September 15, 2005

CHICAGO (ELCA) – Calling the federal budget "a concrete expression of our shared moral values and priorities," the Rev. Mark S. Hanson, presiding bishop of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (ELCA), joined with four other U.S. religious leaders and called on the U.S. Congress to stop the federal budget reconciliation process for fiscal year 2006.

The religious leaders made their recommendation in a Sept. 13 letter to Congress, noting the "unprecedented devastation" caused by Hurricane Katrina which exposed "the all too many faces of poverty living in the wealthiest nation on the planet."

"These faces, precious in the eyes of God, call us to remember that sadly, racial disparities and poverty exist in almost every community in our nation," they said.

Those who signed the letter with Hanson were the Rev. Frank T. Griswold, presiding bishop, Episcopal Church, New York; the Rev. Clifton Kirkpatrick, stated clerk, Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.), Louisville, Ky.; the Rev. John H. Thomas, general minister and president, United Church of Christ, Cleveland; and James Winkler, general secretary, general board of church and society, United Methodist Church, Nashville, Tenn.

In April the religious leaders wrote to Congress and said the proposed 2006 federal budget asks the nation's "working poor to pay the cost of a prosperity they may never share." Medicaid and the Food Stamp Program, slated for cuts by Congress, may have greater burdens placed on them as a result of Hurricane Katrina, the religious leaders said in the Sept. 13 letter.

The religious leaders wrote that, as the disaster occurred on the Gulf Coast, the U.S. Census Bureau "revealed in alarming detail" that poverty in the United States is growing. They cited the bureau's 2004 annual report, "Income, Poverty and Health Insurance Coverage in the United States."

The report "showed 37 million people lived in poverty in 2004, an increase of more than 1 million people since 2003," the leaders said.

The religious leaders noted that Congress responded appropriately by designating funds for the initial response to Katrina and said each of their churches mobilized, providing prayer and financial support.

Before the hurricane or the Census Bureau report, "neither we nor our friends of other faiths had the resources to turn back the rising tide of poverty in this country. The [2006 federal budget] reconciliation bill that is working its way through the authorizing committees will send more people searching for food in cupboards that, quite frequently, are bare," the leaders wrote.

"We commit ourselves to working for economic policies infused with the spirit of the One who began his public ministry almost 2,000 years ago by proclaiming that God had anointed him ‘bring good news to the poor,'" the religious leaders' letter concluded.

The full text of the religious leaders' letter to Congress is at http://releases.usnewswire.com/GetRelease.asp?id=53266 on the Web.

ELCA News Service