“When a poor person has died of hunger, it has not happened because God did not take care of him or her. It has happened because neither you nor I wanted to give that person what he or she needed” (Mother Theresa)

I choose not to take Mother Theresa’s words at face value.  She wasn’t referring to food in the strictest sense and giving people what we think they need or want them to have. She spoke of the unwillingness to meet people where they are and deliver what they ask, including a place at the table where they may have an opportunity to feed all of their needs.

Mother Theresa’s words recognize that charity is not justice. Charity seeks to mollify injustice. Justice empowers people to do for themselves and knows when and where to ask for help.

There’s a narrative that goes along with food charity that ignores the issue of justice.  Such phrases as “if they would only”; patriarchal, hero energy that promotes the message “we have to do for people and communities because they can’t do for themselves”; and lack of good listening and communication skills which results in inequities by mistake or intentional.

Finally, one that I am sometimes guilty of – “vote with your dollar,” the problem of which is that it leaves out those who have no dollars and therefore have no vote in the very system that keeps them hungry.

Consider that institutions such as Food for America use millions of federal tax dollars to invest in corporations such as cereal manufacturers, dispersing their products to food banks. Is this supporting and strengthening people or perpetuating hunger and increasing the strength of corporations?

Instead, should these funds connect local resources such as small farms with community programs and education that include diversity and other conscientious, entrepreneurial investments?

Reserve food banks to meet specific short-term needs, remembering that because of transportation, caregiving duties, and other issues, programs must meet the people where they are, which may not be at the food bank. Stop assuming people are hungry because they are poor. There are many reasons people are hungry.

While I believe that American colonization and white supremacy have enlarged the hunger issue, solutions are the responsibility of everyone, particularly those who have engaged in causing the problem of hunger, intentionally or not. Communication is essential. Be curious with an open mind and heart.

It takes courage to break down and rebuild long-standing institutions of oppression, especially when many of us, myself included, haven’t been aware that our well-meaning response is steeped in what we believe to be true rather than the truth.

We continue to be entrenched in challenges to correct our wrongdoings. To do nothing is easier, but this ensures failure and denies the right of us all to flourish and experience justice.

I’m advocating that when we choose to support hunger programs, we do it with as much knowledge and consciousness as we are able and invest in people directly when possible.

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