Peace & Justice
Peace & Justice Ministry
Celebrant Will you strive for justice and peace among all people, and respect the dignity of every human being?
People I will, with God’s help.
Book of Common Prayer, p 305
Our baptismal vow is the starting point for the work of the Peace & Justice ministry. By virtue of our baptism in Christ, we commit to continuing his work of reconciling the world to God, of the world’s peoples to each other. We invite you to join with us in striving for justice and peace among all peoples.
Millennium Development Goals
The initial focus of the Peace & Justice Ministry is on the problem of extreme poverty in the world, and the efforts to alleviate the death and misery caused by such poverty.
The Problem
Extreme poverty means that people have $1 or less to live on every day. One billion people live in extreme poverty. That means:
- Over 800 million people go to bed hungry every night;
- Eleven million children die every year from hunger and from preventable and treatable disease; that’s 30,000 every day, or one every three seconds,
- 500,000 women die in childbirth every year for lack of medical resources on information,
- One in six lacks clean drinking water,
- AIDS, malaria and other preventable diseases affect millions.
The problem of poverty has been with us forever. What is different now is a realization that we have the capability of drastically reducing poverty and its effects, if we have the will.
The Solution
In September 2000, the nations of the world unanimously made a solemn promise in the United Nations Millennium Declaration: “We will spare no effort to free our fellow men, women and children from the abject and dehumanizing conditions of extreme poverty, to which more than a billion of them are currently subjected. We are committed to making the right to development a reality for everyone and to freeing the entire human race from want.”
From their specific commitments in the Declaration came the Millennium Development Goals [MDGs]– eight specific, time-bound and quantified goals with associated targets for addressing extreme poverty, its causes and effects.
The Millennium Development Goals are:
1. Eradicate Extreme Poverty and Hunger
2. Achieve Universal Primary Education
3. Promote Gender Equality and Empower Women
4. Reduce Child Mortality
5. Improve Maternal Health
6. Combat HIV/AIDS, Malaria, and other diseases
7. Ensure Environmental Sustainability
8. Develop a Global Partnership for Development
The promise and the goals are achievable, perhaps for the first time in human history. But only if with the commitment of citizens, governments, civil society, and faith communities will this global commitment be met.
The Commitment
The Episcopal Church at General Convention 2006 made the Millennium Development Goals a mission priority, including committing 0.7% of its budget to achieving the and asked dioceses and parishes to do the same.
The Vestry of the Church of the Holy Comforter has taken the next step – by endorsing the MDGs, and committing this church to join the ONE Episcopalian campaign, to advocate for achieving the Millennium Development Goals.
Presiding Bishop Katherine Jefferts Schori is making the Millennium Development Goals the centerpiece of the church’s commitment to shalom. As she said in her investiture sermon:
“This church has said that our larger vision will be framed and shaped in the coming years by the vision of shalom embedded in the Millennium Development Goals – a world where the hungry are fed, the ill are healed, the young educated, women and men treated equally, and where all have access to clean water and adequate sanitation, basic health care, and the promise of development that does not endanger the rest of creation. That vision of abundant life is achievable in our own day, but only with the passionate commitment of each and every one of us. It is God's vision of homecoming for all humanity.”
Read the whole sermon, here.
What Do We Do?
An excellent book, What Can One Person Do? Faith to Heal a Broken World, by Sabina Alkire, Edmund Newell, Ann Barham, Chloe Breyer, and Ian Douglas provides a strategy that allows each person to connect with, learn about and take action – to strive for justice and peace. The strategy includes:
Pray Hold people and situations in prayer. Learn more here: Prayers for MDGs
Study Get the basic facts about the MDGs here: MDGs 101. Read the book.
Give Start with Episcopal Relief & Development – and there are many other organizations working to reduce hunger, starvation and disease, and bring clean water and sanitation to God’s children.
Connect Spend time abroad volunteering or visiting to connect with the impoverished.
Raise Awareness Organize a concert or other public event to raise awareness and funds.
Take Action Take part in a direct action – e.g. wear a white wrist band
Advocate Join the ONE campaign – see more information around the church soon.
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To join in striving for peace and justice, for God’s shalom, contact the Peace & Justice committee by sending an e-mail to the |
