2021: A Year in Review
  • Skip to primary navigation
  • Skip to main content
  • Skip to footer

NC Council of Churches

Strength in Unity, Peace through Justice

  • Voices
  • About
    • Overview
    • Staff
    • Members
    • Covenant Partners
    • Issue Statements
    • Governing Board
    • Careers
  • Programs
    • NC Interfaith Power & Light
      • NCIPL Overview
      • Faith in Action NCIPL
      • NCIPL Articles
      • NCIPL Resources
      • Upcoming Events for NCIPL
      • Contact NCIPL
    • Partners in Health & Wholeness
      • PHW Staff
      • Mini-Grants
      • PHW Collaborative Pledge
      • The Overdose Crisis: The Faith Community Responds
      • Mental Health Advocacy
      • BIPOC Mental Health Grant
      • Growing Communities of Inclusion: A Faithful Response to HIV
      • Healthy Aging
      • Citizen Science
      • PHW Articles
      • FAQs
  • Priorities
    • Racial Justice
    • The Overdose Crisis: The Faith Community Responds
    • Gun Violence Prevention
    • Criminal Justice
    • Immigrant Rights
    • Public Education
    • Farmworkers
    • Legislative Advocacy
    • Christian Unity
    • Peace
  • Events
  • Resources
    • COVID-19 Resources
    • Publications & Reports
    • Raleigh Report
    • Lectionary
    • Sermons
  • Donate
  • Council Store
  • Show Search

Search NC Council of Churches

Hide Search

Durham’s Faith Summit on Child Poverty

George Reed, Former Executive Director · January 26, 2013 · Leave a Comment

The NC Council of Churches has been engaged with issues related to child poverty for decades. We were one of the founders of the Covenant with NC’s Children, a leading advocacy group on behalf of children, especially the most vulnerable ones. And we were instrumental in creation of the Caring Program for Children, enabling a partnership between Blue Cross Blue Shield of NC and many congregations which provided health insurance for the children of low-income working parents. When the federal government created the Children’s Health Insurance Program (CHIP) and NC set up its CHIP program as NC Health Choice, the Caring Program kids were the first to be enrolled.

Part of what we know from experience is that childhood poverty is intractable. Eradicating it takes lots of awareness, lots of work, lots of money, and the wholehearted support of a community. So I was excited to learn of the campaign to end childhood poverty in Durham, and the Council was honored to be a co-sponsor of last week’s Faith Summit on Child Poverty, held at Union Baptist Church in the Bull City.

The Summit was conceptualized by Mel Williams, coordinator for End Poverty Durham. Mel has recently retired as pastor of Watts Street Baptist Church, one of the Council’s eight member congregations. He is especially gifted for this task, with a strong sense of justice (“It’s simply unacceptable that 27% of Durham’s children live in poverty.”) and decades of ministry in Durham. As the Summit’s co-chair said, “If you don’t know Mel Williams, you must have just moved to Durham.”

The Council came to be a co-sponsor of the Faith Summit in Durham through our relationship with Jack and Kay Crum and the Jack Crum Conference on Prophetic Ministry. Jack was a Methodist minister who served on the Council’s staff at the height of the civil rights movement and brought his great passion for racial justice to the Council’s work to end segregation. He is also a recipient of the Council’s Distinguished Service Award. We have been proud co-sponsors of the Jack Crum Conference since the Methodist Federation for Social Action created it, and we were pleased to be able to carry over that co-sponsorship to Thursday’s Faith Summit, which was also co-sponsored by MFSA, the Jack Crum Conference, and the NC Conference of the United Methodist Church. Other co-sponsors included Duke Divinity School, Duke Chapel, and Duke Medicine, along with the Durham Public Schools and Durham County Social Services, Durham Congregations in Action, Durham CAN, and a host of other organizations.

The turnout for the Summit was remarkable, both in numbers (about 450) and in the breadth of groups represented. I am grateful for the many Durham congregations with ties to the NC Council which took part; several of them were held up as examples of work already being done to address causes of childhood poverty. One clever (and cleverly named) program is Blacknall Presbyterian’s Calendar Girls ministry. It partners twelve women “of a certain age” – one per month – with young mothers-to-be in the congregation. (The church is having about 25 births per year.) The Calendar Girls are assigned to the young women based on the month the babies are due. The ministry is, first, one of prayer, and also one of support and mentoring where that is appropriate. Other featured programs included English-language tutoring for preschoolers whose first language is not English (done collaboratively by three Episcopal congregations: St. Luke’s, St. Phillip’s, and El Buen Pastor), a playgroup for mothers and children at Immaculate Conception, and even the creation of a “diaper bank” to provide diapers to parents who can’t afford to buy them (being done in conjunction with Watts Street Baptist).

Keynote speakers included J. Herbert Nelson, with the Presbyterian Office of Public Witness in Washington, and William Barber, pastor of Greenleaf Christian Church, Goldsboro, and president of the state NAACP. Nelson insightfully emphasized the importance of schools, not only as places of education but also as community gathering centers. Barber issued a stirring call for those who care about children also to address legislative issues affecting people living in poverty.

The Summit was a powerful roll-out of an important initiative. What develops with this effort in Durham could become a model for congregations in other communities across the state.

