Texts: Isaiah 58: 1-11; Luke 9: 10-17

Well, being the good liberal like I like to think I am, I went through the mail and saw the little nondescript item from Oxfam. You remember Oxfam. The usual pitch is something like, “you won’t see pictures of starving babies…..” and drones on like a lot of good liberal letters for about two pages more than necessary. I do have to say, however, that I appreciate at least one letter not giving me pictures of starving children. I mean, I have the picture of the little Sudanese skin and bones girl and the vulture hovering over her on my refrigerator. Reminds me how fortunate I am every time I open the fridge.

Then there are the pitches that have the word urgent all over them, usually in capital letters and bold print. They tell us of the millions who are starving, who need our help, and so forth. Usually, though not always, there’s a picture of some half-starved emaciated child. There are also the pitches for organizations that do more than just feed children and their mothers; they are the microfinance banks that fund development and change throughout the third world. A few organizations raise policy issues, usually about improving distribution, but most of those pitches avoid incendiary language.

Today people all over Monmouth County are walking for Crop Walk, raising money for food pantries and other assistance programs. And those efforts are necessary as well as laudable. But why is it in the wealthiest country in the world we have to worry about feeding people, not just people in some backwater third world country, but here, right here in America? I think it comes from the failure of our political leaders from both major political parties to seriously address the issues of economic and social policy.

Most of us are probably familiar with the statistics: Almost 36% of families that need assistance have at least one employed adult in the family. The gap between well-off and not so well-off -- usually called rich and poor -- didn’t just spring like Athena from Zeus’ head just because of the current recession. That gap has been steadily growing since the early 1980s when there was an earlier recession during Reagan’s time. You all remember Ronald Reagan, the great communicator who pushed the “me-first” idea of politics, don’t you? The gap has widened even more because so-called normal workers suffer more in a recession than the wealthy who have golden parachutes. The question for us, especially in this election season, is what should we do about the gap?

Our answers will depend on how we understand the meaning of the words “well-off,” “rich,” or “wealthy.” I daresay that none of us would consider ourselves wealthy or rich, though most of us are certainly comfortable even with the belt-tightening we’ve had to do because of the recession. We’ve seen our investment incomes sharply reduced and either in our own families or among our friends, people have been unable to find work. In 2008, Monmouth County had a median income figure of more than $82,000; the data from the 2010 Census are not yet available. To rent an apartment in Monmouth County, a family needs to be prepared to lay out anywhere between $1300 and $1600 a month. Burger King and most of the chain markets pay the minimum wage, $7.25 hourly. Multiply that by 40 and you get $290 and by 4.3 weeks in the average month and you get $1,247. That’s before taxes. ShopRite does better, quite frankly because it’s unionized.

Teachers do better, but the higher paid teachers are administrators and specialists with more than 20 years experience. The median salary for teachers in New Jersey is around $54,000 -- that’s after at least 5 years on the job. And most people fall into the wages and salaries between teachers and Burger King. Why am I plugging your heads with all these numbers? The numbers all have human faces, from Burger King and Target to teaching in Middletown, the Governor notwithstanding. He should talk! He’s been on the public payroll for years. His retirement is secure, quite frankly, as it should be. Public servants, such as teachers, firefighters, and police give their lives to building a society that is productive and safe for all of us. The rest of us owe them.

We need to rethink our entire economic and tax policy in this country because how we raise money and spend it is the very crux of our thinking as a nation. We have got to replace the ‘me first” thinking with a broader vision, one that encompasses the community as a whole, one that really addresses the issues of wealth and poverty. The widow should not need to keep coming to the judge to vindicate her. As a nation, we should not need to continually return to stop gap measures to help feed people. Jesus offered us a new way to live, one that tells us we are responsible for what happens to others, that we must change the system from which many of us benefit, that we are obligated to care for the least among us by much more than just walking to raise money for food pantries.

Our goal as a community and as a nation should be to eliminate the need for food pantries. As you donate to today’s Crop Walkers, think about our tax policies and the measures that Congress can enact to help those at the bottom. And beyond specific measures such as the earned income credit or the child care credit, expand your thinking beyond the traditional categories so we can develop a society where everyone can house, feed, and clothe their families with dignity.

Let us pray: Eternal Judge who sets before us the ways of life and death, teach us to truly give justice to the poor and live for others as Jesus taught us to do. Amen.