Scottish Catholic Observer

While donation fatigue is not something we can afford to suffer from, given the enormity of the crisis facing the people of East Africa, it is understandable that we can sometimes feel overwhelmed and increasingly helpless.

After all, we rationalise, if governments in the developed world are struggling to get their own houses in order—a point highlighted this week by the debt crisis in the US—what do we have spare to change the course of the lives of millions of Africans?

But that is where our Faith comes in. The poverty faced by many in the current crisis in the Horn of Africa is absolute while our own financial difficulties, although all too real, are indeed relative. And while Jesus said ‘for you always have the poor with you’ He did not give us permission to stand by and watch our brothers and sisters in the developing world struggle.

When a crisis of the magnitude of the drought and famine in the Horn of Africa comes to our attention, there is no shame in not donating more than we can afford to. It remains important, however, to give as much as we can.

The widow’s mite is as welcome, and needed, as aid from the international community—all the more so if the individual donation is accompanied by prayer.

Pope Benedict XVI reminds us this week that we cannot stand by as the people of Africa suffer, we must not be indifferent to their plight. This Catholic social teaching is echoed by the Scottish Catholic International Aid Fund. The charity offers great insight this week into why there are no quick-fix solutions to the multi-layered, complex problem of global hunger while reminding us that hope remains.