One of the pleasures of life is to enjoy a good meal. Our celebrations often will be highlighted by a special shared meal. Yet in many places in the world this pleasure is replaced with hunger and malnutrition. Here are some hunger facts:
- Half of all child deaths are linked to malnutrition.
- Every year, around 9 million people die from hunger and hunger-related diseases—more than the combined deaths from AIDS, malaria, and tuberculosis. This means that approximately 24,657 people die from hunger every day.
- According to the 2024 Global Hunger Index, hunger levels in 36 countries are ranked at Serious and 6 countries are ranked alarming.
- The number of people experiencing hunger has gone up by approximately 152 million in the last five years.
The Integrated Food Phase Classification (IPC) estimates that 1.35 million people around the world are in Crisis. Households either have food consumption gaps that are reflected by high or above-usual acute malnutrition; or are marginally able to meet minimum food needs but only by depleting essential livelihood assets or through crisis-coping strategies.
The goal of reaching Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) Zero Hunger by 2030 appears to be impossible. Moreover, if progress remains at the pace we’ve observed in the last decade, the world will not reach even low hunger levels until 2160 — more than 130 years from now.
But we can with the grace of God do something about this. Many charity organizations offer the ability to make small monthly donations. If the majority of people signed up for these monthly donations this problem could be solvable. For just pocket change a day you can make a difference. With enough people doing this it is inconcievable what could be accomplished.
We can learn a lot from nature. In the book of Job it is written
But now ask the beasts to teach you,
the birds of the air to tell you;
Or speak to the earth to instruct you,
and the fish of the sea to inform you.
Which of all these does not know
that the hand of God has done this?
In his hand is the soul of every living thing,
and the life breath of all mortal flesh. – Job 12:7-10
Let’s look at the honeybee. The honeybee has been called “the most important insect in the world”. Honeybees are clearly among the most important of pollinators, and their efforts result in an estimated 80 percent of all pollination in the United States. Pollination by Honeybees in the U.S. favorably affects some $20 billion dollars in crops per year, including fruits, vegetables, and many nuts.
They are truly fascinating creatures that speak of the glory and majesty of God. From the fact that they can communicate the location of a food source to other bees by doing a dance. They can detect dangerous temperature variations in the hive and perform actions to adjust the temperature. Honeybees can perceive movements that are separated by 1/300th of a second. Humans can only sense movements separated by 1/50th of a second. Were a bee to enter a cinema, it would be able to differentiate each individual movie frame being projected. These and many other fascinating facts about honeybees make me in awe of the majesty of God’s creations. However the reason I diverge is to relate some aspects of a honeybee’s existence to our own and how it relates to contributing some regular amount no matter the size to help world hunger.
During honey production periods, spring and summer, a worker bee’s life span is about 6 weeks. The average honey bee will actually make only one twelfth of a teaspoon of honey in its lifetime…
About the size of your pinky fingernail. Yet honeybees do not question the use or value in their small contribution and thus collectively achieve great feats.
Honeybees are “team players” working for the good of the hive and yet communicating with fellow bees and helping out as needed. A worker bee in need of grooming will dance to signal her need for assistance until a fellow worker comes to her aid.
A single bee is alive, that is true, but bees are not like you and I. Though a single bee can fly and move, gather and perform many tasks, no bee lives for itself. It is not quite a cell either. It is a member of a society that forms the larger organism, the colony. … Honey bees exist in colonies, and it is the colony that lives or dies. The colony grows strong and the colony weakens. They will live together in the warm summer. If they starve in the winter, they do so as one. The story of each bee is really the story of all. Together they form the story of the colony, and it is the voice of the colony we choose to listen to. – Excerpt from voiceofthehive.com
The fascinating honeybee has much to teach us in both the wonder of creation and living as a society or better yet as the Body of Christ.
‘For I was hungry and you gave me food, I was thirsty and you gave me drink, a stranger and you welcomed me, naked and you clothed me, ill and you cared for me, in prison and you visited me.’ -Mt 25:35-36
Here is a link to the Catholic Relief Services Monthly Giving Page. For just pocket change a day you can make a difference. We are truly blessed that these charities exist and give us the opportunity to join each other in helping our brothers and sisters. Of course there are other international charities that you could also choose.
Catholic Relief Services (CRS) Monthly Donation Page
Please fill out our poll to track signups now or come back after you sign up for any one of the charity monthly donations. You can only vote once so if you want to think about it come back later and vote. Thank You!
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