Poverty

“In our constant effort to define poverty, we have focused too narrowly on the symptoms of poverty and not enough on the actual cause….By not considering the roots of poverty, attempts to treat it will only provide temporary relief and likely negative effects in the future.” - IFWE

“There is no such thing as a self-made man nor is it possible to pull yourself up by your own bootstraps. Those are lies selling us on the destructive myth of personal autonomy; lies reminiscent of Serpent-Satan’s lies to our first parents and the subsequent lie of Cain who dared to mutter to God, ‘am I my brother’s keeper?’” - The Gospel & Poverty

“Reportedly about two-thirds of the $66 million collected in 2018 was spent making up for shortfalls in the Vatican budget.” - Fox

“Who Killed Civil Society?: The Rise of Big Government and the Decline of Bourgeois Norms argues that ‘formative’ efforts by private organizations to prevent social problems from appearing … have been supplanted by the ‘reformative’ efforts of government programs to remedy problems once they appear.

“If you think that volunteering for an organization that is raising funds to provide food and housing, among many other services, for the needy is an inherently praiseworthy act, you haven’t been following the woke left-wing activists cutting a swath through American culture.” - National Review

“Christians who oppose government intervention are often accused of harboring indifference, or antipathy, for the poor. But an abundance of evidence from two continents shows that welfare state policies actually reduce the wealth of the poor and raise prices, while benefiting the upper-middle class and well-connected corporations at taxpayers’ expense.” - Acton

“Sanders’ statement takes on greater significance given the context of his interviewer’s question: Bernie Sanders credited capitalism with lifting 1.2 billion people out of extreme poverty.” - Acton

“What Barr describes is a long-term shift from an understanding that a robust civil society, including religious institutions, could promote healthy norms such as sobriety and self-discipline to a belief that government could be relied upon for rehabilitation, the term emphasized by the Kennedy administration when it first authorized federal grants for social services.” - National Review

“To the extent that flourishing economies burst forth from fertile soil, it’s worth asking whether economic experiments like these can aid us in understanding how soil that is currently infertile might be enriched. But we should also ask whether some of our current efforts are poisonous rather than enriching.” - Acton

“… if we recognize the inherent value of the individual we would aim to restore that person to a condition of personal freedom and independence. Our goal would be to raise the poor to a place where they are personally responsible for their own lives.” - IFWE