The trouble with statistics is that they are faceless numbers. In this case, a higher percentage evokes more shock than the lower numbers, but they’re still just numbers. What we really need to do is think of them as children with names, stories and families. So even in the areas with just 9 per cent, the reality is that almost one in ten children are living in families which don’t have enough income to cover their living costs. Even nine per cent is too many.
I heard this week about a community in which nobody works – a result of large scale redundancies from businesses closing over 20 years ago. None of the teenagers there are old enough to remember it happening but the result today is that none of them know anybody in their immediate community who has a job. One teenage boy, when asked what his ambitions were, said that he wanted to get referred to social services so he could get a social worker of his own because ‘they take you out for pizza’.
You can take that story a number of ways – sadness at the level of ambition among some of our teenagers today. Or recognition that perhaps they’re hungry and it’s the pizza they want. Or maybe it’s not about the pizza at all, it’s a request for someone to spend some time with them.
When we opened our first MakeLunch Kitchens in 2011, churches volunteered to provide meals during the school holidays for children from low income families. We thought it was about the food. But in Middlesbrough, the kids taught us something else. Even though they didn’t open until 12:30 for food, the children were outside the community centre from as early as 8am. The meals were part of the attraction; nutritious meals to feed the kids, one less financial pressure for the parents, but the children wanted more than that. They were bored, they wanted things to do, and they knew that the team from the local church were safe, friendly people who wanted to spend time with them.
Let’s not be fooled into thinking we can satisfy the challenge of these faceless statistics by delivering simple food parcels. Acts chapter two doesn’t say that the early Church delivered their surplus food to the needy as they walked past. It says they had everything in common, they shared with those who had need, and they ate together. Poverty won’t be eradicated by government schemes, charity campaigns or well-meaning gestures. Let’s take time to get to know the stories and people behind the statistics, build community and change things together.
