c. 1997 Religion News Service

WASHINGTON _ George Mitchell, a construction worker who made $800 a month until a car accident left him with a broken pelvis and no job, was standing in an unusual soupline waiting for an all-too-common meal of chicken soup and a sandwich.

Mitchell was one of some 300 homeless people and their advocates at the soupline _ on the lawn of the U.S. Capitol _ Wednesday (March 5) to protest changes in food-stamps benefits now going into effect as a result of last year’s welfare reform legislation.”I’m injured right now,”Mitchell said.”If not for that (food stamps), I wouldn’t be able to survive.” Mitchell now qualifies for food stamps because of his injury, but he says the changes in the welfare rules may soon affect him.

The soup and sandwich _ standard fare in the homeless shelters that dot the nation’s capital _ was provided by a coalition of religious leaders and activists who argue the cutback in food-stamp eligibility is creating a crisis for low-income Americans who depend on the benefit.”There is a hurricane coming, and this is the first storm squall of the hurricane,”said the Rev. Jim Wallis, convener of Call to Renewal, a grassroots political action group founded as an alternative to the religious right.

While churches have a special responsibility to stand up for the poor, Wallis warned:”The king, the judge, the employer are all going to be judged by how they treat poor people.” Call to Renewal joined Bread for the World, a national Christian anti-hunger advocacy organization, Washington D.C.’s prestigious Shiloh Baptist Church, and Sojourners, an evangelical movement whose magazine is edited by Wallis, in sponsoring today’s lunch.

As the homeless ate, demonstrators sang and waved signs protesting the March 1 cuts under which food-stamp eligibility is denied to the”abled-bodied”unemployed between the ages of 18 and 50 who have no dependents.

The religious leaders said it is difficult to estimate the extent of the cutbacks because states can get waivers to exempt individual counties with high unemployment. They said the poor in Mississippi and Arkansas have already been substantially affected, and estimate 1 million Americans will be denied food stamps as a result of the new regulation.

A second wave of cutbacks will begin April 1 because of a 90-day grace period several states invoked in an effort to prepare for them.

Wallis said that although every state can theoretically apply for the exemption as a way of protecting its food-stamp benefits, it is uncertain how the government will respond.”There’s real resistance in the Congress, on the Republican side especially, to change anything about welfare,”he said.

Rep. Tony Hall, D-Ohio, a leading anti-hunger crusader in Congress, attended the lunch and said he has written to members urging them to”leave their office for a few hours every month”to volunteer at a local shelter or soup kitchen. He said that simple act will help them”listen to what’s really going on in America.” Hall also voiced support for a proposed legislative package devised by Bread for the World called”Tell Congress: Hunger Has A Cure.” The legislation, if enacted, would restore food stamps to unemployed adults unable to find work and would protect funding for the Women, Infants, and Children (WIC) nutrition program, a key anti-poverty program.

The Rev. David Beckmann, president of Bread for the World, said it is critical that Congress pass the”cure”proposal along with elements of the Clinton budget that restore many welfare benefits.

Beckmann acknowledged, however, there is strong congressional opposition to any tinkering with the welfare bill passed last year, especially with restoring benefits. But, he said, religious groups and charities do not have the resources to solve the hunger problem alone.”Unless Congress passes this legislation, there can be no cure for hunger in our land,”Beckmann said.

Wallis agreed.”Churches can’t just clean up the mess from bad social policy,”he said of the bipartisan calls from Clinton and Republican leaders for the religious community to do more to end poverty.

Nevertheless, Beckmann said he is optimistic about the future of the welfare debate _ and funding anti-poverty efforts _ in America.”We could win back a lot this year,”he said.

MJP END LEBOWITZ