Last Sunday, I spoke with a high school youth group from the Fourth Presbyterian Church in downtown Chicago about raising awareness about extreme poverty and preventable disease in Africa.
The students watched “The Lazarus Effect” and then engaged in a group discussion about ONE’s issues. They were particularly struck by the fact that relatively few Americans know about these concerns because they are not regularly included in our newspapers or shown on our nightly news as an emergency situation.
I have high hopes that the Fourth Presbyterian students will work to raise consciousness of the conditions in which many of our global neighbors live and spread a message of hope that we can work together to overcome these struggles.
-Anne-Tyler Morgan, ONE congressional district leader for Illinois’ 7th District
From time to time, our members and field organizers let us in on what they’re doing in their local faith congregations to fight against extreme poverty. If you’d like to conduct a ONE Sabbath service and mobilize your faith group to take action on the Global Fund petition, email faith@one.org.
The congregation at the First United Methodist Church in Mt. Ephraim, New Jersey enjoyed a full ONE Sabbath service this past Sunday morning. Church Lay Leader Larry Barrar’s message was about going beyond the act of giving — charity — to the ideal of providing justice, which involves more of a relationship between the giver and the recipient.
Barrar explained that as Christians, we are called to a higher love, a love that changes. A love beyond merely giving. We are called to three purposes: compassion, action and community. At ONE we are called upon for these same three purposes in order to create a better world for our brothers and sisters in developing nations.
We were glad to see that a number of church members were eager to sign ONE’s petition to President Obama, asking for a strong, three-year, $6 billion pledge to the Global Fund to Fight HIV, TB and Malaria.
If you would like to share the Global Fund with your faith community, please visit our ONE Sabbath page.
- Barbra Barrar, ONE congressional district leader for New Jersey’s 1st District
The mission of ONE stands side by side with the heart of every major faith tradition. Because care for the poor is central to faith, ONE members are working hard to join voices on behalf of the poor across every faith tradition.
Pastor Matt Staniz is a ONE volunteer working to connect people in his congregation, his community, and across his denomination (the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America is a ONE partner). This past weekend, Pastor Matt took ONE’s message to the annual assembly of Southeastern Pennsylvania Synod of Lutheran congregations. In addition to recruiting new ONE members, Pastor Matt led two well-attended workshops inviting congregations to host ONE Sabbath events. He shared his recent experience of hosting simultaneous ONE Sabbath events with 3 other local congregations on World Malaria Day. Bishop Claire S. Burkat was also seen wearing a ONE wristband as she led the assembly!
“Hosting a ONE Sabbath event is engaging, important, and easy to accomplish,” said Pastor Matt. “Even small congregations that are struggling to live out their faith on a limited budget can save lives by using their greatest faith resource: their voice.”
For more information on ONE Sabbath, you can watch highlights of Pastor Matt’s ONE Sabbath sermon here. Helpful resources for several faith traditions are also available at the ONE Sabbath homepage.
Sunday, April 25 is World Malaria Day. And I hope you’ll check out what ONE is doing to inspire action and find out how you can include your faith community here.
Malaria has touched my family in a dramatic way. It almost killed my son Vasco. When I first met Vasco three years ago, he had a hole in his heart. Vasco was an AIDS orphan in Malawi then. Skinny. Knobby knees. Huge eyes. Beautiful, regal features. After his mother, father and gogo (grandmother) died, he lived on the streets for a few years, often sleeping in the open without a bed or netting to keep away the mosquitoes.
As we were visiting with him and a few members of his extended family, Vasco came and sat on my lap. He leaned his bony, narrow back into my chest and immediately I knew something was not right. His heart was beating frighteningly hard, so violently that his heartbeat was actually moving my body. We soon learned that he had a large ventricular septal defect – a hole the size of a quarter in his heart. We sought treatment for him in Malawi, but there was none to be had.
Nearly two years later, after a roller-coaster ride of red tape and the stunning generosity of hundreds of Chicago Sun-Times readers who heard Vasco’s story, he came to Chicago on April 29, 2009 for life-saving heart surgery. But two weeks to the day after he arrived in Chicago, Vasco spiked a high fever and was diagnosed with a raging case of malaria. He had had it once before, a few weeks after we met him in Malawi. He was hospitalized there and almost died. In Chicago, where he had immediate care from doctors, we learned that malaria has a two-week incubation period. Had he pitched the fever in Malawi, he would not have been allowed to travel, and, more than likely, he would have died.
With access to world-class medical care at Hope Children’s Hospital outside Chicago, Vasco survived malaria and host of other ailments — including a water-borne parasite that had lodged in his bladder. On June 10, 2009, Vasco underwent successful open-heart surgery to make his heat whole again. Not long after, Vasco became part of our family when my husband Maury and I began the long process of adopting him. Today, Vasco is happy and healthy and loved. He’s grown almost six inches and put on about 25 pounds. He is able to play soccer for the first time in his life and even scored his first goal a few weeks ago. Vasco is our healthy, normal (extraordinary) boy. He has healed our hearts with his, too, and he has a family for the rest of his life.
ONE’s co-founder Bono once told me: “We can’t do everything. But what we can do, we must do.”
For this World Malaria Day, do what you can. Check out the ONE Sabbath World Malaria Day materials, watch a great new video from United Against Malaria, and then sign-up to bring ONE to your house of worship.
