NIGER

I sit here writing this with a satiated stomach but a very heavy heart. I sit here with many choices of dishes to choose from in a land of wastefulness while my brothers and sisters waste away. I have but to walk to my kitchen for something to eat or if that does not appeal to my liking I can just walk outside and find so many different choices of food all at my finger tips while my brothers and sister walks miles for food and find none. I do not know how many of you have heard of Niger. It’s a pretty large country in the heart of the Sahara in West Africa. There on a day like this where we had three meals here some people in Niger had none. In fact they are dieing because they have not eaten in days or weeks. My friend Frank discussed numbers about AIDS last week but if I may have your ears for but a minute here are some more numbers for all of us to count up. There are more than 80,000 people that are starving and over a million that are at risk of starving while I write this and before I have reached my conclusion many of them will have STARVE TO DEATH.
I watched ABC news horrified that something this serious was going on and it was not getting the type of international attention it needed. While we shopped in our supermarkets, farmers markets, delis and bodagers mothers tries to nourish their young ones with the sagging empty breast of their own malnourished bodies all in a desperate effort to keep their babies alive. What anguish it must be to watch your seed beg for food and you have none to give than a salty dry nipple, to cry for something to eat and all you can do is cry along with them because you have nothing to put in their mouth. While here we waste, we throw away perfectly good food; we complain that we do not eat this or that while these people have neither this nor that to eat. I feel a strong sense of shame at my own gluttonous nature and my wasteful habits so today I beg these people forgiveness

I watched a man talk about his baby son whom he had to bury a week prior and I see the pain in his eyes, the pain for not being able to save someone he loves so dearly. His family walked for miles looking for food. The elderly ones can not walk anymore they just lay weak, waiting on food or death which ever one comes first. The man was a cattleman now all his family has to eat is the rotten fly infested flesh of the dead animals while we choose which cut of meat at the grocery store we want. People are walking for miles in hope of finding something to eat while we walks for minutes and find many. Will you hear me brothers and sisters will you not turn a deaf ear or shut your eyes to what is going on? Today my heart is reflective on them and my spirit soars to meet them in there time of need. I leave you food for thought about these strangers because all they have are thoughts of food.