Government support in the fight against poverty is crucial. Yet the year [of travel and observation] taught us never to sit back and rely on such commitments. Our politicians, in the final analysis, will follow our lead, not vice versa.

- Jeffrey Sachs
from his book The End of Poverty

+ Sign up to receive our quote of the day via e-mail

Restore us to yourself, O Lord, that we may be restored; renew our days as of old.

- Lamentations 5:21

+ Sign up to receive our social justice verse of the day via e-mail

Lord, make me an instrument of your peace; where there is hatred, let me sow love; where there is injury, pardon; where there is doubt, faith; where there is despair, hope; where there is darkness, light; and where there is sadness, joy.

O God, grant that I may not so much seek to be consoled as to console; to be understood, as to understand; to be loved, as to love; for it is in giving that we receive, it is in pardoning that we are pardoned, and it is in dying that we are born to Eternal Life.

Amen.

A prayer of St. Francis of Assisi

Distributing food is a unique act of love because food is the basis for life. When the church can distribute food, it can allay one of people’s most primal fears — that of going hungry — as a way of helping people come to peace. When sources of food are close at hand, peace may be sustained.

- Pamela Couture
Vice President for Academic Affiars, Dean, and professor at Saint Paul School of Theology

+ Sign up to receive our quote of the day via e-mail

Whoever speaks must do so as one speaking the very words of God; whoever serves must do so with the strength that God supplies, so that God may be glorified in all things through Jesus Christ. To him belong the glory and the power forever and ever. Amen.

- 1 Peter 4:11

+ Sign up to receive our social justice verse of the day via e-mail

Even though our faith may be 2,000 years old, our thinking is not. True progress is a balance between preserving the essence of a certain way of life and changing things that are not essential. Christianity was born a revolutionary faith, and we have preserved that … Paradoxically, we have succeeded in not changing the faith that is itself dedicated to change.

- His All Holiness Bartholomew I
Ecumenical Patriarch of the Orthodox Christian World

+ Sign up to receive our quote of the day via e-mail

Search me, O God, and know my 

          heart;

     test me and know my thoughts.

See if there is any wicked way in

          me,

     and lead me in the way

          everlasting.

- Psalm 139:23-24

+ Sign up to receive our social justice verse of the day via e-mail

Dear Jesus, help me to spread Thy fragrance everywhere I go. Flood my soul with Thy spirit and love. Penetrate and possess my whole being so utterly that all my life may only be a radiance of Thine. Shine through me and be so in me that every soul I come in contact with may feel Thy presence in my soul. Let them look up and see no longer me but only Jesus. Stay with me and then I shall begin to shine as you shine, so to shine as to be a light to others.

A prayer of Mother Teresa

St. Benedict tells me to run to Christ. If I stop for a moment and consider what is being asked of me here, and what is involved in the act of running, I think of how when I run I place first one foot and then the other on the ground, that I let go of my balance for a second and then immediately recover it again. It is risky, this matter of running. By daring to lose my balance I keep it.

- Esther de Waal
from her book Living with Contradiction: An Introduction to Benedictine Spirituality

+ Sign up to receive our quote of the day via e-mail

So do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will bring worries of its own. Today’s trouble is enough for today.

- Matthew 6:34

+ Sign up to receive our social justice verse of the day via e-mail

How long, O Lord, will we sing this song? How long will we cry for peace and see only war? How long will our families be torn apart and devastated by unceasing violence? How long, O Lord? We wait on you; we trust in you. Vindicate our faith, Prince of Peace; show forth your glory in shalom.

We begin, sometimes without realizing it, to worship things, to relate to them as persons. And in the process, we inevitably relate to other persons as if they were things.

- Edward J. Farrell
from his book Gathering the Fragments

+ Sign up to receive our quote of the day via e-mail

The law of the Lord is perfect,

     reviving the soul;

the decrees of the Lord are sure,

     making wise the simple;

the precepts of the Lord are right,

     rejoicing the heart;

the commandment of the Lord is

          clear,

     enlightening the eyes;

the fear of the Lord is pure,

     enduring forever;

the ordinances of the Lord are

          true

     and righteous altogether.

- Psalm 19:7-9

+ Sign up to receive our social justice verse of the day via e-mail

Almighty God, who has brought together your elect in one communion and fellowship in the mystical body of Your Son, Christ our Lord: Give us grace so to follow your blessed saints in all virtuous and godly living, that we may come to those ineffable joys that you have prepared for those who truly love you; through the same Jesus Christ our Lord, who with you and the Holy Spirit lives and reigns; one God, in glory everlasting. Amen.

Adapted from the Book of Common Prayer, 1979

The work of the world is common as mud.

Botched, it smears the hands, crumbles to dust.

But the thing worth doing well done

has a shape that satisfies, clean and evident.

Greek amphoras for wine or oil,

Hopi vases that held corn, are put in museums

but you know they were made to be used.

The pitcher cries for water to carry

and a person for work that is real.

- Marge Piercy
from her poem "To Be of Use"

+ Sign up to receive our quote of the day via e-mail

O give thanks to the Lord, for the Lord

          is good; 

     for God’s steadfast love endures 

          forever.

- Psalm 107:1

+ Sign up to receive our social justice verse of the day via e-mail

Look with pity, O heavenly Father, upon people in this land who live with injustice, terror, disease, and death as their constant companions. Have mercy upon us. Help us to eliminate our cruelty to these our neighbors. Strengthen those who spend their lives establishing equal protection of the law and equal opportunities for all. And grant that every one of us may enjoy a fair portion of the riches of this land; through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.

Adapted from the Book of Common Prayer

We live limited lives until we "cross over" into the concrete world of another country, another culture, another tradition of worship … I have left forever a small world to live with the tensions and the tender mercies of God’s larger family.

- Joan Puls
from her book Every Bush Is Burning

+ Sign up to receive our quote of the day via e-mail

Why do you pass judgment on your brother or sister? Or you, why do you despise your brother or sister? For we will all stand before the judgment seat of God. For it is written,

"As I live, says the Lord, every

          knee shall bow to me,

     and every tongue shall give 

          praise to God."

So then, each of us will be accountable to God.

- Romans 14:10-12

+ Sign up to receive our social justice verse of the day via e-mail