As in many fall seasons past, over 2,000 communities across the USA will join forces this month to raise financial support for Church World Service in its effort to address the root causes of world hunger and poverty.
For at least 10 years my family has participated in our area’s Crop Walk collecting pledges and looking forward to that Sunday afternoon walk together – hot or cold, rain or shine. We never break any speed records and usually bring up the rear. We have pushed strollers and pulled wagons that held both our own kids and other’s. My husband, Mark, is always drawn to kids wherever we go – the younger the baby, the better as far as he’s concerned.
This year my family group is undertaking a new challenge – pushing my wheelchair. They are planning to take turns (I hope they’ll make exception on the one big hill and take me on a detour. Just so I won’t be getting off too easily, I’m going to try to walk one complete city block with either my walker or my cane so I’ll have put my own physical effort into this.
Oh, I’m almost ready to give up wheelchair. I’m hobbling around without any assistance on level ground. Outside, I take a knobbly, wooden cane with me that’s shaped like a goose’s head at the top. I like the idea of the goose cane because I can use it to “goose” people if they don’t cooperate as I think they should (all in fun!). Better not take it on the Crop Walk.
The material that came with our pledge envelope says that one-sixth of our human population, about a billion people, live on less than a dollar a day. It goes on to say that over one quarter of them live in Africa. This includes 26 million children who are malnourished.
As we make this small attempt to help provide food for them, I find some of their proverbs reassuring as my own food for thought:
– Communication and food are the things one lives by. Somali proverb
– The one who shares my bread and salt is not my enemy. Arabic Bedouin proverb
– That person is most beloved of God who does most good to God’s creatures. Muhammad
