(C) Daily Montanan This story was originally published by Daily Montanan and is unaltered. . . . . . . . . . . Are you hungry? Prove it. – Daily Montanan [1] ['More From Author', 'June', 'Darrell Ehrlick'] Date: 2023-06-01 I want to thank the Republicans in the U.S. House of Representatives for reminding us that we are, in fact, not a Christian nation. Even though some within their own party insist that the nation was founded by a bunch of holy-rolling churchgoers, the conservatives have demonstrated their secular bonafides by insisting that people who are already facing difficulties need to have it just a bit harder because they’ll soon be required to prove they’re working just to get on the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, often referred to as “food stamps.” Let’s be clear: Jesus Christ himself would have failed to meet the guidelines for help. He was, after all, a single man, less than the age of 55, with no dependents and unemployed. Unless he was actively looking for work, he would have had to resort to his own superpowers, and thankfully, he could duplicate fish and bread. For the rest of us, though, conservatives in Congress would not touch the tax code to raise more revenue to solve the debt crisis. Instead, they focused on the real problem – poor people. These new proposals appeal to us because they sound like they’re codifying something normal. The overwhelming majority of Americans work – and, by global comparisons, spend a lot more time at work. We understand that work is usually a means of paying the bills, including food. Yet, folks who need the support of food stamps or other social safety net programs are there precisely because their lives are not normal, whether through tragedy, illness or other life circumstances. This new legislation seems to make an already bad situation more difficult by asking food-stamp recipients: How much do you want food, and what are you willing to do for it? No one would taunt a homeless person with food, so why are we allowing Congress to tease those who need assistance? That’s why coming back to the example of Jesus, who, according to some politicians, nearly single-handedly founded America, is instructive. According to the Bible, when he performed the miracle of feeding 5,000 – he didn’t do so by first asking how many of them were employed. When he changed water into wine, he didn’t ask if those who drank had enough in their pocket to pay for a jug of Palestine’s best. Two other profound moments during Jesus’ (ahem, unpaid) ministry come to mind because they also focus on the necessity of feeding people. In Matthew (Chapter 25), Jesus proclaims that those who will inherit the kingdom of heaven will be those who fed the poor. In the closing of John’s gospel, Jesus forgives Peter for his betrayal and commands him to “feed my sheep.” Clearly, feeding people without conditions is a moral imperative. I don’t know all the reasons someone may need food stamps. And quite frankly: I don’t care. I would like to think the experience of filling out paperwork, having to admit you need help, would be humbling – even humiliating enough – that asking for help regardless should not require a polygraph or background check. In a barely hidden way, the legislation that Congress is contemplating is a thinly veiled attack on those who are already marginalized. The idea could not be more obvious: In adding more work requirements to qualify for food stamps, there is an assumption that those who are already a part of the program are lazy or loafing. Lawmakers have tarred citizens on food assistance as under suspicion of being lazy just because they dared to ask for help. The GOP doesn’t see those who need temporary assistance as an act of good government, instead they view poverty as a moral failing – as if residents are content to live in poverty or without food. For being the alleged richest nation on earth, maybe it’s time we stop judging our own value and worth on the amount of money and lucre we’ve accumulated, and instead gauge our success on how well we’ve eliminated poverty and illness. Ironically, if our leaders would spend more time worrying about simply feeding those who are hungry regardless of reason, we would begin to look a lot more like that Christian nation I’ve heard so much about, but rarely seen recently. No one summarized what that looked like better than Archbishop Desmond Tutu. “I don’t preach a social gospel; I preach the gospel, period. The gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ is concerned for the whole person. When people were hungry, Jesus didn’t say, ‘Now is that political or social?’ He said, ‘I feed you.’ Because the good news to a hungry person is bread.” [END] --- [1] Url: https://dailymontanan.com/2023/06/01/are-you-hungry-prove-it/ Published and (C) by Daily Montanan Content appears here under this condition or license: Creative Commons CC BY-NC-ND 4.0. via Magical.Fish Gopher News Feeds: gopher://magical.fish/1/feeds/news/montanan/