Purrs 4 Peace- Week 18 - Prosperity not Poverty

To a man with an empty stomach food is God. ~Gandhi

Conditions of poverty have been increasingly worsening worldwide. Roughly 1.4 billion people in the worldwide according to the world bank. And this is a deadly epidemic with one third of all deaths attributed to starvation or other poverty related factors (Source: World Health Organization.) Each year, over 10 million children in developing countries die before the age of five. More than half of these deaths are attributed to malnutrition, which claims a child's life every 5 seconds. (United Nations Food Program).

“Poverty is the worst form of violence” - Gandhi

Extreme poverty is one of the greatest threats world peace. Where people struggle with lack, there is instability and the conditions for violence are ripe. Indeed the head of the U.N.’s World Food Programme warned in 2005 that a "lethal mix" of AIDS, recurring drought and failing governance is slowly destroying social structures and undermining peace and security. In much of Africa, the prevalence of chronic hunger is an accurate barometer for the level of social instability, he said. And the 2007 Global Monitoring Report of the World Bank noted that extreme poverty is increasing in “fragile states and territories,” i.e., places which are sources of war, terrorism and refugee crisis. This is easy to understand. We can each imagine that if we or our child was without food, medicine, water, shelter (the basic necessities of life) we would be more likely to resort to violence to meet those needs.

A heartbreaking video I've posted on my Facebook page focuses on orphans in the African country of Uganda. (Sorry, I couldn't find a link that would allow me to post it here.)

Humanity can do better than this.

"The price of greatness is responsibility." - Sir Winston Churchill

Week 18 of Purrs 4 Peace details are as follows:

• Week eighteen’s appointed time is Sunday, October 11, 2009.
• Participants should purr for three minutes commencing at 3 p.m. EDT (U.S.) which is 8:00 p.m. (20:00 hrs.) BST in the U.K.
• The cat’s human staff should assist their cats with the project by stroking and nuzzling the cat at the appointed time.
• Please post your cat name and the country you purr in at www.confuciuscat.blogspot.com as a COMMENT if you are participating in this historic project. (posting a link to your own website-if you have one-is encouraged.) Or let me know by message on twitter or facebook.
• Posting purrs on facebook ( Acolytes of Confucius Cat or as friend to Alley Mason) and twitter (@ConfuciusCat) is encouraged, since it inspires purring in others, but not required. On twitter please use #purrs4peace in your tweets.

This week we Purr for the welfare of children. We purr that the family of man lives in prosperity rather than prosperity. We purr to bring peace to the turmoil.