Priorities, Dreams, and Faith

What Do Federal Budgets Say about Priorities?

The recently proposed federal budget, totaling in excess of 3.1 trillion ( yes, trillion) dollars, makes it clear that “keeping America safe” …code word for “more war”…wins the bulk of new appropriation increases while Medicare and Social Security are called upon to make deep cuts, notably no increases for hospitals and doctors who provide medical care and services….code word for “ignore inflation” and “pretend it isn’t there.” Likewise numbers of other programs will be cut, particularly in areas of education…obviously children don’t need music and art and drama where they might learn to think and sing and create…better to be a weapon’s dealer or missle manufacturer in the new economy. God forgive us for discouraging the poets and the painters and the purveyors of literacy beyond the codes of text messaging.

What Do Our Choices Say about our Dreams?

In the name of justice, we send more Afro-Americans to prison than to college. In the name of education, we provide a prescription for failure in public schools around the nation where we call for “no child left behind” only to leave thousands behind every day by policies that do not promote family stability, adequate health care, and quality education for all. Economic games are played in neighborhoods all across the land where the wealthy neighborhoods get the books and the struggling neighborhoods get the word that they have to share the book among each class of students because there aren’t funds to go around. Some schools get the computers, but not the software or trained teachers to use it well in effective ways. We struggle as a nation to produce enough engineers and scientists to satisfy the needs of industry and infrastructure needs facing our nation currently, but we pay our teachers a third of what similarly educated persons are making in the marketplace. Football players who make 50 tackles and 8 sacks in 6 seasons with the NFL earn multimillion dollar contracts while those with Ph.D.’s in our universities earn barely $50,000 a year in many settings.

What Do Our Choices Say about our Practice of Faith?

Christians largely have ignored the global climate crisis. In two years half the area of the Polar ice cap at the North Pole has melted. In 5 years, at the present rate of melting, we won’t have an icecap at the North Pole. As that pattern relates to the South Pole, large sections of ice shelf are showing sudden patterns of breaking off and with just a small rise in the ocean temperatures, and a corresponding rise of sea level, hundreds of thousands of people will become “climate change refugees”…forced out of their homes by rising water. We think humanitarian crises have been limited to hunger, poverty, disease, and war….wait til we add to that the suffering of thousands displaced from their homes, coupled with excessive drought, excessive flooding (more intense periods of heavy rain) , larger and more powerful storms…both tornadoes and hurricanes… we haven’t seen anything yet! These are real changes, with scientists relatively “screaming” for nations and lawmakers and industry to respond. The church should be joining in the call for responsible action toward the creation of God.

Studies indicate that 2-3% of all those currently in prison are innocent. We are finding over and over again evidence of injustice and a failure of responsible measures to
dispense justice fairly across the economic spectrum. Overloaded courts and warehousing of prisoners to the neglect of education, work, and rehabilitation add to the long term issues. Christians have a responsibility to visit the imprisoned, to proclaim release to the captives…in the name of our Lord who transforms lives and gives hope.

Patterns of injustice around the world are often ignored by those who choose simply to be self-absorbed and un-informed. Thinking we have no influence betrays our neglect to pray for those who face injustice on a daily basis. Neglecting to speak for those whose voices have been silenced is an indictment on our comfortable apathy. May God forgive us for not using our voices and votes and vigor to call for change in our world.