Hunger-Based Lines Lengthen at the Faith-Based Soup Kitchens

[chlamor]

Hunger-Based Lines Lengthen at the Faith-Based Soup Kitchens
By FRANCIS X. CLINES

Published: April 8, 2005

The 1,130 soup kitchen guests, as they're respectfully called, began gathering outside the church doors an hour early, curling around the corner in a long line to await a free main meal - their safety-net highlight in another day of being down and out, part of the working poor, or surviving somewhere in between.

The repast, at 2,500 calories a serving, steamed aromatically: chicken à la king, rice, buttered spinach, peaches. A staff member in the nave of the building, the Church of the Holy Apostles, cued dozens of volunteer helpers: "Ladies and gentlemen, it's showtime. Thanks be to God." And from Ninth Avenue in Manhattan, the diners flowed in.

The sight of masses of Americans gratefully chowing down on free food is indeed a show, an amazingly discreet one that is classified not as outright hunger but as "food insecurity" by government specialists who are busy measuring the growing lines at soup kitchens and food pantries across the nation. There were 25.5 million supplicants regularly lining up in 2002; they were joined by 1.1 million more the next year. And even more arrive as unemployment and other government programs run out
http://www.nytimes.com/2005/04/08/opinion/08fri3.html?ex=1113624000&en=88ad4b7130add481&ei=5070

[Demit]

1. The coming thing: "...longer lines of people silently begging for food"

"The budget debate...compromise cuts are likely to lean toward the House, levying more than their fair budget share on the poor, even as President Bush and the G.O.P. leaders argue that still more upper-bracket tax cuts are somehow justifiable."


This, in America. And I wonder if, and when, I'll join the line.