Yesterday Pastor Matt Staniz from Temple Lutheran Church in Havertown, PA and I met with several local faith leaders in the Philadelphia area to discuss opportunities for ONE Sabbath in their respective faith traditions. To learn more about ONE Sabbath please click here.
Faith leaders attending the meeting included members of the Haverford Township Clergy Association, a group committed to interfaith dialogue and civic involvement among all faith traditions. We discussed different ways congregations could get involved after viewing portions of this ONE Sabbath video. There was also discussion on ways that the different congregations could come together as ONE and fight poverty together. Pastor Staniz suggested that a weekend be chosen to have simultaneous ONE Sabbath events in multiple congregations followed with a joint effort to engage people in active partnership with ONE’s goals.
Everyone left the meeting energized about the possibilities of working together on a common goal. Leaders of several small to mid-size congregations agreed that they could accomplish more by joining together than by working separately. The group identified that the challenge in congregations is to move beyond concern for the poor and generosity toward justice a response that creates change. All were in agreement that caring for the poor is at the center of every major faith tradition.
More to come when the multiple ONE Sabbath Sunday is announced!
Each of us has a unique role to play in addressing global challenges such as poverty, HIV/AIDS, clean water and maternal health. For over twenty years now I’ve been telling stories, through video and web media, designed to inspire small groups to live out their faith. In particular, I have a deep passion that individuals in small groups discover their role in seeking solutions in the fight against global poverty and pandemic diseases.
That’s why I created a small group and Church video and print resource called START: Becoming a Good Samaritan. That’s also why I’m excited to partner with ONE—to get this resource into your hands…your Church. Starting today, we’re offering “Becoming a Good Samaritan” as a free resource to small groups and Churches looking to raise awareness in their congregations and their communities.
This teaching tool will help your small group or Church become inspired to take action in the fight against global poverty—especially treatable, preventable diseases such as AIDS and malaria. You’ll hear personal stories from Kay Warren of Saddleback Church, Rich Stearns, president of World Vision, as well as Princess Kasune Zulu who shares her hope that we can end the senseless suffering of HIV/AIDS. Sign up and register at ONE Sabbath today to receive this free DVD session and study guide chapter from START: Becoming A Good Samaritan curriculum. Together as ONE… We can make a difference!
Last week ONE joined with hundreds of leaders at the National Association of Evangelicals “Evangelical Leaders Forum” at First Baptist Church of Glenarden in nearby Landover, Maryland mobilizing action in the fight global poverty alongside other national and global challenges. The consensus here is that despite many differences and difficulties, there is hope when we work together in achieving positive change.
ONE was a cosponsor of the event, along with Micah Challenge USA, where we led discussion and discernment in how churches can best raise awareness and act in concern around AIDS, clean water, education and maternal health issues through ONE Sabbath and Micah Sunday. Other ONE partners such as Bread for the World, Save Darfur, and World Relief were also in attendance.
Friday morning we heard from Wesleyan General Superintendent and ONE Sabbath supporter Jo Anne Lyon on the importance of the church’s role in working to end poverty by direct relief and development as well as its role in advocacy to elected leaders. Lyon, in reflecting on Psalm 82 , made a compelling and passionate plea for the church to work towards women empowerment, continued AIDS initiatives like PEPFAR, as well as leadership for care for the environment – because “the world’s poor are hurt first and worst” amidst the climate crisis. Later at lunch, former President George W. Bush’s speechwriter and adviser Michael Gerson gave an eyewitness account of the President’s historic PEPFAR initiative and his on the ground stories of seeing US funds at work to rebuild a community in Ethiopia.
It was a spirited couple of days of conversation and calling – I look forward to the action that will come out of this national gathering in the days to come.
ONE is campaigning to ensure that the Congressional budget does not cut foreign assistance programs like Feed the Future that help people break the cycle of poverty and hunger.
The Horn of Africa is experiencing its worst drought in 60 years. More than 11 million people, mostly nomadic pastoralists and farmers in south-central Somalia, north-eastern Kenya, and south-eastern Ethiopia, are severely lacking access to food.
2011 marks 30 years since the first cases of AIDS were documented. Take a closer look at the specific, achievable goals we must hit by 2015 to make this year the beginning of the end of AIDS.
As aid agencies warn more than 9 million people could be affected by a food crisis in East Africa, world leaders are failing to keep their 2009 promises to tackle the causes of chronic hunger and support farmers in the world's poorest countries.
Yesterday Pastor Matt Staniz from Temple Lutheran Church in Havertown, PA and I met with several local faith leaders in the Philadelphia area to discuss opportunities for ONE Sabbath in their respective faith traditions. To learn more about ONE Sabbath please 
Last week ONE joined with hundreds of leaders at the National Association of Evangelicals 
Friday morning we heard from Wesleyan General Superintendent and ONE Sabbath supporter Jo Anne Lyon on the importance of the church’s role in working to end poverty by direct relief and development as well as its role in advocacy to elected leaders. Lyon, in reflecting on Psalm 82 , made a compelling and passionate plea for the church to work towards women empowerment, continued AIDS initiatives like PEPFAR, as well as leadership for care for the environment – because “the world’s poor are hurt first and worst” amidst the climate crisis. Later at lunch, former President George W. Bush’s speechwriter and adviser Michael Gerson gave an eyewitness account of the President’s historic PEPFAR initiative and his on the ground stories of seeing US funds at work to rebuild a community in Ethiopia.
