabama Arise motto says it all “A hand UP, not a hand out”.
Boston Faith and Justice Network
Fair Trade Boston was designed to connect church teams, businesses and student groups to broader community engagement of Fair Trade. They hold events for Christians to raise consciousness about how these issues relate to their faith such as film screenings, a national webinar on fair trade and faith, and a bike ride and a benefit concert for a local safe house for survivors of human trafficking. They provide information to Boston-area residents so they are able to understand the ways workers are abused and how fair trade can address this.
The picture to the right is from BFJN director's recent trip to India. Read Ryan's India blog posts on their website.
Corporate Accountability International
Corporate Accountability International is “Thinking Outside the Bottle.” They have convinced schools, businesses, mayors and governors to support and create Bottled Water Free Zones. We definitely need to come together and get various corporations to stop draining watersheds and aquifers for profits. We can work together and all be “Bottle Free”!
PHP has supported CAI's water campaign in past years and is now supporting their work to combat unhealthy food advertising. Read about their campaigns.
First Presbyterian Church St Joseph
First Presbyterian Church St. Joseph will celebrate its 27th anniversary in June of 2012. The church provides sack lunches every Sunday with the help of many volunteers. While folks are there to pick up their food, nurses give flu and hepatitis shots, AIDS screenings and other health services. There is a “Health Express” mobile clinic that parks in front of Open Door Food Kitchen twice a month to offer blood pressure checks, diabetes sugar level sticks, hygiene kits and referral services. They also have Para Medic and a nurse practitioner on board.
And check out their Food for Kids program as well.
Idaho Community Action Network
Due to so many Americans struggling in todays time ICAN got together and came to legislature to increase Food Stamp Asset test from $2,000 to $5,000. This bill is now a law! They are also trying to reverse Medicaid cuts after $35 million was cut from the state budget. Started in 1999, ICAN has over 2,000 members statewide and they educate and mobilize people to advocate on issues of social, racial, and economic justice and to eliminate poverty in Idaho. Learn about their great food justice programs and read their new report:
Families or Corporations?
SUPER COMMITTEE CHOICE: NEED VERSUS GREED
New Report Shows Staggering Hunger and Food Insecurity Nationwide While Federal Funds Feed “Big Ag” Profits.
All this great work is made possible by the generous gifts of Presbyterians to the One Great Hour of Sharing. Thank you!
November 17, 2011
Summer Internship Opportunity!
Here is the scoop, including why you might apply (or send this to a young adult that you love!)
Anathoth Community Garden is a church ministry positioned in the hub of the South’s “local, organic movement” and in proximity to Duke Divinity School. This nature and location provide apprentices with the unique opportunity to learn the fundamentals of regenerative agriculture and its place within the framework of Christian reconciliation and community development--not only in the garden and surrounding community, but also from leading practitioners and scholars! The program is designed as a curriculum-based, immersion experience for 3-4 college-age or older Christians interested in developing the horticultural and theological proficiency to lead related initiatives in their own communities.
What to expect?
Our goal is to shower each apprentice with the encouragement and appropriate resources they need to grow and better minister to the communities of which they are a part. In return, our hope is that the apprentices would help us do the work to sustain this ministry by working in the garden, loving our neighbors and helping us imagine how we might better minister to Northern Orange County.
Download more details and the application forms
Please email further questions to anathothgarden@gmail.com or call Chas Edens at (336) 408-0968.
October 28, 2011
Job announcement! Anti-Hunger Empowerment Corps VISTA positions
Presbyterian Hunger Program (PCUSA) will host 3-4 full-time Anti-Hunger Empowerment Corps AmeriCorps*VISTA members for 12 months. They will be based in the national denominational offices in Louisville, Kentucky. Deadline for cover letter and applications is November 18. (See full post for details)
October 27, 2011
What does WINning look like?
More than 560 people attended (100 more than last year!) the Workers Interfaith Network (WIN) 9th Annual Labor Day Picnic. The day was a great success with fun for the whole family. Face painting and MoonBounce for the kids, and music and entertainment for all.
