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Presiding Bishop joins call for federal budget representing 'justice and compassion'
Friday, February 16, 2007 Issue: Section: Corrected: [Episcopal News Service] Presiding Bishop Katharine Jefferts Schori and four leaders of Protestant denominations wrote to the U. S. Congress February 15, calling on the members to re-write President George Bush’s fiscal year 2008 budget in a way that represents "a shared vision of justice and compassion for all of God’s people, both in our own nation and around the world." The letter is signed by Jefferts Schori and the Rev. Mark S. Hanson, Presiding Bishop of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America; the Rev. Dr. Clifton Kirkpatrick, Stated Clerk of the General Assembly, Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.); Bishop Beverly Shamana, President of the United Methodist General Board of Church & Society and the Rev. John H. Thomas, General Minister and President, United Church of Christ. "We call upon the 110th Congress to work to both sustain this budget where it is just and compassionate and to improve upon it where it is not," they wrote. The signers wrote that the current version of the budget "meets our vision in some areas but decidedly not in others" and noted the "staggeringly large" cost of the war in Iraq and Afghanistan, as well as the cost of extending tax cuts. The letter lists specific changes in domestic spending, applauds international spending for HIV/AIDS, the Millennium Development Goals and humanitarian and peacekeeping aid in Sudan. It asks that international-development efforts be supported. The full text of the letter follows. -------------------------- February 15, 2007 Dear Members of Congress The President has now sent his proposed FY ’08 Federal Budget to the 110th Congress. Much will be written and said in the coming weeks and months about the content of that $2.9 trillion budget. As the leaders of five denominations whose members helped shape the core values of this nation from its founding, we believe the Federal Budget must represent a shared vision of justice and compassion for all of God's people, both in our own nation and around the world. Not surprisingly, we find that the FY '08 Federal Budget meets our vision in some areas but decidedly not in others. We call upon the 110th Congress to work to both sustain this budget where it is just and compassionate and to improve upon it where it is not. One of the gifts of our work is that we travel the world, knowing that our mission is to seek and serve those both at home and abroad. We believe that our government must do likewise. In this budget we find that while it cuts spending for those at home, it expands funding for the critical fight against deadly poverty and disease in poor countries around the world. Even in difficult financial times, policymakers should not be forced to pit the needs of vulnerable people at home against our nation's moral obligation to respond to the life-and-death struggles of people around the world. We are grateful for increases in international-assistance programs, and call upon Congress to ensure that equally critical domestic spending receive similar increases. Those increases must not come, however, at the expense of the unprecedented advances this budget makes in fighting poverty and disease abroad. Specifically, we ask Congress to fight these cuts in domestic discretionary spending:
These cuts are especially disheartening when combined with the fading from view of the aftermath of Hurricanes Katrina, Rita and Wilma. We have forgotten all too quickly the stark portrait of poverty in America that emerged from those disasters. In international spending, we applaud:
Within the international budget, we urge Congress to maintain these critical increases while also working to maintain the momentum of key international-development accounts that did not fare as well but which are equally critical in fighting extreme poverty and disease abroad. Spending on humanitarian and development programs abroad is especially important at this time, not only because of the catastrophes that are unfolding daily before us, but because of the need to show that the United States sees all God’s people as its neighbors and seeks to serve human need wherever it occurs. In Matthew 6 it is written: "For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also." We in the United States are blessed with many treasures. And there are many demands on just where and how those treasures should be spent. It is our prayer that our federal budget will put our treasure into programs that show our hearts to be compassionate and just. For in doing so we will strengthen all of God's people and in return our nation. Signed by: The Rev. Mark S. Hanson The Most Rev. Katharine Jefferts Schori The Rev. Dr. Clifton Kirkpatrick Bishop Beverly Shamana The Rev. John H. Thomas Corrections:
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