Facing Poverty

In the wake of Hurricane Katrina, the class divide in America became more visible than it has been in a long time. I say America rather than New Orleans, because at least ten major U.S. cities have higher povery rates than New Orleans had. It has never been easy to be poor in America, and in recent years it has only gotten worse, as holes have been torn in the safety net, as the real value of the minimum wage continues to erode, as gas prices rise, as bankruptcy laws become less forgiving, and as affordable housing and affordable health insurance become increasingly out of reach.

The reality of poverty in America was illustrated well by Barbara Ehrenreich a few years ago in her book, “Nickel and Dimed.” Taking very little with her into unfamiliar places, she found it almost impossible to live on the minimum-wage jobs she could find, even without children and without illness or disability. How much harder it is now, and how much harder it will be for many of the displaced poor from New Orleans, who are already beginning to fade from the news.

Contrast all this with what our Congress was planning to do just over a month ago. Until Katrina hit, at the top of the agenda was permanent repeal of the estate tax. This action would cost the U.S. treasury a trillion dollars over ten years, while benefitting only a few thousand of the wealthiest families in America. Over a thousand very wealthy Americans have signed a statement declaring that they don’t need this tax relief. If you haven’t read it, I strongly recommend the book, “Wealth and Our Commonwealth” by Bill Gates, Sr. and Chuck Collins, published by Beacon Press. It describes well the reasons for keeping this tax, and the misleading arguments against it. Unless you are a multi-millionaire whose first priority is to establish a family dynasty, there is no good reason to repeal the estate tax. Unfortunately, many in our government do indeed come from family dynasties. Permanent estate tax repeal has been tabled for now, but Congressional leaders assure us they will come back to it when they can.

If you listen to the anti-tax and anti-government crowd–the ones who not only want to repeal the estate tax, but also to eliminate the capital gains tax and to defeat Referenda C and D so that TABOR will maintain its full stranglehold on Colorado–you won’t hear very often the words of the Bible about wealth and poverty, in spite of the Biblical faith many of them proclaim. The God of the Bible almost always favored the poor over the wealthy. The reading we heard from Isaiah is only one of many examples. There are Christians who take those teachings seriously, the kind you will find in Sojourners magazine, but the dominant culture of modern conservative Christianity has turned those teachings upside-down. Instead, they just offer variations on old trickle-down economic theories and a false dichotomy between the virtues of the private sector and the wastefulness of government. I have to admit that at times it almost seems to me that some of our elected leaders actually want to bungle government so badly that they can say, “We told you government is no good, and we were right, so you should vote for us again.”

One especially dangerous argument you will hear is this: the claim that you earned your money by yourself, so you should be able to keep it and use it however you wish. What makes this argument so damaging is that it has a grain of truth and it sounds appealing, but it is based on a falsehood. We never earn money all by ourselves. Billionaire Warren Buffett, who also opposes estate tax repeal, has pointed out that he could never have become so wealthy if he had been dropped down in a Third World country. Without roads and utilities, courts and security, education and banking laws, and all the other infrastructure provided by government, we couldn’t make or keep any money at all. Look at how quickly things fell apart in New Orleans without that infrastructure.

When we are encouraged to think we earned our money on our own, it is easy to conclude that we have no responsibility to government or to the common good, except as we may happen to choose. There are legitimate debates about what patterns of taxation and government are best for the common good, and I don’t object to those debates, as long as they are honest. But I do object to a mindset that seems to have given up on equity in human relations as a desirable goal. Poverty rates in America have risen each of the last four years, with over a million more Americans falling into poverty last year, and no one seemed to notice until Katrina put poverty back in the news. Global poverty is an overwhelming problem, but too many on the right are more interested in vilifying the United Nations than in supporting its Millenium goals to cut global poverty in half by 2015. Too many people are willing just to build stronger gates or higher walls, or to assume that they will be raptured away before things get really bad, so there is no need to worry about poverty or war or environmental destruction.