WIN’s Memphis Workers’ Center is celebrating four years of seeking justice! The Workers’ Center educates and organizes low-wage workers, many whose rights have been violated. They help workers learn their rights; help them recover stolen wages and help injured workers get workers compensation.
The Workers’ Center helped Fernando Santiago, former waiter, recover $13,000 from stolen wages – the largest amount ever recovered. In his gratitude, Fernando gived $2,000 back to the Center.
The Presbyterian Hunger Program just approved a grant of $4,000 to support WIN’s ministry. You too can support WIN by sending a gift online to www.workersinterfaithnetwork.org or by mail to:
WIN, 3035 Directors Row, Bldg. B-1207, Memphis, TN. 38131
WIN is encouraging congregations everywhere to take part in “Wage Theft Sabbath” during November 19-20 to draw attention to the growing crisis. You can get your congregation involved by requesting the Wage Theft Sabbath package at (901)332-3570 or email zach@workersinterfaithnetwork.org. And you can provide ongoing support and engagement by becoming a Partnering Congregation!
September 30, 2011
Hunger Program partner highlights labor rights for World Food Day
World Food Day!
World Food Day happens on October 16. The US Food Sovereignty Alliance, of which the FCWA is a member, is joining with La Via Campesina and food sovereignty movements to call on people and organizations to fashion the food and farming future we need—a future of communities, regions and nations revitalized with local food, democracy, sustainability and justice.
September 27, 2011
PCUSA congregation plans for World Food Day
Ashley Goff, the associate pastor at the PCUSA Church of the Pilgrims in Washington, D.C. sent us their plans for World Food Day (October 16) and the Food Week of Action.
Here is how she explained it ~~
"We are honoring the Food Week of Action starting October 9th and wanted to share our current plan. At Church of the Pilgrims, we are honoring Food Week in this way:
During our education hour prior to worship, we are having one of our members, Erin LittleStar who is active in sustainable food practices and local food/faith advocacy lead us in an hour of learning more about the food cycle and systems. This is an intergenerational event.
At the end of the hour, we are going to invite people to make 4 choices to honor the week in a practical way:
Compost for a week: We have two standing composts at Pilgrims along with worm composting. People will be invited to compost for a week and bring the compost to church the following Sunday.
SNAP Challenge: One of our members works for the Dept of Agriculture, specifically around SNAP, and recently did a SNAP Challenge with her colleagues. The challenge is to eat for a week on your amount you would receive for food stamps. (See how it works below)
Local Food: Eat one meal a day with locally grown food.
Intentional Prayer: Set an intention before each meal, snack, drink for the week. Setting an intention and honoring where the food has come from and naming if the food with be healthy or destructive to your body (and in turn to the planet).
Each session will be led by a church member who has been doing this practice and can explain the nitty-gritty.
After church, we are having a beekeeping 101 session and a farmer's market group shopping experience. We have 5 beehives at Pilgrims which pollinate our urban garden (plus areas around us) and our beekeeper is coming to give us more information on our hives, feed the bees, etc.
Erin will be taking another group to our local farmers market to meet some farmer's, shop for the SNAP challenge and have hands on learning around local food, seeing food as more than fuel but a faith experience.
Worship will be part of Food Week in some way. Yet to be determined!"
You can find all the resources you need for World Food Day and the Food Week of Action on the PCUSA's Food and Faith website.
STEP 1 - Eat on $4/day for a week, a month or longer if you so choose.
STEP 2 - Experience hunger for yourself and the difficulties faced by hungry people everywhere.
STEP 3 - Engage others by sharing your experience. We encourage you to keep a journal, post to our Facebook page, email us your story or simply share your feelings with with friends, family and coworkers.
And you? Consider getting your congregation to do something for Sunday, World Food Day ~ October 16. How about organizing a group meal? Just email us at php@pcusa.org and we will send you free placemats. No cost. Table discussion questions and other downloadable resources can be found here.