–George Reed, Executive Director

Filed Under: Blog Tagged With: Children & Youth, Economic Justice, Prophetic Voice

About George Reed, Former Executive Director

As I had hoped, I have spent more time reading books in my retirement. One recent read was Jon Meacham’s splendid biography of Thomas Jefferson. I resonated with something TJ wrote in a letter shortly after leaving the White House in 1809: “I am here [at Monticello] enjoying the ineffable luxury of being owner of my own time.” I can’t say that I am complete owner of my time, but I am really enjoying not being controlled by clock and calendar. Well, except when there’s a deadline for Raleigh Report.

Reader Interactions

More Like This

Because of Jesus
The Perfect Gift for Mother’s Day
PHW Faith and Health Summit: Thank You

Leave a Reply Cancel reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

Anonymous comments or comments that target individuals will not be posted (please include your first and last name). All comments must be on topic and respectful. Comments will not be posted until they have been reviewed by a moderator. Comments do not reflect the positions of the NC Council of Churches.

Footer

Contact

NC Council of Churches
27 Horne St.
Raleigh, NC 27607
(919) 828-6501
info@ncchurches.org

Facebook

Partners in Health and Wholeness

Featured

Durham’s Faith Summit on Child Poverty

Latest Tweets

We must #ExpandMedicaid in North Carolina. Lives depend on it. twitter.com/healthac…

About 10 hours ago

We have supported reproductive choice since 1970. "To see that now, 50 years later, my 26-year-old daughter has fewer rights around reproductive choice than I had when I was 26? We are going backward and that is unconscionable,” said Jennifer Copeland. newsobserver.com/new…

About 2 days ago

#SCOTUS has overturned Roe v. Wade, making it crystal clear how much #CourtsMatter. Reproductive choice is a healthcare decision and women should make those decisions about their own bodies. We stand by those words today.

About 4 days ago

We affirmed in 1970 that reproductive choice is a healthcare decision and women should make those decisions “without embarrassment, excessive cost, and unwarranted delay.” We stand by those words today.

About 4 days ago

Grant opportunity for BIPOC faith communities in North Carolina to apply towards COVID-19 mental health efforts. Follow the link for more details! ncchurches.org/bipoc…

About 4 days ago

Follow @ncchurches

Latest Tweets

Greetings! Be sure to stop by our table at the Western NC Annual Conference of the United Methodist Church at Lake Junaluska this weekend! We hope to see you there! pic.twitter.com/30bk…

About 2 weeks ago

Hello twitter family! Be sure to stop by our table at the NC Conference of the United Methodist Church in Greenville, NC starting today! We hope to see you there! pic.twitter.com/l6X3…

About 2 weeks ago

Our mini grant cycle is now open!!! pic.twitter.com/eyRp…

About 3 weeks ago

RT @faithleadership Faith coalitions are addressing the opioid crisis by providing resources, connections and a destigmatizing vision. lght.ly/45iam80 Featuring: @okconfchurches | @ODMHSASINFO | @healthandfaith | @ncchurches | @DukeTMCI | @shannon_fleck

Last month

Join us for Sacred Conversations: Older Adults - Fraud & Scams on Friday, June 24th from 11 AM to 12 PM and learn to recognize common scams targeted towards older adults and how to protect yourself and those in your faith communities. ncchurches.ourpowerb…

About a month ago

Follow @healthandfaith

Latest Tweets

Faith Leaders Call on U.S. to Pay Fair Share for Climate Related Loss #USFairShare Click to listen - 2min w/Rev. Malcom @mtmalcom & Rev. @Susannah_Tuttle: shar.es/afbjPy @scennetwork1 @uscan @WEDO_worldwide @ActionAidUSA @AlabamaPJC @foe_us @UCSUSA @ClimateNexus

Last week

RT @mocleanair Climate change affects everything: investments, agriculture, health, factories, transportation, the electric grid. Fossil fuels cause climate change, and @LloydsofLondon needs to stop insuring fossil fuels. Climate change is wreaking havoc with the economy and our health. Enough! twitter.com/parents4…

Last week

RT @mocleanair Today @mocleanair, @GeorgiaIPL and @CleanAirMoms_GA delivered postcards to @SenatorWarnock asking for more funding for #EVschoolbuses! #EV schoolbuses are better for kids health and learning! #post4theplanet #cleanair4kids #CleanAir #ClimateAction pic.twitter.com/ztzI…

About 2 weeks ago

RT @mocleanair #EVschoolbuses: better for health, better for education, better for climate, and good for Georgia’s economy. A real win-win-win! #post4theplanet #CleanAir #HealthyAirIsHealthCare #ClimateAction #ClimateActionNow @GeorgiaIPL @NCIPL @uwomenfaith @AlabamaPJC @eldersclimate twitter.com/mocleana…

About 2 weeks ago

RT @alinterfaithpl You don’t want to miss this! Register RIGHT NOW with this link: us02web.zoom.us/meet… twitter.com/AlabamaP…

About 2 weeks ago

Follow @ncipl

Latest Tweets

Copyright © 2022 NC Council of Churches · All Rights Reserved · Website by Tomatillo Design · Hosted by WP Engine