An opening for action against poverty

From The Associated Press:

Left-leaning Christian and social activists see opportunity in an unconventional presidential race and a spiraling national economy: pushing poverty as an election issue.

At a time when more than 37 million Americans are in poverty, including many who are newly poor and paying keen attention, spiritual leaders are encouraging the young to vote and urging voters to select candidates who will fight poverty. ….

The cause has resonated across party lines and denominations, said Elaine Clements, deacon of St. Andrew’s Episcopal Church in New Orleans. More liberal Episcopalians and Methodists are working alongside more conservative evangelicals and Baptists in a manner many say they have not seen this generation.

She said that every Wal-Mart patron she has approached in the economically stricken Tchoupitoulas neighborhood has readily signed a pledge to pick local, state and federal candidates this year with poverty foremost in mind.

Many Christians viewed the city’s treatment after Hurricane Katrina as added evidence that the poor’s needs were being overlooked, said Lisa Sharon Harper, of New York Faith & Justice.

“War and violence across the globe, the lack of compassion toward the poor during their time of most need in Katrina, and the collapse of an economic structure where Wall Street was made rich on the backs of the poor,” Harper said. “There’s an open window that nobody really made. It’s just time.”