And too many people have bought the story that allowing limitless concentration of wealth in the hands of a few will rain down jobs and economic benefits on everyone else, when the reality is that excessive inequality undermines democracy. Excessive concentration of power is always dangerous, whether it is in private hands, in the media, in government, or in global corporations. Today, wealth and power are becoming more concentrated than at any time since the Gilded Age a hundred years ago.

The economic failure of communism is often taken as a vindication of capitalism, but pure capitalism would not be much better. Sometimes, I imagine communism as a train, representing the common good, with no engine to pull it. Pure capitalism is like the same train, but with a detached engine, racing around by itself. In neither case does the common good budge. Only when the engine is hooked to the train is the common good delivered. Much of America’s overall economic success has come from allowing the creation of wealth but requiring a significant portion of that wealth to be turned back to the common good, protecting the resources and building the infrastructure that benefit everyone, and that made that wealth possible in the first place. Some of this happens voluntarily, but I worked with charitable nonprofit organizations for over a decade, and I know they can never replace good government as a foundation for the common good. This is why the battle over repeal of the estate tax is so important symbolically as well as financially, because it represents our willingness to connect the accumulation of wealth to an obligation for the common good.

Keeping things connected within our society is very important, because there is another way of looking at wealth and poverty that is about more than money. Wealth is also found in relationships, in the strength of the bonds connecting us to one another and to the places we call home. Many of the people displaced by Katrina lost more than money and things–in many cases they also lost connections and relationships and a sense of place. In our society, financial poverty is a source of enormous suffering because access to so many basic needs depends on money. But this has not been the case in all times and places. Until touched by so-called civilization, many remote tribal or native communities lived without money at all, but you would not really say they lived in poverty. They had a network of relationships, a stable pattern of living, and a knowledge of the land. They also lived in a much more sustainable way than we do today.

Now, if I’m honest, I have to acknowledge that there is plenty about modern civilization that I’d like to keep. Our advances in learning and technology and material welfare are mostly good in and of themselves. Some improvements in our way of life could be shared much more widely, with plenty to go around, but some aspects of our way of life are deeply unsustainable. Part of America’s wealth has come from an immense development and exploitation of natural resources that cannot go on indefinitely. The solution to poverty in America, much less poverty in the world, will not come from accelerating our oil-based economy as far as it will go.

But that is what some people seem to want to do. And, perhaps knowing that such a way of life cannot be shared by all, they disconnect from any deep commitment to the common good, across our country, across the world, or across generations. In contrast, Unitarian Universalism calls us to exactly that commitment, a commitment to the worth and well-being of all people, now and in future generations. It is a commitment most of us care about deeply.

But as Unitarian Universalists, we have our own challenges in facing poverty, especially right here in America. We may believe in diversity and equity and the common good, but we are not a representative sample of all Americans, racially, culturally or economically. Hurricane Katrina exposed the intertwined nature of race and class in America, but as much as race remains an issue within Unitarian Universalism, I think we have an even greater challenge facing issues of class.

If we pay attention, we will find that there are people with a very wide range of financial situations in our congregations, but on average we are better off financially than the majority of Americans. This means we are deeply embedded in the oil-based American economy and culture. On average, we are also better educated than most Americans. We have a disproportionate number of college degrees, and our youth by a good margin have the highest SAT scores of any religious group in America. We should never give up on our commitment to education and to lifelong learning. But unfortunately, access to education is also affected by class in America. What is the message of Unitarian Universalism to those who have been denied financial resources and education?

I believe that Unitarian Universalism has a message, a saving message if you will, that is needed far beyond our walls and can reach far beyond our present limits. We are called to open our eyes to the people around us, to the planet that sustains us, and to the universe in which we live, to love and care for each other, and to remain open to truth as far as we can glimpse it, no matter what it may be. We wish for health and education and material well-being for all, but we know that Unitarian Universalism is not about wealth or educational status. At its best, Unitarian Universalism saves us from alienation, from idolatry, and from fear. It saves us for reconciliation, integrity, and a life filled with meaning and love. It doesn’t take high SAT scores to love and care for one another. It doesn’t take a big bank account to gaze at the universe with wonder and to radically open our hearts to whatever is ultimately good and true. It doesn’t take a college degree to commit ourselves to social justice, to change a life or bring hope. I look forward to the day when our doors are crowded with people from every walk of life, because they can feel in their bones a spirit of hope and joy, love and justice here.

