Make January Poverty in America Awareness Month in Your Parish
With 37 million residents, Poverty, USA, is the largest state in America. To bring attention to this forgotten state, the Catholic Campaign for Human Development (CCHD) has designated January as Poverty in America Awareness Month.
January is an ideal time to raise awareness of Poverty in America and invite others to join the diocese and empowered low-income leaders in working to remove barriers that keep people trapped in the state of poverty. Whether you plan activities for individuals, groups or both, this on-line tool can help to make that plan a powerful reality.
Use one of these 12 Ways to Bring Awareness to the Forgotten State of Poverty:
(Click on the links below for downloadable resources.)
- Conduct a local media tour of PovertyUSA by inviting members of the media to visit with CCHD-funded projects in your community or diocese heres how: Step-by-step instructions and samples
- Use parish bulletins and ministry newsletters to get the word out. For ideas click on the links below.
Raise awareness and compassion at Mass. Every Sunday in January use these Intercessory Prayers and Bulletin Announcements or create your own.
- In parishes after mass, invite parishioners to a poverty awareness program or conduct a poverty awareness assembly in the parish school to raise awareness among youth. Some things to do at such a program are:
- View and discuss the video, Among the People: Facing Poverty in America. Order through the CCHD catalog, Item No. 5-729, 53 minutes, VHS. Call toll free at 800.235.8722.
- Set up a visual display of the CCHD work that is happening locally or in the region. Give a CCHD button to everyone who spends time examining the display.
- Listen to a speaker from a CCHD-funded project talk about a poverty-related issue and what's being done to overcome it. Include time for the audiences questions and answers.
- At ministry meetings in which opportunities exist for prayer and reflection, tell stories that share the good news of poor and low-income people breaking the cycle of poverty in your community. Tell the story verbally or visually using CCHD material. Materials may include news about a local group or extra copies of promotional material from the Collection. Click here for more good news to share about the Churchs efforts to address poverty around the country.
- Send a free E-greeting that encourages awareness and compassion. Thank those who are working with you to break the cycle of poverty in your diocese. Invite others to get involved in local efforts to spotlight poverty and address it.
- Write a letter to the editor or an article for your diocesan paper about an aspect of poverty that needs attention in your diocese. If you have a local CCHD committee, have a discussion with the members to identify a top priority local or regional issue. Then ask for a volunteer from the committee to write the article.
- Share what you know about poverty in the region with teachers you know and ask them to have their students write about poverty in America for their school paper.
- Encourage teachers and catechists to use the Student Action Project or the Multi-Media Youth Arts Contest educational materials.
- Add an electronic ribbon (banner message) to your CCHD website and email during January. Visit the Media Gallery at the Poverty USA web site for instructions.
- Ask individual diocesan and secular media directors to use the CCHD Poverty USA public service announcements in January via television, radio and print media. Preview them on-line. Visit www.tvaccessreports.com/cchd to find out which media outlets received or used the tv, print, and radio announcements.
- Use these interactive resources to raise awareness of poverty with diocesan, parish and
school groups:
BOOKMARK these sites for easy reference:
| We would appreciate receiving feedback about this tool. How did you use it? Was it helpful to you? In what way could it have been more useful? Email your comments. Thank you. |