One of the things that struck me the most while reading Bryant L. Myers book Walking With The Poor is his comprehensive discussion on what constitutes poverty. One of the things he highlights is how our good intended caring for the poor has the potential to impoverish the poor person even more. Myers who is writing about transformational development work says, “A Flawed process can make the poor poorer by further devaluing their view of themselves and what they have” (116). We might unwillingly contribute to the poor internalizing their poverty. Myers explains that the poor internalize their poverty partially because of non-value messages from the non-poor. This is what Augustine Musopole describes as a poverty of being. This poverty is felt the most when a person has come to believe that they are no good and don’t have anything to contribute in this world. Myers states, “When the poor accept their marred identity and their distorted sense of vocation as normative and immutable, their poverty is complete. It is also permanent unless this issue is addressed and they are helped to recover their identity as children of God, made in God’s image, and their true vocation as productive stewards in the world God made for them” (76). Thus as we seek to partner with the poor and engage together with them in transformational development work we need to make sure that we affirm their identity as God’s children and acknowledge the gifts God has given them that can contribute to their communities wellbeing. Deep reflection on how we relate to the poor and the effects that our actions can have on them is needed.
Here is an example of a thoughtful non-profit organization who is trying to think creatively of how to empower the people in the community that they are working with and to give them dignity. The non-profits name is Mission Waco and I was involved with them while I was studying at Truett Seminary in Waco. Here is a website if you are interested in learning more (they have a great poverty simulation program, Church under the Bridge etc.)
http://www.missionwaco.org/indexmain.html
Each year in December Mission Waco opens a Christmas toy store. The parents who shop at the store come from poor families in the Waco community. With this toy store Mission Waco seeks to give dignity to the parents that shop at the store. Let me explain. A lot of times during Christmas, well-meaning Christians buy gifts for the poor and give them to them. What they don’t realize is that if they give the gift to the child in front of the parents who can’t afford to buy his or her child a gift they impoverish the parents by making them feel that they can’t provide. Another common occurrence is that the gift a family receives does not fit the child’s interest. For example a boy who wants a football for Christmas gets a book. What I am describing here is not exhaustive, but it is enough to give you a sense of how some of our practices can be impoverishing. What Mission Waco does instead of these practices is that it lets the people shop in their Christmas store where they get to pay 20% of the cost of the toy. This gives people dignity since they are purchasing their own toys for their children and they are able to get things that the children actually want. This practice is an attempt to empower the parents and to avoid impoverishing the poor even more. It’s an attempt to avoid what Myers calls playing god in the poor people’s lives. I know this is not a perfect model, but Mission Waco reflected on their practices and is seeking the best they can to affirm with their practices that the people they are partnering with have dignity and can meaningfully contribute to the purchasing of the gift.
Community can only be transformed when people transformed. As long as our practices further the internalizing of the marred identity of the poor no real community transformation will happen. Thus we need to reflect on our practices and need to make sure that they build up and don’t tear down.
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