Of course, it is difficult to engage with each other at this level if we do not even have food or shelter or water to drink. It is not enough simply to open our doors; if we truly intend to face the reality of poverty, we must go out of our doors and into the world. Who are the poor in the world, and who are the poor in our own community? Who are the ten thousand people below the poverty line here in our own relatively well-off Jefferson County? Who has the minimum-wage jobs, or no jobs at all? Do we see them, listen to them, show respect for them? Do we truly welcome them? If you are in that place yourself, what is your own message in this community?

We need to assess honestly our own gifts and our our own limitations, and to ask what we can learn from our own life stories about wealth and poverty. In my own life, I have witnessed the rise and fall of a whole family fortune, from the patched, ill-fitting clothes I wore as a young child to highly privileged opportunities for college and career development, to watching my father squander family resources, mostly on right-wing causes, largely cutting off his more liberal children emotionally and financially. The goal of self-examination is not to feel guilty about what we do or don’t have. We are who we are, and we can only begin where we are. But as we learn, our commitment to integrity, truth and reconciliation may lead us to changes in our lives.

The Social Responsibility Council here at JUC has voted to adopt a theme this year as an area for deeper work and exploration, for anyone here at JUC who wishes to engage with it. The theme is, “Poverty: Doing Our Part,” and you will hear more about it in coming weeks. This focus doesn’t replace the individual work of all our different task forces, but it will help us see the interconnectedness of all we do, and to go deeper in one area. There are many ways for us to face poverty, many ways to do our part. We can examine our own lives, meet and listen to the poor, or study the causes of poverty. Learning is important, because so often it is hard to know what is the best thing to do. We can engage in service face-to-face, such as volunteering for the Interfaith Hospitality Network, or we can join in legislative action for fairer tax laws or for effective programs that really meet basic needs, reduce inequalities and enhance the common good. Programs like Guest At Your Table help to remind us and our children about the needs of the world and how our giving can help. Our congregation was wonderfully generous in response to Hurricane Katrina, but there is also more for us to learn about the poor in our own community, and about systems that affect people world-wide, such as the workshop later today about global corporations and the food supply. Especially when we look at global poverty, there is a lot for all of us to learn about how we can possibly live in ways that are more equitable and sustainable than the ways we live now.
Again, the point of all of this is not to feel guilty about what we can or can’t do. We all have many demands on our lives, and this is only one aspect of our life as a congregation. But our own principles call us to face the realities of the world around us and to face our fellow human beings with caring and compassion. Getting involved is a way of living our faith, and it is a source of meaning in our lives. It can be heartbreaking, but also joyful, and even fun.

It all starts with loving life so much that we want everyone to share in the joys of life, both now and in future generations. It also means acknowledging tragedy, being honest about dangers and risks, forgiving ourselves and each other, letting love overcome our anger and our fears, and then reaching out to embrace life and honor the lives of those who share the earth with us. When a catastrophe such as Hurricane Katrina wakes us up to the reality of poverty, not only around the globe but here in America, we are given a chance to respond. The overwhelmingly generous response from across the country after Katrina gives me hope that the fabric of our society is not so torn that it cannot be mended. But as the stories fade from the news, will we still remember the faces of the poor? As a nation, we have a choice between continuing to drift toward tiny islands of wealth surrounded by a sea of poverty, or reinvesting in true wealth, in the fabric of society that serves the good of all. As Unitarian Universalist congregations and as individuals, we have a choice between turning away and forgetting, or turning toward the faces of poverty, seeing one another eye to eye, and then letting our hearts and minds guide our hands and feet.

May it be so.

© 2005 Nathan Woodliff-Stanley. Members and friends of Jefferson Unitarian Church are welcome to copy this sermon for personal use or to share with family or friends, but the contents of this sermon remain copyrighted, and may not be republished, preached, used without attribution or used for commercial purposes without the written consent of the author.